several interests and perswasions such different understandings and tempers such distinct abilities and weaknesses that it is no wonder there is so great variety of readings both in the Old and New Testament In the old Testament the Jews pretend that the Christians have corrupted many places on purpose to make symphony between both the Testaments On the other side the Christians have had so much reason to suspect the Jews That when Aquilla had translated the Bible in their Schools and had been taught by them they rejected the Edition many of them and some of them called it Heresie to follow it And Justin Martyr justified to Tryphon That the Jews had defalk'd many sayings from the Books of the Old Prophets and amongst the rest he instances that of the Psalm Dicite in Nationibus quia Dominus Regnavit à ligno Englished Tell it or say i.e. amongst the Nations the Lord hath raigned for or by the wood or tree The last words they have cut off and prevailed so far in it that to this day none of our Bibles have it but if they ought not to have it then Justin Martyr's Bible had more in it then it should have for there it was so that a fault there was eitheir under or over But however there are infinite readings of the New Testament for in that I will instance some whole verses in one that are not in another and there was in some Copies of Saint Marks Gospel in the last chapter a whole verse a chapter it was anciently called that is not found in our Bibles as St. Hierom ad Hedibiam Q. 3. notes the words he repeats Lib. 2. Contra Polygamos Et illi satis faciebant dicentes saeculum istu iniquitatis incredulitatis substantia est quae non sivit per immundos spiritus veram Dei apprehendi vertutem idcirto jam nunc revela justitiam tuam Englished And they did satisfie saying that age is the substance of iniquity and incredulity which by reason of unclean spirits doth not suffer the virtue power or efficacie of God to be apprehended therefore now reveal thy righteousness These words are thought by some to savour of Manichaism and for ought I can find were therefore rejected out of many Greek Copies and at last out of the Latine c. The Parable of the woman taken in Adultery which is now in Joh. 8. Eusebius sayes It was not in any Gospel but the Gospel secundum Hebraeos and St. Hierome makes it doubtful and so doth St. Chrysostome and Euthimius the first not vouchsafing to explicate it in Homolies upon St. John the other affirming it not to be found in the exacter Copies c. But the instances in this kinde are too many as appears in the variety of readings in several Copies proceeding from the negligence or ignorance of the Translators or the malicious * Graci corruperunt novum Testamentum ut Testantur Tertul. l. 5. ado Marcion Euseb L. 5. Hist C. ult Irenae l. 1. c. 29. Allu Haeres Bafil L. 2. Contr. Eunomium endeavour of Hereticks or the inserting Marginal Notes into the Text or the neerness of several words And in pag. 82. he saith That since there are in Scripture many mysteries and matters of question upon which there is a vail since there are so many Copies with infinite variety of readings since a various interpunction a Parenthesis a Letter an Accent may much alter the sense since some places have divers litteral senses many have spiritual mystical and allegorical meanings since there are so many trops metononies ironies hyperbolies properties and improperties of Languages whose understanding depends upon such circumstances that it is almost impossible to know its proper interpretation now that the proper knowledge of such circumstances and particular stories is irrecoverably lost since there are some mysteries which at the best advantage of expression are not easily to be apprehended and whose explication by reason of our imperfections must needs be dark sometimes weak sometimes untelligable And lastly Since those ordinary means of expounding Scripture as searching the Originals conference of places purity of reason analogie of faith are all dubious uncertain and very fallible he that is wisest and by consequence the likeliest to expound truest in all probability of reason will be very far from confidence because every one of these and many more are like so many degrees of improbabilities and incertainty all depressing our certtainty of finding out the truth in such mysteries and amidst so many difficulties and therefore a wise man that considers this would not willingly be prescribed to by others and therefore if he be also a just man he will not impose it upon others for it is best every man should be left to that Liberty from which no man can justly take him unless he could secure him from Error And in pag. 82. he tells us That Osiander in his confutation of a Book which Melanchthon wrote against him observes That there are twenty several Opinions concerning Justification all drawn from Scriptures by the men onely of the Augustan Confession there are sixteen several Opinions conncerning Original Sin and as many definitions of the Sacraments as there are Sects of men that disagree about them And then he proposeth a question with i'ts answer in these words viz. And now what help is there for us in the midst of these uncertainties if we follow any one Translation or any one mans Commentary what Rule have we to choose the right by Or is there any one man that hath translated perfectly or expounded infallibly No Translation challenges such a prerogative as to be authentick but the vulgar Latine and yet see with what success for when