and the first temptation presented to him Now all the power and army of Hell is let loose all the machinations of the bottomless pit put in practise against the second Adam but all to no purpose he stands like a rock unmoved in his righteousness and obedience and by such a death destroys him that had the power over death the Devil II. As the Dâ—â—â—l must be conquered so God must be satisfied And as Christs obedience did the one work so it did the other Obedience was the debt of Adam and mankind and by disobedience they had forfeited their Bonds Then comes this great Undertaker and will satisfie the debt with full interest yea and measure heaped and running over Does not the Apostle speak thus much Rom. V. from vers 12. forward particularly at vers 19. By the disobedience of one man many were made sinners so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous Nor was this all that mans debt must be paid but Gods honour lay at stake too and that must be vindicated God had created man his noblest creature that he might glorifie and honour his Creator by his obedience Satan brings him to disobey his Creator and to obey him How might Satan here triumph and the honour of God lie in the dust I have mastered the chief Creation of God might Satan boast and made him that carried the badge and livery of his image now to carry mine I have frustrated the end and honour of the Creator and now all is mine own How sad a time were those three hours or thereabouts that passed betwixt the Fall of Adam and the promise of Christ Adam in darkness and not the least glimpse of promise or comfort Satan triumphing and poor manking and Gods honour trampled underfoot But then the Sun of righteousness arose in the promise that the seed of the woman should break the head of the Serpent And shall this uncircumcised Philistin thus deâ—ie the honour and armies of the living God saith Christ shall Satan thus carry the day against man and against God I will pay obedience that shall fully satisfie to the vindication of Gods honour to confound Satan and to the payment of mans debt to his reinstating and recovery And that was it that he paid consummatively in his Obedience to the death and in it and to the shedding of his blood Of which to speak in the full dimensions of the height depth length bredth of it what tongue can suffice what time can serve T is a Theme the glorified Saints deservedly sing of to all Eternity I shall speak in little of that which can never be extolled enough these two things only I. That he died merely out of obedience The Apostle tells us in Phil. II. 8. He became obedient to the death the death of the Cross. And what can ye name that brought him thither but Obedience Christs dead body imagine lies before you Call together a whole College of Phisitians to diffect it and to tell you what it was of which he died And their Verdict will be Of nothing but Love to man and Obedience to God For Principles of death he had none in his nature And the reason of his death lay not in any mortality of his body as it does in ourâ— but in the willingness of his mind Nor was his death his wages of sin as it is ours Rom. VI. ult but it was his choise and delight Luke XII 50. I have a baptism to be baptised withal and how am I straitned till it be accomplished Ask the first Adam why he sinned when he had no principles of sin in him and the true answer must be Because he would sin And so ask the second Adam why he died when he had no principles of death in him his answer must be to the like tenor He would lay down his life because he would be obedient to the death He came purposely into the World that he might dye Behold I tell you a mystery Christ came purposely into the World that he might dye and so never did Man but himself never will man do but himself True that every Man that comes into the World must dye but never Man came purposely that he might dye but only He. And he saith no less than that he did so Joh. XII 27. Father save me from this hour but for this cause came I to this hour And John XVIII 37. For this cause came I into this World to bear witness to the Truth Even to bear witness to the Truth to Death and Martyrdom II. Now add to all this the dignity of his Person who performed this Obedience that he was God as well as Man That as he offered himself according to his Manhood so he offered himself by the Eternal Spirit or as he was God as this Apostle saith Chap. IX 14. And now his obedience his holiness that he shewed in his death is infinite And what need we say more So that lay all the disobedience of all men in the World on an heap as the dead frogs in Egypt were laid on heaps that they made the land to stink again yet here is an Obedience that out-vies them all For though they be infinite in number as to mans numbring yet lay them all together they are finite upon this account because committed by creatures finite But here is an Obedience a holiness paid down by him that is infinite And now Satan where is thy Triumph Thou broughtest the first Adam to fail of perfect Obedience that he should have paid his Creator and here the second Adam hath paid him for it infinite Obedience And what hast thou now gained Therefore to take account from whence comes that infinite Virtue of Christs blood and death that the Scripture so much and so deservedly extols and magnifies Because as the Evangelist â—aith Out of his side came water and blood so out of his wounds came obedience and blood holiness and blood righteousness and blood and that obedience holiness righteousness infinite because he that paid it down and performed it was infinite And now judge whether it may not very properly be said That Christ was sanctified by his own blood As Aaron was sanctified for his Priesthood by his Unction and Garments Christ was consecrated fitted capacitated by his infinite obedience and righteousness which he shewed to the death and in it to be an High Priest able to save to the uttermost all those that come to him For first as in reference to himself it is said by this Apostle that he was raised from the dead by the blood of the Covenant Chap. XIII 20. And it was not possible but he should be raised for when he had performed such obedience and righteousness as in it was infinite in its validity subdued Satan in its alsufficiency satisfied the justice of God it was impossible that he should be held of death which is the wages of sin and disobedience And as he was thus raised by
of the Nation it self It is observable concerning that unhappy Nation that before their Captivity into Babylon they were all for Idolatry but after their return out of Captivity they abhorred Idolatry but were all for Traditions they changed naught for naught or rather naught for worse For indeed their Traditions one may justly say were more destructive than their Idolatry Their Traditions wrought them and brought them to murder the Lord of life and glory which their Idolatry would hardly ever have brought them to And the very principles of their Traditions were such that they had not been right Scholars in that School they had not been faithful to their principles if they had not destroied him So directly contrary to the tenor of the Gospel and to the quality and appearance of Christ were those cursed Traditions that if they sought not withal might and main to destroy them and root them out the beast did not work according to the nature of the beast but clean contrary to it It is very generally conceived that God rejected that Nation for the murther of the Lord of life And that was a very just cause and reason why they were rejected But if I should say God rejected the bulk and mass of that Nation long before the death of Christ for those cursed Traditions I believe I should not speak it without good proof and warrant And it is observable that John Baptist calls them a generation of Vipers which in plain English is The seed of the Serpent at his first preaching among them And it is observable that which we are upon that wickedness and villanies were grown so abounding and so predominant that they were past the Magistrates correcting before ever our Saviour comes to be arraigned And it is no wonder they were grown so abounding and predominant when their very Principles led them to make crimes of those that were but trifles and no crimes of those that were crimes indeed to omit the great things of the Law whereby they might have beaten down cruelty dishonesty and debauchery and to make all their business only about toys only for the promoting of formality and hypocrisie and seeming goodness And thus you see wickedness uncorrected till it grow incorrigible an unhappy Magistracy asleep till it wake like Sampson with the locks of his strength cut and overpowred by the Philistins and a miserable Nation bleeding to death and weltering in its own blood because the Physitian would not let blood when he should have done in due time and in the right vein And now do I need to say any thing by way of Application As the Apostle concerning Abel He being dead yet speaketh so I of Judea she is here dying and do you not hear her speak nay as he of old Loquere ut te videam Do you not see her speak The very looking on her may read a Lecture As the Lacedaemonians read a silent Lecture against drunkenness to their children only by shewing them their slaves Swine-drunk So t is a silent Lecture against neglecting of the execution of Justice and Judgment and against partiality in executing of Judgment and Justice only to look upon her and her undone condition It is well known to you all that pass by behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow that is done unto me And who wrought it to thee O unhappy Nation Oh! I was wounded in this house of my friends Folly and fondness partiality and foolish tenderness sloth and sleepiness have been my undoing Discite justitiam moniti Take warning by my fate all Nations and Countries and set your selves to execute Judgment and do Justice lest wickedness grow that there be no curbing and so vengeance follow that there be no healing The Grandees of that Nation though so careless as to practise this will tell you that all the six hundred and thirteen precepts contained in the Law of Moses are couched and included within those two in Esay LVI 1. Keep judgment and do justice And indeed how much and how great things are included in those two keeping or observing Judgment in causes Controversal and doing just in causes Criminal The Greek Poet will tell you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That in Justice is comprehended all Vertues and the Scripture will tell you that under the name of righteousness is comprehended all piety by the use of the name a righteous man for one after Gods own heart I might speak how much piety is comprehended in doing Justice and how much charity how much service to God how much benefit to the Country But need I to illustrate these things that are so plain It is something strange and not to be passed by without observation that in the New Testament in several places the second Table is cited and taken for the whole Law without mention of the first Table at all In Matth. XIX 16. when a man comes and asks what he should do to have eternal life Christ bids him keep the Commandments When he demands which He refers him only to the second Table Thou shalt do no murder Thou shalt not commit adultery Thou shalt not steal Thou shalt not bear false witness Honour thy Father and thy Mother And Thou shall love thy neighbour as thy self You have the like reference to the second Table Rom. XIII 8. Ow nothing to any man but to love one another for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the Law And there going to reckon up the Commandments of the Law he mentions only those of the second Table And you may observe the Apostle S. James using the same style Jam 11. 8. If ye fulfil the Royal Law according to the Scripture Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self ye do well What then is the younger sister fairer than the Elder the second Table more lovely than the fiâ—â—â— that Jacob mâ—â—t serve his â—pprenticeship for Rachel the younger rather than for Iâ—â—ah the eldeâ— As Micah VI 8. He hath shewed thee O man what is good and what the Lord requires of thee to do justly and love mercy For these two are the Urim and Thummim of the second Table the very life of true Christian piety and of a true Christians acting And the Lord thus directs men to the duties of the second Table as the touchstone of Piety whereby to try whether we love God by our love to our neighbour whether he will do God right by doing right to his neighbour If time would permit I mâ—ght speak I. How great a duty Justice is of the second Table II. How great a charity to a place or Country III. How great a tye upon all not Judges and Magistrates only but Juries Witnesses all in their places to promote it IV. How great a misery and undoing of a Nation to have the current of it stopped A SERMON PREACHED AT ELY ASSISE Septemb. 12. 1671. JAMES V. 9. Behold the Iudge standeth before the door THE great Court of Judicature
prophaned but when a scandalous person comes c. Our Respondent denyed the Major The other in proving it construed To tread under foot as much as To neglect or slight Which received this answer That neither the word in the Hebrew in the Old Testament nor in the Greek in the New siguifieth in that sense And that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies not prophaning but a higher maliciousness than ordinary slighting Again they used that Text for suspension from the Sacrament in 2. Thes. III. 6. That ye withdraw your selves from every Brother that walketh disorderly Where our Doctor desired to know how this private proof would come up to a positive proposition For the proposition is of suspending another from the Sacrament and this of suspending our selves from company with another To which Dr. B. gave this answer That though the terms be different in the Proposition and Text yet the sense is the same Against which our Champion argued thus That in Matth. I. 19. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Put her away Erasmus and Brucioli the Italian render it He would depart from her This he conceived did much change that sense and spake not of any divorse at all from Joseph but makes him Passive Mr. P. answered again That the Apostle giving so strict a charge makes the Passive an Active He replied 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Law speaks in the Language of Man that the Reader or Hearer may best understand Now if the Apostle had mainly intended Actively I conceive saith he he would have spoke Actively Yet this Text being put to the Vote was carried in the Affirmative nemine contradicente but Dr. Lightfoot I perceive I must beg the Readers pardon for so large a relation of the canvasing of one single point But the use and pleasure of it may countervail its tediousness Whereby may be observed the manner of proceeding in that Assembly which it may be may be a curiosity at least not unacceptable to some ingenious persons and particularly the courage honesty quickness learning and intimate knowledge of the Holy Scriptures that appeared in the worthy Man of whom we are speaking Let us not be weary to hear his thoughts and discourse upon the other Sacrament of Baptism as we have heard him upon that of the Lords Supper Our Doctor did allow of private Baptism in some cases This was opposed by some who would have Baptism celebrated in publick only Here the Doctor insisted upon these things I. That in 1 Cor. I. I baptized the House of Stephanas was in Ecclesia constituta and the phrase importeth that it was not in a Synagogue II. Whereas some had asserted that Circumcision was publick he proved that it was generally private 1. Otherwise in great Towns every day sometimes would have been as a Sabbath for every day would some Child come to be eight days old 2. Moses his Wife and Judah at Chezib circumcised Children distant from any Congregation III. All the Nation was baptized when they were to come out of Egypt but this could not be in the Congregation IV. The Jews Pandect tells us That a Proselyte was to be baptized at home as a Servant by his Master but if either Servant or Master refuse then should he be brought before the Congregation Then was there a Learned discourse between our Author and another well skilled in Hebrew Learning concerning the import of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The one in a large discourse making it to mean dipping over head and cars Which Dr. Lightfoot largely also proved to imply no more but Sprinkling And finally made a challenge to them all to produce any one place in all the Old Testament where Baptizare when it is used De Sacris and in a Transient action is not used of Sprinkling And so assured he was of this That he declared he held Dipping unlawful and an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a piece of Wilworship Concerning Keeping the Sabbath the first Proposition was That the Sabbath is to be remembred before it come c. That Phrase Before it come Our Doctor spake against as putting a Gloss upon the Commemoration of the fourth Commandment never heard of before But howsoever it was carried in terminis But he succeeded better in his dislike of the third Proposition which was That there be no feasting on the Sabbath he instancing in Christs feasting Luke XIV and in his feasting at least Dining with all his Disciples in Peters House Matth. VIII Whereupon it was thus proposed That the Diet on the Sabbath day be so ordered that no servants or others be unnecessarily kept from the publick Service The Assembly discoursing concerning Marriage whether it should be denyed to be a part of Gods Worship or whether it were to be held out as a mere civil thing Mr. G. alledged Eccles. VIII 2. I counsel thee to keep the Kings Commandment and that in regard of the Oath of God to shew obedience to Magistrates to be a mere Civil thing and yet it lays a tie of Obedience from God Dr. Lightfoot denyed that Gloss of the place and said That the Oath there is not an Oath taken by the Subject to David but the Oath made by God to Davids House When the Assembly had expounded the meaning of that Article He descended into Hell to be that he continued under the power of death he impleaded that sense as too short and not reaching to the meaning of the Greek phrase For saith he 1. There is not so much difference between He was dead till he rose again and He continued under the power of death till he rose again as to make two distinct Articles of the Creed 2. The Greek phrase is a phrase used among the Heathen originally and therefore from them best to be understood 3. That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 among them signifies properly and constantly in relation to the Souls departed For this he cited Homer Diphilus and other Heathens which prove this undeniably 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imports locomotion and there is a plain difference between Descending and Continuing in 5. It is without doubt that this Article came into the Creed upon emergent occasion because it was inserted after so many scores of years absence out Now the detention of Christ under death was not such an emergency as to cause an Article of so obscure a nature for expression of that which was so well known But it seems rather to have come in upon the Heresie of Apolinarius who denied Christ to have had a true humane Soul These things he pleaded at large and at last prevailed to have this clause In the state of the dead added to the explication but could not strain it to any expression of his Soul Of this Article he hath a just and learned Discourse in the second Volume of his Works That Proposition Christs whole Obedience is imputed to us the Assembly proved from that place among others Rom. V. 9 17 18 19. Against this
had seen the figure and pattern of a glorious Tabernacle so now in this second forty days fast he desireth to have a sight of the glory of God On the thirtieth day of the month A◠he goeth up again with the two Tables and beginneth another forty days fast and seeth the Lord and heareth him proclaim himself by most glorious attributes and receiveth some commands from him On the tenth day of the month Tisri he cometh down with the glad tydings that all is well betwixt God and Israel with the renewed Tables in his hand and with commission to set about making the Tabernacle CHAP. XXXV XXXVI XXXVII XXXVIII XXXIX XL. World 2515 Moses 82 Redemption from Egypt 2 AND so do Israel fall about that work which by the first day of the month Abib the first month of the next year is finished and it begun to be erected when it is set up the cloud of glory filleth it and God taketh up his seat upon the Ark in figure of his dwelling amongst men in Christ. The Book of LEVITICUS OUT of the Tabernacle newly erected God giveth ordinances for it and first concerning Sacrifice to represent Christs death as the Tabernacle it self did represent his body The whole time of the story of Leviticus is but one moneth namely the first month of the second year of their deliverance and not altogether so much neither for the very first beginning of the month was taken up in the erecting of the Tabernacle of which the story is in Exod. 40. CHAP. I. II. III. IV. V. VI. VII RUles given for all manner of sacrifices This is the first Oracle given from off the Mercy-seat There is the letter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the very 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 first word of the Book 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 written less then all his fellows and it seemeth by such a writing to hint and intimate that though this were a glorious Oracle yet was it small in comparison of what was to come when God would speak to his people by his own Son whom the Ark Mercy-seat and Oracle did represent CHAP. VIII IX THE seven days of the consecration of Aaron and his sons follow after the time of the setting up of the Tabernacle and were not coincident or concurrent with that time as the Jews very generally but very groundlesly do apprehend as Seder Olam Tanchum ex R. Joseph Baal Turim Ab Ezra R. Sol and others For 1. this command for their consecration is given out of the Tabernacle now erected as well as the rules for sacrifice were And 2. they abide the seven days in the Tabernacle Chap. 8. 33. and the very first day of the seven the congregation were gathered to the door vers 3 4. which undeniably shew that it was finished and set up when these seven days of consecration began CHAP. X. THE death of Nadab and Abihu was on the very first day that the service of the Altar began namely on that eighth day after the seven of the consecration when Aaron and his sons offered sacrifices for themselves and the people This appeareth plainly by comparing the third and fifteenth Verses of the ninth Chapter with the sixteenth Verse of this tenth Chapter and thus the service of the Sanctuary by an accident began with Death and Judgment NUMBERS IX to Ver. 15. AFter the end of the tenth Chapter of Leviticus in the proper order of story are the first fourteen Verses of the ninth Chapter of Numbers to be taken in which treat concerning the Passover For the Tabernacle being reared on the very first day of the second year of their coming out of Egypt namely on the first day of Nisan these orders and rules concerning Sacrifices and the Priests consecration were given and the eight days of Priests consecration and Sacrifices were accomplished before the fourteenth day of that month came when the Passover was to be kept by an old command given the last year in Egypt and by a second command now given in the wilderness so that this order and method is clear Now the reason why this story of this second Passover is not only not laid in its proper place in this Book of Leviticus but also out of its proper place in the Book of Numbers for the Book beginneth its story with the beginning of the second month but this story of the Passover belongeth to the first month The reason I say of this dislocation is because Moses his chief aim in that place is to shew and relate the new dispensation or command for a Passover in the second month which was a matter of very great moment For the translation of that feast a month beyond its proper time did the rather inforce the significancy of things future then of things past as rather recording the death of Christ to come then their delivery from Egypt when it hit not on that very night This story therefore of the Passover transferred to the second month upon some occasions being the matter that Moses chiefly aimed at and respected in that relation and history he hath set it in his proper place for so is that where it lies in the Book of Numbers and intending and aiming at the mention of that he hath also brought in the mention of the right Passover or that of the first month as it was necessary he should to shew the occasion of the other LEVITICUS XI XII XIII XIV XV. AFter the rules for things clean and fit for sacrifice the Lord cometh to give rules for things clean and fit to eat and clean and fit to touch for this was the tripartite distinction of clean or unclean in the Law Every thing that was unclean to touch was unclean to eat but every thing that was unclean to eat was not unclean to touch every thing that was unclean to eat was unclean to sacrifice but every thing that was unclean to sacrifice was not unclean to eat for many things might be eaten which might not be sacrificed and many things might be touched which might not be eaten And under the Law about clean and unclean there is exceeding much of the doctrine of sin and renovation touched considerable in very many particulars 1. By the Law of Moses nothing was unclean to be touched while it was alive but only man A man in Leprosie unclean to be touched Lev. 13. and a woman in her separation Lev. 12. but Dogs Swine Worms c. not unclean to be touched till they be dead Lev. 11. 31. 2. By the Law of Moses uncleanness had several degrees and Leprosie was the greatest There was uncleanness for a day as by touching a dead beast for a week as by touching a dead man for a month as a woman after Child-birth and for a year or more as Leprosie 3. Every Priest had equal priviledge and calling to judge of the Leprosie as well as the the high Priest 4. The Priests that were judges of Leprosie could not be tainted
them to be humbled some for their fathers guilt some for their own and some for both and to acknowledge that their being alive till now and their liberty to enter into the Land was a free and a great mercy for their own and their fathers faults might justly have caused it to have been otherwise with them 2. They had imitated their fathers rebellion to the utmost in their murmuring at Kadesh at their last coming up thither and in the matter of Baal Peor and therefore he might very well personate them by their fathers when their fathers faults were so legible and easie to be seen in them 4. He reckoneth not their second journy to Kadesh by name but slips by it Chap. 2. 1 4. Nor mentions their long wanderings for seven and thirty years together between Kadesh and Kadesh but only under this expression We compassed mount Seir many days Chap. 2. 1. because in that rehearsal he mainly insisteth but upon these two heads Gods decree against them that had first murmured at Kadesh and how that was made good upon them and Gods promise of bringing their children into the land and how that was made good upon them therefore when he hath largely related both the decree and the promise he hastens to shew the accomplishment of both 5. In rehearsing the Ten Commandments he proposeth a reason of the Sabbaths ordaining differing from that in Exodus there it was because God rested on the seventh day here it is because of their delivery out of Egypt and so here it respecteth the Jewish Sabbath more properly there the Sabbath in its pure morality and perpetuity And here is a figure of what is now come to pass in our Sabbath celebrated in memorial of Redemption as well as of Creation In the fifth Commandment in this his rehearsal there is an addition or two more then there is in it in Exod. 20. and the letter Teth is brought in twice which in the twentieth of Exodus was only wanting of all the letters 6. In Chap. 10. ver 6. 7 8. there is a strange and remarkable transposition and a matter that affordeth a double scruple 1. In that after the mention of the golden Calf in Chap. 9. and of the renewing of the Tables Chap. 10. which occurred in the first year after their coming out of Egypt he bringeth in their departing from Beeroth to Mosera where Aaron died which was in the fortieth year after now the reason of this is because he would shew Gods reconciliation to Aaron and his reconciliation to the people to Aaron in that though he had deserved death suddenly with the rest of the people that died for the sin of the golden Calf yet the Lord had mercy on him and spared him and he died not till forty years after and to the people because that for all that transgression yet the Lord brought them through that wilderness to a land of rivers of waters But 2. there is yet a greater doubt lies in these words then this for in Numb 33. the peoples march is set down to be from Moseroth to Bene Jahaan ver 31. and here it is said to be from Beeroth of Bene Jaahan to Moseroth there it is said Aaron died at mount Hor but here it is said He died at Moseroth now there were World 2553 Moses 120 Redemption from Egypt 40 seven several incampings between Moseroth and mount Hor Numb 33. 31 32 c. Now the answer to this must arise from this consideration that in those stations mentioned Numb 33. From Moseroth to Bene Jaahan to Horhagidgad c. they were marching towards Kadesh before their fortieth year and so they went from Moseroth to Bene Jaahan But in these stations Deut. 10. 6. they are marching from Kadish in their fortieth year by some of that way that they came thither and so they must now go from Bene Jaahan to Moseroth And 2. how Moseroth and mount Hor Gudgodah and Horhagidgad were but the * * * As Horeb and Sinai were though they be counted two several incampings of Israel Exod. 17. 1 6. and 19. 1. compared same place and Country and how though Israel were now going back from Kadish yet hit in the very same journies that they went in when they were coming thither as to Gudgodah or Horhagidgad to Jotbathah or Jotbath requires a discourse Geographical by it self which is the next thing that was promised in the Preface to the first part of the Harmony of the Evangelists and with some part of that work by Gods permission and his good hand upon the Work-man shall come forth 7. It cannot pass the Eye of him that readeth the Text in the Original but he must observe it how in Chap. 29. ver 29. the Holy Ghost hath pointed one clause 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To us and to our Children belong the revealed things after an extraordinary and unparalleld manner to give warning against curiosity in prying into Gods secrets and that we should content our selves with his revealed will 8. Moses in blessing of the Tribes Chap. 33. nameth them not according to their seniority but in another order Reuben is set first though he had lost the birth-right to shew his repentance and that he died not * * * So the Chaldee renders ver 6. Let Reuben live and not die the second death the second death Simeon is omitted because of his cruelty to Sichem and Joseph and therefore he the fittest to be left out when there were twelve Tribes beside Judah is placed before Levi for the Kingdoms dignity above the Priest-hood Christ being promised a King of that Tribe Benjamin is set before Joseph for the dignity of Jerusalem above Samaria c. 9. The last Chapter of the Book was written by some other then Moses for it relateth his death and how he was buried by the Lord that is by Michael Jude 9. or Christ who was to bury Moses Ceremonies The Book of JOSHUA THIS Book containeth a history of the seventeen years of the rule of Joshua which though they be not expresly named by this sum in clear words yet are they to be collected to be so many from that gross sum of four hundred and eighty years from the delivery out of Egypt to the laying of the foundation of solomons Temple mentioned 1 Kings 6. 1. for the Scripture hath parcelled out that sum into these particulars forty years of the people in the wilderness two hundred ninety and nine years of the Judges forty years of Eli forty of Samuel and Saul forty of David and four of Solomon to the Temples founding in all four hundred sixty three and therefore the seventeen years that must make up the sum four hundred and eighty must needs be concluded to have been the time of the rule of Joshua CHAP. I. World 2554 Ioshua 1 JOSHUA of Joseph succeedeth Moses the seventh from Ephraim 1 Chron. 7. 25. and in him first appeared Josephs birth-right 1 Chron. 5. 1. and
