uses can be combined, is purely fanciful and arbitrary. It was not too fanciful and arbitrary, however, for some of the Christian Fathers, who argue Christ's eternal existence from the use of › or í › (or qui est) in such passages as John i. 18; iii. 13 (t. r.); vi. 46; Rom. ix. 5; Heb. i. 3. So Athanasius, as above; Epiphanius, Ancorat. c. 5; Gregory of Nyssa, Adv. Eunom. lib. x., Opp. (1638) ii. 680–82; Pseudo-Basil, Adv. Eunom. iv. 2, Opp. i. 282 (399); Chrysostom, Opp. 1. 476 f., viii. 87, ed. Montf.; Hilary, De Trin. xii. 24. So Proclus of Constantinople, Ep. ad Armen. de Fide c. 14, quoting Rom. ix. 5, says: εἶπεν αὐτὸν ὄντα, ἵνα ἄναρχον βροντήση; "he spoke of him as being, that he might declare in thunder his existence without beginning. (Migne, Patrol. Gr. Ixv. 8729.)

5.

The construction, "from whom is the Messiah as to the flesh, he who is over all: God be blessed for ever!", has found favor with some eminent scholars (see below under IV.), and deserves consideration. If adopted, I think we should understand ó öv ènì návrov not as meaning "he who is superior to all the patriarchs" (Justi and others), which is tame, and would hardly be expressed in this way; nor "he who is over all things," which, without qualification, seems too absolute for Paul; but rather, "who is Lord of all (Jews and Gentiles alike), comp. Acts x. 36; Rom. x. 12; xi. 32; who, though he sprang from the Jews, is yet, as the Messiah, the ruler of a kingdom which embraces all men. (See Wetstein's note, near the end.) The natural contrast suggested by the mention of Christ's relation to the Jews zarà ápza, may justify us in assuming this reference of avto, which also accords with the central thought of the Epistle. The doxology, however, seems exceedingly abrupt and curt; and we should expect & Ozó instead of 0 as the subject of the sentence, though in a few cases the word stands in the nominative without the article. Grimm compares 05 μápros, 1 Thess. ii. 5, with páprus ó 05, Rom. i. 9; also 2 Cor. v. 19; Gal. ii. 6; vi. 7; Luke xx. 38 (?). We should also rather expect borró to stand first in the doxology; but the position of words in Greek is so largely subjective, depending on the feeling of the writer, that we cannot urge this objection very strongly. The thought, so frequent in Paul, of God as the source, in contrast with, or rather in distinction from, Christ as the medium of the Messianic blessings, may have given the word cós prominence. (See above, p. 108 f., in regard to the position of the subject in contrasts.) Gess accordingly dismisses the objection founded on the position of solorós, remarking, “die Voranstellung von sós hätte durch den Gegensatz gegen Christum ein zureichendes Motiv" (ubi

supra, p. 206). Still, on the whole, construction No. 7 seems to me much easier and more natural.

6. The construction numbered 6 was, I believe, first proposed by Professor Andrews Norton, in his review of Prof. Stuart's Letters to Dr. Channing. This was published in the Christian Disciple (Boston) for 1819, new series, vol. i. p. 370 ff.; on Rom. ix. 5 see p. 418 ff. The passage is discussed more fully in his Statement of Reasons, &c. Cambridge and Boston, 1833, p. 147 ff.; new ed. (ster. 1856), p. 203 ff. 470 ff., in which some notes were added by the writer of the present essay. There, after giving as the literal rendering, "He who was over all was God, blessed for ever," Mr. Norton remarks: "He who was over all,' that is, over all which has just been mentioned by the Apostle." "Among the privileges and distinctions of the Jews, it could not be forgotten by the Apostle, that God had presided over all their concerns in a particular manner.”

There is no grammatical objection to this construction of the passage. (See above, p. 99, 1st paragr.) Mr. Norton, in translating ver. 4 and 5, uses the past tense in supplying the ellipsis of the substantive verb. This is done by other translators, e. g. Conybeare and Howson. It may be questioned, however, whether this is fully Canon Kennedy uses the present tense, but seems to take the same general view of the bearing of the passage as Mr. Norton. See his Occasional Sermons, pp. 64, 65, and Ely Lectures, pp. 88, 89.

justified here.

