Lord himself, and lastly by his disciples in his lifetime, is never αυτού, 7. Further, I must take notice, that though announcing publicly the reign of the Messiah comes always under the denomination кηovσσεv, no moral instructions, or doctrinal explanations, given either by our Lord or by his apostles, are ever, either in the Gospels or in the Acts so denominated. Thus, that most instructive discourse of our Lord, (Matt. v. 2, vii. 28, 29,) the longest that is recorded in the Gospel, commonly named his sermon on the mount, is called teaching by the evangelist, both in introducing it, and after the conclusion: "Opening his mouth," EdidaσKEV AVTOVÇ, "he taught them, saying:" and "when Jesus had εδίδασκεν αυτούς, ended these sayings, the people were astonished," etti τη didaɣn avrov, "at his doctrine," his manner of teaching. It is added, ην γαρ διδάσκων αυτους, “ for he taught them as one having authority, and not as the Scribes." He is said to have been employed in teaching, (Matt. xiii. 54, Mark vi. 2, Luke iv. 15, 22,) when the wisdom which shone forth in his discourses excited the astonishment of all who heard him. In like manner, the instructions he gave by parables are called teaching the people, not preaching to them, Mark iv. 1, 2; and those given in private to his apostles are in the same way styled teaching, (Mark viii. 31,) never preaching. And if teaching and preaching be found sometimes coupled together, the reason appears to be, because their teaching, in the beginning of this new dispensation, must have been frequently introduced by announcing the Messiah, which alone was preaching. The explanations, admonitions, arguments, and motives that followed came under the denomination of teaching. Nor does any thing else spoken by our Lord, and his disciples in his lifetime, appear to have been called preaching but this single sentence, Μετανοείτε ήγγικε γαρ ἡ βασιλεια των ουρανων. In the Acts of the Apostles, the difference of meaning in the two words is carefully observed: The former is always a general and open declaration of the Messiah's reign, called emphatically the good news, or gospel; or, which amounts to the same, the announcing of the great foundation of our hope, the Messiah's resurrection: the latter comprehends every kind of instruction, public or private, that is necessary for illustrating the nature and laws of his kingdom, for confuting gainsayers, persuading the hearers, for confirming and comforting believers. The proper subject of each is fitly expressed in the conclusion of this book, (ch. xxviii. 31,) where, speaking of Paul then confined at Rome in a hired house, the author tells us that he received all who came to him, κηρύσσων την βασιλειαν του Θεού, και διδασκων τα περι του Κυρίου Ιησου Χριστού; announcing to them the reign of God, 1 and instructing them in every thing that related to the Lord Jesus Christ. 8. Let it also be observed, that, in all the quotations in the Gospels from the ancient Prophets, neither the word кnpuσow, nor any of its conjugates, is applied to any of them beside Jonah. What is quoted from the rest is said to have been spoken, or foretold, or prophesied, but never preached. Jonah's prophecy to the Ninevites, on the contrary, is but twice quoted; and it is in both places called knpvyμa, rendered preaching, properly cry or proclamation. The same name it has in the book itself in the Septuagint, and with great propriety, according to the explanation above given of the word, for it was a real proclamation which God required him to make through the streets of Nineveh. Thus he is charged, "Go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach to it the preaching that I bid thee," Jonah iii. 2. The very words are prescribed. It may be observed here, by the way, that, both in the Hebrew and in the Greek, it is the same word which is here rendered preach, and in verse 5th proclaim, when used in reference to a fast appointed by the king of Nineveh for averting the divine anger, and notified to the people by proclamation. In obedience to the command of God, Jonah began to enter into the city a day's journey, and to cry, as he had been bidden. Now, what was the preaching which God put into his mouth? It was neither more nor less than this, "Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown." This warning the prophet, at proper distances, repeated as he advanced. In one passage of the Apocalypse, (ch. v. 2,) the word occurs so manifestly in the same sense, that it is one of the two places (for there are no more) in the New Testament wherein our translators have rendered it proclaim: "I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, Who is worthy to open the book, and to loose the seals thereof?" That is, whosoever is worthy to open the book and to loose its seals, may come and do it. This is the whole of the angel's knovyua, preaching or proclamation. In the Acts and Epistles we find the verb кnpvoow followed by Χριστον, τον Ιησουν, or something equivalent. This is entirely proper. To proclaim the advent of the Messiah, and that Jesus is the person, was the first step of their important charge, and necessarily preceded their teaching and explaining his doctrine, or inculcating his precepts. 