Sanctuary Eli 18 with a Sacrifice and a Song The year of his birth is not determinable Eli 19 Eli 20 no not so much as whether it were in the Judgeship of Eli though it be undoubted Eli 21 that it was in his Priest-hood Eli's sons commit theft and adultery in Eli 22 the very Sanctuary they ravin from the men that came to sacrifice and they Eli 23 ravish the women that * * * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chap. 2. 22. Women that had some office and attendance at the Tabernacle As Num. 4. 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is to do the Sanctuary service Anna was such a woman Luke 2. 37. waited on the Sanctuary and so they cause the Ordinances Eli 24 of the Lord to be abhorred Under such example is Samuel educated Eli 25 Eli 26 yet falleth not under that taint A Prophet sharply reproveth Eli for not reproving Eli 27 his sons This Prophet the Jews held to be Elkanah himself and say Eli 28 that he was one of the eight and forty Prophets that prophesied to Israel In Chap. Eli 29 2. Vers. 11. it is said that Elkanah returned to Ramoth to his own house and yet Eli 30 verse 20. it is said that Eli blessed Elkanah which is to be understood that Eli 31 he had done so from Samuels first dedication and so did as oft as he came to Eli 32 Shiloh Samuel himself becomes a Prophet first against Elies house and then Eli 33 afterward to all Israel Chap. 3. 1. Impiety had exceedingly banished Prophesie Eli 34 Eli 35 in these times amongst them but now the Lord begins to restore it for prediction Eli 36 of ruine and then for direction of reformation Urim and Thummim Eli 37 were ere long to be lost from the Priests with the loss of the Ark Eli 38 and God pours the Spirit of Prophesie upon a Levite to supply that Eli 39 want CHAP. IV. World 2909 Eli 40 THE Ark first touched and taken with the hands of uncircumcised ones The two sons of Eli come to fatal ends at this last service of the Ark as the two sons of Aaron Nadab and Abihu did at the first Eli himself dieth the very death of an unredeemed Ass Exod. 13. 13. Shiloh laid waste Jer. 7. 14. and the birthright lost from Joseph and Ephraim Psal. 78. 60. c. The Tabernacle had been at Shiloh 340 years and somewhat more The Idol of Dan hath now out-lived it Judg. 18. 31. Ah poor Israel World 2910 Eli 1 Here begin the forty years of Samuel and Saul mentioned Act. 13. 20 21. He gave them Judges after a manner four hundred and fifty years that is the years of the oppressors also reckoned in the Judges 299. the oppressors 111. and Eli 40. until Samuel the Prophet And afterward they desired a King and God gave them Saul by the space of forty years that is to the expiration of forty years from Elies death the last of the Judges CHAP. V. VI. THE Ark is all the spring and summer of this year in the land of the Philistims For its sake the Lord smiteth Dagon the god of their Corn and destroyeth the harvest of their Corn as it grew on the ground with an army of Mice He striketh the people with Emerods in their hinder parts Psal. 78. 66. and bringeth a shameful soreness on them in a contrary part and in a contrary nature to the honourable soreness of Circumcision They restore the Ark again with strange presents with abundance of golden Mice Et cum quinque anis vel podicibus aureis quasi 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Two Kine knew their owner as Esa. 1. 3. Hophni and Phineas knew him not The Bethshemites though Priests yet slain by the Lord for too much boldness with the Ark. CHAP. VII Vers. 1. And the first half of the second Samuel 2 THE Ark setled in Kirjath-jearim the City of the woods to this the Samuel 3 Psalmist speaketh Psal. 132. 6. We heard of it at Ephratah or at Shiloh Samuel 4 in Ephraim we found it in the fields of the wood or at Kirjath-jearim there an Samuel 5 Eleazar looketh to it when both the line of Eleazar and Ithamar are out of Samuel 6 that service And it came to pass while the Ark abode in Kirjath-jearim the time Samuel 7 Samuel 8 was long for it was twenty years This is not to be understood for the whole Samuel 9 time that it was there for it was above six and forty years there before David Samuel 10 fetched it up 2 Sam. 6. namely thirty nine years of Samuel and Saul and Samuel 11 seven David born in the tenth year of Samuel years of Davids reign in Hebron but it is to be thus understood and construed Samuel 12 that the Ark was twenty years in Kirjath-jearim before the people of Israel Samuel 13 minded it or looked after it but they followed and adhered to their former Samuel 14 Idolatries and corruptions and therefore it is said by Samuel afterward vers 3. Samuel 15 Samuel 16 If you do return unto the Lord put away the strange gods Ashteroth from among Samuel 17 you c. Their Idolatry and prophaneness was so deep rooted having been so Samuel 18 long and so customary with them that neither the loss of the Ark nor the Samuel 19 slaughter of Israel had wrought upon them but that twenty years together Samuel 20 they are lost to the Ark though the Ark were not then lost to them CHAP. VII Vers. 2. The latter half of it * * * The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be translated not And but Then they lamented Then all the house of Israel lamented after the Lord and so to the end of the 7 Chapter and Chapter 8. all World 2930 Samuel 21 A Spirit of repentance and conversion cometh generally upon all the people a matter and a time as remarkable as almost any we read of in Scripture one only parallel to it and that is in Acts 2. and 3. at the great conversion there There were to that time these sums of years four hundred ninety years from hence to the beginning of the Captivity seventy years of the Captivity and four hundred ninety years from the end of the Captivity thither The seventy of the Captivity are the midst of years Hab. 3. 2. And Samuel according to this chain is the first of the Prophets Acts 4. 24. Samuel 22 Israel is baptized from their Idols Samuel though no Priest yet by special They drew water and poured it before the Lord Chap. 7. 6 To be understood of their washing themselves from their idols as Gen. 35. 2. Exod. 19. 14. Samuel 23 warrant sacrificeth by Prayer destroyeth the Philistims with thunder Chap. 2. Samuel 24 20. Psal. 99. 6. they were subdued in that very place where they had subdued Samuel 25 Israel and taken the Ark one and twenty years before Samuel rideth in circuit Samuel 26 and judgeth Israel Judah recovereth
Jehoahaz 6 Division 122 he forgetteth God and forsaketh Ioash 29 Jehoahaz 7 Division 123 his Temple and he and Ioash 30 Jehoahaz 8 Division 124 Judah betake themselves to Ioash 31 Jehoahaz 9 Division 125 open Idolatry for which wrath Ioash 32 Jehoahaz 10 Division 126 cometh upon them And to Ioash 33 Jehoahaz 11 Division 127 make their measure full they slay Zachariah a Priest and Prophet between the Temple and the Altar Ioash 34 Jehoahaz 12 Division 128 Zachariah stoned in the Temple Ioash 35 Ioash 36 Ioash 37 Jehoahaz 13 Jehoahaz 14 Jehoahaz 15 Division 129 Division 130 Division 131 Hazael invadeth Judah World 3163 Ioash 38 Amaziah 1 Jehoahaz 16 Iehoash 1 Division 132 Amaziah reigneth twenty Ioash 39 Amaziah 2 Jehoahaz 17 Iehoash 2 Division 133 nine years 2 King 14. 1 2. World 3163 Ioash 40 Amaziah 3 Iehoash 3 Iehoash 4 Division 134 Joash sâ—ain by his servants Here it is apparent that Amaziah reigned three years before his fathers death and the reason was because of his fathers sore diseasedness which made him unable to manage the Kingdom 2 Chron. 24. 25. Jehoash also reigned three years before his fathers death for he grew valiant and victorious against the Syrians and thereupon he is made Viceroy in his fathers life time 2 KING XIII all World 3146 Ioash 23 Jehoahaz 1 Division 117 JEHOAHAZ the son of Ioash 24 Jehoahaz 2 Division 118 Jehu reigned 17 years and Ioash 25 Jehoahaz 3 Division 119 doth wickedly following Jeroboams Ioash 26 Jehoahaz 4 Division 120 Calves Hazael oppresseth Ioash 27 Jehoahaz 5 Division 121 Israel and continueth that Ioash 28 Jehoahaz 6 Division 122 misery that he had begun in the Ioash 29 Jehoahaz 7 Division 123 time of Jehu He had invaded Ioash 30 Jehoahaz 8 Division 124 and destroyed Israel beyond Ioash 31 Jehoahaz 9 Division 125 Jordan And threshed Gilead with Ioash 32 Jehoahaz 10 Division 126 threshing instruments of iron as Ioash 33 Jehoahaz 11 Division 127 Amos 1. 3. and now he cometh on this side Jordan and falleth upon Israel there and taketh Gath of the Philistims and setteth Ioash 34 Jehoahaz 12 Division 128 himself against Jerusalem Ioash 35 Jehoahaz 13 Division 129 He is hired by King Joash with the Ioash 36 Jehoahaz 14 Division 130 dedicate things of the Temple Ioash 37 Jehoahaz 15 Division 131 to depart but yet he doth Joash no small mischief World 3163 Ioash 38 Amaziah 1 Jehoahaz 16 Iehoash 1 Division 132 Jehoash reigneth 16 years Ioash 39 Amaziah 2 Jehoahaz 17 Iehoash 2 Division 133 2 King 13. 10. and proveth a World 3163 Ioash 40 Amaziah 3 Iehoash 3 Division 134 deliverer and Saviour against Iehoash 4 Syria for this is he that is spoken of in 2 King 13. 5. 2 KING XIV from ver 3. to ver 19. 2 CHRON. XXV to ver 27. Amaziah 4 Iehoash 5 Division 135 AMAZIAH slayeth the Amaziah 5 Iehoash 6 Division 136 murderers of his father Amaziah 6 Iehoash 7 Division 137 hireth 100000 of Israel against Amaziah 7 Iehoash 8 Division 138 Edom they dismissed plunder Amaziah 8 Iehoash 9 Division 139 Judah and slay 3000 men Amaziah 9 Iehoash 10 Division 140 2 Chron. 25. 13. Amaziah conquereth Amaziah 10 Iehoash 11 Division 141 Edom but is overcome Amaziah 11 Iehoash 12 Division 142 by their Idols He is miserably Amaziah 12 Iehoash 13 Division 143 beaten by Jehoash King of Israel Amaziah 13 Iehoash 14 Division 144 and Jerusalem plundered and a Amaziah 14 Iehoash 15 Division 145 great deal of the wall of it Amaziah 15 Iehoash 16 Division 146 broken down namely on that side of the City that looked towards Samaria World 3176 Amaziah 16 Ierob 1 Ierob 2 Division 147 AMAZIAH liveth fifteen Amaziah 17 Ierob 3 Division 148 years current after Jehoash Amaziah 18 Ierob 4 Division 149 his death 2 Chron. 25. 25. Amaziah 19 Ierob 5 Division 150 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Amaziah 20 Ierob 6 Division 151 2 Chron. 25. 27. And from the Amaziah 21 Ierob 7 Division 152 time that he departed from the Amaziah 22 Ierob 8 Division 153 Lord the hearts of his Subjects Amaziah 23 Ierob 9 Division 154 departed from him and they Amaziah 24 Ierob 10 Division 155 began to conspire against him Amaziah 25 Ierob 11 Division 156 and the conspiracy grew so Amaziah 26 Ierob 12 Division 157 strong that they forced him at last to flee from Jerusalem to Lachish for his safety this was but a little before his death for it seemeth Amaziah 4 Iehoash 5 Division 135 IN the time of Jehoash his Amaziah 5 Iehoash 6 Division 136 reign Elisha dieth and his Amaziah 6 Iehoash 7 Division 137 dead bones raise a dead man Amaziah 7 Iehoash 8 Division 138 Hazael the King of Syria dieth Amaziah 8 Iehoash 9 Division 139 also in the time of Jehoash Amaziah 9 Iehoash 10 Division 140 and Benhadad his Son reigneth Amaziah 10 Iehoash 11 Division 141 in his stead Him Jehoash beateth Amaziah 11 Iehoash 12 Division 142 three times and restoreth Amaziah 12 Iehoash 13 Division 143 Cities to Israel which he had Amaziah 13 Iehoash 14 Division 144 taken from them in the time of Amaziah 14 Iehoash 15 Division 145 Jehoachaz when he had sorely Amaziah 15 Iehoash 16 Division 146 conquered both without and within Jordan 2 KING XIV ver 23 24 25 26 27. World 3176 Amaziah 16 Ierob 1 Ierob 2 Division 147 JEROBOAM reigneth Amaziah 17 Ierob 3 Division 148 41 years and walketh Amaziah 18 Ierob 4 Division 149 in the Idolatry of Jeroboam Amaziah 19 Ierob 5 Division 150 in the first yet is he victorious Amaziah 20 Ierob 6 Division 151 exceedingly and prosecutes Amaziah 21 Ierob 7 Division 152 his father Joash his Amaziah 22 Ierob 8 Division 153 wars and victories with very Amaziah 23 Ierob 9 Division 154 good success For the Lord Amaziah 24 Ierob 10 Division 155 pittied Israel and would not Amaziah 25 Ierob 11 Division 156 yet destroy them Jeroboam Amaziah 26 Ierob 12 Division 157 restoreth all the land of the two Tribes and half Tribe beyond Jordan which Hazael had taken in the time of 2 KING XIV ver 19 20. 2 Chron. 25. 27 28. Amaziah 27 Ierob 13 Division 158 by the Text that they sent Amaziah 28 Ierob 14 Division 159 presently after him thither to â—lay World 3189 Amaziah 29 Ierob 15 Division 160 him Amaziah is slain at Lachish Amaziah 1 Ierob 16 Division 161 At his death his son and heir Amaziah 2 Ierob 17 Division 162 apparent Uzziah or Azariah is Amaziah 3 Ierob 18 Division 163 but four years old for he is Amaziah 4 Ierob 19 Division 164 but sixteen in Jeroboams twenty Amaziah 5 Ierob 20 Division 165 seventh 2 King 15. 1 2. Amaziah 6 Amaziah 7 Ierob 21 Division 166 therefore the throne is empty Amaziah 8 Ierob 22 Division 167 eleven years and the rule is Amaziah 9 Ierob 23 Division 168 managed by some as
enough of him when he speaks but this Antonius Felix per omnem saevitiam ac libidinem jus regium servili ingenio exercuit Histor. lib. 5. cap. 2. Upon which Josephus will give you a large comment of his intolerable covetousness polling cruelty sacriledge murdering and all manner of wickedness His injuriousness to Paul in the story before us and the very naming of his wife Drusilla may be brand enough upon him for her by inticements and magical tricks he allured to himself from her Husband and married her And him he kept prisoner two years wrongfully because he would not bribe him In his pleading before him he makes him tremble but it is but a qualm and away CHRIST LVII NERO. III PAUL is a prisoner this year at Caesarea under Felix A great City of Jews and Greeks mixtly the place where the first spark of Jews Wars kindled afterward A famous University of Jews in time if so be it was not so at this time CHRIST LVIII NERO. IV ACTS Chap. XXIV Ver. 27. PAUL still a prisoner at Cesarea under Felix for the first part of this year Then cometh Festus into the Government and Felix packeth to Rome to answer for his misdemeanours ACTS Chap. XXV XXVI PAUL answereth for himself first before Festus alone then before Agrippa and his Sister Bernice this Agrippa was his Son whose death is related Acts 12. he by the favour of Claudius the Emperour succeeded his brother in Law-Uncle Herod for such relations did that Incestuous family find out in the Kingdom of Chalcis For Bernice his Sister had married Herod King of Chalcis her Uncle and his who was now dead and this Agrippa succeeded him in his Kingdom being also King of Judea Of this Agrippa as it is most probable there is frequent mention among the Hebrew Writers as particularly this that King Agrippa reading the Law in the latter end of the year of release as it was injoyned and coming to those words Deut. 17. 15. Thou shalt not set astranger King over thee which is not of thy brethren the tears ran down his cheeks for he was not of the seed of Israel which the Congregation observing cried out Be of good comfort O King Agrippa thou art our brother He was of their Religion though not of their blood and well versed in all the Laws and Customs as Paul speaks Chap. 26. 3. Berenice his Sister now a Widdow lived with him and that in more familiarity then was for their credit afterwards she fell into the like familiarity with Titus the Son of Vespasian when he came up to the Jews Wars There is mention in Jerus in Taanith fol. 66. col 1. and again in Megillah fol. 70. col 3. of the Scribes or learned Jews of Chalcis against whom the people rose and tumultuated In the one place it is written 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the other 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It may be they were of this Agrippa's planting there As Paul pleads for himself Festus takes him to be beside himself but Agrippa better acquainted with those kind of things that he spake of was much moved and concludes that had he not appealed to Caesar he might have been quit What he did in this appeal was not a small thing and it is very questionable whether ever Jew had appealed from their own Sanhedrin to the Heathen Tribunal before But for this he had a Divine Warrant ACTS Chap. XXVII PAUL shipped for Rome and Luke with him and Aristarchus a Thessalonian Paul calls him his fellow-prisoner Coloss. 4. 10. whether now or not till he came to Rome is a question Trophimus an Ephesian is also now with him Acts 21. 29. whom he leaves sick at Miletum as he passeth by those coasts of Asia Acts 27. 2. 2 Tim. 4. 20. and there likewise he leaves Timothy Who else of those that went with him to Jerusalem Acts 20. 4. were now with him is uncertain It was now far in the year and Winter entring for the feast of expiation was over so that they met with a tempestuous journey and at last suffer shipwrack and swim for their lives and do all escape The Reader by the time of the writing of the second Epistle to the Corinthians which he hath passed will easily see that what he speaks there A day and a night have I been in the deep 2 Cor. 11. 25. cannot be understood of his shipwrack now but refers to some time a good while ago CHRIST LIX NERO. V ACTS CHAP. XXVIII from the beginning to Ver. 30. PAUL and his company are the three winter months in Malta where he doth some miracles And when winter was now drawing over they put to sea again in an Alexandrian bottom whose badge was Castor and Pollux or the Picture of two young men on white horses with either of them a javelin in his hand and by him half an egge and a star whom Heathenish folly and superstition conceited to have been twins begotten by Jupiter and Deities favourable to those that sailed on the sea And this seemeth to have been the reason why Luke doth mention this circumstance because he would intimate the mens superstition as expecting better sailing under this badge then they had had From Melita they sail to Syracuse in Sicilie and there abide three daies Form thence to Rhegium in Italy and from thence to Puteoli there they find Christians and stay with them seven daies and then set away for Rome At Appii Forum about Fifty miles from the City some of the Roman Christians hearing of their coming come to meet them and at the Tres Tabernae Thirty three from the City they met with more and so they injoy the society of one another some space together as they travel along which was no small refreshing to Paul who had desired so much and so long to see them SECTION XXVIII Ver. 30. And Paul dwelt two whole years in his hired house and received all that came to him 31. Preaching the Kingdom of God and teaching those things which concern the Lord Iesus Christ with all confidence no man forbidding him JULIUS the Centurion that had brought him and the rest of the Prisoners from Judea had been his friend and favourer from their first setting out Chap. 27. 3. and so continued even to the time of his setling in Rome obtaining him this liberty that he might take lodgings of his own and there he was kept under a restraintless restraint After three daies he sends for the Chief of the Jews and laies open his case before them and upon a day appointed he asserteth and expoundeth the truth and doctrine of the Gospel whereupon some believe but others do the rather become his enemies His accusers that were come from Judea to lay in his charge against him for we can hardly suppose otherwise but that some such were come would be urgent to get their business dispatched that they might be returning to their own homes again and so would bring him
The meaning of the whole let us take up in parts There are two main things here intended First To shew the ruine of the Kingdom of Satan and secondly The nature of the Kingdom of Christ. The Scripture speaks much of Christs Kingdom and his conquering Satan and his Saints reigning with him that common place is briefly handled here That Kingdom was to be especially among the Gentiles they called in unto the Gospel Now among the Gentiles had been Satans Kingdom most setled and potent but here Christ binds him and casts him into the bottomless pit that he should deceive no more as a great cheater and seducer cast into prison and this done by the coming in of the Gospel among them Then as for Christs Kingdom I saw Thrones saith John and they sate upon them c. ver 4. here is Christ and his inthroned and reigning But how do they reign with him Here John faceth the foolish opinion of the Jews of their reigning with the Messias in an earthly pomp and shews that the matter is of a far different tenour that they that suffer with him shall reign with him they that stick to him witness for him dye for him these shall sit inthroned with him And he nameth beheading only of all kinds of deaths as being the most common used both by Jews and Romans alike as we have observed before at Acts 12. out of Sanhedr per. 7. halac 3. And the first witness for Christ John the Baptist died this death He saith that such live and reign with Christ the thousand years not as if they were all raised from the dead at the beginning of the 1000 years and so reign all together with him those years out as is the conceit of some as absolute Judaism as any is for matter of Opinion but that this must be expected to be the garb of Christs Kingdom all along suffering and standing out against sin and the mark of the Beast and the like whereas they held it to be a thousand years of earthly bravery and pompousness But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished This is the first resurrection Not that they lived again when the thousand years were finished but it means that they lived not in this time which was the time of living when Satan was bound and truth and life came into the world The Gentiles before the Gospel came among them were dead in Scripture phrase very copiously Ephes. 2. 1 2. 4. 18. c. but that revived them Joh. 5. 25. This is the first resurrection in and to Christs Kingdom the second is spoken of at the twelfth verse of this Chapter that we are upon Paul useth the same expression to signifie the same thing namely a raising from darkness and sin by the power of the Gospel Rom. 11. 15. Now when this quickning came among the Gentiles Satan going down and Christs Kingdom advanced and the Gospel bringing in life and light as Joh. 1. 4. those that did not come and stick close to Christ and bear witness to him but closed with the mark of the Beast sin and sinful men these were dead still and lived not again till the thousand years were finished that is while they lasted though that were a time of receiving life Blessed therefore and holy are they that have part in this first resurrection for on them the second death hath no power ver 6. The second death is a phrase used by the Jews Onkelos renders Deut. 33. 6. thus Let Reuben live and not die the second death And Jonathan Isa. 65. 6. thus Behold it is written before me I will not grant them long life but I will pay them vengeance for their sins and deliver their carcases to the second death And ver 15. The Lord will slay them with the second death Observe in the Prophet that these verses speak of the ruine and rejection of the Jews now a cursed people and given up to the second death and in Chapter 66. vers 29 30 31. is told how the Lord would send and gather the Gentiles to be his people and would make them his Priests and Levites And then see how fitly this verse answers those In stead of these cursed people these are blessed and holy and might not see the second death and Christ makes them Priests to himself and his Father In this passage of John scorn is put again upon the Jews wild interpretâ—â—â—â—n of the resurrection in Ezekiel They take it litterally think some dead were really raised out of their graves came into the Land of Israel begat children and died a second time Nay they stick not to tell who these men were and who were their children Talm. Babyl in Sanhedr ubi supra After the thousand years are expired Satan is let loose again and falls to his old trade of the deceiving the Nations again ver 8. Zohar fol. 72. col 286. hath this saying It is a tradition that in the day when judgment is upon the world and the holy blessed God sits upon the Throne of judgment then it is found that Satan that deceives high and low he is found destroying the world and taking away souls When the Papacy began then Heathenism came over the world again and Satan as loose and deceiving as ever then Idolatry blindness deluding oracularities and miracles as fresh and plenteous as before from the rising of the Gospel among the Gentiles these had been beating down and Satan fettered and imprisoned deeper and deeper every day and though his agent Rome bestird it self hard to hold up his Kingdom by the horrid persecutions it raised yet still the Gospel prevailed and laid all flat But when the Papacy came then he was loose again and his cheatings prevailed and the world became again no better then Heathen And if you should take the thousand years fixedly and literally and begin to count either from the beginning of the Gospel in the preaching of John or of Peter to Cornelius the first inlet to the Gentiles or of Paul and Barnabas their being sent among them the expiring of them will be in the very depth of Popery especially begin them from the fall of Jerusalem where the date of the Gentiles more peculiarly begins and they will end upon the times of Pope Hildebrand when if the Devil were not let loose when was he He calls the enemies of the Church especially Antichrist Gog and Magog the title of the Syrogrecian Monarchy the great persecutor Ezek. 38. 39. Pliny mentions a place in Caelosyria that retained the name Magog lib. 5. cap. 23. So that John from old stories and copies of great troubles transcribeth new using known terms from Scripture and from the Jews language and notions that he might the better be understood So that this Chapter containeth a brief of all the times from the rising of the Gospel among the Gentiles to the end of the world under these two sums first the beating
reign in the twelfth year of Joram the son of Ahab 2 King 8. 25. and in the eleventh year of Joram the son of Ahab 2 Kings 9. 29. Answer The resolution of this doubt will be easie to him that hath such a Chronical Table as we have spoken of before his eyes For there will he see that Jehoram reigned one year before his Father Ahabs death For in the twentieth year of Ahab which was the seventeenth of Jehoshaphat did Ahaziah the son of Ahab begin to reign 1 King 22. 51. being made Viceroy when his Father went to Ramoth Gilead He reigning but that year Jehoram his son was Viceroy or began to rule in his stead the next year namely in Ahabs one and twentieth Ahab in his two and twentieth died and so Jehoram became absolute and intire King and reigned so eleven years so that his reign hath a double reckoning he reigned as Viceroy twelve years but as intire King but eleven 7. Amaziah began to reign in the second year of Joash King of Israel 2 King 14. 1. this was the eight and thirtieth year of his father Joash King of Judah three years current before his death And the reason was because his father had cast himself into so much misery and mischief through his Apostasie and murder of Zacharias 2 King 12. 17 18. 2 Chron. 24. 23 24 25. that he was become unfit and unable to manage the Kingdom 8. Uzziah or Azariah the son of this Amaziah being but sixteen years of age in the seven and twentieth year of the reign of Jeroboam the second 2 King 15. 1 2. it appeareth that he was but four years old at his fathers death Therefore was the Throne empty for eleven years and the rule managed by some as Protectors in the Kings minority 9. There is also an interregnum or vacancy of twenty two years in the Kingdom of Israel between Jeroboam the second and Zachariah whereof what the reason should be is not easie to determine whether through wars from abroad which Jeroboam might have provoked against his house by the conquest of Hamath and Damascus 2 King 14. 28. or through war at home as appeareth by the end of Zachariah 2 King 15. 10. or through what else it was it is uncertain but most sure it was that the Throne was so long without a King since Jeroboam beginning to reign in the fifteenth year of Amaziah and reigning forty one years 1 King 14. 23. died in the fifteenth of Uzziah and Zechariah began not to Reign till the eight and thirtieth 2 Kings 15. 8. 10. Hoshea is said to slay Pekah in the twentieth year of Jotham the Son of Uzziah 2 King 15. 30. whereas Jotham reigned but sixteen years in all 2 King 15. 33. But the reason of this accounting is because of the wickedness of Ahaz in whose reign this occurrence was and the Holy Ghost chuseth rather to reckon by holy Jotham in the dust then by wicked Ahaz alive For in the slaughter of Pekah the Lord avenged upon Pekah the blood-shed and misery he had caused in Judah for he had slain of the men thereof 120000 in one day 2 Chron. 28. 6. Now Ahaz had caused this wrath upon the people in withdrawing them from the ways of the Lord therefore when the Lord avengeth this injury of his people upon Pekah the time of it is computed from Jotham who was holy and upright and not from Ahaz who had caused the mischief 11. There is a scruple of no small difficulty about the reckoning of this twentieth year of Jotham if it once be spied out And that is this If Pekah began to reign in the two and fiftieth or last year of Uzziah and reigned twenty years as 2 King 15. 27. and if Jotham began to reign in the second year of Pekah 2 King 15. 33. then certainly the twentieth year of Pekah the year when Hoshea slew him was but the nineteenth year of Jotham and not the twentieth Answer In this very difficulty hath the Text fixed the time of Uzziahs becoming Leprous which else-where is not determined and it sheweth that it was in the last year of his reign when he assayed to offer incense in the Temple and was struck with the Leprosie a disease with which the Priests who were to be the Judges of it could not be touched nor infected and his son Jotham was over the house judging the land 2 King 15. 5. till the day of his death Now that last year of Uzziah is counted for the first of Jotham in this reckoning that we have in hand and although he began to reign as absolute and sole King in the second year of the Reign of Pekah yet began he to reign as Viceroy in the diseasedness of his father the year before 12. It is said Hoshea the son of Elab began to reign in the twelfth year of Ahaz 2 King 17. 1. whereas he had slain Pekah in the fourth of Ahaz or the twentieth of Jotham which sheweth that he obtained not the Crown immediately upon Pekahs death but was seven or eight years before he could settle it quietly upon his head It is like that Ahaz in this time did disquiet Israel when his potent enemy Pekah was dead in revenge of that slaughter that he had made in Judah and that he kept Hoshea out of the Throne and for this is called the King of Israel 2 Chron. 28. 19. as well as for walking in the ways of those Kings 13. It is said that Hezekiah began to reign in the third year of Hoshea the son of Elab 2 King 18. 1. Now Hoshea beginning in the twelfth of Ahaz 2 King 17. 1. it is apparent that Hezekiah began in the fourteenth and so reigned two or three years with his father Ahaz who reigned sixteen years 2 King 16. 2. The reason of this was because of the wickedness of Ahaz and because of the miseries and intanglements that his wickedness had brought him into as a Chron. 28. 16 17 18 and Chap. 29. 7 8 9. And this sheweth the zeal of Hezekiah in the work of Reformation the more in that he assayed and perfected it so much in the very time of his wicked Father 14. But yet there ariseth another doubt in the computation of the times of Hezekiah parallel with the times of Hoshea For whereas he began to reign in the third year of Hoshea as is clear before then the seventh year of Hoshea should be counted his fifth year and yet it is called but his fourth 2 King 18 9. Answer The beginning of Hezekiahs reign is of a double date He began indeed to be Viceroy and to bear the rule in the third of Hoshea which was the 14th year of his father Ahaz but the time of that year was but short that he was in the royalty and he did but little or nothing of note that year but the next year which was the fifteenth of Ahaz and the fourth of Hoshea on the very first day of