it was declared authentick by the Councel of Trent Sextus put forth a Copy much amended of what it was and tyed all men to follow that but that did not satisfie for Pope Clement reviews and corrects it in many places and still the Decree remains in a changed subject And secondly that Translation will be very unapt to satisfie in which one of their own Issidore Clarius a Monk of Brestia found and amended 8000. faults besides innumerable others which he sayes he pretermitted And then thirdly To shew how little themselves were satisfyed with it divers learned men among them did new translate the Bible and thought they did God and the Church good service in it So that if you take this for your president you are sure to be mistaken infinittly if you take any other the Authors themselves do not promise you any security If you resolve to follow any one as far only as you see cause then you only do wrong or right by chance for you have certainty just proportionable to your own skill to your own infallibility If you resolve to folllow any one whithersoever he leads we shall oftentimes come thither where we shall see our selves to become ridiculous Thus far that learned and ingenuous Doctor who also shews
year and commands the Lictors as if he that can kill a man cannot but be infallible and if he be not why should I do violence to my conscience because he can do violence to my person Force in matters of Opinion can do no good but is very apt to do hurt for no man can change his Opinion when he will or be satisfied in his reason that his Opinion is false because discountenanced if a man could change his opinion when he lists he might cure many inconveniences of his life all his fears and his sorrows would soon disband if he would but alter his Opinion whereby he is perswaded that such an accident that afflicts him is an evil and such an object formidable let him but believe himself impregnable or that he receives a benefit when he is plundered disgraced imprisoned condemned and afflicted neither his sleeps need to be disturbed nor his quietness discomposed but if a man cannot change his Opinion when he list nor ever doth heartily or resolutely but when he cannot do otherwise then to use force may make him an hypocrite but never to be a right believer and so instead of erecting a Trophee for God and true Religion to build a monument for the Devil Infinite examples are recorded in Church story to this very purpose but Socrates instances in one for all for when Elucius Bishop of Cyzicum was threatned by the Emperor Valence with banishment and confiscation if he did not subscribe to the Decree of Ariminum at last he yeelded to the Arian Opinion and prosently fell into great torment of conscience openly at Cyzicum recanted the Error asked God and the Church forgiveness and complained of the Emperors injustice and that was all the good the Arian party got by offering violence to his conscience and so many families in Spain which are as they call them new Christians and of a suspected Faith into which they were forced by the Tyranny of the Inquisition and yet are secret Moors is evidence enough of the inconvenience of preaching a Doctrine more gladly Ceventandi for it either punishes a man for keeping a good conscience or forces him into a bad it either punishes sincerity or perswades hypocrisie it persecutes a truth or drives into an error and it teaches a man to dissemble and to be safe but never to be honest Thus far he Notwithstanding all which where can we see it otherwise with any Nation or people in any form of religious Worship but that they have drank so deep of that Whores cup as to thirst for the blood of their opposites especially if they shall but in the least discover to the world the unsoundness of the foundation on which their Babel is built All which the aforesaid Mr. G. well knowing and by experience finding that a little Light will much offend the tender sights of many who therefore like Owls in the dark will both skreech and strick at the meer shine of a Candle yet nevertheless in this Divine Authority of Scripture pag 10. he tells us If no Translation whatsoever nor any any either written or printed Copy whatsoever be the Word of God or foundation of Religion certainly our English Translations cannot challenge this honor And in pag. 18. of the same he saith Questionless no writing whatsoever whether Translations or Originals are the foundation of Christian Religion And in his Youngling Elder pag. 35. he saith It is very possible that either through negligence ignorance want of memory or the like in Scribes and Correctors of the Press some such Error may be found in every Copy of the Scriptures now extant in the world which will render this Copy contradictious to it self yea it is possible that many such errors as this may be found in the best and truest Copies that are And in the 36. page of the same Book he saith The true and proper foundation of Religion is intrinsecally essentially and in the nature of it unchangeable unalterable in the least by the wills pleasures or attempts of men But there is no Book or Books whatsoever Bible or other but in the contents of them may be altered or changed by men Ergo The major he proveth thus If the proper Foundation of Religion were intrinsecally and in the nature of it changeable and alterable by men then can it not be any matter of truth because the nature of truth is like the nature of God himself unchangeable unalterable by men Angels Devils or any creature whatsoever