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A52613
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A letter of resolution concerning the doctrines of the Trinity and the Incarnation
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Nye, Stephen, 1648?-1719.
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1691
(1691)
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Wing N1507B; ESTC R217844
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25,852
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principal Criticks in such manner as Socinians and Unitarians interpret them What is this but to say that is an express Revelation which is only an harsh and doubtful Consequence framed by themselves and that is a clear Revelation for these Doctrines which the best and most knowing of their own Party interpret to a contrary Sense Perhaps Sir you may be a little surprised at what I here affirm but so it is and I make challenge to any of our Opposers to convict me of Falshood that there is no Text of Holy Scripture alledged for the Trinity or Incarnation which all the Catholick Doctors and some or other of the most discerning and eminent Interpreters and Criticks of the Protestants have not acknowledged that 't is not to the purpose of the Trinity or Incarnation The Texts that are cited for the Trinity or Incarnation are either out of the Old Testament or out of the New As to the Texts of the Old Testament the Learned among our Opposers of all Persuasions laugh at those that pretend to find the Trinity or the Incarnation in the Books of the Old Testament 'T is universally agreed among the more Learned Trinitarians that to use the Words of an Author and Book licensed by the famous Faculty of the Sorbon Ex veteri Testamento nihil praeter umbras i. e. There is nothing urged for the Trinity out of any Book or Books of the Old Testament but mere Umbrages and Shadows J. Salabert Haeres domitae par 2 dâ Then for the New Testament all the Catholick Doctors own what D. Petavius the most learned Writer of the most learned Order among them has thought fit to express in these Words They that would prove the Trinity out of only the Words of Scripture without taking to their Aid the Churches Interpretation and Authority Sudant plus satis suo artificio vincuntur i. e. They sweat to no purpose and are beaten at their own Weapon Scripture by their Adversaries the Socinians and Arians D. Petav. de Trin. l. 3. c. 11. s 9. Protestants indeed have been somewhat more careful of such free and general Acknowledgmets because they know there is no trusting to Tradition and the Authority of the Fathers on which the Catholicks so called wholly relie in these Questions Notwithstanding even Protestants have among them given up to us all their Scripture-Strengths That Text cannot be named which some or other of the Learnedest Protestants have not either interpreted as 't is interpreted by Socinians and Arians or expresly said 't was not intended by the inspired Author concerning the Incarnation or Trinity or any Person therein I demand such a Text of our Opposers and do here profess that if they name it not 't is because they cannot I will leave it here with you Sir Whether this first be not a just Exception to these Doctrines even this that they have no sufficient Foundation in Holy Scripture by Confession of the most and the learnedest of our Opposers and that being evidently false in Reason they cannot possibly be true in Divine Revelation or Scripture Our Second Reason against them is There has never yet been any Apology or Defence made nor can be for the confess'd Inconsistency of these Doctrines with Reason but what is equally applicable to the Transubstantiation or any other absurd and impossible Doctrine Our Opposers being sensible how great a Prejudice 't is to their Cause that their Doctrines are so directly contrary to Reason so utterly inconsistent with our natural Knowledg and congenit Notions which were given us by GOD to be Tests or Touch-stones whereby to discern Truth from Falshood they have therefore turned themselves all ways to find a Remedy for this Evil. The Sum and Force of what they have been observed to say either in their Books or Sermons is as follows The Trinity and Incarnation are indeed incomprehensible Mysteries but Almighty God hath a Right to require of us to believe on his Word what we do not comprehend or understand He has already posed us with divers Mysteries and seeming Contradictions to our Reason and Capacities in finite visible and ordinary Objects thereby to prepare and dispose us to receive with an humble Faith what he shall please to reveal in his Word concerning Objects invisible and infinite Whatsoever