some machination against himself he had now shut up in prison and intended him presently for the execution but that his sickness whereof he died seizing on him gave some more space to the imprisoned and some hopes and possibilities of escaping His disease was all these mixed together an inward burning and exulceration an insatiable greediness and devouring the Chollick the Gout and Dropsie his loins and secrets crawling with lice and a stink about him not to be indured These wringings and tortures of his body meeting with the peevishness of old age for he was now seventy and with the natural cruelty which always had been in him made him murderously minded above all measure insomuch that he put to death divers that had taken down a golden Eagle which he had set up about the Temple And when he grew near to his end and saw himself ready to die he slew his Son Antipater and caused great multitudes of the Nobility and People to be closed up in a sure place giving command to slay them as soon as he was dead for by that means he said he should have the Jews truly and really to sorrow at his death Vid. Joseph Antiq. lib. 17. cap. 8 9 10. and de Bel. lib. 1. cap. 21. Vers. 20. For they are dead that sought the young childs life The like saying is to Moses Exod. 4. 19. where the word they may be understood of Pharaoh and his servants which jointly sought his life for the Egyptians sake whom he had slain and were now all dead and worn out in the fourty years of his being in Midian But here it is true indeed that the seeking of the childs life may well be applied to Herods Servants as well as himself but that all they died with him or about the time of his death who in flattery or favour or obedience to him had promoted the slaughter at Bethlehem and had sought the childs life I know not upon what ground it should be conceived I should therefore by the they in this place understand Herod and his Son Antipater jointly together For if it be well considered how mischievous this Antipater was against his own Brethren and how he wrought their ruine and misery for fear they should get betwixt him and the throne yea how he sought the destruction of his own Father because he thought he kept him out of the Throne too long it may very well be believed that he would bloodily stir against this new King of the Jews that the wisemen spake of for fear of interception of the Crown as well as his Father He died but five days before his fathers death as it was touched before out of Josephus and thus God brought this bloodliness of the Father and the Son and the rest of their cruelties to an end and upon their own heads at once and in a manner together and thus may the words of the Angel be very fairly understood Take the child and return to the Land of Israel for Herod and Antipater are dead that sought his life Ver. 22. Archelaus did reign in Iudea in the room of his Father Herod Herod had first named Antipater for his Successor in the Throne of Judea but upon detection of his conspiracy against him he altered his mind and his will and nominated Antipas and changing his mind yet again he named Archelaus and he succeeded him a man not likely to prosper in a Throne that was so bebloodied His conclusion was that in the tenth year of his reign he was accused by the Nobles of Judea and Samaria to Augustus banished to Vienna and his estate confiscate Jos. Ant. lib. 17. cap. 15. Ver. 23. He shall be called a Nazarene From Isa. 11. 1. where the Messias is called by the title Nezer which indifferently signifieth A branch and the City Nazaret one and the same word denoting Christ and the place where he should be born SECTION VIII S. LUKE CHAP. II. Christ sheweth his wisdom at twelve years old Ver. 40. AND a a a a a a Compare Exod. 2. 10. 1 Sam. 2. 26. Jud. 16. 24. the Child grew and waxed strong in spirit filled with wisdom and the grace of God was upon him 41. Now his Parents went to Ierusalem b b b b b b Exod. 23. 15. 17. every year at the Feast of the Passover 42. And when he was twelve years old they went up to Ierusalem after the custom of the Feast 43. And when they had fulfilled the days as they returned the Child Iesus tarried behind in Ierusalem and Ioseph and his mother knew not of it 44. But they supposing him to have been in the company went a days journey and they sought him among their kinsfolks and acquaintance 45. And when they found him not they turned back again to Ierusalem seeking him 46. And it came to pass that after three days they found him in the Temple sitting in the middest of the Doctors both hearing them and asking them questions 47. And all that heard him were astonished at his understanding and answers 48. And when they saw him they were amazed and his mother said unto him Son why hast thou thus dealt with us Behold thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing 49. And he said unto them How is it that ye sought me Wist ye not that I must * * * * * * Or In my Fathers house be about my Fathers business 50. And they understood not the saying which he spake unto them 51. And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was subject unto them but his mother kept all these sayings in her heart 52. And Iesus increased in wisdom and stature and in favour with God and men Reason of the Order THE Order of this Section dependeth so clearly upon the proper Order of that preceding that that being made good to lie where it doth as in the proper place the subsequence of this to it can nothing at all be doubted of For whereas all the Evangelists have unanimously passed over in silence all those years of Christs minority which intervened or passed between his return out of Egypt and this passage of his at twelve years old there is nothing possible to be found in the Gospels that can come between to interpose this order and connexion The carriage and demeanour of our Saviour in the time between is only briefly comprised in the first verse of this portion And the child grew and waxed strong in spirit filled with wisdom and the grace of God was upon him Harmony and Explanation Ver. 40. And the child grew c. TWO years Old he was when he went into Egypt and there he aboad in his Exile a very small time it may be some two or three months about such a space as Moses had been hid in Egypt in his Fathers house from the fury of Pharaoh When he returned to Nazareth his Mothers City being now about two years and a quarter old he
some apprehend it but that we find not the Evangelist speaking of the Sabbath but in the proper sense By Sabbath therefore in these words is to be understood the Sabbatism of the day as well as the very day it self and on the same day was the Sabbath 10. The Iews therefore said unto him that was cured It is the Sabbath day it is not lawful for thee to carry thy bed 11. He answered them He that made me whole the same said unto me Take up thy bed and walk 12. Then asked they him What man is that which said unto thee Take up thy bed and walk 13. And he that was healed wist not who it was for Iesus f f f f f f 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The word by some Expositors is made of a questionable derivation whether from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The latter is the more undoubted both as better suiting with the sense of the place and having also its parallel in the Old Testament as 2 King 23. 16. And as Josiah turned himself he saw the graves c. The Septuaginâ— have it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. So Jesus when he had done his cure upon the man turned himself away and was gone Having picked out this long diseased man to do his work upon and not minding in his wisdom to heal any more nor to be observed by the multitude more than he must needs What brought the concourse together in this place is somewhat hard to find Jerusalem was now full of people it being the Passover and whether these cloisters were full of the poorer sort that had come up to the feast and could not find better accomodation of lodging for themselves who can tell whether they were not built for such a purpose or whether the multitude had followed Jesus thither or gathered thither upon the report of the maâ—s recovering be it left to those to think upon that desire to be resolved of it had conveyed himself away a multitude being in that place 14. Afterward Iesus findeth him in the Temple and said unto him Behold thou art made whole sin no more lest a worse thing come unto thee 15. The man departed and told the g g g g g g The Jews that is the Sanhedrin or the Rulers for so it is very common with the Evangelists especially with this to mean by that expression as Chap. 1. 19. The Jews sent Priests and Levites from Jerusalem Chap. 7. 1. The Jews sought to kill him Chap. 9. 22. The Jews had agreed to put out of the Synagogue c. Chap. 18. 12. The Officers of the Jews took Jesus vers 14. Now Caiaphas was he that gave Counsel to the Jews c. So that Christ is here convented before the Sanhedrin although the Evangelist hath not expressed so much totidem verbis and is put to answer for his life about the violation of the Sabbath which they laid to his charge upon what he had done and commanded to the man that he had recovered Iews that it was Iesus which had made him whole 16. And therefore did the Iews persecute Iesus and sought to slay him because he had done those things on the Sabbath day 17. But Iesus answered them My Father worketh hitherto and I work 18. Therefore the Iews sought the more to kill him not only because he had broken the Sabbath but said also that God was his Father making himself equal with God 19. Then answered Iesus and said unto them Verily verily I say unto you The Son can do nothing of himself but what he seeth the Father do for what things soever he doth those also doth the Son likewise 20. For the Father loveth the Son and sheweth him all things that himself doth and he will shew him greater works than these that ye may marvail 21. For as the Father raised up the dead and quickneth them even so the Son quickneth whom he will 22. For the Father judgeth no man but hath committed all judgment unto the Son 23. That all men should honour the Son even as they honour the Father He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which hath sent him 24. Verily verily I say unto you He that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation but is passed from death unto life 25. Verily verily I say unto you The hour is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God and they that hear shall live 26. For as the Father hath life in himself so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself 27. And hath given him authority to execute judgment also h h h h h h Some divide this seven and twentieth verse and joyn the latter part of it because he is the Son of man to the verse following and read it in this sense and juncture Because he is the Son of man Marvail not at this that is Marvail not at this that I speak although ye see me to be a man c. And thus readeth the Syriack and Chrysostome and some that follow him And Chrysostome the rather upon this ground because Paulus Samosatenus abused the verse pointed as we have it to the denial of the Godhead of Christ making this argument upon it If authority to execute judgment was given to Christ because he was the son of man then had he not this power of himself as God To which Chrysostome gave this answer If the Father gave authority of judging unto the Son upon this ground and reason because he was man then by the same reason all men should have the same authority for they are men likewise And so it appeareth that he was strained to point the verse as he did joyning that clause Because he is the Son of man to the verse following that he might avoid the dint of the Hereticks argument which had been more fairely fenced against and without straining the Text had the term The Son of man been cautelously interpreted and the dispensations of the Father to the Son as he was the Messias observed As for the pointing that we follow joyning the clause Because he is the Son of man to the words preceding and not to those that follow it is plainly cleared and asserted by the very sense and construction of the place it self And with all it hath this consent and concurrence of antiquity Augustinus eam distinctionem sequitur quam ille Chrysost. Samosateno tribuit they are the words of Beza ut plane appareat Latinam Ecclesiam semper ita legisse Consentiunt veteres omnes Graeci codices quos vidimus Cyrillus quoque non aliter distinguit To which I may add Nec aliter distinguit Arabs for the Arabick pointeth also as we do because he is the son of man 28. Marvail not at this for the hour is coming in which all that are
doth hereby more clearly open that mystery of God in Christ than if he had spoken only of believing himself or only of believing the Father 2. There are some that conceive that he speaketh of believing him that sent him rather than of believing him himself that by this humble reference of all to God he might make his speech more accceptable to the hearers 3. Compare this passage with Exod. 20. 19. and Deut. 18. 16 17 18. His expression of passing from death to life seemeth to refer either to the doom upon Adams not hearkening to the voice of God thou shalt die the death or to the codition under which every man is left by the Law namely under a curse from which hearkning to the voice of the Gospel is deliverance Or it may be it is spoken in some parallel to the case of the man healed for he by hearkening to the Word of Christ received health of body so whosoever heareth his Word obtains life of the Soul And thus doth Christ still make good the word that he had spoken to the man for a dispensation with the Sabbath and argueth that he might do such a thing because he was to give the Law and Word of the New Testament as the Father had done of the Old and sheweth that though violation of the Sabbath deserved and had been punished with death yet obedience to his Word and Command was discharge and a passing from death to life Vers. 25. The hour is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voyce of the Son of God c. 1. These words are most generally understood as aiming at those dead that Christ raised by his voyce or word to life again as saying to Jairus daughter Talitha Kumi to the widdows son of Naim Young man arise and to Lazarus Lazarus come forth And being taken in such a relation the connexion of them to the words going immediately before lyeth thus Christ had spoken there of his spiritual reviving whosoever should believe his Word and here he either produceth a proof and evidence of what he had there spoken or else alledgeth it as another wonder and virtue of his power that by his voyce he would raise those that were bodily deceased And he ascribeth this reviving to the hearing of his voyce partly because he had ascribed the spiritual reviving to the hearing of his Word and partly to distinguish his rasing of those dead from the raising of those that were revived under the Old Testament for they were not raised by a word but by other applications 1 King 17. 21. 2 King 4. 34. 13. 21. 2. It was the opinion of the Jews that there should be a resurrection in the days of Messias The Chaldee Paraphrast glosseth Hos. 6. 2. thus He will revive us in the days of consolation Luke 2. 25. which are to come in the day of the Resurrection of the dead And Hos. 14. 8. thus They shall be gathered out of their captivity they shall sit under the shadow of their Messias and the dead shall revive and good shall be multiplyed on the Earth And Esay 49. 9. I give thee for a Covenant to the people to raise the righteous that lye in the dust And Kimchi on Esay 26. 19. The Holy blessed God will raise the dead at the time of deliverance And in Jer. 23. 20. In that he saith Ye shall consider it and not They shall consider it it intimateth the Resurrection of the dead in the days of the Messias And on Ezek. 37. It may be God shewed Ezekiel the vision of the dead bones reviving to signifie to him that he would raise the dead of Israel at the time of deliverance that they also might see the deliverance Ab. Ezr. in Dan. 12. 2. The righteous that dyed in the captivity shall revive when the Redeemer cometh c. And this was so far the opinion of the Nation that they understood the term The World to come of the state of glory and yet of the days of Messias as shall be shewed when we meet with that phrase Now there was a Resurrection in the days of the Messias accordingly not only of those three that have been named but also of divers Saints whose graves were opened and bodies arose Mat. 27. 52. And if the words that we have in hand be applyed to the raising of dead in a bodily sense they may most properly be pointed to that Resurrection which was so parellel to the expectation of the Jews and Christ asscribing such a matter to himself doth prove himself to be the Messias even they and their own opinion being Judges 3. But the raising of the dead is taken in Scripture also in a borrowed sense namely for the reviving and quickning of those that were dead in trespasses and sins c. as Ephes. 2. 1. And that sense doth seem more agreeable to this place because our Saviour in the verse before doth apparently speak of such spiritual reviving The calling in of the Gentiles to the Gospel is called a Resurrection in divers places of the Scripture as Esa. 26. 19. Thy dead men shall live together with my Body they shall rise awake and sing ye that dwell in the dust for thy dew is as the dew of herbs and the Earth shall cast out her dead What dead these are that were to rise with Christs body from the dead is not so much intimated in that passage of the Evangelist The bodies of divers Saints arose Matth. 27. 52. as in that saying of our Saviour There shall no sign be given them but the sign of Jonah the Prophet By which he doth not only signifie his own death and Resurrection but he doth also gall the Jews with an intimation of the calling of the Gentiles upon his Resurrection as the Ninivites were called upon Jonahs Resurrection out of the grave of the Whales belly And that dew of his that should inliven men as the dew doth herbs is the dew of the Doctrine of the Gospel as Deut. 32. 2. And so likewise Hos. 6. 2. speaketh to the very same tenor of Christs raising the dead in a spiritual sense upon his own Resurrection which was on the third day And so is the Resurrection in Ezek. 37. plainly expounded in that very chapter to be in a spiritual sense and so the Apostle construes it Rom. 11. 15. Amd the calling of the Gentiles is styled the first Resurrection Rev. 20. 5. c. That Christ meaneth the dead and the raising of the dead in this sense in this place might be argued upon these observations 1. Because throughout his speech hitherto and some steps further the scope of his discourse is namely to prove his all powerful rule and disposal of the affairs under the Gospel equal to what the Father had under the Law of which the calling of the Gentiles was one of the most eminent and remarkable 2. Because as was said before his very last words preceding were of passing
from death to life in a spiritual sense which argues that he intends the same sense here 3. In that he ascribeth reviving to his Voice here as he did there to his Word 4. Because he distinguisheth upon hearing his voice The dead shall hear it and as many as hear it shall live which is applicable a great deal more fairly to the bare and to the effectual hearing of the Gospel than to dead in corporal sense And 5. lastly Because there are so great things spoken of the calling of the Gentiles in the Scripture and of Christs work about that matter and their Heathenish condition so expresly called death and their imbracing the Gospel a resurrection that when Christ is speaking of his actings in the New Testament and useth such words as these before us we may not unproperly apply them in that sense It would have prevented many controversies and not a few errors if the Phrases the last days and the day of the Lord and the end and new Heavens and new Earth and the dead raised c. had been cautelously understood and as the Scripture means them in several places But as for the raising of the dead in the verse in hand it needeth not very much curiosity to fix it to either of those as a determinate sense since taken either way that hath been mentioned it carries a fair construction most agreeable to the truth and not very disagreeable to the scope and context Vers. 26. For as the Father hath life in himself so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself It is needless to dispute here how far the second person in the Trinity may be said to have or not to have his being of himself for the words do not consider him simply as the second person but as the Messias God and Man as is the tenour of speech all along And in this acceptation we may give the words this construction 1. That they are a Paraphrase upon the name Jehovah which betokeneth Gods eternal being in himself and his giving of being to the Creature and that they mean that as the Father is Jehovah so also hath he given to the Son the Messias that name above all names as Philip. 2. 9. to be owned and worshipped for Jehovah having life in himself as being the eternal and living God and having the disposal of life in his power as being the God of all living 2. That as the Father is the eternal and immortal God so also is the Messias and though he stand there before the Sanhedrin in humane appearance yet should he never see corruption as Psalm 16. 10. but declare himself mightily to be the Son of God and to have life in himself by his raising himself from the dead Rom. 1. 4. Being the first and last He that liveth though he died and is alive for evermore Amen and hath the Keys of Hell and death at his disposal Rev. 1. 17 18. 3. As the words before may be applied to Christs raising from the dead those that were either bodily or spiritually deceased so these are a reason and proof of that assertion because as the Father hath the absolute disposal of life in his own power so hath he given to the Messias the same disposal Vers. 27. And hath given him authority to execute Iudgment also because he is the Son of Man By this passage it is apparent in what sense our Saviour useth the term The Son and The Son of God all along this discourse namely for the Son of God as he was also the Son of Man or the Messias There hath been some scruple made as was mentioned before upon the reason given of Christs authority of Judging namely because he was the Son of Man which will be removed by rightly stating the sense of the Son of Man which we may take up in these three particulars 1. The Phrase the Son of Man may be taken to signifie simply A Man and then the words are to be understood in this sense He hath given him authority of judging because he is a man and then is the reason current and apparent under this construction First Because the Son of God humbled himself and became man for the redemption of man therefore the Lord hath given him authority to be judge of man as Phil. 2. 8 9. And secondly He hath given the Messias authority of judging because he is man that man might be judged by one in his own nature as Act. 17. 31. He hath appointed a day in which he will judge the World in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained whereof he hath given assurance unto all men in that he hath raised him from the dead 2. The title The Son of Man which our Saviour so oft applieth to himself in the Gospel doth not speak him barely A Man but it owns him as that singular and peculiar seed of the woman or Son of Man that was promised to Adam to be a repairer of ruined mankind and the destroyer of the works of Satan as the term hath been cleared before And in this construction the reason of Christs authority of judging because he was the Son of Man is yet cleared further namely because he was the Son of that promise the Heir of the world and Redeemer of mankind and Destroyer of Devils therefore the Lord did give authority to him to be Lord of the World and Judge of Men and Devils to destroy the Serpent and his seed that were his enemies and to perfect and save the holy seed that should believe in him and obey him and to do and order all things here in this world that were in tendency either to the one or the other end 3. The Messias is thus charactered in Dan. 7. 13 14. Behold one like the Son of man came with the clouds of Heaven and came to the antient of days and they brought him near before him And there was given him dominion and glory and a Kingdom that all people nations and languages should serve him Upon which words R. Saadias glosseth thus This is Messias our righteousness But is it not written concerning the Messias lowly and riding upon an Ass Because he shall come in humility and not in pomp riding upon Horses And with the Clouds of Heavens meaneth the Angels the Host of Heaven this is the abundance of greatness which the Creator shall give unto the Messias c. Our Saviour in the words that we are upon seemeth to point at those words of Daniel and whereas it was confessed by the Nation that the Son of Man there spoken of to whom all Dominion was given was the Messias he doth here plainly aver that it was himself and that all Authority and Judicature was given him because he was the Son of Man Observe how purposely he changeth expressions In ver 25. He speaketh of raising the dead by the voice of the Son of God and here of executing judgment because he is the Son
now in Capreae having forsaken the City living in all filthiness and cruelty 770. Divers cruelties ibid. Strange accusing 771. The boldness of Sejanus and Terentius 772. Divers cruelties more and other occurrencies ibid. Tiberius troubled in mind 773. Among the Jews A Commotion among them occasioned by Pilate ibid. Occurrences in the year of Christ XXXIV Tiberius XIX In the Church Hellenists murmuring against the Hebrews Act. 6. Seven Deacons chosen And their office 777. c. Stephen Martyred 780 c. Act. 7. Bitter persecution against the whole Church 785. Act. 8. Dispersion of the hundred and eight upon the Persecution ibid. Samaria receiveth the Gospel 786. Simon Magus ibid. The Holy Ghost given by imposition of hands 787. The Ethiopian Eunuch converted 789 c. Paul converted and baptized ibid. Act. 9. to ver 10. In the Empire Velleius Paterculus flourisheth 795. Troubles in Rome about Usury 796 c. Tiberius still most bloudily cruel ibid. Strang accusations among the People ibid. Marius and his daughter wrongfully slaughtered ibid. The miserable end of Asinius Gallus and Nerva ibid. The miserable end of Agrippin◠and Drusius ibid. Other Massacres ibid. Occurrences in the Year of Christ XXXV Tiberius XX. In the Church No particular occurrence of the Church mentioned this year 801. In the Empire Tiberius Reign proclaimed for ten years longer and the Consuls punished for it ibid. Many cruelties of the Emperour 802. A feigned Drusus ib. Among the Jews A commotion and slaughter of them caused by Pilate 803 Philip the Tetrach of Trachonitis dyeth ib. Occurrences in the year of Christ XXXVI Tiberius XXI In the Church No particular Occurrence mentioned this year Among the Jews Vitellius Governour of Judea he cometh to Jerusalem is courteous to the Iews 809. Caiaphas removed from the High Priesthood 810. In the Empire A Rebellion in Parthia ib. Tiberius still cruel and shameless 811. Occurrences in the year of Christ XXXVII Tiberius XXII In the Church Paul cometh to Jerusalem 813. Act. 9. vers 23 c. to vers 32. The Disciples afraid of him 814. Persecution lasteth yet ib. Paul presented to the Apostles preacheth boldly is persecuted and goeth to Tarsus 815. In the Empire The Parthian War yet uncomposed 816 817. Artabanus restored to his Kingdom ib. A commotion in Cappadocia ib. Cruelties at Rome ib. Mishaps there through fire and water ib. The death of Thrasyllus the Astrologer ib. Among the Jews A commotion in Samaria 818 c. Pilate put out of Office ib. Agrippa his journey to Rome ib. His imprisoment there ib. War betwixt Herod the Tetrach and Aretas King of Arabia ib. Occurrences in the year of Christ XXXVIII Tiberius XXIII Being also the first year of Caius No particular Occurrence of the Church specified this year In the Empire Macro all base 823. A wicked woman 824. Preparations of War against Aretas 825 c. An Omen to Agrippa in Chains ib. Tiberius near his end ib. His choice of a successor ib. Tiberius his Death ib. Caius his successor ib. Tiberius in a manner cruel being dead ib. Agrippa in perplexity and enlarged 825 c. His dissimulation ib. He beginneth to shew himself in his own colours ib. His cruelty ib. Young Tiberius brought to a miserable end ib. Occurrences in the year of Christ XXXIX Caius II. No Occurrence of the Church mentioned this year In the Empire Cruelties at Rome 831. An end of Macro 832. Among the Jews Great troubles of the Jews in Alexandria 832 c. Agrippa at Alexandria abused ib. A Pageant of one and more madmen ib. Sad outrages upon the Jews ib. Caius will be a God ib. More of their Miseries ib. Agrippa in his own kingdom ib. Yet more Occurrences in the Empire Caius the new God little better than a Devil 836 c. Many and many cruelties of his ib. Occurrences in the year of Christ XL. Caius III. In the Church Peter visiting divers parts 839 840. Act. 9. ver 32. Yet not at Antioch in this visitation ib. Dorcas raised 841. Act. 10. Cornelius converted 842. The keys of the kingdom of Heaven now only used 845. The Holy Ghost given to the Gentiles 847. In the Empire Caius still cruel 848 c. A most inhumane cruelty ib. Caius his luxury and prodigality ib. His strange bridge of Ships ib. His covetousness ib. Among the Jews Herod and Herodias before the Emperour 852. The Alexandrian Jews still perplexed ib. Flaccus his downfall ib. The Jews still distressed for all that ib. Occurrences in the year of Christ XLI Caius Caligula IV. In the Chuhch Antioch receiveth the Gospel 855. Barnabas cometh thither ib. Act. 11. ver 19. to ver 26. Among the Jews Troubles at Jamnia 856 c. Caius his image to be set up in the Temple causing troubles ib. Petronius his Letter hereupon to the Emperour ib. Agrippa his mediation for the Jews ib. Flaccus Avilius his end ib. The Ambassadors of the Alexandrian Jews before the Emperour Apion ib. Philo the Jew and his Writings ib. In the Empire Caius still foolish and cruel 862. Caius profane ib. Occurrences in the year of Christ XXII Caius V. Claudius I. In the Empire Caius his death contrived 865 c. The manner of his death ib. The sequel ib. Dissention about the government ib. Claudius ib. Caesonia and her child slain ib. Claudius made Emperour ib. His demeanour at the beginning ib. In the Church The name of Christian first used 871. Act. 11. ver 26. Among the Jews The Theraputae 872. The affairs of the Jews in Alexandria and Babylonia ib. The rebellion of some Jews ib. Occurrences in the year of Christ XLIII Claudius II. In the Church A famine in Judea and all the world 877. Paul rapt into the third heaven ib. Act. 11. ver 28. Peter not this year at Rome 888. Among the Jews Herod Agrippa his coming to Jerusalem 879 c. Imperial acts in behalf of the Jews ib. Peter not imprisoned this second year of Claudius ib. In the Empire The Moors subdued 881. Claudius beginneth to be cruel and his Empress Messalina wicked ib. Occurrences in the year of Christ XLIV Claudius III. In the Church The martyrdomn of James the great 883. Concerning the Apostles Creed 884. Concerning Traditions 885. Peters imprisonment and delivery ib. In the Empire Some actions of Claudius 887. Messalina abominably wicked ib. An expedition into England ib. A whorish trick of Messalina ib. Among the Jews The fatal end of Herod Agrippa 889. THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES CHAP. I. Vers. 1. The former Treatise have I made c. THE Syrian and Arabick render it The former * * * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by which word they render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Matth. 1. 1. book have I written and so is the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 used in Heathen Authors not only for an oration by word of mouth but also for a Treatise or Discourse that