As regards this view of the passage, I will only say here, that the thought presented in Mr. Norton's translation did not need to be expressed, as it is fully implied in the nature of the privileges and distinctions enumerated. (See above, p. 94.) Taking Professor Kennedy's rendering, I doubt whether the Apostle would have used this language in respect to the relation existing between God and the Jewish people at the time when he was writing. The Jews gloried in God as their God in a special sense (Rom. ii. 17); but in Paul's view it was Christians, now, who rightfully gloried in God through our Lord Jesus Christ (Rom. v. 11; comp. iii. 29).

7. I add a single remark, which might more properly have been made before. I have rendered & yptozó here not "Christ," as a mere proper name, but "the Messiah." Not only the use of the article, but the context, seems to me to require this. Westcott and Hort observe in regard to the word yptozós: "We doubt whether the appellative force, with its various associations and implications, is ever entirely lost in the New Testament, and are convinced that the number of passages is small in which Messiahship, of course in the

enlarged apostolic sense, is not the principal intention of the word." (The N. T. in Greek, vol. ii., Introd., p. 317.)

IV. WE will now take notice of some points connected with the history of the interpretation of Rom. ix. 5. The fullest account of this is perhaps that given by Schultz in the article already repeatedly referred to; but he is neither very thorough nor very accurate.

The application of the passage by the Christian Fathers will naturally come first under consideration.

The fact that the great majority of the Fathers whose writings have come down to us understood the last part of the verse to relate to Christ has been regarded by many as a very weighty argument in favor of that construction. I have before had occasion to consider the value of this argument in connection with another. passage. (See above, p. 8.) The remarks there made apply equally to the present case. The fact that the Fathers in quoting a passage grammatically ambiguous have given it a construction which suited their theology, does not help us much in determining the true construction. We must remember also the looser use of the term sós which prevailed in the latter part of the second century and later. (See above, p. 120 f.) Those in the second and third centuries who held strongly the doctrine of the inferiority of the Son, and the Arians in the fourth, like the Socinians at a later period, did not hesitate to apply the name "God" to Christ, and would find little difficulty in a construction of the passage which involved this. They might hesitate about the expression "God over all;" but, as we have seen, though natural, it is not necessary to connect the ἐπὶ πάντων with θεός.

The specimen of patristic exegesis in the construction given to 2 Cor. iv. 4, where so many of the Fathers make the genitive to aiàvoz depend not on 0ɛós, but ròv àñíarwy (see above, p. 8), will be sufficient for most persons who wish to form an estimate of their authority in a case like the present. I will only ask further, taking the first examples that occur to me, how much weight is to be attributed to the judgment of Origen, Cyril of Jerusalem, Chrysostom, Theodoret, Isidore of Pelusium, Gennadius, Theodorus Monachus, Joannes Damascenus (?), Photius, Ecumenius (or what passes under his name), and Theophylact, when, in their zeal for the freedom of the will, they explain πρόθεσις in Rom. viii. 28 (τοῖς κατὰ πρόθεσιν κλητοῖς), not as denoting the Divine purpose, but the purpose or choice of the subjects of the call? (Cyril of Alexandria gives the words both meanings at the same time.) What is the value of the opinion of Chrysostom, Joannes Damascenus, Ecumenius, and Theophylact

that διὰ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ in Rom. xvi. 27 is to be construed with στη pizat in ver. 25? Shall we accept the exegesis of Chrysostom and Theophylact when they tell us that in the injunction of Christ in Matt. v. 39 not to resist v novo, tự nоvype means the devil?