is matter of pure and mere Revelation is not to be judged by either Reason or Sense concerning such things there is a Necessity to acquiesce in Revelation only how unaccountable and wonderful soever they may seem And if Revelation is so express and clear concerning them that we would believe were it not for their supposed Contradiction to Reason in that case Reason must submit to Revelation else we fall into the horrible both Impiety and Foolery of giving the Lie to God and preferring our Knowledg before his What is the Union of the Soul with the Body how do the Parts of Matter hold together are Bodies made up of divisible Parts or of indivisible If we cannot answer these and divers such like Questions without involving our selves in great Difficulties and even in Contradictions Why do we wonder that there may be some seeming Contradictions in what we are taught about the Divine Nature or GOD Which of the Attributes of GOD is not as incomprehensible as the Trinity or the Incarnation Do we comprehend GOD's Eternity by which he possesses eternal Life all at once or his Immensity by which he is whole and all present in every Point of Space Can a finite Mind comprehend Infinite Wisdom Infinite Justice Infinite Power or ought else that is infinite How many have been as confident that the very Notion of a Spirit implies a Contradiction and that 't is not possible there should be Antipodes as any Unitarian can be that the Trinity is a Contradiction to Reason and the Incarnation impossible This should make us cautious and modest it should serve to instruct us that 't is easy for us to mistake our own Shallowness and our Errors for Impossibilities and Contradictions to true Reason Finally As hot as the Unitarians are against Mysteries and incomprehensible things themselves for all that advance as many and as great as those which they oppose You know Sir that I have elsewhere answer'd particularly and severally to all the Parts of this Defence but here I will be content to answer in general that what will prove every thing will prove nothing This Defence or Proof will serve as well for the Transubstantiation or any other absurd and impossible Doctrine as for the Trinity or Incarnation I am resolved to keep close to clear and express Revelation therefore our Saviour himself having said expresly that he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the true Vine John 15.1 I maintain that as 't was certain by Sense to those who conversed with him that he was a true and very Man so 't is certain by Revelation that he was also a true and very Vine That any Person should
whom they are derived or by whom they were invented He that is generally and indeed deservedly confess'd to have written the most learnedly on this Subject is D. Cudworth in the Intellectual System The Sum of what he saith up and down in that large Book in behalf of the Trinity is this The Christian Trinity is the very same with the Trinity of the Platonick Philosophers Yet we are not to think that the Platonists were the first Authors or Devisers of the Trinity Plato learned it of Parmenides Parmenides of the Pythagoreans Pythagoras from Orpheus and the Books of Egyptian Hermes and other Hermaic Books which Books contained the Arcane Theology of the Egyptians The Magisk or Chalday Oracles and the Mithraick Mysteries both of them derived from Zoroaster a most ancient and sage King of the Bactrians and Persians express also the Mystery of the Trinity The Romans had their Capitoline Trinity which they derived from the Phrygians they from the Samothracians This Consent of Philosophers and Nations makes it more than probable and no less than certain that the Trinity was no humane Invention for how should so many jump in the same groundless Conceit but a Theology of Divine Original even a Part of the Cabala Tradition or oral Law of the Jews which they had from Moses and he from GOD which also is the Opinion of Eusebius and Theodoret the ablest Historians and Antiquaries of the Primitive Church To make up weight I will fling into the Scale three Authorities altogether as considerable and authentick as any of these alledged by Dr. Cudworth Let them take the Grecian Trinity which is much older than the Roman Phrygian or Samothracian Let them take the Books of Hystaspes another most ancient and sage King of the Medes which Books are celebrated by Lactantius and other Fathers We will also give them the Sybillin Oracles or Verses which speak so expresly of the Father Son and Spirit and even of the Incarnation that no Trinitarian or Arian can deliver himself more explicitly or evidently He saith How should so many Philosophers and Nations jump in the same groundless Conceit Therefore