might have had the rule alone and yet he was unwilling that Caius should go without it seeming to divide his affections betwixt the two whereas his chief thoughts and respects were to his own self But Caius whom the Gods had cast upon it as his foolish auspicium perswaded him must be the man though he read in his nature the very bane of the Empire and yet for affection sake too must young Tiberius be joynt heir with him though he foresaw and foretold that Caius should murder him A monstrous policy to lay his own grandchild for a bait for those jaws that he knew would devour him and this was that by that present cruelty of Caius his own cruelties that were past might be forgotten and the talk of that might not give room to talk of old Tiberius This was that pretended care that he had of the Commonwealth to be sure to leave one behind him that should be worse than himself that by his greater wickedness his own might be lessened and that himself might seem to be less vitious by the others vitiousness above him Yet giveth he counsel to Caius inciting him to goodness which he himself could never follow and exhorting him to tenderness towards young Tiberius which in his heart he was reasonably indifferent whether he followed or no. §. 3. His death Charicles the Doctor gave notice of his death approaching to Caius and Macro though he stole this judgment and conjecture but by a sleight For sitting with the Emperor at a Banquet and taking on him some earnest and speedy occasion to be gone to some other place he rose from the Table and pretending to take the Emperors hand to kiss he closely and stealingly tried his Pulse which Tiberius perceiving but not expressing so much caused him to take his place again and the Banquet to be renewed and him to set out the meal But when the Doctor was got loose from the Table and was come to Caius and Macro and the rest of the adorers of that imperial Sun that was now waiting when he should rise he resolved them that his end drew on apace and was not many days off And then was all preparation for the new Emperor when the last gaspe should remove the old But he that had used so much dissimulation all his life dissembled even in his dying For fainting and swooning so very sore that all conceived he was departed and Caius and all his favorites were gone forth to take possession of his new Empire suddenly the tune is turned and news comes forth that Tiberius is revived and calleth for meat Macro that had often been his instrument of cruelty upon others turns the faculty now upon himself and in stead of meat stopt his mouth with a pillow or with heaping cloaths upon his face and so he died There are indeed diversities of opinion about the manner of his death some saying it was thus as is mentioned others that it was by poyson others that it was by being denied meat in the intermission of his â—its others that he rose out of his bed and fell on the floor no body being near him all which are mentioned by Suetonius It is not much material what his end was that that is first named is most intertained and certainly it suiteth very well with his deservings and it is some wonder that he came to such an end no sooner He died the seventeenth of the Calends of April or the sixteenth of March or if Dion may have his will the seventh and so the rest of that year is accounted the first of Caius SECT 4. CAIUS AN evil Emperor is gone but a worse is to succeed him Caius the son of Germanicus a bad child of a good father inheriting the love and favour of the people for his fathers sake till he forfeited it by his reserving the qualities of Tiberius He was surnamed Caligula from a garb that he wore in the Camp in which he was bred and educated from whence he had the love of the Souldiers till his barbarous nature lost it It may seem incredible that a worse disposition should ever be found than that of Tiberius but the old Politician saw that this was so much beyond it that it would do him credit some impute the fault to his bloody Nurse one Pressilla a Campanian the custom of which Country it was that the women when they were to give their children suck they first anointed the Nipple with the blood of an Hedg-hog to the end their children might be the more fierce and cruel This woman was as savage above the rest of the Nation as they were above other women for her breasts were all hairy over like the beards of men and her activity and strength in martial exercises inferiour to few of the Infantry of Rome One day as she was giving Caligula the Pap being angry at a young child that stood by her she took it and tore it in pieces and with the blood thereof anointed her breasts and so set her nursling Caius to suck both blood and milk But had not his infancy been educated in such a Butchery the school of his youth had been enough to have habituated him to mischief For being brought up in the sight and at the elbow of Tiberius it would have served to have corrupted the best nature that could be but this of his was either never good or at least was spoiled long before Yet had he reasonably well learned his Tutors art of dissimulation so that he hid those Serpentine conditions not only before Tiberius his death but also a while after he had obtained the Empire Only he that had taught him to weave this mantle of dissembling could spie through it insomuch that he would profess That Caius lived for the destruction of him and all others And that he hatched up a snake for the Roman Empire and a Phaeton for all the world And it proved so both to him and them For when Tiberius lay a gasping stifled with a pillow prest upon him he also throtled him with his hand and crucified one of his servants that cried out upon the hideousness of the fact And as for his demeanor toward the State a little time will give too lamentable witness §. 5. Tiberius in a manner cruel being dead How welcom news the tydings of Tiberius death were at Rome may be easily conjectured by any that hath observed his cruelties before Some cried out Tiberius into Tiber some to the hurdle and Tyburne some to one thing some to another using the more liberty of their Tongues against the Tyrant now by how much they had been tied up the straiter whilst he lived Nor did the remembrance of his former cruelties only cause them to rejoyce for his death but a present cruelty as if he were bloody being dead made him the more odious to them than alive For certain men that were but lately condemned and their execution day falling upon the very day when
tydings of his death came to the City for the Senate did ever allow ten days for the condemned persons after their sentence before their end the poor men emplored the aid and comfort of every one they met because Caius to whom they should have sued was not in the City but they were haled away by the Executioners and strangled §. 6. Agrippa in a perplexity and inlarged Agrippa was partaker of the common joy but withal of some mixture of misery for such variety of fortune had he tasted ever and now must he have a farewel to such vicissitudes Marsyas his freeman hearing the rumour in the City runneth with all speed to certifie his Master and finding him with some company in the ways toward the Bath he beckneth to him with this speech in the Hebrew Tongue The Lion is dead With which tydings Agrippa was so transported with joy that the Centurion his Keeper perceived it and inquiring the reason and being told it by Agrippa he rejoyced with him for the news and looseth him from his Bonds But as they were at Supper there cometh a contrary report that Tiberius was alive and would ere long be in the City What now think you is become of the heart and mettle of Agrippa and his Centurion Both had done enough by this their present joy to procure their endless sorrow and his Keeper the worse of the two but Agrippa must smart for all for the present He therefore casts him into irons again and committeth him to a surer Guard than before And thus as his too much eagerness of Tiberius his death had imprisoned him before even so doth it now but the next morning puts him into life again for the rumor of the old Emperours death is confirmed by Letters from the new and a special Warrant cometh from him for the inlarging of Agrippa out of Prison to the house where he had used to live before §. 7. Caius cometh to Rome The Corps of the dead Tyrant is carried by the Souldiers into the City Caius himself in mourning apparel following the Hearse and there he maketh his Funeral Oration and performeth his Obsequies with great pomp and solemnity And on the very day of his comming to Town he had enlarged Agrippa but that the advice of Antonia perswaded him to hold a while lest the people should suspect that he was glad of the death of Tiberius if he should so sodainly set free one that he had committed for an enemy But within a few days he is inlarged and sent for home unto him And there is he trimmed his garments changed and he crowned King of the Tetrarchies of Philip and Lysanias and his chain of iron and of his bondage changed for a chain of Gold of the same weight This is that King Agrippa that slew James and imprisoned Peter and is called Herod Acts 12. §. 8. Caius his dissembling Caius his beginnings were plausible and popular dissembling his cursed dispositions under such crafty colours that the people were transported with so happy a change as they supposed and 160000 Sacrifices were slain for gratulation in his three first months His tears for Tiberius his piety to his dead Mother and Brother his respect to his living Sisters his fair words to the Senate and as fair carriage to the people his paying of Legacies his inlarging of Prisoners his remitting of offences his reviving of good Laws c. made the people to forget either in what School of dissimulation he had been brought up or how soon so great advancement corrupteth men of little education and it made them vainly to hope that they had a Germanicus because they had his son and that a good Prince could be bequeathed to them by Tiberius Yet could he not hide the ilness of his disposition under all these cloaks and coverts of dissembling for presently upon his coming to the City he disanulled the will of Tiberius that he might nullifie the authority of his partner of the same name in the rule and Empire And yet did he pay all the Legacies of old Tiberius with bountiful additions of his own which shewed that he disliked the will only because of partnership of Tiberius the younger Having thus the whole sway and dominion devolved upon himself by the outing of his poor Cousin for the Senate was made and packed by Macro for such a purpose he was received with as much joy and applause as was possible to express upon the old memory of his Father and the present expectation of himself Nor was this jocundness confined in the narrow bonds of Rome and Italy but dilated it self through all the Empire in every corner where the hoped benefit and happy fruit of so great an expectation would have come had it proved right Every Country City and Town was poured forth into exultation and festivity with a common joy in this common hope Now could you have seen nothing but Altars Offerings Sacrifices Feasts Revels Banquets Plays Dancings merry Faces crowned Heads singing Tongues and joyful Hearts that the World seemed to be ravished besides it self and all misery to be banished out of it and all the thoughts of a changing fortune utterly forgot Had Tiberius but spied this work out of his Coffin how would he have laughed for company to behold this deludedness of the people and dissimulation of the Prince And thus lasted this musick and masking for his first seven months in which the new Emperor behaved himself with that moderation and bravery as if vertue it self had been come among them In the eighth month a grievous sickness seized upon him and then was all this mirth and melody turned to mourning and lamentation each man sorrowful and women bemoaning as if all the world had been sick as well as he Now was their songs turned into Tears their revelling into Prayers and their festivals to Vows for his recovery Nay so far did some strain the expression of their affections that they vowed their heads and lives for his restoring Nor could the people be so much blamed for this their sorrow as pitied for being thus deceived nor could it so much be wondred at that they were deceived as it was wonderful that he could so deceive For who could have chosen but have erred their error that had seen what they beheld and who could have brought them into such an error but such a one as he who was both a Caius and a scholar of Tiberius When he paid the Legacies of Tiberius he also discharged those of Julia which Tiberius had stopped and added a considerable sum of his own bounty He gathered the ashes of his Mother and Brother and committed them to their Urne with his own hands choosing a tempestuous season purposely when he travailed about that business that his piety might be blown about the more and he instituted annual Festivals for them Nor must his Father Germanicus be forgotten nor indeed could he nor did he deserve it for his memory therefore
is man deserted and left unto himself that he will be a God when he is in the next form to a Devil The plain and rustick Gaule hit him right and spake but the truth when seeing him in these his postures of his foolish Diety and laughing and being asked by Caius what he thought of him that he laughed he answered boldly and escaped with it That he seemed to him to be a great folly § 6. The miseries of the Alexandrian Jews How these manners of the Prince might redound to the calamity of the Jews who would worship no God but their own it is easie to guess by the common advantages that are always taken in the like cases by men that are armed with power and weaponed with malice As this humour of the Emperour was blown up with flattery and blasphemous clawing at home so was it soon blazoned and divulged abroad and they that delighted in many Gods it was good contentment to have them all met in the Center of the new God all-God their Prince But what will become of the Jews the only opposers of such impiety and what especially of the Alexandrian Jews whose tragedy was begun already This opportunity suited with the spiteful desires of their adversaries as their adversaries themselves could have desired For now thinks Flaccus he may ingratiate himself to Caesar indeed by being ungratious to the Jews and now have the Alexandrians a double forwarding beside their own malice their Governour and their Prince First Flaccus deprived the Jews of their Synagogues Oratories and houses of prayer and therewith as much as in him lay of their Religion then of the benefit of the City and Country Laws proclaiming them strangers and forreigners and at last gave free and open liberty to the Alexandrians to use their wills upon them in what manner and measure their malice thought meet And now their Tragedy begins The Jews in the City were above two parts of five the Alexandrians driving them out of their own houses and ransacking the houses as they went they force them into a strait place of the City where they had not room to stir one for another much less to make any orderly battalia for defence of themselves or for resistance In this strait both of place and fortune it is no wonder if they speedily suffered famine who had nothing of their sustenance left them unless they would have devoured one another Here are many mouths and no meat and great complaining but no relief Plenty enough there was in the City but none for them and abundance of every thing necessary but pity The poor crowded straved and distressed people those that had any hope or courage to shift for themselves streak abroad and steal forth of their inclosure for food and fresh air some to the shore some into the City some one way some another but the misery of them also was no less than theirs that staid impounded but that it was not so lingring For wheresoever they were caught as no where could they go but descried they were either stoned clubbed or burned to death yea often man wife children and whole families so murdred all of a heap Some they smoaked and choaked to death in a fire where they wanted fewel to burn them out some they haled with ropes tied about their ankles up and down the streets till they were dead and then neither spared they the dead bodies but mangled them in pieces Their Synagogues they all burnt down with the loss also of some of the Alexandrians houses adjoyning their houses they defaced and their lives they took away when and wheresoever they could catch them Flaccus in this bloodiness had done enough by connivance and toleration but he is not content with this passive tyranny unless he be an actor himself in the Scene and be not behind other in this mischief as he was before them in authority Eight and thirty of their Judges and Counsellors for a Senate of their own was tolerated by Augustus and allowed them he sendeth for by his officers and binding their hands behind them causeth them thus to be led along the streets for a derision and then caused them to be publickly scourged some to death some to the lingring out of a miserable life He caused also a pretended search to be made throughout all the Jews houses for armour pretending a suspicion of their insurrection but intending thereby to give the Souldiers the more advantage for their pillaging and oppression He spared neither age nor sex against whom he could take an occasion or find cavil nor reverenced he any festival for their execution nor omitted any kind of cruelty for their torture Here is the first smarting blow to count of that this nation felt since they called for the blood of the just one upon themselves and upon their children and some of this City were nimble agents for the comapssing of the death of his first Matyr Steven Act. 6. 9. § 7. Agrippa in his own Kingdom You may well presume that the stay of Agrippa would not be long at Alexandria where his intertainment was so foul and his invitation to his own home was so fair and good His welcome thither was not so full of scorn and disgrace as in the other place but as full of unkindness because the unkindness was from his own sister Herodias the incestuous wife of Herod the Tetrarch and once some comfort to this her brother whilest he was in distress growes now the bitter envier of his prosperity A woman ever active to the mischief of others but now beginning to twine a whip for her own back It griveth her to see the unlooked for pomp of the new King Agrippa A man that had so lately been under the hatches of fortune and in her bilboes debt and danger that had but the other day fled from his wife country and friends for poverty and shame unable to pay the monies that he ought and which was worse as unable to borrow more and now he is returned again with a Kingdom a Crown and with pomp and train agreeable to both Oh how this grated her haughty and emulative spirit though he were her brother Well whether it were in spite to his promotion or in disdain to her degree that was now below him which is the more like the shower and storms of her discontents do shower upon her husband She lays in his dish the present spectacle of Agrippa's glory and his own inferioritie Taxeth him with dulness and sleepiness that would not seek for a higher dignity which might be had for a journey to Rome twitteth him for being an underling when he might prevent it perswadeth him to spare no cost nor travail for that prevention and in fine worketh so with him by uncessant clamours that though he could well have been contented to have sitten quiet at home yet he is induced or driven to travail and she with him to Rome to Caius Agrippa was not unacquainted
with her discontents and with both their designs and will not be far behind in reciprocal requital of such intentions but their meeting pleading and success at Rome must be reserved to another year PART III. The Roman Story again § Caius the new God little better than a Devil AFTER the sight of the goodly Godship of the Emperour shewed in little a little before let us take him now as he is indeed little better than a Devil A man the shame and confusion of men if he may be called a man and so far beyond the vices of any that had gone before that he seemed to live to no other purpose than to shew what the utmost extent of vitiousness could do in the utmost height of power and liberty You would wonder but that his defiance of the Gods doth lessen that wonder how scornfully and despitefully he used the memory and persons of his ancestors sisters kindred and best friends He charged Augustus with incest Livia with base birth Tiberius but with what he deserved his own mother with bastardize and whosoever was most near and most honour to him with some ignominy and reproach or other But such words were curtesies in comparison of his actions All his sisters he first deflowred and then prostituted them to others being so deslowred But his darling sister Drusilla sped somewhat better if that better were not as bad To her he continued his affection of love or lust whether you will while she continued in life and when she was dead he made her the means of his profit as he had done before of his pleasure she was the wife of M. Lepidus but still the whore of her brother Cains and after her death he made her a Goddess whom all her life long he had made his harlot Altars Statues Vowes Festivals were ordained for her and Livius Geminius played the knight o' th post and swore devoutly that he saw her ascend to heaven and conversing with the Gods Such a Deity had the Romans never known before but only her brother and she troubled them as much in her heaven as he did on the earth For now was it impossible for any man so to behave himself but he was intrapped on the one hand or the other about this new found Goddess To mourn for her death it was criminal because she was a Deity and to rejoyce for her Deity was capital because she was dead so that betwixt this Dilemma of piety tears and devotion that man was very wary indeed that suffered not inhumanity and violence For to laugh feast bath sing or dance was mortal because the Emperours sister and darling was dead and yet to mourn or sorrow for her death was as deadly because she was immortal This last stale did he make of this his deceased sister when she would now serve him for no other use that both sorrow for her mortality and joy for her being immortal did alike bring in mony to his treasures which were now almost drained of his many millions either by bribes for the saving of the life of some or by consiscation upon the death of others But how must he do now for another Paramor after his dear Drusilla Why that needeth not to breed any great difficulty when his unbridled lust is not very curious of his choice and his as unbridled power might choose as it list He first married Lollia Paullina the wife of C. Memmius sending for her from another country where her husband was General of the Army and all the reason of this his choice was because he was told that her grandmother was an exceeding great beauty but he soon put her away again and forbad that any should touch her for ever after him Next came Caesonia into his affections and there contined a mother of three children and of more age than beauty but of a lasciviousness and beastiality so well befitting his that now he had met with his match and it was pity they should have missed meeting He would sometimes shew her to the Souldiers in armour and sometimes to his friends stark naked transforming her by these vicissitudes into two extreams equally unbefitting her sex to a man and to a beast By her he had a Daughter whom he named Julia Drusilla and whom he brought to the shrines of all the Goddesses in Rome and at last committed to the lap of Minerva for her tutorage and education But this his behaviour is nothing in comparison of that which followed He slew divers of the Senate and yet afterward cited them to appear as if they had been alive and in the end pretended that they had died by their own hands others came off with a scourging and so they escaped with life but he caused the Souldiers to tread on them as they lay and as they whipped them that they might have them at the more command And thus he used some of all ranks and degrees Being disturbed at midnight one night by the noise of some that were getting places in the Circus against the next day he fell upon them with Clubs and slew twenty Knights as many matrons and an infinite company of the common people He threw a great multitude of old men and decrepit housholders to the wild beasts that he might rid such unserviceable men as he thought them out of the way and he caused the granaries to be often shut up that they that had escaped the wild beasts might perish with famine He used to fatten the beasts that he desired to have fed with the inhumane diet of humane bodies yet alive that thereby he might save other charges Many men he first mangled and maimed and then condemned to the mines or to the wild beasts or to little-â—ase-prisons and some he caused to be sawed in sunder He forced parents to be present at the execution of their children and for one that could not come to such a miserable spectacle he sent a letter and another he invited to a feast after he had caused him to be a spectator of the execution of his own Son One of the masters of his games that had offended him he kept in chains and caused him to be beaten every day before his face till the offensiveness and stench of his wounded brain obtained his death A Roman Knight being cast by him to the wild beasts and crying out of the injustice done to him he caused to be taken out again and his tongue to be cut out and then he cast him to them again He caused all the banished men that were in the Islands about Italy to be slain at once because having asked one that was banished in the time of Tiberius what he did all the time of his exile and he answered that he prayed continually for the death of Tiberius and the succession of Caius he thought that all the present exiles prayed for his death likewise Every tenth day he caused an execution to be had of those that were condemned boasting and
Apostle or Antioh a chief Church above others more than by humane preferring or Antioch yet a Church and were all these proved which never will be yet is the inference or argumentation thereupon but of small value and validity 6. His last Argument is from Authorities which at last he gathereth into the Center of a Councel at Rome pag. 332. But Amicus Plato amicus Aristoteles magis amica veritas As for his answers to Eusebius that calleth Evodius the first Bishop of Antioch his answer to Ignatius that saith he was placed there by the Apostels more than one and to Onuphrius that maketh Peter Bishop of Rome before he was Bishop of Antioch be they referred to the perusal of his own Text for the matter is not worth the labour of examining them Vers. 32. Lydda This seemeth to be the same with Lod 1 Chron. 8. 12. A City in the Tribe of Benjamin mentioned Ezra 2. 33. Vers. 35. Saron Heb. Sharon A fertile valley famous in Scriptures as 1 Chron. 27. 29. Esa. 33. 9. Cant. 2. 1 c. where the Targum renders it the garden of Eden and the LXX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a field or plain the masculine Article sheweth it is not named of a City And so do the LXX article it Esa. 33. 9. There is mention of a Sharon beyond Jordan 1 Chron. 5. 16. inhabited about by Gileadites by which it seemeth it was a common name for plain champion grounds wheresoever Vers. 36. Tabitha which by interpretation is called Dorcas Tabitha the Syriack and Dorcas the Greek do both signifie a Hind or Doe Capream as Beza renders it Now the reason why Luke doth thus render the one into the other seemeth to be because Tabitha was a Grecizing Jewesse and so was commonly called by these two names by the Syrian among the Hebrews and by the Greek among the Greeks Vers. 37. Whom when they had washed Whether it were a common custom among the Jews to wash all their dead bodies before they buried them as is concluded by many upon this place we will not insist to question nor whether it were in token of the resurrection or no as some apply it only the other application that they make hereupon I cannot pass over untouchâ—â— which is that Paul spake in reference to this custom and to that intention is this custom when he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 1 Cor. 15. 29. Else what shall they do which are baptised for the dead c. as our English reads it as if the Apostle produced this custom as an argument for the resurrection as meaning to what purpose should dead bodies be washed if not to betoken this thus he is conceived to argue whereas by the juncture of the thirtieth verse to this it seemeth that he intended a clean contrary or different thing by being baptized 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 namely being baptized so as baptism signifieth death by matyrdom or suffering for the truth as Matth. 20. 22 23. Luke 12. 50. And his arguing is to this sense if the dead rise not again what will become of those that are baptized with a martyrial baptism or that do suffer death for the profession of the truth why are they then baptized for the dead yea and why stand we in jeopardy every hour of such a baptism and matyrdom also Why do they suffer and why are we daily in danger to suffer for the truth if there be no resurrection And so the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to signifie not vice or supra but pro that is in such a sense and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to mean In such a sense as baptized meaneth dead or martyred As 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is taken in this clause 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fabius delivered the power or Army to Minucius under this intent and meaning or condition that he should not fight Plut. in Fab. § They laid her in an upper chamber This probably was the publick meeting room for the believers of that Town Dorcas being a woman of some good rank as may be conjectured by her plenteousness of good works and alms-deeds Now they purposely disposing of the dead corps that Peter if he would come might exercise a miracle upon it they lay it in that publick room that the company might be spectators of the wonder but Peter would not suffer them so to be for some singular reason vers 40. Acts X. § Some things remarkable about the calling in of Cornelius First the Gospel had now dilated it self to the very utmost bounds of the Jews territories in Canaan Judaea Samaria and Galilee had been preached to and through and now is it got to the very walls of their dominions round about And there wanteth nothing but laying the partition wall flat that the Gospel may get out unto the Gentiles and that is done in this Chapter where the great partition and distance that was betwixt Jew and Gentile is utterly removed and taken away by God himself who had first pitched and set it betwixt them Secondly the two first and mainest stones of interposition that were laid in this wall were circumcision and diet the one in the time of Abraham Gen. 17. the other in the time of Jacob Gen. 32. 32. And in reference to these two it is that they of the Circumcision contend with Peter upon his return to Jerusalem for they are grieved that he went in to men uncircumcised and ate with them Chap. 11. 3. These were the proper distinguishers betwixt Israel and other Nations for all their other Ceremonies were not so much to distinguish them from other people as to compose them among themselves and towards God they being first distinguished from others by these Of these two singularity of Dyet or Prohibition of certain meats was the more proper difference and the more strict distinctive For all the seed of Abraham was circumcised and so in regard of that Ceremony there was no difference betwixt an Ismaelite and a Jew But abstaining from such and such meats was a proprium quarto modo a singularity that differenced an Israelite from all the world besides Thirdly therefore it was most proper and of most divine reason that the liberty of eating any meats did denote and shew a liberty of conversing with any nation and that the inlarging of the one is the inlarging of the other Fourthly the first-fruits of this inlargement and entertainment beyond the partition wall is Cornelius a Convert but not a Proselyte a man that was already come in to God but not come in to the Church of Israel a man as far contrarily qualified for such a business in all humane appearance as what could be most contrary as being a Roman a Souldier a Centurion and yet he of all men chosen to be the first-fruits of the Gentiles that God herein might be the more plainly shewed to be no respecter of persons Fifthly it had been now 2210 years since the Heathen were cast