9. So much for the primitive and most common meaning of the word knpuσow in the New Testament. But, as few words in any language remain perfectly univocal, I own there are some instances in which the term is employed in this part of Scripture with greater latitude. The first and most natural extension of the word is, when it is used by hyperbole for publishing, any how divulging, making a thing to be universally talked of. The first instance of this is where we are told of the leper that was cleansed by our Lord, and charged not to divulge the manner of his cure. "But he went out," says the historian, Mark i. 45, "and began to publish it much," kηpvoσεv Tolλa: So our translators, very properly, render the word. In some other places we find it in the same sense, and in the same way rendered; Matt. x. 27, Luke xii. 3. All the instances are similar, in that they relate to miraculous cures performed by our Lord, which some of those who received, notwithstanding the prohibition given them, were every-where assiduous to divulge. Not that they did literally proclaim them by crying aloud in the public places, but that they made the matter as well known as though this method had been taken. Such hyperbolical idioms are to be found in all languages. How common is it to say of profligates, that they proclaim their infamy to all the world? because their lives make it as notorious as it could be made by proclamation. It is in the same sense of publishing, and by the same figure, that proclaiming from the house-tops, (Matt. x. 27, Luke xii. 3,) is opposed to whispering in the ear. Nor is it certain, that the words knpurow and knovyμa have any other meaning than those above specified in the Gospels and Acts. κηρυγμα 10. The only remaining sense of the words which I find in the New Testament, and which answers to the import of the English words preach and preaching, seems to be peculiar to the writings of Paul. "Thou," says he, "who teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? Thou that preachest," o κnpvσowv, “a man should not steal, dost thou steal?" Rom. ii. 21. The two clauses illustrate each other, and show that knpvoow in the latter has nearly the same import with Sidaoko in the former: for, though we may speak properly of proclaiming laws, and "thou shalt not steal" is doubtless of the number, it is only of laws newly enacted, or at least not before promulgated, that we use that expression. The law here spoken of was sufficiently known and acknowledged every-where; but though there was no occasion for proclaiming it, it might be very necessary to inculcate and explain it. Now this is properly expressed by the word preach. There are some other places in his Epistles, wherein it cannot be doubted that the word is used in this large application for teaching publicly. Thus we ought to understand his admonition to Timothy, (2 Ep. iv. 2,) înрužov тov λoyov, "preach the word." Knpvyua is also used by him, with the same latitude, for all public teaching; as when he says, "It pleased God, by the foolishness of preaching,” δια της μωρίας του κηρυγματος, "to save them that believe," 1 Cor. i. 21. Again, "My speech and my preaching," το κήρυγμα μου, was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in the demonstration of the spirit and of power," chap. ii. 4: there can be no question but the term is used for teaching in general, since кnpvyμa, in the confined sense it bears in the Gospels, could hardly admit variety or choice in the expression, nor consequently aught of the enticing words of man's wisdom. There is, besides, one place, (1 Pet. iii. 19,) where the apostle 66 Peter uses the word кnovoσev in speaking of our Lord's preaching to the spirits in prison: but the passage is so obscure, that no argument can safely be founded on it. 11. Nothing, however, can be clearer to the attentive and critical reader of the original, than that the aforesaid words are not used with the same latitude in the historical books. In the Acts, in particular, several discourses are recorded, those especially of Peter and Paul, but to none of them are the terms κηρύσσω and κηρυγμα ever applied. I think it the more necessary to make this remark, because the English word preach is in the common version frequently applied to them. Now this tends to confound the distinction so well preserved in the history, and to render all our ideas on this head extremely indeterminate. Some will perhaps be surprised to be informed, that there are, in the Acts alone, no fewer than six Greek words (not synonymous either) which are (some of them oftener, some of them seldomer) translated by the verb preach. The words are κηρύσσω, ευαγγελιζομαι, καταγγελλω, λαλεω, διαλεγομαι, and παρρησιαζομαι ; which last is rendered "I preach boldly." I admit that it is impossible, in translating out of one language into another, to find a distinction of words in one exactly correspondent to what obtains in the other, and so to preserve uniformity, in rendering every different word by a different word, and the same word by the same word. This is what neither propriety nor perspicuity will admit. The rule, however, to translate uniformly, when it can be done in a consistency both with propriety and perspicuity, is a good rule, and one of the simplest and surest methods I know, of making us enter into the conceptions of the sacred writers, and adopt their very turn of thinking. 