the Trinity is a part of the Jewish Cabala or Oral Law and was from them borrowed by other Nations and by the Philosophers I omit that the Nations and Philosophers by him mentioned are but few But all Men know there was an incomparably greater Consent of Nations and Philosophers in Polytheism or the Acknowledgment and Worship of many distinct Gods And that Consideration should have made this learned Author aware that a surprizing Consent of many is not always the Effect of a divine Tradition but too often of a diabolical Suggestion or other Causes Again supposing the aforesaid Consent of Philosophers and Nations yet 't is very odly father'd by a Protestant Divine on a Cabala Tradition or Oral Law of the Jews 'T is one of the Principles of us Protestants to disclaim all pretended Cabala's and Traditions whether of Jews or Christians and to believe there never was any other Divine Tradition but only the Books of the Old and New Testaments I am ready to dispute this Point at large with any of our Opposers whenever they shall think fit again to insist on it In the mean time I take notice that indeed the Pharisees having devised of their own Heads divers Doctrines and Rites to give them the greater Authority they called them Traditions and pretended they were a Cabala or Oral Law delivered originally by Moses But the sounder part of the Jews themselves even all the Karaits disown any such Tradition or Law And our Saviour whose Authority I hope may be equivalent to Eusebius or Theodorets calls these Traditions and this pretended Law not a Theology of divine Original but Doctrines and Commandments of Men Matth. 15.6 9. Nor is there any mention or least Intimation of such a Cabala or Law in any of the Books of the Old Testament And it seems incredible that among so many of the Holy Writers there should be no where found so much as any Allusion to their Cabala if indeed they had acknowledged or known of any such thing Why did not Esdras when he collected into one the scattered and dispersed Canon of Scripture without omitting the Proverbs of Solomon and others or his Book of Love why did he not at the same time commit to Writing and publish the Divine Cabala of so much more Authority and Concernment than divers Pieces by him published and added to the Law Furthermore admitting the pretended aforesaid Consent of some Philosophers and Nations and also a Tradition Cabala or oral Law of the Jews yet 't is certain the Trinity is no part of that Cabala For all the World knows that the Jews though they strictly adhere to their Cabala yet are so far from acknowledging a Trinity that this Doctrine is the very Stumbling-block which hinders their entring into the Church That whole Nation and all the Sects of them hold the Christians to be Polytheists and Idolaters on the Account of the Doctrine of the Trinity They pronounce Christianity to be a much worse Idolatry than Jeroboam's Calves Which were not two fictitious Gods added to the true one but only Images of the Cherubims as the Cherubims were Hieroglyfick Resemblances of the one true GOD. So that though the ten Tribes were guilty of a kind of Idolatry by their worshipping the true GOD under forbidden Resemblances for though the Cherubims themselves were set up by GOD's Order yet not for Worship or to common Sight they were not Polytheists they owned with all the rest of the Jews but one Divine Person I doubt not Sir but that you perceive that the whole Force of Dr. Cudworth's Argument from the supposed Consent of some Nations and Philosophers is enervated and that such pretended Consent notwithstanding the Trinity is not as he says a Theology of Divine Tradition but merely and solely of Paganick and Heathen Extraction and brought into the Christian Church by the Platonick Philosophers when they came over to Christianity I could now tell you Sir that whereas Dr. Cudworth brings in his Philosophers Oracles Kings and Nations as believing and asserting the Trinity even in the dark times of Heathenism this is all mere Flourish and Rhodomontade For first as to the Books of Hermes Zoroaster and Hystaspes as also the Sybillin and Chalday or Magick Oracles they are all of them Forgeries partly of the Jews a little before the Nativity of our Saviour partly of the Christians of the second and third Centuries And this is so generally agreed and so clearly demonstrated by the Criticks that I was extreamly surprized to see such Authorities alledged in a Book written by Dr. Cudworth a Man if any other of true and real Learning But so it is that in the Defect of genuine and solid Proofs the most Learned must have recourse to such as their Cause will afford Next as to the Nations and Philosophers by him mentioned the