yea God himself cannot alter it any whit more then deny himself or change his own nature or being And for the minor saith he That also is no less evident experience teacheth us that Books or Bibles themselves are de facto changed and altered by men from time to time every new Edition or Impression almost commending it self for somewhat corrected or amended in it which was delinquent or defective in the former Yet this learned Author notwithstanding all the aforesaid passages of his in his Divine Authority of Scripture pag. 13. doth affirm If by Scripture be meant the matter and substance of things contained and held forth in the Books of the Old and New Testament commonly known amongst Protestants by the Name of Canonical he fully with all his heart and all his soul believes them to be of Divine Authority and none other then the Word of God And in the 26. page of his Youngling Elder he doth distinguish and lay down a double sense and acceptation of the word Scripture and in the one sense clearly acknowledgeth them to be of Divine Authority and so the foundation of Christian Religion onely denying them to be such in the other sense And in that sense here denyed by this Author his learned Oponent Mr. William jenkin doth affirm them to be both of Divine Authority and the Word of God disallowing that distinction made by our Author demanding How any can believe the matter and substance of the Scripture to be the Word of God when he must be uncertain whether the written Word or Scriptures wherein the matter is contained are the Word of God or no. Now although both these learned men do affirm the Scripture to be of Divine Authority the Word of God yet it is so that the one affirms it to be such in one sense and the other in another sense neither of them allowing it to be such in the others sense nor yet producing any competent proof to evidence it to be such in his own sense The truth of it in either sense must still therefore remain much the more to be doubted and that from these grounds and reasons following First Because the Scripture as it came from the Original Pen-men was then if at all of Divine authority the word of God to the world but it was not so then being in an unknown Tongue to the generality of man-kind and therefore according to St. Pauls Doctrine was both in form matter and substance so far from being
from doing this that each various and contrary Faith and Doctrine is stifly upheld and maintained from the various Copies and Translations thereof and from the various and contrary readings and meanings which each Opinionist respectively may and doth put upon the Scripture it self insomuch that indeed it is now made capable of any impression which every learned and witty man can invent and pleaseth to put upon it to serve his own turn and occasion though he face about and change never so much never so often And thus each man still makes the Scriptures to be like to Pictures wherein every man in the Room believes they look on him only and that wheresoever he standeth or how often soever he changeth his station Now whether all this doth arise from a natural hidden sense of the Scripture or from the brevity of them or for want of many Books mentioned in Scripture whereof we never had either Original or Copy or from mistakes made by Transcribers Printers or Translators or from the varions acceptation of words and phrases contained in them and in probability understandable only by such persons to whom they were first written who being before-hand grounded in the Faith and Principles of Christianity and instrueted in the things treated upon were thereby enabled aright to understand the mind of the Pen-men in what they did but briefly touch upon in their Writings to them Or whether from all of these or from any other cause or causes I leave to the wise and considerate to determine but certainly were they perspicuous in their sense so many learned studious good men could not possible so much have erred and been divided in their understanding of them And if such as these notwithstanding all their advantages of learning have not been able to resolve the truth of these Doctrines so familiarly mentioned in the Scripture and so necessarily required to true Christianity who shall conceive that they were intended by God for the ground of Faith and Worship for all or any sort of men whatsoever except we shall conceive that the unlearned sort of men are in a better capacity perfectly to resolve the sense of Scripture then the learned which is too gross to imagine or else that all men are bound to know and conform their Faith and Worship to a Doctrine that none of them certainly understand which none will affirm it being inconsistent with that Justice and Goodness which all confesse to be in Almighty God Let us see what to this point is said by learned Dr. Taylor in his forecited Book pag. 13. his words are these viz. It is a demonstration that nothing can be necessary to be believed upon pain of damnation but such propositions of which it is certain that God hath spoken and taught them to us and of which it is certaine that this is their sense and purpose for if the sense be uncertaine we can no more be obliged to believe it in a certaine sense then we are to believe it at all if it were not certaine that God delivered it but if it be only certaine that God spake it and not certaine to what sense our faith of it is to be as indeterminate as its sense nor is it consonant to Gods justice to believe of him that he can or will