stander by have laughed to have seen the different passions of Claudius and the Souldier meet together in one like and uniform action Claudius ready to kneel to the Souldier to beg for his life and the Souldier already kneeling to Claudius to reverence his person For being drawn out and brought into the light and his face known by him and who he was he presently shews him all reverence and homage and crieth out An Emperor an Emperor with this cry they bring him out to some more of their fellows who getting him on their shoulders bring him into their Garrison the people as he went pitying him as going unto execution There he lodged that night and you may suppose that he slept but little being so divided betwixt hope and fear The Consul and Senate the next day hearing what was done send to him advise him to submit to their Government and not to disturb the State with a Monarchy again which had been so burdensom and tedious to it so long which if he should go about to do they would oppose him to their utmost strength and doubted not the assistance of the Gods in this their vindication of their liberty Verrannius and Brachus their two Legats upon this message delivered their errand with as much moving Rhetorick and intreaty as they could invent beseeching him with all the vehemency they could not to distemper the Republick again by affecting and aspiring the Monarchy which was now in a hopeful possibility of setling her tranquility and liberty to her own content But the sight of the strength and forwardness of the Souldiers that were about him made them to strain their Oratory one key higher than it may be they had either commission for at their coming sorth or any thanks for at their return For they besought him that if he would needs have the Empire that he would rather receive it from the hands of the Senate than of the Souldiers and make an entry to his Government by consent and approval and not by violence Claudius howsoever his mind stood gave a gentle answer either dissembling till he could be sure to have his own party good or indeed rather forced upon this pursuit than propense and though affecting the Majesty of the Empire yet not patient of the trouble §. 6. Caesonia and her child slain There let us leave him to study as far as his fear and the Souldiers tumult would suffer him what to resolve upon as best to be done or if he were resolved already then how to do it And let us a little step aside to the corps of Caius and there we shall see some partners with him in his death which had better relation to it than Asprenas and the other that we saw slain before Chereas not thinking it enough for the common safety and the accomplishment of his design that Caius was dead alone unless so much also of him were cut off with him as was in Caesonia his wife and her and his little child he sendeth one Lupus one of the tribunes upon this execution that nothing might remain of Caligula but his putrified memory Some were of opinion that Caesonia had been his perswasive and provocation to his mischiefs either by charms or exhortations or both others thought that she used her utmost endeavours to have reduced him to a better mind but could not prevail But were it the one or the other were she good or bad it is all one to Chereas she was Caius his wife and so must needs die for the desert of her actions if she were nought and though she were otherwise yet for the due of her relation Lupus findeth her tumbling upon the ground with the corps all besmeared with his blood and her own tears She conceiving his errand by his very person boldly invites him to accomplish what he came about which he did accordingly and withal slew the little child upon the heap And so their lieth the greatest Prince and Princess under Heaven a spectacle of misery and majesty tied up together and to be lamented in regard of these two howsoever but justly rewarded in regard of their deserts §. 7. Claudius made Emperor That rule and Monarchy that the Souldiers would have tumbled upon Claudius they cared not how Agrippa the King of whom we had mention a good while ago folded it as it were upon him fairly and smoothly that it both lay more easie for him himself and less wrinckled and rugged to the eyes of others For first coming privately to Claudius whilst he somewhat fluctuated in opinion and was ready to have yielded to the Senates propositions he setled him in a contrary resolution perswading him by no means to forsake or relinquish that fair apprehension and seisure of the dominion that was offered him Then cometh he as craftily into the Senate as if he had been a meer stranger to what was in hand and there asketh how the matter went between them and Claudius when they ingenuously laid all the business before him and demanded his counsel and advise in those affairs He subtle enough for his own ends and neither regarding their liberty nor Claudius his Monarchy so much in the matter as his own security in his Kingdom maketh fair weather to them and professeth with all solemnity to serve them in their designs to the utmost of his power But when it came to the vote what must be done and the resolution was that they must take up arms and arm their servants and compass that with the sword that they could not do with perswasions then Agrippa thought it was time to work or never He therefore puts them in mind of the strength of the Souldiers that had proclaimed Claudius and of their forces but weak few and utterly unexpert that to hazard a war was to hazard their State and therefore he would advise them to tender to Claudius propositions of accommodation and if they were so pleased he himself would be the agent It is agreed upon and he sent upon this imployment which how he would perform it is easie to guess by looking upon his own condition in which he now stood For in the life of Caius it was conceived that his evil counsel had very much forwarded the others cruelty and mischievousness and therefore if the Senate be masters of their desires he can little expect to be master any more of his Kingdom but if with all his officiousness and trotting up and down he can help Claudius to the Monarchy he is sure he hath then holpen himself to the Royalty It was therefore not an oversight in that grave and discreet great Councel that they imployed such a man as this in their occasions who a far dimmer eye of judgment than any of theirs would easily perceive would be against them but it was their discreet evasion with their honour when finding themselves too weak to deal it out by force of Arms they came to a noble reference by the motion and
his seed to Molech or useth Sorcery or profaneth the Sabbath or eateth holy things in his uncleanness or that cometh into the Sanctuary he being unclean or that eateth fat or blood or what is left of the sacrifice or any sacrificed thing not offered in season or that killeth or offereth up a sacrifice out of the Court or that eateth leaven at the Passover or that eateth ought on the day of Expiation or doth any work on it or that makes oil or incense like the holy or that anoints with holy oil that delayeth the Passover or Circumcision for which there are affirmative precepts All these if done wilfully are liable to cutting off and if done ignorantly then to the fixed sin-offering and if it be unknown whether he did it or no then to a suspensive trespass-offering but only he that defiles the Sanctuary and its holy things for he is bound to an ascending or descending offering Now that we may the better understand what Death by the hand of Heaven and Cutting off mean we are first to take notice that neither of them was any penalty inflicted by the hand or sentence of man but both of them do import a liableness to the wrath and vengeance of the Lord in their several kinds And the Jews do ever account Cutting off to be the higher and more eminent degree of Divine vengeance As to spare more evidences of this which might be given copiously this passage of Maymonides is sufficient and it is remarkable when he saith f f f Maym. in Biath Mikdash per. 4. Is it possible for a Priest that serveth in his uncleanness to stay so little in the Court 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As that he should be guilty of death by the hand of Heaven only and not guilty of cutting off He had had those words but a little before which were cited even now An unclean person that serveth in the Sanctuary profaneth his Service and is guilty of death by the hand of Heaven although he stay not there and then he comes on and is it possible saith he that he should stay so little as to be guilty only of death by the hand of Heaven and not to be guilty of cutting off Apparently shewing that cutting off was the deeper degree and die of guilt and vengeance by the hand of God and Divine indignation By Death by the hand of Heaven in their sense therefore is to be apprehended some such a sodain avengeful stroke as the Lord shewed upon Nadab and Abihu or Ananias and Saphira to take them away And this may the better be collected by two passages usual in the Rabbins about this matter First In that they give up the offence of the Priests drinking wine before they went to serve which is held to have been the offence of Nadab and Abihu g g g â—â—â— per. 1. to death by the hand of Heaven which argues that they mean such a kind of stroke as they two had And secondly In that wheresoever the Law enjoyneth Aaron and his sons and the people about the affairs of the Sanctuary they shall or they shall not do thus or thus lest they die they interpret this of death by the hand of Heaven But what to understand by Cutting off is not so readily agreed among them h h h Kimchi in Esay â—8 Kimchi alledgeth it as the opinion of their Doctors That Dying before fifty years old is death by cutting off Compare Joh. 8. 57. i i i R. Sol. in Gâ—â— 17. Rabbi Solomon saith It is to die childless and to die before his time Baal Aruch giveth this distinction between Cutting off and Death by the hand of Heaven that k k k Arâ—â—h in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cutting off is of himself and of his children but Death by the hand of Heaven is of himself but not of his children But mean it which of these you will or all these together or which may have good probability to conceive a liableness to cutting off from the life of the world to come both this and Death by the Hand of Heaven were held by that Nation with whom the phrases were so much in use to mean not any censure or punishment inflicted by man but an impending vengeance of God and a continual danger and possibility when indignation should seize upon him that was faln under these gilts Anathema Maran Atha one under a curse whensoever the Lord shall come to inflict it as Joh. 3. 18 36. SECT III. Penalties inflicted upon unclean persons found in the Temple Whipping and the Rebels beating IT was not a small awe that this might work in the hearts of the people towards their restraining from going into the Sanctuary in their uncleanness to have this impressed and inculcated upon them as it was continually that such a venture did hazard them both body and soul and brought them ipso facto into Gods dreadful displeasure and into undoubted danger of accrewing judgment But did they let the offender thus alone that had offended as if he was fallen under the guilt of death by the Hand of Heaven or under the guilt of cutting off that they had no more to do with him but leave him to the justice of God and to judgment when it should fall upon him Many a wretch would make sleight of this matter and because sentence upon his evil work was not executed speedily his heart would be fully set in him to do so again as Eccles. 8. 11. Therefore they let not the Delinquent so escape but as he had fallen under the wrath of God so they also brought him under a penalty by the hand of man And this penalty was twofold either 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whipping by the appointment of the Judges or mawling and beating by the people 1. There was the penalty of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whipping or scourging upon the censure of the Judges according to the Law Deut. 25. 2. Where he was to receive forty stripes but their Tradition brought it to forty save one 2 Cor. 11. 24. And the reason of this was because they would make a hedge to the Law and whereas that commands that they should not give to a Delinquent that was whipt above forty stripes lest their brother should seem vile unto them they abated one of forty to make sure to keep within compass The measure and manner of their whipping is largely described in the Treatise Maccoth thus in their own words a a a Maccoth per. 3. How many stripes do they give him saith the Mishueh there Why forty lacking one As it is said by a certain number forty stripes that is a number near to forty Rabbi Judah saith he is beaten with full forty and where hath he the odd one above thirty nine Between his shoulders They allot him not stripes but so as they might be triplicated They allot him to receive forty he hath had some of them
in Hand In Haste So the Sacrament of the Supper to be Eaten Without Leaven of Malice With bitter Repentance With resolution of Amendment With preparation to walk Better Leaning on the Staff of true Faith Hasting to leave this worldly Egypt Thus was the Passover first Eaten in Egypt after which all Egypt is struck with death of the First Born and the Egyptians are now punished with death of their Children for murthering Israels Children This night was ill to them but the night in the Read Sea was worse At the Death of a Lamb Egypt is Destroyed Israel Delivered So by the Death of a Lamb Hell is Destroyed Mankind Delivered When Israel comes out of Egypt they bring up with them Josephs bones and so as he brought them down thither so they bring him up thence So when Christ comes up out of his Grave he brings dead bones with him by raising some out of their Graves I cannot think it idle that the Passover was at night and that S. Paul saith The Israelites were Baptized in the Sea which was also by night and in the cloud but to shew that these Sacraments of Israel looked for a dawning when the true light which they foresignified should appear The Jews do find thirteen precepts Negative and Affirmative about the keeping of the Passover 1. The slaying of it Exod. 12. 6. 2. The eating of it 8. 3. Not to eat it raw or boiled 9. 4. Not to leave ought of it 10. 5. The putting away of leaven 15. 6. The eating of unleavened bread 18. 7. That leaven be not found with them 19. 8. Not to eat ought mixt with leaven 20. 9. An Apostate Jew not to eat it 43. 10. A stranger not to eat it 45. 11. Not to bring forth the flesh of it 46. 12. Not to break a bone of it 46. 13. No uncircumcised to eat of it 48. How variously they Comment upon these as they do upon all things and how over-curious they be in observing these as they do all things their writings do witness Their folding of their bitter herbs their three unleavened cakes their water and salt their searching for leaven their casting forth of leaven and their cursing of leaven their Graces over their tables their Prayers over their hands as they wash them their Words over their unleavened bread their remembring how they lived in Egypt and came out their words over their bitter herbs their Passover Psalms the 113. 114. all these and their other Ceremonies are set down accurately in their Common Prayer Book which I would not have denied to the Reader in English both for his recreation satisfaction and some instruction but that I know not whether I should actum agere do that which some one hath done before And besides I write these things not as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not set studies but stoln hours employing my idle hours to the writing of these studies that I may witness to some that my whole time is not idle But it may be I may seem more idle in thus writing than if I had been idle indeed to them that think thus I can only answer It is youth Age may do better CHAP. XXVIII Of the Confusion of Tongues THAT the World from Babel was scattered into divers Tongues we need not other proof then as Diogenes proved that there is motion by walking so we may see the confusion of Languages by our confused speaking Once all the Earth was of one Tongue one Speech and one Consent for they all spake in the Holy Tongue wherein the World was created in the beginning to use the very words of the Chaldee Paraphrast and Targ. Jerusal upon Gen. 11. 1. But pro peccato dissentionis humanae as saith St. Austen for the sin of men disagreeing not only different dispositions but also different Languages came into the World They came to Babel with a disagreeing agreement and they come away punished with a speechless speech They disagree among themselves cum quisque principatum ad se rapit while every one strives for dominion as the same Austen They agree against God in their Nagnavad lan Siguda c. We will make our selves a Rendevouz for Idolatry as the same Jeruselamy But they come away speaking each to other but not understood of each other and so speak to no more purpose than if they spake not at all This punishment of theirs at Babel is like Adams corruption hereditary to us for we never come under the rod at Grammar School but we smart for our Ancestors rebellion at Babel Into how many Countries and * * * One in Epiphanius saith this is easie to find but he doth little towards it Epiph. coâ—â— Haeret. Tom. 2. lib. 6. Tongues those Shinaar rebels were scattered is no less confused work to find out than was theirs at the Tower So divers is the speech of men about the diversity of Speech that it makes the confusion more confused ‖ ‖ ‖ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Clem. Alex. Strom. 1. Euphorus and many other Historians say that the Nations and Tongues are seventy five listning to the voice of Moses which saith all the souls that came into Egypt out of Jacob were seventy five But in truth the natural Dialects of Speech appears to be seventy two as our Scriptures have delivered Thus saith Clemens Alexandrinus of whose conceit herein I must for my part say as Saint Ambrose saith of Aaron about the golden calf Tantum Sacerdotem c. So great a Scholar as Clemens I dare not censure though I dare not believe him The Jews with one consent maintain that there are just seventy Nations and so many Tongues So confident they are of this that they dare say that the seventy souls that went with Jacob into Egypt were as much as all the seventy Nations of the World Jerusalems Schools rang with this Doctrine and the Children learned to high-prize themselves from their Fathers A stately claim was this to Israel but the keeping of it dangerous Men of the seventy Nations would not be so undervalued by one people Therefore when Israel wanted strength to keep this challenge they do it by sleight And so it is the thrice-learned Master Broughtons opinion that the Septuagint when they were to Translate the Bible and were to speak of the seventy souls of Jacobs house they durst not put down the just number of seventy lest tales should have been told out of their Schools concerning their scornful Doctrine and when the rumour and the number should both come to the King of Egypt the meet number might maintain the truth of the rumour So in Gen. 10. the Septuag put in two Cainans and so spoil the roundness of that seventy and by both they might incur danger therefore they added five more to spoil the roundness of the sum and Saint Steven follows their Translation Then Joseph sent and called his father Jacob to him and
came himself and lay upon him with his mouth to the Childs mouth his eyes to his eyes and his hands to his hands then the Child recovered So when man was dead in trespasses and sin as it is Eph. 2. God lays his * * * Psal. 23. staff or rod of the Law upon him but what good did this toward his recovery Even make him to long the more for Elisha or Christ who when he came and laid his mouth to mans mouth and kissed humanity in his Incarnation and laid his eyes to his eyes and his hands to his hands and suffered for mans actions at his passion then is man recured God in the book of Isay when he is to send a Prophet to Israel says thus Mi eshlah whom shall I send or who will go for us Isa. 6. 8. Upon which words the Jew Kimchi paraphrases thus Shalahti eth Micah wehem maccim otho Shalahti eth Amos wehem korin otho * * * Amos in Heb. signifies one that is heavy tongued which Kimchi calls Peseleusa from the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Blaesus Pesilusa I have sent Micah and him they smote I have sent Amos and him they called a stammerer Whom shall I send or who will go for us Then says Esay Behold I am here send me Imagine that upon the fall of man you saw God about to send the great Prophet not to Israel alone but to all the World nor only to teach but also to redeem Suppose you heard him thus questioning whom shall I send to restore fallen man And who will go for us Should I send Angels They are creatures and consequently finite and so cannot answer mine infinite Justice Should I send man himself Alas though he once had power not to have fallen yet now hath he no power to raise himself again Should I send beasts to sacrifice themselves for him Alas can the burning of dead beasts satisfie for the sins of all men alive Whom shall I send or who will go for us Our Saviour is ready to answer with Isay Behold I am here send me Here am I that am able to do it send me for I am willing I am able for I am God I am willing for I will become a man I am God and so can fulfil the Law which man hath broke I will become man that so I may suffer death which man hath deserved Behold I am here send me Then as one of our Country Martyrs at his death so may we sing all our lives None but Christ none but Christ None but Christ to cure the wounded travailor None but Christ to raise the dead Shunamite None but Christ to restore decaid mankind None but Christ that would None but Christ that could No Angel no Man no Creature no Sacrifice no Ceremony that would and could do this for us which we could not do for our selves and say for us I have trod the Winepress alone When the Ceremonial and Judicial Law have thus brought us to Christ we may shake hands with them and farewel but for the Moral as it helps to bring us thither so must it help to keep us there For Christ came not to disannul this Law but to fulfil it He does not acquit us from this but furthers us to the keeping of it What else is the Gospel but this in milder terms of Faith and Repentance which is since we cannot keep this Law yet to strive to keep it as we can and to repent us for that we have not kept it and to relie upon his merits that hath kept it for us Thus as love to God and to our neighbours was the sum of the Old so true faith and unfained repentance is the total of the New This was the tenour of Christs first words after his Baptism Mark 1. 15. and of his last words before his Ascension Mark 16. 16. CHAP. LXI Of the Ten Commandments THE Ten Commandments may be called the Word of the Word of God for though all Scripture be his Word yet these in more special be his Scripture to which he made himself his own Scribe or Pen-man upon these Commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets and these Commandments upon two duties to love God and to love our neighbour A shorter and yet a fuller Comment needs not to be given of them than what our Saviour hath given Luke 10. 27. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy strength and with all thy mind and thy neighbour as thy self The four Commandments of the first Table he expounds in four words The Lord thy God there is the Preface I am the Lord c. Thou shalt love the Lord c. with all thy Heart for the First Commandment Soul for the Second Commandment Strength for the Third Commandment Mind for the Fourth Commandment If we need any further Exposition upon this Exposition of our Saviours it is easie to find as thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine Heart for it he hath Created Soul for it he hath Redeemed Strength for it he hath Preserved Mind for it he hath Inlightned And therefore thou shalt love him with all thine Heart without Only talking and no more Soul without Dissembling Strength without Revolting Mind without Erring This is the first and the great Commandment and the other is like unto this thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self This adds great light to the second Table for half of the Commandments of that Table want an object whereupon to fasten the duty The first hath one Honour thy Father c. the last but one hath one thou shalt not witness falsely against thy neighbour And so the last hath Thou shalt not covet ought of thy Neighbours But Thou shalt not kill steal and commit adultery these have no object viz. none named whom from whom and with whom we must not kill steal nor adulterate because we must make our selves also the object here and reflect the Commandments upon our selves as thus Thou shalt not kill first not thy self and secondly not thy neighbour and so of the rest The Jews have been too bold in adding too strict an object as you may see in their explaining these three precepts And some Hereticks have been too nice in giving some of them too * * * For Marcion held it unlawful to kill a beast because the command non occides hath no set object Aug. de Clv. Dei l. 1. cap. 20. large a one The fifth Commandment in the Ten is with a Promise and the fifth Petition in the Lords Prayer is with a Condition I omit the exquisiteness of the pricking of this piece of Scripture of the Commandments extraordinarily Some special thing is in it The Jews do gather six hundred and thirteen Precepts Negative and Affirmative to be in the whole Law according to the six hundred and thirteen letters in the two Tables and so many