66 12. I shall here take notice only of two passages in the common translation, which, to a reader unacquainted with the original, may appear to contradict my remark in regard to the distinction so carefully observed by the historian. "When the Jews," says he, Acts xiii. 42, were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles besought that these words might be preached to them,” λαληθηναι αὑτοις τα ῥηματα ταυτα, “the next sabbath;” literally and simply, that these words might be spoken to them. The words here meant are those contained in the twenty-six preceding verses. Our translators, I suppose, have been the more inclinable to call it preaching, because spoken in a synagogue by permission of the rulers. In another place, (chap. xx. 7,) "when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them," διελέγετο αυτοίς. Soon after, (ver. 9,) "as Paul was long preaching,” διαλεγομενου επι πλειον. Διαλεγομαι is properly dissero, disputo. It occurs frequently in the Acts, but, except in this passage, is always rendered to reason or to dispute. I own that neither of these words suits the context here, as it appears that all present were disciples. The word, however, implies not only to dispute, but to discourse on any subject. But what I take the freedom to censure in our translators, is not their rendering diadeyouau in this place preach, which, considered by itself, might be justified, but it is their confounding it with so many words not synonymous, particularly with кnovσσ, whose meaning in this book, as well as in the Gospels, is totally different. 13. Now, in regard to the manner wherein this word has been translated, with which I shall finish what relates peculiarly to it, we may observe, that prædicare, used in the Vulgate, and in all the Latin versions, corresponds entirely to the Greek word in its primitive meaning, and signifies to give public notice by proclamation. In this sense it had been used by the Latin classics, long before the translation of the Bible into their tongue. But prædicare having been employed uniformly in rendering κηρύσσειν, not only in the history but in the Epistles, has derived, from the latter use, a signification different and much more limited than it has in profane authors. Now this additional or acquired signification, is that which has principally obtained amongst ecclesiastics; and hence has arisen the sole meaning, in modern languages, ascribed to the word whereby they commonly render the Greek knрvσow. The Latin word is manifestly that from which the Italian predicare, the French precher, and the English to preach, are derived. Yet these three words correspond to the Latin only in the last mentioned and ecclesiastical sense, not in the primitive and classical, which is also the scriptural sense in the Gospels and Acts. Thus the learned Academicians della Crusca, in their Vocabulary, interpret the Italian predicare, not by the Latin prædicare, its etymon, but by concionari, concionem habere; terms certainly much nearer than the other to the import of the word used in the other two languages mentioned, though by no means adapted to express the sense of κnovσov in the historical books. This is another evidence of what was observed in a former Dissertation, that a mistake, occasioned by supposing the word in the original exactly correspondent to the term in the common version by which it is usually rendered, is often confirmed, instead of being corrected, by recurring to translations into other modern tongues, inasmuch as from the same, or similar causes, the like deviation from the original import has been produced in these languages as in our own. 14. I should now examine critically the import of the word ευαγγελίζω, often rendered in the same way with κηρύσσω. But what might have been offered on this subject I have in a great measure anticipated in the explanation I gave of the name ευαγγελιον. It would have been impossible to consider the noun and the verb separately, without either repeating the same observations and criticisms on each, or, by dividing things so closely connected, injuring the illustration of both. I shall therefore here, after referring the reader to that Dissertation, which is pretty full, point out, in the briefest manner, the chief distinctions in mean Diss. II. Part iii. sect. 6. + Diss. V. Part ii, |