require more But to go on and bring this neater It is manifest even in those Scriptures we have that Jesus Christ requires no credit to be given to his Doctrine either upon his own bare word or the bare word of any persons whatsoever as before is set forth If I bear witness of my self saith he my witness is not true neither receive I testimony of men the works that I do in my Fathers Name they bear witness of me that the Father hath sent me And when he is blaming the Scribes and Pharisees for their unbelief in him he thus far excuseth them in it That if he had not done among them the Works that none other man did they had not had sin Now who can conceive that Christ should pronounce men guiltless for not believing him upon his own bare testimony and yet not hold men much more guiltless for not believing the Scripture upon its bare testimony Christ though he bare witness of himself his witness was certain and true whereas Copies and Translations as before we have seen are uncertain and erroneous Christ disclaims the Testimony of men yea of John the Baptist as a ground insufficient to engage men to believe in his Doctrine though all that John said of him was true and what he had heard and seen that he testified And shall we imagine that he will binde all the succeeding generations of men to believe the truth of Christ and the Gospel upon any such inferior testimony as the testimony only of such as disclaim infallibility and have neither heard nor seen as John did Shall God and Christ be true and all men lyars and yet shall fallible men be preferred before them in being believed upon lower easier terms then either they or their most infallible servants Or shal God be conceived to require contraries of men as not to believe super-natural truths such the Gospel is judged to be without a sutable evidence and on the other side require men to believe it without any such evidence Shall men be blameless and blamed by him upon one and the same account If this cannot be as surely it cannot then it must necessarily follow That the Scripture was never instituted or intended by Almighty God to be the ground of Christian Faith and Religion or to be believed in and obeyed by mankind to salvation Moreover it is evident if we may take the meaning according to the sense of the words as they are delivered to us in Translations That the Epistles and St. Johns Revelation in the New Testament were all written unto Believers and that both the Acts and Lukes Gospel were written to Theophilus an instructed Disciple Luke 14. And it is most probable that the other three Gospels were written to believers also at least for their sakes especially for such of them as did not see Christ themselves after his resurrection whereby he mightily declared himself to be the Son of God Rom. 1.4 whereof the rest of the Apostles as well as Thomas much doubted whilest he lay dead as may appear by 1 Pet. 1.3 where St. Peter speaking of himself and of the rest saith That God of his abundant mercy had begotten them again to a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and what may be understood by this but that all their hope was extinct or languished by his death and revived again by his resurrection And that his being risen from death was very hardly believed by any of them may appear from Mark 16.10 11. when Mary Magdalen told the Disciples as they were mourning and weeping that Christ was alive and that she had seen him they believed it not and
as the devils instruments they unjustly hold their Fellow-brethren as captives in oppression slavery It is therefore to be lamented when at any time we see him thrive in any such devillish project The Lord in mercy deliver every honest man from being overcome by any such temptation Amen But to find the word answer of God in the way aforementioned may apear to be very uncertain by this viz. If four pious men should each of them seek by prayer for an answer from God in one and the same thing be it of publicke concernment or otherwise wherein their interests judgements and perswasions are different and various each from other you will find the propencity and bent of their hearts and desires after prayer for the most part will vary as much as before which will manifest this to be no sound or sure way to find out or know the word or answer of God nor is this intended to discourage any from seeking to the Lord in any occasion but from trusting to the bent of their own hearts to be any sure Rule to know the answer of God by because that may be the effect of some pride or vain desire of wordly glory or of some other lust secretly lurking in the heart of man undiscerned for the heart of man being deceitful above all things who then can know his own heart or the secret turnings thereof Jer. 17.9.10.11 or who can say his heart is so pure and clean as to be quite purged from all kind of vain carnal and eatthly affection and lust he must then be no longer a man having flesh blood or any other infirmity like other men on earth but be equal to the purest Angel in heaven And now having proposed left these things to consideration we will proceed to the next Fourthly Mr. R Baxter a man of Eminency both for exquisite learning parts in his Saints Rest Part. 2. pag. 201. of the sixth Edition tells us thus viz. R.B. That Divine Faith hath ever a Divine Fvidence And in page 205. thus We must know it to be a Divine Testimony before we can believe Fide Divina And in page 211. he saith As Translations are no further Scripture then they agree