look first to what use these several rooms were constantly put and then we shall be the better inabled to judge of this matter n n n Mid. ubi supr 1. That in the South East corner was a room for Nazarites 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For there they boiled their peace-offerings polled their hair and put it under the pot according to the Law Numb VI. 18. o o o Nazir per. 1. Nazarism was most ordinarily for thirty days though sometime it was for years and sometime for term of life He whose vow was expired was to bring three beasts one for a burnt-offering another for a sin-offering and a third for a peace-offering p p p Ibid. per. 6. If he polled his head in the Country as Paul did at Cenchrea he was to bring his hair and burn it under the Caldron where his peace-offering was boiling which was in this place that we are speaking of And if he polled it here it was the readier The Jews in the Treatise alledged in the Margine above speak of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Samson Nazarite and an everlasting Nazarite not but that Samson was a Nazarite always but they use this distinction in reference to the manner of the Vow making He that took on him to be a Nazarite like Samson as saying Behold I will be a Nazarite like Samson or like the Son of Manoah or like the husband of Delilah or like him that carried away the gates of Azzah or like him whose eyes the Philistines put out such an one might never cut his hair but it must ever grow upon him and such a Nazarite did Absalom take upon him to be but he was forced to cut his hair once every year it was so heavy But he that was a Nazarite everlasting that is that took upon him Nazarism upon other terms as he that said I will be a Nazarite according to the number of the hairs of my head or the dust of the Earth or sand of the Sea shore he might poll his head once in thirty days but his hair was not to be thus burnt because his vow was not out But he whose vow was expired wheresoever he polled his head was to come to this place and here to boyl his Peace-offeting and to burn his hair and the Priest took the shoulder as it boiled and a Cake and a Wafer of unleavened bread and put all upon the hands of the Nazarite and waved them and then was the Nazarite at liberty to drink wine and to be defiled by the dead But R. Simeon saith that as soon as any of the blood of any of the Lambs was sprinkled on him he was at this liberty The same Tract also speaketh of women Nazarites as o o o Ibid. per. 3. Queen Helena who was a Nazarite first by her own ingagement seven years and by coming into the Land of Israel seven years more and by a defilement seven years more one and twenty in all p p p Ibid. per. 6. And Mary of Tarmud who whilst the blood of her offerings was sprinkling on her word was brought her that her daughter was in danger of death and she went away the sprinkling half done and half undone and found her daughter dead and came again and was sprinkled out Now to enquire whether these women cut their hair at the expiring of their vow is not much to this place and purpose and therefore we shall not trouble our selves at present to hearken after it But me thinks that q q q Iuchasin fol. 15. trac 1. passage of Simeon the Just was to purpose who in all his life time would take a Sin-offering but of one Nazarite only and his reason was because he thought they made their vows in some passion and repented of it when they had done 2. r r r Mid. ubi supr The North-East rooms 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was the place of the wood where the Priests that had blemishes did search the wood for worms for any wood that had worms in it was unclean for to burn upon the Altar s s s Maym. in biath hamiâ—dash per. 6. Mid. per. 5 The great Sanhedrin sate in the building Gazith and a main work of theirs continually was that they judged of the Priesthood and tryed the Priests as concerning their genealogy whether they were truly of the Priestly line or no and concerning blemishes whether they were fit to serve or no every one that was found failing of the right pedegree was clothed with black and vailed with black and got him out of the Court But whosoever was found right and perfect was clothed with white compare Rev. III. 4. VII 9. and went in and served with the Priests his brethren Whosoever was found of the right blood of the Priests but some blemish was found in him he went and sate him down in the Wood-room and wormed the wood for the Altar and had his portion in the holy things with the men of the house of his father and eat with them And when a Priest was found without blemish they made holy day and great rejoycing and blessed God for it with a Solemn prayer t t t Mid. ubi sup 3. The North-West room 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was the room of the Lepers After the many rites for the cleansing of the Leper abroad in the Country at his own house u u u Maym. in Tâ—mâ—ach tsoreah per. 11. as killing a Sparrow and besprinkling him with the bloud mingled with water sending another sparrow flying in the open air shaving himself with a razor every hair off c. On the seventh day he was to shave himself again and to wash himself in water and then he was clean from defiling and might come within Jerusalem On the eighth day he brought three Lambs for a Sin-offering Trespass-offering and Burnt-offering w w w Talm. in Negain per. 11. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He bathed himself in the Lepers room and went and stood in the gate of Nicanor and there the Priests besprinkled him c. The manner of which we have observed elsewhere x x x Mid. ubi sup 4. The South-West room was called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The house of the oyl y y y Ibid. Maym. in Beth. â—abbâ—â—h per. 5. For there they laid up the wine and the oyl whereof there was so frequent and constant use by the appointment of the Law in their meat and drink offerings see Numb XV. And now that we have seen the use and imployment to which these rooms were put it is the more seasonable to consider of that which we mentioned before namely whether these four rooms in the four corners of the Court of the women were quite open to the skies or roofed over and in what sense to take the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Two things do here meet us which are considerable 1. That these places in
Scholars to become faint hearted and the strength of Wisdom and the Cabala to fail and the Oral Law to be much diminished he gathered and scraped up together all the Decrees Statutes and sayings of the wise Men of which he wrote every one apart which the house of the Sanhedrin had taught c. And he disposed it into six classes which are Zeraim Moed Nezikin Nashim Kedoshim Tahoroth And a little after All the Israelites ratified the Body of the Mishnaioth and obliged themselves to it and in it during the life of Rabbi his two sons Rabban Gamaliel and R. Simeon employed themselves in the School of the land of Israel and R. Chaija R. Oshaia R. Chanina and R. John and their companions And in the School of Babylon Rabh and Samuel exercised themselves in it c. Therefore it is worthy of examination whence those differences should arise between the Jerusalem Mishna and the Babylonian differences in words without number in things in great number which he that compares them will meet with every where You have a remarkable example in the very p p p p p p Beracoth cap. 1. hal 4. entrance of the Jerusalem Mishna where the story of R. Tarphons danger among thieves is wanting which is in that of Babylon Whether R. Judah composed that System in Tyberias or in Zippor we are not solicitous to enquire he sat in both and enriched both with famed Schools and Tiberias was the more eminent For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 q q q q q q Glossa in Bab. Sanhedr fol. 32 The University of Tiberias was greater than that of Zippor CHAP. LXXXII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sippor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a a a a a a Joseph de bell lib. 3. cap 3. Sippor is the greatest City of Galilee and built in a very strong place b b b b b b Bab. Mâ—gill fol. 6. 1. Kitron Judg. 1. 29 30. is Sippor and why is it called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sippor Because it is seated upon a mountain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Sippor a bird c c c c c c Hieros Biccurim fol. 64. 2. Bab. Megill in the place above Sixteen miles on all sides from Sippor was a land flowing with Milk and Hony This City is noted in Josephus for its warlike affairs but most noted in the Talmudists for the University fixed there and for the Learning which Rabbi Judah the Holy brought hither as we have said before d d d d d d Hieros Kilaim fol. 32. 2. He sat in this place seventeen years and used most frequently to say this of himself Jacob lived in Egypt seventeen years and Judah lived in Zippor seventeen years e e e e e e Juchasin fol. 2. 2. He sat also in Beth-Shaarim as also in Tiberias but he ended his life in Zippor There is this story of his death f f f f f f Hieros in the place before The men of Sippor said Whosoever shall tell us that Rabbi is dead we will kill him Bar Kaphra having his head vailed looked upon them and said Holy Men and Angels both took hold of the Tables of the Covenant and the hand of the Angels prevailed and they snatched away the Tables They said to him Is Rabbi dead He said Ye have said They rent their garments after that manner that the Voice of the renting came as far as Papath that is the space of three miles R. Nachman in the name of R. Mena said Miracles were done on that day When all Cities were gathered together to lament him and that on the Eve of the Sabbath the day did not waste until every one was gone home had filled a bottle with water and had lighted up a Sabbath candle The Bath Kol pronounced blessedness upon those that lamented him excepting only one who knowing himself excepted threw himself headlong from the Roof and died g g g g g g Gloss. in Bab. Sanhedr fol 47 1. R. Judah died in Zippor but his burial was in Beth-shaarim dying he gave in command to his son When ye carry me to my burial do not lament me in the small Cities through which ye shall pass but in the great c. What say you to this R. Benjamin In you it is h h h h h h R. Benjam â—n Itinerar His Sepulchre is in Zippor in the mountain as also the Sepulchre of R. Chaija and Jonah the Prophet c. Do you make up the controversie with your kinsmen now cited There were many Synagogues in Zippor In the story but now alledged concerning the death and burial of R. Judah mention is made of eighteen Synagogues that bewailed him but whether all these were Synagogues of Zippor or of other places it is questioned not without cause 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i i i i i i Hieros Berac fol. 6. 1. Nazir fol. 56. 1. The Synagogue of Gophna was certainly in Zippor There was also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 k k k k k k Id. Berac fol. 9. 1. Shab fol. 8. 1. The Synagogue of Babylon in Zippor There are also many names of famous Doctors there l l l l l l Id. Shekalim fol 46 1. R. Honna Rabba m m m m m m Id. Niddah fol. 50. 2. R. Abudina of Zippor n n n n n n Bab. Sanhedr fol. 91. 1. R. Bar Kaphra in Zippor R. Chaninah of Zippor o o o o o o Hieros Maasar Sheni fol. 55. 4 Schab fol. 9. 2. Trumoth fol. 45 3. c. The mention of whom is most frequent above others p p p p p p Bava Mizia cap. 8. hal 8. A controversie risen at Zippor was determined before R. Simeon ben Gamaliel and R. Jose Among many stories acted on this stage which might be produced we shall offer these only q q q q q q Hieros Jevamoth fol. 15. 3. Sotah fol. 23. 3. An Inquisition was sometime made after the men of Zippor they therefore that they might not be known clapped patches upon their noses but at last they were discovered c. r r r r r r Bab. Joma fol. 11. 1. One in the upper street of Zippor taking care about the scripts of paper fixed to the door posts was punished a thousand zuzees These words argue some persecution stirred up in that City against the Jews s s s s s s Hieros Trumoth fol. 45. 3. A certain Butcher of Zippor sould the Jews flesh that was forbidden namely dead carcasses and that which was torn On one Sabbath Eve after he had been drinking Wine going up into the roof he fell down thence and died The Dogs came and licked his blood R. Chaninah being asked Whether they should drive away the Dogs By no means said he for they eat of their own 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 t t t t t t
that she was a witch I have therefore cited these passages not only that it may be shewn that there were women Pharisees and so that the name is not taken from interpreting or expounding but that it may be observed also what kind of women for the most part embrace Phariseism namely Widows and Maids under the vail of Sanctity and Devotion hiding and practising all manner of wickedness And so much we gain of the history of the Pharisees while we are tracing the etymology of the word II. That the Pharisees therefore were so called from the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying Separation is more commonly asserted and more truly and the thing it self as well as the word speaks it so that by a word more known to us you might rightly call the Pharisees Separatists but in what sense has need of more narrow enquiry The differences of the Jewish people are to be disposed here into divers ranks and first we will begin with the Women 1. It were an infinite task to search particularly how their Canons indulged shall I say or prescribed the Woman a freedom from very many rites in which a great part of the Jewish religion was placed How numberless are the times that that occurs in the Talmudic Pandect 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 d d d d d d Berac cap. 3 hal 3. Women servants and children are not bound to these things e e e e e e Hieros Kiddush fol. 61. 3. Women servants and children are not bound to recite their Phylacteries nor to wear them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Passovers of Women are at their own Will And not to dwell upon things that are obvious let this one serve instead of many f f f f f f Bab. Sotah fol. 21. 2. A certain Matron asked R. Eleazar Why when Aaron sinned in making the Golden Calf the people are punished with a threefold death He answered Let not a Woman be learned beyond her distaff Hirâ—anus his son said unto him Because no answer is given her in one word out of the Law She will withdraw from us three hundred tenth Cori yearly To whom he replied Let them rather go and be burnt than the words of the Law be delivered to Women From hence it appears that the Women that embraced Pharisaism did it of their own free will and vow not by command which the Men Pharisees also did 2. Pass we from the Women to the Men and first to the lowest degrees of Men in the distinction relating to Religion namely to them whom they ordinarily called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Illiterate and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The people of the Earth or the Plebeians Of them thus the Gemara in Sotah newly cited g g g g g g Fol. 22. 1. One reads the Scriptures and recites the Mishna and yet he waits not upon the Scholars of the Wise-men what of him R. Eleazar saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is one of the people of the earth R. Samuel bar Nachmani saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Behold this is an illiterate man R. Jannai saith behold this is a Cuthean R. Achabar Jacob saith behold This is a Magician And a little after Who is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the people of the Earth R. Meir saith He that recites not his Phylacteries morning and evening with his prayers But the Wise men say He whosoever he be that lays not up his Phylacteries Ben Azzai saith He who hath not a fringe on his garment R. Jochanan ben Joseph saith He that instructs not his sons in the doctrine of the Law Others say He who although he read the Scriptures and repeats the Traditions yet attends not on the Scholars of the Wise men this is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the people of the Earth or the Plebeian Does he read the Scriptures and not repeat the Tradition Behold this man is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Illiterate The Gloss upon the place speaks thus The people of the Earth are they of whom there is suspicion of Tenths and cleanness that is lest they tithe not rightly nor take care aright concerning cleansings And 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the illiterate person is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 more vile or inferior than the people of the Earth Compare that John VII 49. The people that knoweth not the Law is cursed The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Collegians or Associates and Scholars of the Wise men were opposed to these Vulgar persons Under the title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Scholars of the Wise men are comprehended all that were learned and studious under the title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Religious as well learned as unlearned There were some of the learned whom they commonly called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Collegians of the Rabbins who as yet were Candidates and not preferred to the publick office of teaching or judging The thing may be illustrated by one Example 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 h h h h h h Hieros Sanhedr fol. 18. 3. Do the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Collegians enter in to appoint the New Moon R. Hoshaia said When I was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Collegian R. Samuel ben R. Isaac led me in to the appointment of the New Moon but I knew not whether I were of the number or no. And a little after Do the Collegians or Fellows go in to intercalate the year Let us learn this from the example of Rabban Gamaliel who said Let the seven Seniors meet me in the Chamber But eight entred Who came in hither saith he without leave I answered Samuel the little In this sense the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Collegue differs nothing from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Scholar of a Wise man in that both signifie a Student and a Learned man But the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Collegue hath a wider sense denoting all such who have more professedly devoted themselves to Religion and have professed a more devout Life and Rule than the common people whether they were learned or unlearned whether of the Sect of the Pharisees or of the Sadduces or some other Hence you have mention of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i i i i i i Bab. Berac fol. 44. 2. a religious Samaritan and of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 k k k k k k Ioma fol. 8. 2. a religious Baker And the phrase seems to be drawn from Psal. CXIX 63. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I am a companion of all those that fear thee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They take upon them the habit of Religion See the Babylonian Talmud in l l l l l l Fol. 7. 1. Avodah Zarah in the Gloss. That distinction also is worthy of consideration of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 m m m m m m Hieros Bava Bâ—thra fol. 17. 1 The greater and the less Religious Yet the word seems sometimes to be appropriated to the Pharisees as being
is and I will do it a a a a a a Hieros I have done my duty that the Command may be performed according to it The Aruch thus As though he should say There is no man can shew me wherein I have transgressed 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Pharisee of fear such as Iob. 7. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Pharisee of love as Abraham 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 b b b b b b Hieros Among all these none is worthy to be loved but the Pharisee of love Whether Pharisaism ran out into any of these Sects in the days of the Baptist we dispute not Let it be granted that the best and the most modest of that order came to his baptism the best of the Pharisees certainly were the worst of men And it is so much the more to be wondred at that these men should receive his baptism after that manner as they did when it was highly contrary to the rule of the Pharisees to converse among the common people of whom there was so great a concourse to John and highly contrary to the Doctrine of the Pharisees so much as to dream of any righteousness besides that which was of the works of the Law which the Doctrine of John diametrically contradicted The original of the Sadducees learned men as well Jews as Christians do for the most part refer to one Zadoc a Scholar of Antigonus Socheus which Antigonus took the chief seat in the Sanhedrin after the death of Simeon the Just. Of him thus speaks the Tract Avoth c c c c c c Chap. 1. Antigonus of Socho received Traditions of Simeon the Just. He said Be not as servants who wait upon their Master for the sake of the reward but be ye like servants who wait upon their Master not for the sake of the reward but let the fear of the Lord rule you The Wise man saith Rambam upon the place had two Scholars Zadoc and Baithus who when they heard this from their Master said among themselves when they were gone away our Master in his Exposition teacheth us that there is neither reward nor punishment nor any expectation at all for the future For they understood not what he meant Therefore they mutually strengthned one another and departed from the rule and forsook the Law and some company adhered to both The Wise men therefore called them Sadducees and Baithusees And a little after But in these Countries namely in Egypt they call them Karaites 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but Sadducees and Baithusees are their Names among the Wise men d d d d d d Chap. 5. See also the Avoth of R. Nathan e e e e e e Bab. Berac fol. 5◠Yet that raiseth a scruple here At the conclusion of all prayers in the Temple they said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for ever But when the Hereticks brake in and said There was no age but one it was appointed to be said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For ever and ever or from age to age Upon these words thus the Gloss In the first Temple they said only Blessed be the Lord God of Israel for ever But when the Hereticks brake in and said There was no age but this Ezra and his consistory appointed that it should be said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For ever and ever or from age to age to imply there is a double world this and one to come to root out of the heart the opinion of those that deny the Resurrection of the dead Take notice Reader that there were some who denied the Resurrection of the dead in the days of Ezra when as yet Zadoc the father of the Sadducees was not born After Ezra and his great Synagogue which indured many a year after Ezra was dead sat Simeon the Just performing the office of the High Priest for the space of forty years and Antigonus Socheus the Master of Zadoc succeeded him in the chair of the Sanhedrin So that although the Sadducees with good reason do bear an ill report for denying the Resurrection and that was their principal Heresie yet that Heresie was when as yet there were no Hereticks called by the name of Sadducees To which perhaps those words do agree which sufficiently taste of such a Heresie Ye have said it is in vain to serve God c. Mal. III. 14. It is not therefore to be denied that the Sadducee Hereticks were so named from Zadoc but that the Heresie of the Sadducees concerning the Resurrection was older than that name one may suppose not without reason nor that that cursed Doctrine first arose from the words of Antigonus illy understood by Zadoc and Baithus but was of an antienter original when as yet the Prophets Zacharias Malachi and Ezra himself were alive if that Ezra were not the same with Malachi as the Jews suppose Therefore I do rather think that Heresie sprang from the misunderstanding of the words of Ezekiel Chap. XXXVII which some understanding according to the letter and together with it seeing no Resurrection dreamt that there would be none afterwards And this Doctrine encreased and exalted it self into a Sect when at length Zadoc and Baithus asserted that it was so determined out of the Chair by their Master Antigonus the President of the Sanhedrin When I fetch the rise of the Sadducees not much after the death of Simeon the Just that does not unseasonably come into my mind which is mentioned by the Talmudists that the state of things became worse after his death f f f f f f Hieros Ioma fol. 43. 3. All the days of Simeon the Just the scape Goat had scarce come to the middle of the precipice of the Mountain whence he was cast down but he was broken into pieces but when Simeon the Just was dead he fled away alive into the desert and was eaten by Saracens While Simeon the Just lived the lot of God in the day of Expiation went forth always to the right hand Simeon the Just being dead it went forth sometimes to the right hand and sometimes to the left All the days of Simeon the Just the little scarlet Tongue looked always white but when Simeon the Just was dead it sometimes looked white and sometimes red All the days of Simeon the Just the West light always burnt but when he was dead it sometimes burnt and sometimes went out All the days of Simeon the Just the fire upon the Altar burnt clear and bright and after two pieces of wood laid on in the morning they laid on nothing else the whole day but when he was dead the force of the fire languished in that manner that they were compelled to supply it all the day All the days of Simeon the Just a blessing was sent upon the two loaves and the Shewbread so that a portion came to every Priest to the quantity of an Olive at least and there were some who eat till they were satisfied and there were
he propounded more plainly and familiarly II. But however it was whether those things were true indeed or only believed and conceived so by a most apt and open comparison is shewn that the Devil was first cast out of the Jewish Nation by the Gospel and then seeking for a seat and rest among the Gentiles and not finding it the Gospel every where vexing him came back into the Jewish Nation again fixed his seat there and possessed it much more than he had done before The truth of this thing appears in that fearful Apostasie of an infinite multitude of Jews who received the Gospel and most wickedly revolted from it afterwards concerning which the New Testament speaks in abundance of places CHAP. XIII VERS II. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So that he sate and the whole multitude stood SO was the manner of the nation that the Masters when they read their lectures sate and the Scholars stood Which Honorary custom continued to the death of Gamaliel the Elder and then so far ceased that the Scholars sate when their Masters sate Hence is that passage a a a a a a Sotah cap. 9. hal 15. From that time that old Rabban Gamaliel died the Honor of the Law perished and purity and Pharisaism died Where the Gloss from Megillah writes thus Before his death health was in the world and they learned the Law standing but when he was dead sickness came down into the world and they were compelled to learn the Law sitting VERS III. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In Parables I. NO Scheme of Jewish Retoric was more familiarly used than that of parables which perhaps creeping in from thence among the Heathen ended in Fables It is said in the place of the Talmud just now cited 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 From the time that R. Meri died those that spake in Parables ceased not that that Figure of Rhetoric perished in the Nation from that time but because he surpassed all others in these flowers as the Gloss there from the Tract Sanhedrin speaks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A third part of his discourses or sermons was Tradition a third part Allegory and a third part Parable The Jewish books abound every where with these Figures the Nation enclining by a kind of Natural Genius to this kind of Rhetoric One might not amiss call their Religion Parabolical folded up within the Coverings of Ceremonies and their Oratory in their Sermons was like to it But it is a wonder indeed that they who were so given to and delighted in Parables and so dextrous in unfolding them should stick in the outward Shell of Ceremonies and should not have fetched out the Parabolical and spiritual sense of them neither should be able to fetch them out II. Our Saviour who always and every where spake with the vulgar useth the same kind of speech and very often the same preface as they did in their Parables 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. To what is it likened c. But in him thus speaking one may both acknowledg the divine Justice who speaks darkly to them that despise the light and his divine Wisdom likewise who so speaks to them that see and yet see not that they may see the shell and not see the Kernel VERS IV. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Some fell by the way side c. COcerning the husbandry of the Jews and their manner of sowing we meet with various passages in the Tracts Peah Demai Kilaim Sheviith We shall only touch upon those things which the words of the Text under our hands do readily remind us of There were ways and paths as well common as more private along the sown fields see Chap. XII 1. hence in the tract b b b b b b Cap. 2. Peah where they dispute what those things are which divide a field so that it owes a double corner to the poor thus it is determined These things divide a River an Aqueduct a private way a common way a common path and a private path c. See the place and the Gloss. VERS V. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Some fell among stony places c c c c c c In Hieros Kilaim fol. 27. 1. DIscourse is had concerning some laws of the Kilaim or of the seeds of different kinds and of the seventh year where among other things we meet with these words R. Simeon ben Lachish saith That he is freed from those Laws who sows his seed by the Sea 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Upon rocks Shelves and rocky places These words are spoken according to the reason and nature of the land of Israel which was very rocky and yet those places that were so were not altogether unfit for tillage VERS VII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Others fell among thorns HERE the distinction comes into my mind of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a white field that is which is all sowen and of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a woody field that is in which trees and bushes grow here and there Concerning which see the Tract d d d d d d Chap. 2. Sheviith So there is very frequent mention in the Talmudists of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Beds in fields and vineyards e e e e e e Peah cap. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which speaks the same thing f f f f f f Kilaim c. 3. And of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Baldness in a field that is when some places are left not sowen and some places lying between are g g g g g g Kilaim c. 4. VERS VIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. And brought forth fruit some an hundred c. THESE words are spoken according to the fruitfulness of the land of Israel concerning which the Talmudists speak much and hyperbolically enough which nevertheless they confess to be turned long since into miserable barrenness but are dim-sighted as to the true cause of it h h h h h h Hieros Peah fol. 20. 1 2. They treat of this matter and various stories are produced which you may see we will only mention these two R. Jochanan said The worst fruit which we eat in our youth excelled the best which we now eat in our old age for in his days the World was changed R. Chaijah bar Ba said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Arbelite bushel formerly yelded a bushel of flower a bushel of meal a bushel of bran and a bushel of course bran and a bushel of courser bran yet and a bushel of the coursest bran also but now one bushel scarcely comes from one bushel VERS XIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. They seeing see not HERE you may observe this people to have been given up to a reprobate mind and a spirit of deep sleep now a great while before the death of Christ Which being observed the sense of the Apostle will more easily appear Rom. XI where these very words are repeated If you there state aright the