Dean Burgon, in his article on "New Testament Revision" in the Quarterly Review for January, 1882, has given perhaps the fullest enumeration yet presented of Christian writers who have referred the ú v z. 7. λ. in Rom. ix. 5 to Christ. He counts up "55 illustrious names," 40 of Greek writers from Irenæus in the latter part of the second century to John of Damascus in the eighth, and 15 of Latin writers, from Tertullian at the beginning of the third century to Facundus in the sixth, "who all see in Rom. ix. 5 a glorious assertion of the eternal Godhead of CHRIST." An examination of his list will show that it needs some sifting. Most of the Latin writers whom he mentions, as Augustine, knew little or nothing of Greek, and their authority cannot be very weighty in determining the construction of an ambiguous Greek sentence. Of his illustrious names 6 are unfortunately unknown, being writers, "of whom," as Mr. Burgon mildly puts it, "3 have been mistaken for Athanasius, and 3 for Chrysostom." Another is the illustrious forger of the Answers to Ten Questions of Paul of Samosata, fathered upon Dionysius of Alexandria, "certainly spurious," according to Cardinal Newman and the best scholars generally, and marked as pseudonymous by Mr. Burgon himself. Cæsarius should also have been cited as Pseudo-Cæsarius. Among the other illustrious names we find "6 of the Bishops at the Council of Antioch, A. D. 269." On looking at the names as they appear in Routh's Rell. Sacrae, ed. alt. (1846), iii. 289, I regret my inability to recall the deeds or the occasion that made them "illustrious," unless it is the fact that, as members of that Council, about half a century before the Council of Nicæa, they condemned the use of the term poobato, "consubstantial," which was established by the latter as the test and watchword of orthodoxy.

Next to the six Bishops and "ps. -Dionysius Alex." in Mr. Burgon's list of the illustrious Fathers "who see in Rom. ix. 5 a glorious assertion of the eternal Godhead of Christ," we find "Constt. App.," that is, the Apostolical Constitutions, with a reference to "vi. c. 26." He does not quote the passage. It reads as follows:-"Some of the heretics imagine the Christ [so Lagarde; or "the Lord," Cotelier and Ueltzen] to be a mere man ; but others of them suppose that Jesus himself is the God over all, glorifying him as his own Father, supposing him to be Son and Paraclete; than which docrines what can be more abominable?" Compare Const.

.

Apost. iii. 17:-"The Father is the God over all, ó ènì mávtwv Ocús; Christ is the only-begotten God, the beloved Son, the Lord of glory.” See also vi. 18.

One is surprised, after this, to find that Mr. Burgon did not cite for the same purpose Pseudo-Ignatius ad Tars. cc. 2, 5, and ad Philip. c. 7, where it is denied emphatically that Christ is ὁ ἐπὶ πάντων θεός; and also Origen, Cont. Cels. viii. 14, who says:-"Grant that there are some among the multitude of believers, with their differences of opinion, who rashly suppose that the Saviour is the Most High God over all; yet certainly we do not, for we believe him when he said, The Father who sent me is greater than I." The very strong language which Origen uses in many other places respecting the inferiority of the Son, renders it unlikely that he applied the last part of this verse to Christ. See, e. g. Cont. Cels. viii. 15; De Princip. i. 3. § 5; In Ioan. tom. ii. cc. 2, 3, 6; vi. 23; xiii. 25. Rufinus's Latin version of Origen's Comm. on Romans, which is the only authority for ascribing to Origen the common interpretation of this passage, is no authority at all. He, according to his own account of his work, had so transformed it by omissions, additions, and alterations, that his friends thought he ought to claim it as his own.* It was in accordance with his professed principles to omit or alter in the works which he translated whatever he regarded as dangerous, particularly whatever did not conform to his standard of orthodoxy. His falsification of other writings of Origen is notorious. Westcott and Hort remark that in the Rufino-Origenian commentary on this verse "there is not a trace of Origenian language, and this is one of the places in which Rufinus would not fail to indulge his habit of altering an interpretation which he disapproved on doctrinal grounds." They also remark, "it is difficult to impute Origen's silence to accident in the many places in which quotation would have been natural had he followed the common interpretation."

Origen should therefore be henceforth excluded from the list of Fathers cited in support of the common punctuation. It is even "probable," as Westcott and Hort maintain, though "not certain," that he and Eusebius gave the passage a different construction.

*See his Peroratio at the end of the Epistle; Origenis Opp. iv. 688 f., ed. Delarue. Matthaei remarks: " Rufini interpretatio, quæ parum fidei habet, in epistola ad Romanos, quod quilibet ipse intelligit, non tam pro Origenis opere, quam pro compendio Rufini haberi debet, quod haud dubie alia omisit, alia, sicut in ceteris libris, invito Origene admisit."-Pauli Epp. ad Thess., etc. (Rigae, 1785), Praefatio, sig. b2. See more fully to the same purpose Redepenning's Origenes, ii. 189 ff., who speaks of his "Ausscheidung ganzer Stücke," and "Umgestaltung des Heterodoxen in der Trinitätslehre."