with the Copies in the Original Tongues so neither are these Copies further then they agree with the Authographs or original Copies or with some Copies perused and approved by the Apostles Obj. But it is a thing worth the knowing of this Author Whether he or any man else can infallibly produce the Authographs or any such original Copies of the Bible as have been so perused and approved of by the Apostles and if none can do this how can they then prove any Copie or Translation to be true or Scripture as he phraseth it And if any can do this how shall it be known to be such without Divine Evidence undoubtedly to prove it Answ But to this he gives us a general answer in his Preface to his Book of Infidelity where he tells us R.B. That the Holy Ghost by special inspiration was the Author of the Scriptures and by extraordinary Endowments was the Author of the miracles which were wrought for its confirmation Obj. But here it is necessary that he tells us where when by whom those miracles were wrought which so confirmed the scriptures And in the second place he should tell us where which are those Scriptures that were so confirmed withal to produce some Divine Evidence to prove what he therein sayes before any wise man believe him for he himself in his Rest Pag. 201. before cited informs us R. B. That to believe implicitely That the Testimony is Divine or the Scripture is the Word of God this is not to believe God but to resolve our faith into some humane Testimony even to lay our foundation upon the Sand where all will fall at the next assault And yet notwithstanding in Pag 238. 239. of his Saints Rest before mentioned he tells us R.B. That something must be taken upon trust from man whether we will or no yet no uncertainty in our faith neither For 1. saith he The meer illitterate man must take it upon trust that the Book is a Bible which he hears read for else he knows not but it may be some other Book Obj. What! may he not take it so upon trust that the Book is a Bible and yet never the more know but it may be some other Book or doth not a mans simple taking a thing especially of such high concernment so groundlesly upon trust argue some diminution of his knowledg and wisdom too rather then any augmentation of either R. B. 2. That these words are in it which the Reader pronounceth 3. That it is translated truly out of the Original Languages Obj. How can it be translated truly and imperfectly or imperfectly and truly for in pag. 211. of the same Book he positively asserts That there is an impossibility that any Translation should perfectly express the sense of the Original R. B. 4. That the Hebrew and Greek Copies out of which it was translated are true authentick Copies 5. That it was originally written in these Languages 6. Yea and the meaning of divers Scripture-passages which cannot be understood without the knowledge of Jewish ustoms of Cronology Geography c. though the words were never â—o exactly translated all these with many more the vulgar must take upon the word of their Teachers Obj. Alas poor Vulgars what miserable hard tasks are here imposed upon you and almost all men with a must much like those put upon the children of Israel to make their full tale of brick without any allowance of straw whereby they were put to take up any stubble where-ever they could find it But can any wise man take these Doctrines to be divine or come from God they being so irrational and absurd and so contrary to him and his wayes who oppointed his Gospel to be dispensed not in an unknown Tongue or upon any such uncertainties to any but to all people in their own language himself also evidently and powerfully attesting the same otherwise he obligeth no man to take it for truth nor blameth any man for taking it otherwise And whereas he positively asserts in pag. 211. of his Saints Rest as before is noted R. B. That there is an impossibility that any Translation should perfectly express the sense of the Original Obj. It 's now incumbent on him to tell us whether it was the expressable imperfect sense in Translations or the unexpressable perfect sense of the Original that was so confirmed by miracles or whether it was all or any of those many books which are mentioned in Scripture and whereof we have neither original nor Copy that were so confirmed plain dealing herein would be very satisfactory and is even more then necessary In his book of Infidelity Part 1. Pag. 11. he tells us That R. B. Besides the sanctifying Spirit of Christ proper
best then is the best still had almost made me think that he intended a perfect agreement with the truth which all along he had opposed but that I found him presently to falsifie that Text in Joh. 15 24. in like manner as he had done the same Text in many other places viz. In leaving out the Emphasis thereof even that which chiefly corroborated and upheld that truth which in his precedent assertion he seemingly maintained namely in omitting these words viz. Among them and that they did both see and hateâ— for the Text is If I had done among them c. that is in their presence that they might both see and hear the Miracles done by Christ as the Samaritans did those that were done by Philip Acts 8.6 they had not had sin but now have they beth seen and hated both me and my Father And with the like unfaithfulness doth he bring up the Rear in the words following by omitting to add to him by which it is made neither current nor found for if St. Paul were now living and had convincingly revealed the Gospel to