not hearken to my words which I shall put into his mouth c. 3. How the Heavenly voice went out of the Cloud that overshadowed them when at his Baptism no such Cloud appeared Here that is worthy observing which some Jews note and reason dictates namely That the Cloud of Glory the Conductor of Israel departed at the death of Moses for while he lived that Cloud was the peoples guide in the Wilderness but when he was dead the Ark of the Covenant led them Therefore as that Cloud departed at the death of Moses that Great Prophet so such a Cloud was now present at the Sealing of the Greatest Prophet 4. Christ here shines with such a brightness nay with a greater than Moses and Elias now glorified and this both for the honour of his Person and for the honour of his Doctrine both which surpassed by infinite degrees the Persons and the Doctrines of both of them When you recollect the face of Christ transfigured shining with so great luster when he talked with Moses and Elias acknowledg the Brightness of the Gospel above the cloudy obscurity of the Law and of the Prophets VERS IV. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Let us make here three Tabernacles c. THE Transfiguration of Christ was by night Compare Luk. IX 37. The form of his face and garments is changed while he prays and Moses and Elias came and discourse with him concerning his death it is uncertain how long while as yet the Disciples that were present were over-charged with sleep When they awaked O what a Spectacle had they being afraid they observe and contemplate they discover the Prophets whom now departing Peter would detain and being loth that so noble a Scene should be dispersed made this Proposition Let us make here three Tabernacles c. Whence he should know them to be Prophets it is in vain to seek because it is no where to be found but being known he was loth they should depart thence being ravished with the sweetness of such society however astonished at the terrour of the Glory and hence those words which when he spake he is said by Luke Not to know what he said and by Mark Not to know what he should say which are rather to be understood of the misapplication of his words than of the sense of the words He knew well enough that he said these words and he knew as well for what reason he said them but yet he knew not what he said that is he was much mistaken when he spake these words while he believed that Christ Moses and Elias would abide and dwell there together in Earthly Tabernacles VERS V. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. While he yet spake behold a cloud c. MOses and Elias now turning their backs and going out of the Scene Peter speaks his words and as he speaks them when the Prophets were now gone Behold a Cloud c. they had foretold Christ of his death such is the cry of the Law and of the Prophets that Christ should suffer Luk. XXIV 44. He Preaches his Deity to his Disciples and the Heavenly voice seals him for the true Messias See 2 Pet. I. 16 17. VERS X. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Why therefore say the Scribes that Elias must first come I. IT would be an infinite task to produce all the passages out of the Jewish Writings which one might concerning the expected coming of Elias We will mention a few things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in passing which sufficiently speak out that vain expectation and the ends also of his expected coming 1. Let David Kimchi first be heard upon those words of Malachi Behold I send you Elias the Prophet God saith he shall restore the soul of Elias which ascended of old into Heaven into a created body like to his former body for his first body returned to Earth when he went up to Heaven each Element to its own Element But when God shall bring him to life in the body he shall send him to Israel before the day of Judgment which is the Great and Terrible day of the Lord and he shall admonish both the fathers and the children together to turn to God and they that turn shall be delivered from the day of Judgment c. Consider whether the Eye of the Disciples looks in the Question under our hands Christ had commanded in the verse before Tell the Vision of the Transfiguration to no man until the Son of man be risen from the dead But now although they understood not what the Resurrection from the dead meant which Mark intimates yet they roundly retort Why therefore say the Scribes that Elias shall first come That is before there be a Resurrection and a day of Judgment for as yet they were altogether ignorant that Christ should rise They believed with the whole Nation that there should be a Resurrection at the coming of the Messias 2. Let Aben Ezra be heard in the second place We find saith he that Elias lived in the days of Ahaziah the son of Ahab we find also that Joram the son of Ahab and Jehoshaphat enquired of Elisha the Prophet and there it is written This is Elisha the son of Shaphat 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Who poured water upon the hands of Elijah And this is a sign that Elias was first gone up into Heaven in a whirlwind because it is not said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Who poureth water but Who poured Moreover Elisha departed not from Elijah from the time that he first waited upon him until Elias went up And yet we find that after the death of Jehoshaphat in the days of Ahasiah his son It was written And a letter came to him from Elijah the Prophet And this proves that he then writ and sent it for if it had been written before his Ascension it would be said A letter was found or brought to him which Elias had left behind him And it is without controversie that he was seen in the days of our Holy Wise Men. God of his Mercy hasten his Prophesie and the times of his coming So he upon Mal. IV. 3. The Talmudists do suppose Elias keeping the Sabbath in Mount Carmel a a a a a a Hieros Pesach fol. 30. 2. Let not the Truma saith one of which it is doubted whither it be clean or unclean be burnt lest Elias keeping the Sabbath in Mount Carmel come and testifie of it on the Sabbath that it is clean 4. The Talmudical books abound with these and the like trifles b b b b b b Maimon in Gizelah c. 13. If a man finds any thing that is lost he is bound to declare it by a publick outcry but if the owners come not to ask for it let him lay it up by him until Elias shall come And c c c c c c Bava Mezia cap. 1. Hal. ult c. If any find a Bill of Contract between his Country men and knows
After these things Jesus walked in Galilee for he would not walk any more in Judea because the Jews sought to kill him 3. It was not unusal to defer the payment of the half Shekels of this year to the year following by reason of some urgent necessity Hence it was when they sat to collect and receive this Tribute the Collectors had before them two chests placed in one of which they put the h See Shekal cap. 2. Maimon ibid. Tax of the present year in the other of the year past u But it may be objected Why did the Collectors of Capernaum require the payment at that time when according to Custom they began not to demand it before the fifteenth day of the month Adar I answer 1. It is certain there were in every City money changers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to collect it and being collected to carry it to Jerusalem Hence is that in the Tract cited The fifteenth day of the month Adar the Collectors sit in the Cities to demand the half Shekel and the five and twentieth they sit in the Temple 2. The uncertain abode of Christ at Capernaum gave these Collectors no unjust cause of demanding this due whensoever they had him there present at this time especially when the feast of Tabernacles was near and they about to go to Jerusalem to render an account perhaps of their Collection But if any list to understand this of the Tax paid the Romans we do not contend And then the words of those that collected the Tribute Does not your Master pay the Didrachm seem to sound to this effect Is your Master of the Sect of Judas of Galilee CHAP. XVIII VERS I. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Who is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven IT cannot be passed over without observation that the ambitious dispute of the Disciples concerning Primacy for the most part followed the mention of the death of Christ and his Resurrection See this Story in Mark IX 31 32 33. And Luke IX 44 45 46. He said to his Disciples Lay up these discourses in your ears for the time is coming that the Son of man is delivered into the hands of Men. But they knew not that saying c. and there arose a contest between them who among them should be greatest Also Matth. XX. 18 19 20. He said to them Behold we go up to Jerusalem and the Son of man shall be betrayed unto the Chief Priests c. Then came to him the Mother of Zebedees children with her sons saying Grant that these my two sons may sit one on thy right hand c. And Luke XXII 22 23 24. The Son of man indeed goeth as it is determined c. and there arose a Contention among them who of them should seem to be the greater The dream of the earthly Kingdom of the Messias did so possess their minds for they had suck'd in this Doctrine with their first milk that the mention of the most vile death of the Messias repeated over and over again did not at all drive it thence The image of earthly pomp was fixed at the bottom of their hearts and there it stuck nor by any words of Christ could it as yet be rooted out no not when they saw the death of Christ when together with that they saw his Resurrection for then they also asked Wilt thou at this time restore the Kingdom to Israel Acts I. 6. However after Christ had oftentimes foretold his death and resurrection it always follows in the Evangelists that they understood not what was spoken yet the opinion formed in their minds by their Doctors That the Resurrection should go before the Kingdom of the Messias supplied them with such an interpretation of this matter that they lost not an ace of the opinion of a future Earthly Kingdom See more at Chap. XXIV 3. VERS VI. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. It were better for him that a mill-stone were hanged about his neck c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is good for him in Talmudick Language 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 seems to be said in distinction from those very small Mills wherewith they were wont to grind the spices that were either to be applied to the wound of Circumcision or to be added to the delights of the Sabbath Hence the Gloss of R. Solomon upon Jer. XXV 10. The sound of Mills and the light of the candle the sound of Mills saith he wherewith spices were ground and bruised for the healing of Circumcision That Christ here speaks of a kind of death perhaps no where certainly never used among the Jews he does it either to aggravate the thing or in allusion to drowning in the dead Sea in which one cannot be drowned without some weight hung to him and in which to drown any thing by a common manner of speech implied to devote to rejection hatred and execration which we have observed elswhere VERS X. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Their Angels in Heaven do always behold c. THIS one may very well expound by laying to it that which is said Heb. I. 14. The Angels are Ministring Spirits sent to minister for them who shall be heirs of the salvation to come As if he should say See that ye do not despise one of these little ones who have been received with their believing parents into the Gospel Church for I say unto you that after that manner as the Angels minister to adult Believers they minister to them also VERS XII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. If he lose one does he not leave the ninety and nine c. A Very common form of speech a a a a a a Peah cap. 4. Hal. â— In distributing some grapes and dates to the poor although ninety nine say Scatter them and only one Divide them They hearken to him because he speaks according to the Tradition b b b b b b â—ieros Schabh fol. â—4 â— If ninety nine die by an evil eye that is by bewitching and but one by the hand of Heaven that is by the stroke of God c. If ninety nine die by reason of cold but one by the hand of God c. VERS XV. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tell him his fault between thee and him alone THE reason of the precept is founded in that charitable Law Levit. XIX 17. Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thy heart but thou shalt surely reprove him and shalt not suffer sin in him Here the Talmudists speak not amiss c c c c c c Bab. â—â—achin fol. 1â— â— The Rabbins deliver Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thy heart Perhaps he does not beat him he does not pull off his hair he does not curse him the Text saith In thy Heart speaking of hatred in the heart But whence is it proved that he that sees his brother doing some foul action is bound to reprove him Because it is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
z Berac sol 5 4 The righteous even in death are said to live and the wicked even in life are said to be dead But how is it proved that the wicked even in life are said to be dead From that place where it is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I have no delight in the death of the dead Is he already dead that is here called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dead And whence is it proved that the righteous even in death are said to live From that passage And he said to him this is the land concerning which I sware to Abraham to Isaac and to Jacob 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 What is the meaning of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He saith to him Go and tell the Fathers whatsoever I promised to you I have performed to your children The opinion of the Babylonians is the same a a a a a a Berac sol 18. 1 The living know that they shall dye They are righteous who in their death are said to live as it is said And Benaiah the son of Jehojada the son of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 â— living man c. And a little after The dead knew nothing They are the wicked who even in their life are called Dead as it is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And thou dead wicked Prince of Israel The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is commonly rendred Profane in this place they render it also in a sense very usual namely for one wounded or dead b b b b b b Ibid. col 2. There are further divers stories alledged by which they prove that the dead so far live that they understand many things which are done here and that some have spoke after death c. CHAP. XXIII VERS II. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. In Moses seat c. THIS is to be understood rather of the Legislative seat or chair than of the merely Doctrinal and Christ here asserts the authority of the Magistrate and perswadeth to obey him in lawful things Concerning the Chairs of the Sanhedrin there is mention made in Bab. Succah c c c c c c Fol. â—1 2. There were at Alexandria seventy one golden chairs according to the number of the seventy one Elders of the great Council Concerning the authority of Moses and his Vicegerent in the Council there is also mention in Sanhedrim d d d d d d Chap. 1. hal 6 The great Council consisted of seventy one Elders But whence was this number derived From that place where it is said Chuse me out seventy men of the Elders of Israel And Moses was President over them Behold seventy one What is here observed by Galatinus from the signification of the Aorist 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sat iâ— too light and aery He saith They sat saith he and not They sit that he might plainly demonstrate that their power was then ceased e e e e e e Chap. 6. Book 4. But if we would be so curious to gather any thing from this Aorist we might very well transfer it to this sense rather The Scribes and Pharises the worst of men have long usurped Moses seat nevertheless we ought to obey them because by the dispensation of the Divine Providence they bear the chief Magistracy Concerning their authority thus Maimonides f f f f f f In Mamrim cap. 1. The great Council of Jerusalem was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 g g g g g g See 1 Tim. III. 15. The Pillar and Ground The ground of the traditional Law and the pillar of Doctrine whence proceeded statutes and judgments for all Israel And concerning them the Law asserts this very thing saying h h h h h h Deut. XVII 11. According to the Sentence of the Law which they shall teach thee Whosoever therefore believes Moses our Master and his Law is bound to relie upon them for the things of the Law Christ teacheth that they were not to be esteemed as Oracles but as Magistrates VERS IV. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heavy burdens 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Talmudick Language Hence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A heavy Prohibition i i i i i i Jerus Roshbashanaâ— fol. 56. 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 k k k k k k Maim in Mamr chap. 1. Let him follow him that imposeth heavy things There are reckoned up four and twenty things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Of the weighty things of the School of Hillel and the light things of that of Shammai l l l l l l Jerus Jom Tobh fol. 60. 2. Sotah f. 19. 2 R. Joshua saith m m m m m m Ibid. chap. 3 hal 4. A foolish religious man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A crafty wicked man a shee-Pharisee and the voluntary dashing of the Pharisees destroy the world It is disputed by the Gemarists who is that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 crafty wicked man and it is answer'd by some He that prescribes light things to himself and heavy to others VERS V. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They make broad their Phylacteries THESE four places of the Law Exod. XIII ver 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10. Exod. XIII ver 11 12 13 14 15 16. Deut. VI. ver 5 6 7 8 9. Deut. XI ver 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21. Being writ upon two Parchment-Labels which they called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tephillin were carried about with them constantly with great devotion being fastned to their forehead and their left arm To the forehead in that place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 n n n n n n Bab. Taanith fol. 16. 1. in the Gloss. where the pulse of an Infants brain is This of the forehead was most conspicuous and made broad hence came that Let no body pass by the Synagogue while prayers are saying there But if he hath Rhylacteries upon his head he may pass by because they show that he is studious of the Law o o o o o o Maimon on Tephilla Chap. 8. It is not lawful to walk through burying places with Phylacteries on ones head and the book of the Law hanging at ones arm * * * * * * Bab. Berac fol. 18. 1. They are called in Greek Phylacteries that is Observatories because they were to put them in mind of the Law and perhaps they were also called Preservatories because they were supposed to have some vertue in them to drive away Devils It is necessary that the Phylacteries should be repeated at home anights 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to drive away Devils p p p p p p Jerus Berac fol. 2. 4. Pisk in Berac Chap. 1. art 6. Rabben Asher ibid. Chap. 1. Col. 1. Concerning the curious writing of the Phylacteries see Maimon on Tephillin q q q q q q Chap. 1. 2. Concerning their strings marked with certain small letters See
by the Council were not to be buried in the Sepulchres of their fathers but two burying places were appointed by the Council one for those that were slain by the sword and strangled the other for those that were stoned who also were hanged and burnt There according to the custom Jesus should have been buried had not Joseph with a pious boldness beg'd of Pilate that he might be more honourably Interred which the fathers of the Council out of spight to him would hardly have permitted if they had been asked and yet they did not use to deny the honour of a Funeral to those whom they had put to death if the meanness of the common burial would have been a disgrace to their family As to the dead person himself they thought it would be better for him to be treated dishonourably after death and to be neither lamented nor buried for this vilifying of him they fancied amounted to some attonement for him as we have seen before And yet to avoid the disgrace of his family they used at the request of it to allow the honour of a funeral h h h h h h See Bab. Sanhedr fol. 46. 2. 47. 1. CHAP. XXVIII VERS I. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In the end of the Sabbath IN the Jerusalem Talmudists it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In the coming forth of the Sabbath vulgarly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In the going out of the Sabbath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 h h h h h h Avodah Zarah fol. 44. 4. On a certain eve of the Sabbath namely when the Sabbath began there was no wine to be found in all Samaria 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But at the end of the Sabbath there was found abundance because the Aramites had brought it and the Cuthites had received it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies all the night 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Toward the first day of the week The Jews reckon the days of the week thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 One day or the first day of the Sabbath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Two or the second day of the Sabbath i i i i i i Bab. Maccoth fol. 5. 1. Two witnesses come and say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The first of the Sabbath this man stole c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and on the second day of the Sabbath judgment passed on him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The third of the Sabbath A Virgin is married on the fourth day of the week for they provide for the Feast 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the first day of the week 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The second day of the week 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And the third day of the week k k k k k k Bab. Chetub fol. 21. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 On the fourth day of the week they set apart him who was to burn the red heifer l l l l l l Gloss on Parah Chap. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 On the fifth of the Sabbath Ezra ordained that they should read the Law publickly on the second and fifth day of the Sabbath c. He appointed that Judges should sit in the Cities on the second and fifth day m m m m m m Hieros Meg. fol. 75. 1. Ezra also appointed that they should wash their clothes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 on the fifth day of the Sabbath n n n n n n Bab. Bava Kama fol. 82. 1. The sixth day they commonly called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the eve of the Sabbath To wash their clothes on the fifth day of the Sabbath and eat onions on the Eve of the Sabbath p p p p p p Ibid. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 On the fifth day of the Sabbath or week and the eve of the Sabbath and the Sabbath o o o o o o Id. fol. 3◠2. The first day of the week which is now changed into the Sabbath or Lords-day the Talmudists call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Christians or the Christian day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p p p p p p Bab. Avoda◠Zarah fol. 6. 1. 7. 2. On the Christians day it is always forbidden for a Jew to traffick with a Christian. Where the Gloss saith thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Nazarean or Christian is he who followeth the error of that man who commanded them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to make the first day of the week a Festival-day to him and according to the words of Ismael it is always unlawful to traffick with them three days before that day and three days after that is not at all all the week through We cannot here pass by the words of the Glossers on Bab. Rosh hashanah q q q q q q Fol. 22. 2. The Baithuseans desire that the first day of the Passover might be on the Sabbath so that the presenting of the Sheaf might be on the first day of the week and the feast of pentecost on the first day of the week With good reason did our blessed Saviour remove the Sabbath to this day the day of his resurrection the day which the Lord had made Psal. CXVIII 24. when now the stone which the builders refused was become the head stone in the Corner For I. When Christ was to make a new world or a New Creation r r r r r r Esai LXV 17. it was necessary for him to make a new Sabbath The Sabbath of the old Creation was not proper for the new II. The Kingdom of Christ took its beginning principally from the resurrection of Christ when he had now overcome death and Hell The Jews themselves confess that the Kingdom of the Messiah was to begin with the resurrection of the dead and the renewing of the world Therefore it was very proper that that day from which Christs Kingdom took its beginning should pass into the Sabbath rather than the old Sabbath the memorial of the Creation III. That old Sabbath was not instituted till after the giving the promise of Christ. Gen. III. 15. and the rest of God on that seventh day was chiefly in having perfected the new Creation in Christ that also was the Sabbatical rest of Adam When therefore that was accomplished which was then promised namely the bruising of the Serpents head by the resurrection of Christ s s s s s s Heb. II. 14. and that was fulfilled which was typified and represented in the old Sabbath namely the finishing of a new Creation the Sabbath could not but justly be tranferred to that day on which these things were done IV. It was necessary that the Christians should have a Sabbath given them distinct from the Sabbath of the Jews that a Christian might be thereby distinguished from a Jew For as the Law took great care to provide that a Jew might be distinguished from an Heathen So it was provided by the Gospel with the like care that partly
that he saith he knew not that day and hour of the destruction of Jerusalem yea it excellently agrees with his Office and Deputation who being the Fathers Servant Messenger and Minister followed the orders of the Father and obeyed him in all things The Son knoweth not that is It is not revealed to him from the Father to reveal to the Church Revel I. 1. The Revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave to him We omit enquiring concerning the Knowledge of Christ being now raised from death whether and how far it exceeded his knowledg while yet he conversed on earth It is without doubt that being now raised from the dead he merited all kind of Revelation See Revel V. 9. And they sung a new song saying thou art worthy to take the book and to open the seals thereof for thou wast slain c. and that he conversing on earth before his death acted with the vigor of the Holy Spirit and of that unspeakable holiness which flowed from the Union of the Humane Nature with the Divine the Divine Nature in the mean time suspending its infinite activity of Omnipotence So that Christ might work miracles and know things to come in the same manner as the Prophets also did namely by the Holy Ghost but in a larger measure and might overcome the Devil not so much by the Omnipotence of the Divine Nature as by the infinite holiness of his Person and of his obedience So that if you either look upon him as the Minister and Servant of God or if you look upon the constitution as I may so call it and condition of his Person These words of his Of that day and hour knoweth not the Son also carry nothing of incongruity along with them yea do excellently speak out his substitution as a Servant and the constitution of his Person as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God-man The reason why the Divine Wisdom would have the time of the destruction of Jerusalem so concealed is well known to it self but by men since the time of it was unsearchable the reason certainly is not easie to be searched We may conjecture that the time was hid partly lest the Godly might be terrified with the sound of it as 2 Thes. II. 2. partly that the Ungodly and those that would be secure might be taken in the snares of their own security as Mat. XXIV 38. But let secret things belong to God CHAP. XIV VERS III. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Of Spikenard WHAT if I should render it Nardinum Balaninum Nardin of Balanus Nardin a a a a a a Pliny lib. 13. cap. 1. consists of Omphacium Balaninum Bulrush Nard Amomum Myrrhe Balsame c. And again b b b b b b Idem lib. 12. cap. 21. Myrobalanum is common to the Troglodytes and to Thebais and to that part of Arabia which divides Judea from Egypt a growing oyntment as appears by the very name whereby also is shewn that it is the maste of a tree 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as all know among the Greeks is Glans Maste or an Acorn so also is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pistaca among the Talmudists There are prescribed by the Talmudists c c c c c c Bab. Gittin fol. 69. 1. various remedies for various diseases among others this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For a Pluriâ—ie or as others will have it A certain disease of the head Take to the quantity of the Maste of Aâ—moniac The Gloss is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the maste of Cedar The Aruch saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the grain of a fruit which is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Glans The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nard is Hebrew from the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nerd and the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is Syriac from the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pistaca So that the Oyntment might be called Unguentum Balaninum Balanine oyntment in the composition of which Nard and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Maste or Myrobalane were the chief ingredients 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Poured it upon his head In Talmâ—dic Language 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 d d d d d d Bab. Chetubh fol. 17. 2. What are the Testimonies that the woman married is a Virgin If she goes forth to be married 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with a veil let down over her eyes yet with her head not veiled The scattering of nâ—ts is also a testimony These are in Judea but what are in Babylon Rabh saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If oyntment be â—pon the head of the Rabbins The Gloss is the women poured oyntment upon the heads 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Scholars and anoynted them Rabh Papa said to Abai 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Does that Doctor speak of the aromatic oyntment used in bridg-chambers The Gloss is Are the Rabbins such to be anoynted with such Oyntments He answered 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O Orphan that is O thou unacquainted with the Customs Did not thy â—other pour out oyntment for you at thy wedding upon the heads of the Rabins Thus a certain Rabâ—in got a wife for his son in the house of Rabbah bar Ulla and they said to him Rabbah bar ulla also got a wife in the house of a certain Rabbin for his Son 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And he poured out oyntment upon the heads of the Rabbins From the Tradition produced it may be asked whether it were customary in Judea to wet the heads of the Rabbins with oyntments in the marriages of Virgins as it was in Babylon Or whether it were so customary otherwise to anoynt their heads as that such an anoynting at weddings were not so memorable a matter as it was in Babylon Certainly in both places however they anoynted mens heads for healths sake it was accounted unfitting for Rabbins to smell of aromatical oyntments e e e e e e Hieros Berac fol. 11. 2. It is undecent say the Jerusalem Talmudists for a Scholar of the Wise men to smell of spices And you have the judgment of the Babylonians in this very place when it is enquired among them and that as it were with a certain kind of disatisfaction whether Rabbins be such as that they should be anoynted with aromatical oyntments as the more nice sort are wont to be anoynted From this opinion every where received among them you may more aptly understand why the other Disciples as well as Judas did bear the lavish of the oyntment with some indignation He out of wicked covetousness but they partly as not willing that so precious a thing should be lost and partly as not liking so nice a custom should be used towards their Master from which the Masters of the Jews themselves were so averse And our Saviour taking off the envy of what was done applies this anoynting to his burial both in his intention and in the intention of the woman that it might not seem to be done out