many thousand men and not to me this though it bound them to believe yet it binds not me to whom it was never convincingly revealed but when ever it is convincingly revealed to me as well as to them then it binds me as well as them but not else These bawks are not comely in any man especially if in the least he pretends sincerity for as the sin of the Scribes and Pharisees there was much aggravated by their seeing and hating so is every mans else though not in the same degree that shall see this or any other Text flatly against his purpose and then to cite it so maimedly as to make it speak against the intention or genuine sense thereof as by this Author this is often cited whereby to make Christ whose words they were to bear false witness so much against himself and his truth this I conceive is no small offence nor is this any other then a friendly caution that when ever this Argument is again handled both Christ his truth and this Text may be better dealt with R. B. And whereas this Author here tells us from current Testimony That the gift of casting out Devils and making them confess themselves mastered by Christ did remain in the Church for three or four hundred yeers at least after the Apostles and that Satan could no where â—eep his possession where this power of Christ did assault him Now then let it be considered Quest. 1. Whether there be not many Pagan Nations whereof Satan hath full possession and wherein he is worshipped by the Inhabitants as God 2. Whether he hath not in all Nations places and persons some large possession at least in their hearts by envy pride covetousness or some other base affection and lust And shall any such man yet think that there is not now need or use of these powerful gifts of the Spirit to dispossess this powerful Prince that yet so ruleth in the world and hearts of men Or can he or any man else be so simple as to think that Satan ever was or yet is so weak or foolish as to be scared and cast out of any of all these his strong holds meerly by the various uncertain and contrary holy winds blown from Pulpits by artificial Divines any more then he ever was or will be cast out of any place or person by vertue of holy Water sprinkled by Fryars or Monks Wherefore for these and many other good causes it may be well deem'd That there was since the said four hundred yeers and is yet the same need of the said powerful gifts of the spirit as were formerly given by Christ to his Church notwithstanding all or any thing said by this learned Author to the contrary 5. Dan. Featly another Doctor in Divinity and famed for a great Schollar in his Dippers Dipt pag. 1. likewise plainly tells us That No Translation is simply authentical or the undoubted Word of God in the undoubted Word of God there can be no error but in Translations there may be and are errors The Bible translated therefore is not the undoubted Word of God but so far onely as it agreeth with the Original Now these passages coming forth by Authority as licenced Vertues if the learned Licencer know any and this Argument being approved as sound and good by other of the learned in my hearing I cannot chuse but query thus of my own understanding or of any mans else that hath charity and ability to inform me better Whether the very same Argument upon the very same grounds and reasons may not in like manner be enforc't against all Copies whatsoever in any Language whatsoever as well and as truly as against Translations thus viz. No Copy is simply authentical or the undoubted Word of God in the undoubted Word of God there can be no Error but in Copies there may be and are Errors The Bible copyed therefore is not the undoubted Word of God but so far onely as it agreeâ—h with the Original For although it be admitted by many that the original Pen-men of the Scripture were all inspired by God yet it may be and is by all denyed that the Copyers thereof were any more inspired then the Translators but that they might erre and have erred as well as Translators as before is manifest how else came there such diversities of Copies into the world as well as of Translations And whereas in the conclusion of the Argument is implyed That so far as either Translation or Copy can be proved to agree with the Original so far only it is to be accounted the Word of God Whence I query Whether it be possible for any to produce the undoubted several Originals of the several Books of the Bible or undoubtedly to know them if it were possible to produce them they being written by divers persons in divers places in diver ages in divâ—rs Languages and upon divers occasions And if none be able to do this I then query How it can be possible for any undoubtedly to prove any Book Chapter or Verse either of Translation or Copy to agree with the Original Besides seeing reason experience teach That time produceth such variations and changes in languages as that a word signifying one thing in one age may often hath another signisication put upon it by use and custom in another age whence else is it that some Hebrew and Greek words bears divers some six some seven and some contrary significations as one word to signifie both to bless and to curse in Job 2.9 And it cannot in reason be imagined but that some words may have quite lost their Original signification since the first writing of the Bible wherefore it would prove a very difficult work if not impossible for any to give to each passage and word its genuine sense and undoubted signification if it were possible as it is not