The appearance in the Court 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The rejoycing The Chagigah or the Peace-offerings were on the first day The appearance in the Court was on the second day The rejoycing might be on any day IV. In Moed Katon a Treatise that discourseth on things lawful or not lawful to be done in the intermedials of the Feast or in those days of the Feast that were not kept holy in the very entrance of that Discourse there are several things allowed which plainly argue absence and distance from Jerusalem As to eating unleavened bread the precept indeed was indispensible neither that any thing leavened should be eaten nor that any leaven should be found in their Houses for seven days together but no one would say that this command was restrained only to Jerusalem It is said in Jerusalem Kiddushin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c c c c c c Fol. 61. 3. The Womens Passover is arbitrary That is the Womens appearance at Jerusalem at the Passover was at pleasure But let them not say that eating unleavened bread was arbitrary or at the Womens pleasure for although they sate at home and did not go to Jerusalem to the Passover yet did they abstain from leven in their own Houses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 d Hieros Megillah fol. 74. 5 The unleavened bread was eaten in every house VI. It seems from the very phraseology 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Joseph and Mary continued at Jerusalem all the seven days which was indeed generally done by others for devotion 's sake And then think what numerous companies of people must be going away to this or that Country yea particularly how great a crowd might be journeying together with Joseph and Mary toward Galilee So that it may be less strange if Jesus had not been within his Parents sight though he had been among the crowd nor that though they did not see him yet that they should not suspect his abscence VERS XLIV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They went a days journey THE first ordinary days journey from Jerusalem toward Galilee was to Neapolis of old called Sichem distant thirty miles But was this the days journey that Joseph and the company that travailed along with him made at this time The place where Christ was first mist by his Parents is commonly shewed at this day to Travailers much nearer Jerusalem by the name of Beere but ten miles from that City You may believe those that shew it as you think fit VERS XLVI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sitting in the midst of the Doctors I. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a a a a a a Sanhedr cap. 11. hal 2. There are three Courts of Judicature in the Temple one in the gate of the Court of the Gentiles another in the gate of the Court of Israel a third in the room Gazith There was also a Synagogue in the Temple which must be observed b b b b b b Joma fol. 68. 2. The High-Priest came to read those places which were to be read on the day of attonement The Chazan of the Synagogue takes the Book and gives it to the Ruler of the Synagogue the Ruler to the Sagan the Sagan to the High-Priest c. Where the gloss There was a Synagogue near the Court in the Mountain of the Temple In which of these places Christ was found sitting amongst the Doctors let those tell us that undertake to shew the place where his Parents first missed him II. It is not easie to say what place he could be admitted to amongst the Doctors especially when that custom obtained which is mentioned c c c c c c Megillah fol. 21. 1. The Rabbins have a Tradition that from the days of Moses to Rabban Gamaliels they were instructed in the Law standing But when Rabban Gamaliel dyed the world languisht so that they learnt the Law sitting d d d d d d See Succah fol. 49. 1. Jucoas fol. 53. 1. Whence also that tradition that since the death of Rabban Gamaliel the glory of the Law was eclipsed Now when it was come to that pass after Gamaliel's death that the Disciples sate while the Master read how did they sit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 On the ground Hence that passage e e e e e e In Megillah ubi supr Rabh would not sit upon his bed and read to his Scholar while he sate upon the ground Gloss. Either both should be on the bed or both upon the ground f f f f f f Ibid. fol. 27. 2. The disciples of R. Eleazar ben Shammua askt him how came you to this great age He answered them I never made the Synagogue 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a common way That is he never took his passage through the Synagogue for a shorter cut 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And I never walkt upon the heads of the Holy people The gloss is Upon the heads of his Disciples sitting upon the ground Whether on the naked floor might be a question if there were place for it but we let that pass at this present For this custom of sitting prevailed after the death of Gamaliel who took the Chair many years after this that we are now upon The great Hillel possest the Seat at this time or if he was newly dead his Son Simeon succeeded him so that it was the Disciples part in this age to stand not to sit in the presence of their Doctors How therefore should it be said of Christ that he was sitting among the Doctors let the following clause solve the difficulty 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And asking them questions It was both lawful and customary for the Disciples or any that were present publickly to enquire either of the Doctor that was then reading or indeed the whole consistory about any doubtful matter wherein he was not well satisfied Take but two stories out of many others that may illustrate this matter g g g g g g Beâ—esh rabb fol. 90. 3. R. Judah ordained R. Levi ben Susi for a Doctor to the Simonians They made him a great chair and placed him in it Then propounded questions to him occasioned from Deut. XXV 9. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if the Brothers Wife should have her hands cut off how should she loose the shooe of her Husbands Brother 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If she should spit blood what then Most profound questions certainly such as require a most cunning sophister to unriddle them h h h h h h Hieros Taanith fol. 67. 4. There is a story of a certain Disciple that came and interrogated R. Joshua 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of what kind is Evening Prayer He answered him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is arbitrary He came to Rabban Gamaliel and askt him he told him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is that we are in duty bound to How then saith he did R. Joshua tell me it is voluntary saith the other To
〈◊〉 Zephaniah the second Priest Targum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Zephaniah the Sagan of the Priests Caiaphas therefore was the High-Priest and Annas the Sagan or Ruler of the Temple who for his independent dignity is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or High-Priest as well as Caiaphas and seems therefore to be named first because he was the others Father-in-law 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 h h h h h h Chetub fol. 88. 2. fol. 105. 1. There was a dissention between Hanan and the Sons of the chief Priests c. It was in a judicial cause about a Wife requiring her dower c. Where the scruple is who should these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 these Chief Priests be Whether the Fathers and heads of the Courses or the High-Priest only and the Sagan It was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i i i i i i Cap. 1. of the same Treatise hal 5. a Counsel of Priests which we have already spoken to at Matth. XXVI 3. Now the question is whether by the Sons of the chief Priests be meant the Sons of the Fathers of Courses or the Fathers of Courses themselves or the Sons of the High-Priest and the Sagan where the High-Priest in that Court was like 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Prince in the Sanhedrin and the Sagan 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Father of the Sanhedrin k k k k k k Pesikta fol. 11. 4. Moses was made a Sagan to Aaron He put on his Garments and took them off viz. on the day of his Consecration And as he was his Sagan in life so he was in death too VERS V. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Every valley shall be filled THE Jews have a Tradition that some such thing was done by the cloud that led Israel in the Wilderness Instead of many instances take the Targumist upon Cant. II. 6. There was a cloud went before them three days journey 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to take down the hills and raise the valleyes It slew all fiery Serpents in the Wilderness and all Scorpions and found out for them a fit place to lodge in What the meaning of the Prophet in this passage was Christians well enough understand the Jews apply it to levelling and making the ways plain for Israel's return out of Captivity for this was the main thing they expected from the Messiah viz. to bring back the Captivity of Israel l l l l l l Beresh rabb fol. 110. 3. R. Chanan saith Israel shall have no need of the Doctrine of Messiah the King in time to come for it is said to him shall the Gentiles seek Isai. XI 10. but not Israel If so why then is Messiah to come and what is he to doe when he doth come He shall gather together the Captivity of Israel c. VERS VIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Of these stones to raise up Children unto Abraham WE do not say the Baptist played with the sound of those two words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Banaia and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Abanaia He does certainly with great scorn deride the vain confidence and glorying of that Nation amongst whom nothing was more ready and usual in their mouths than to boast that they were the Children of Abraham when he tells them that they were such Children of Abraham that God could raise as good as they from those very stones VERS XI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that hath two Coats let him impart to him that hath none IT would be no sense to say he that hath two Coats let him give to him that hath not two but to him that hath none For it was esteemed for Religion by some to weare but one single Coat or Garment Of which more elsewhere VERS XIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Exact no more than that which is appointed you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 m m m m m m Sanhedr fol. 25. 2. When the Rabbins saw that the Publicans exacted too much they rejected them as not being fit to give their testimony in any case Where the Gloss hath it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 too much that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 More than that which is appointed them And the Father of R. Zeirah is commended in the same place that he gently and honestly executed that trust He discharged the Office of a Publican for thirteen years when the Prince of the City came and this Publican saw the Rabbins he was wont to say to them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Go my people enter thou into thy Chambers Isai. XXVI The Gloss is Lest the Prince of the City should see you and taking notice what numbers you are should encrease his tax yearly VERS XIV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Neither accuse any falsly LEVIT XIX 11. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Neither lye one to another Job XXXV 9. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The oppressed See Psal. LXXII 4. CXIX 122. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. n n n n n n Dion Cass. lib. 58. a little from the beginning The manner of sycophants is first to load a person with reproaches and whisper some secret that the other hearing it may by telling something like it become obnoxious himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 With your wages A word used also by the Rabbins o o o o o o Midr. Schir fol. 5. 3. The King distributeh 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 wages to his Legions p p p p p p Sanhedr fol. 18. 2. The King is not admitted to the intercalation of the year 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because of the Opsonia That is lest he should favour himself in laying out the years with respect to the Souldiers pay VERS XXII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Like a Dove IF you will believe the Jews there sate a golden Dove upon the top of Solomon's Scepter q q q q q q Bemidb. rabh fol. 250. 1. As Solomon sate in his throne his Scepter was hung up behind him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 at the top of which there was a Dove and a golden crown in the mouth of it VERS XXIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Being as was supposed the Son of Ioseph A Parable r r r r r r Schemoth rabba fol. 160. 4. There was a certain Orphaness brought by a certain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epitropus or Foster-father an honest good man At length he would place her in Marriage A scribe is called to write a bill of her dower Saith he to the girl what is thy name N. saith she What the name of thy Father She held her peace To whom her Foster-father why dost thou not speak Because saith she I know no other Father but thee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that educateh the child is called a Father not he that begets it Note that Joseph having been taught by the Angel and well satisfied in
q q q Fol. 98. 2. there is a certain beggar called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Diglus Patragus or Petargus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 poor infirm naked and famished But there could hardly be invented a more convenient name for a poor beggar than Lazar which signifies the help of God when he stands in so much need of the help of men But perhaps there may be something more aimed at in the name when the discourse is concerning Abraham and Lazarus who would not call to mind Abraham and Eleazar his servant r r r r r r Gen. XV. one born at Damascus a gentile by birth and sometime in posse the heir of Abraham but shut out of the inheritance by the birth of Isaac yet restored here into Abraham's bosom Which I leave to the judgment of the Reader whether it might not hint the calling of the Gentiles into the faith of Abraham The Gemarists make Eleazar to accompany his Master even in the Cave of Macpelah s s s s s s Bava bathra fol. 58. 1. R. Baanah painted the sepulchres when he came to Abraham's cave he found Eleazar standing at the mouth of it He saith unto him what is Abraham doing To whom he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he lieth in the embraces of Sarah Then said Baanah go and tell him that Baanah is at the door c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Full of sores In the Hebrew language 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Stricken with Ulcers Sometimes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 His body full of Ulcers as in that Story t t t t t t Taanith fol. 21. 1. They tell of Nahum Gamzu that he was blind lame of both hands and of both feet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in all his body full of sores He was thrown into a ruinous house the feet of his bed being put into basins full of water that the Ants might not creep upon him His Disciples ask him how hath this mischief befallen thee when as thou art a just man He gives the reason himself viz. Because he deferr'd to give something to a poor man that begged of him We have the same story in Hieros Peah u u u u u u Fol. 21. 2. where it were worth the while to take notice how they vary in the telling it VERS XXII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He was carried by Angels THE Rabbins have an invention that there are three bands of Angels attend the death of wicked men proclaiming there is no peace saith the Lord unto the wicked x x x x x x â—emidb rabb fol. 245. 4. But what conceptions they have of Angels being present at the death of good men let us judge from this following passage y y y y y y Hieros Kilaim fol. 32. 3. The men of Tsippor said whoever tells us that Rabbi Judah is dead we will kill him Bar-kaphra looking upon them with his head veiled with an hood said unto them Holy men and Angels took hold of the tables of the Covenant and the hand of the Angels prevailed so that they took away the tables They said unto him is Rabbi dead then The meaning of this parabolizer was this Holy men would fain have detained R. Judah still in the land of the living but the Angels took him away 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Into Abraham's bosom So vers 23. in the plural number 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which doth not alter the sense but strengthens it The Jewish Schools dispose of the Souls of Jews under a threefold phrase I can hardly say under a threefold state I. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In the garden of Eden or Paradise Amongst those many instances that might be alledged even to nauseousness let us take one wherein this very Abraham is named z z z z z z Midras Tillin fol. 3. 1. He shall be as a tree planted by the Rivers of waters This is Abraham whom God took and planted in the land of Israel or whom God took and planted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Paradise Take one instance more of one of equal fame and piety and that was Moses a a a a a a Tâ—murah fol 11â— 1. When our Master Moses departed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 into Paradise he said unto Joshua if thou hast any doubt upon thee about any thing enquire now of me concerning it II. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Under the throne of glory We have a long story in Avoth R. Nathan b b b b b b Cap. 10. of the Angel of death being sent by God to take away the soul of Moses which when he could not do God taketh hold of him himself and treasureth him up 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 under the throne of glory And a little after Nor is Moses his soul only placed under the throne of glory but the souls of other just persons also are reposited under the throne of glory Moses in the words quoted before is in Paradise in these words he is under the throne of glory In another place c c c c c c Pesikta fol 93. 1. he is in Heaven ministring before God So that under different phrases is the same thing exprest and this however made evident that there 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the garden of Eden was not to be understood of an earthly but an heavenly Paradise That in Revel VI. 9. of souls crying under the Altar comes pretty near this phrase of being placed under the throne of glory For the Jews conceived of the Altar as the throne of the Divine Majesty and for that reason the Court of the Sanhedrin was placed so near the Altar that they might be filled with the reverence of the Divine Majesty so near them while they were giving judgment Only whereas there is mention of the Souls of the Martyrs that had poured out their blood for God it is in allusion to the blood of the Sacrifices that were wont to be poured out at the foot of the Altar III. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In Abraham's bosom Which if you would know what it is you need seek no further than the Rhemists our County-men with grief be it spoken if you will believe them For they upon this place have this passage The bosom of Abraham is the resting place of all them that died in perfect state of grace before Christ's time heaven before being shut from men It is called Zachary a Lake without water and sometimes a prison but must commonly of the Divines Limbus patrum for that it is thought to have been the higher part or brim of hell c. If our Saviour had been the first author of this phrase than might it have been tolerable to have lookt for the meaning of it amongst Christian Expositors but seeing it is a scheme of speech so familiar amongst the Jews and our Saviour spoke no other than in the known and vulgar dialect of that Nation the meaning
〈◊〉 out of the Linnen in which they wrapt up Books when it grew old they make shrowds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the dead of the precept for this is to their disgrace The Gloss adds That they do it of the linnen wherein they fold up the Book of the Law He who had suffered death by the sentence of the Sanhedrin or Magistrate they were wont to call him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The dead of the precept because he was executed according to the precept And such an one to them was our Jesus Now as to one that was condemned to death by the Magistrate they had an opinion that by how much the more disgracefully they dealt with him by so much the greater attonement was made for him Hence that expression 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they did not openly bewail him that that very setting him at nought no man lamenting him might redound to his attonement And from thence perhaps if the Women at Jerusalem had bewailed any other person as they bewailed our Saviour that other person might have said ye Daughters of Jerusalem weep not for me lest ye cut short my attonement But Christ speaks to them upon a far different account And under this notion they wrapped one that had been so Executed in some ragged torn old dirty winding-sheets that this disgrace being thrown upon him might augment his expiation But this good Arimathean behaves himself otherwise with Jesus as having conceived quite another opinion concerning him VERS LIV. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And the Sabbath drew on THE Vulgar reads Et Sabbatum illucescebat The Sabbath began to dawn Not ill rendred Beza reads Et Sabbatum succedebat And the Sabbath succeded Not properly One would have thought it had been more congruously said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it began to be dark toward the Sabbath For the night before the Sabbath was coming on But I. The Sabbatical Candles that were lighted in honour of the Sabbath were now set up i i i i i i Schabb. fol. 34. 1. There are three things which it is necessary a man should warn those of his own House of on the Evening of the Sabbath when Night is coming on Have you paid your Tenths 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Have you begun your Erubhick Society 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Light up your Candle k k k k k k Maimon in Schab cap. 5. Men and Women are bound to light up a Candle in their Houses upon the Sabbath day If a Man hath not Bread to eat yet he must beg from door to door to get a little Oyl to set up his light These things being noted the Evangelist may not be improperly understood thus The Sabbath began to shine with the lights set up respect being had to these Sabbath Candles But I do not acquiesce here II. The Evening of the Sabbath was called amongst the Jews 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 l l l l l l Pesachin fol. 34. 1. Light 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 By the light of the fourteenth day they make a search for Leven by the light of a Candle By the light of the fourteenth day that is on the Evening or in the night that immediatdly preceeds that day So Rambam upon the place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The search for Leven is in the night of the fourteenth day although the eating of leavened bread is not forbidden before the noon of the fourteenth day But they instituted this because it is most convenient searching in the night time by Candle light and at that time also all persons are at home m m m m m m Cherithuth fol. 79. 2. Adaioth cap. 4. hal 10. The Woman that miscarries on the light i. e. the Evening of the eighty first day the Shammean School absolves her from any offering but the School of Hillel doth not The Gloss hath iit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 on the light of the eighty first day i. e. in the night of the eighty first day The question disputed there is this The Woman that had been brought to bed of a Girl was bound to the purification of eighty days When those days were at an end then she was bound to offer Levit. XII 5 6. Now therefore seeing the oblation was to be brought on the eighty first day the question is what if the Woman should happen to miscarry within the very night that begins the eighty first day must she the next day offer one or two Sacrifices one for the Girl and one for that of which she hath miscarried The Shammean School will have but one but the School of Hillel saith two Pesikta n n n n n n Fol. 10. 4 speaking concerning a vowed Sacrifice from Levit. VII 17. hath this passage 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Perhaps it may be eaten on the light i. e. the Evening of the third day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Text saith upon the third day It is eaten until the third day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is not eaten on the light i. e. the evening or the night of the third day For then the third day was actually begun But now in this phrase they restrain the word especially to the beginning of the night though sometimes it is taken for the whole night as in that Tradition newly quoted concerning the Woman that miscarried And so the Gloss upon Pesachin Maimonides o discoursing i In Hhamats Umatsah cap. 2. about putting away the Leven which ought to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 on the light of the fourteenth day i. e. on the night that begins the fourteenth day hath this passage By prescription of the Scribes they search for and cast out their Leven 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the night namely the beginning of that night that ushers in the fourteenth day Much to the same sense the Gemarists concerning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the light p p p p p p Beracoth fol 3. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 How comes twilight to be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 light from thence because it is written In the twilight in the evening of the day Prov. VII 9. Rambam thinks it so called by a rule of contraries for so he in Pesachin q q q q q q Cap. 1. the night is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 light by the same rule that they call many other things by their contraries But the Gemarists upon the place affirm That the evening is not improperly called light and prove it from that expression Psal. CXLVIII 3 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Praise him all ye stars of light However unsuitably therefore it might sound in the ears of Greeks or Latines when they hear the evening or beginning of the night expressed by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet with the Jews it was a way of expression very usual and they could readily understand the Evangelist speaking in their own vulgar way when
Israel The Lord thy God is one Lord. And so being blind as to the mystery of the Trinity are the more hardened to deny that Our Saviour strenuously asserts here the God-head of the Son or Messiah namely that he hath the same power with the Father the same honour due to him as to the Father that he hath all things in common with the Father and hence he makes this reply upon them about healing on the Sabbath my Father worketh on the Sabbath day so do I also VERS XIX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Son can do nothing of himself THAT is The Messiah can do nothing of himself For he is a Servant and sent by his Father so that he must work not of his own will and pleasure but his Father's Isai. XLII 1. Behold my servant Targ. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Behold my Servant the Messiah So Kemch in loc and St. Paul Philip. II. 7. The Jew himself however he may endeavour to elude the sense of that phrase The Son of God yet cannot deny the truth of this Maxim That the Messiah can do nothing but according to the will and prescription of his Father that sent him Which he also will expound not of the weakness and impotency but the perfection and obedience of the Son that he so doth VERS XXV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The hour cometh and now is when the dead shall hear c. THE Jews as we have said before looked for the Resurrection of the dead at the coming of Messiah and that truly and with great reason though it was not to be in their sense The Vision of Ezekiel about the dry bones living Chap. XXXVII and those words of Isaiah thy dead men shall live c. Chap. XXVI 20. suggesting to them some such thing although they grope exceedingly in the dark as to the true interpretation of this matter That of R. Eliczer is well enough n n n n n n Chetub â—ol 3. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The people of the Earth the Gentiles do not live which somewhat agrees with that of the Apostle Ephes. II 2. Ye were dead in trespasses and sins Nor does that of Jeremiah Bar Abba sound much differently o o o o o o Sanhedr fol. 92. 2. The dry bones Ezek. XXXVII are the Sons of men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in whom is not the moisture of the Law It is true many bodies of the Saints arose when Christ himself arose Matth. XXVII 52. But as to those places in Scripture which hint the Resurrection of the dead at his coming I would not understand them so much of these as the raising the Gentiles from their spiritual death of sin when they lay in ignorance and Idolatry to the light and life of the Gospel Nor need we wholly expound Ezekiel's dry bones recovered to life of the return of the Tribes of Israel from their Captivity though that may be included in it but rather or together with that the resuscitation of the Israel of God that is those Gentiles that were to believe in the Messiah from their spiritual death The words in the Revel XX. 5. This is the first Resurrection do seem to confirm this Now what and at what time is this Resurrection When the great Angel of the Covenant Christ had bound the old Dragon with the Chains of the Gospel and shut him up that he should no more seduce the Nations p p p p p p 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by lying Wonders Oracles and Divinations and his False-gods as formerly he had done that is when the Gospel being published amongst the Heathen Nations had laid open all the devices and delusions of Satan and had restored them from the death of sin and ignorance to a true state of life indeed This was the first Resurrection That our Saviour in this place speaks of this Resurrection I so much the less doubt because that Resurrction he here intends he plainly distinguishes it from the last and general Resurrection of the dead vers 28 29. this first Resurrection from that last which he points therefore to as it were with his finger the hour is coming and now is c. VERS XXVII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To execute judgment also because he is the Son of man DAN VII 13. Behold one like the Son of Man came with the Clouds and came to the Antient of days and there was given him dominion and glory c. To this our blessed Saviour seems to have respect in these words as the thing it self plainly shews R. Solomon upon the place One like the Son of man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is the King the Messiah R. Saadias 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is the Messiah our righteousness When our Saviour declared before the Sanhedrin Ye shall see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of power and coming in the Clouds they all said art thou Christ the Son of the blessed God by which they imply that the Son of God and Christ are convertible terms as also are Christ and the Son of Man And it plainly shews that their eyes were intent up-this place Art thou that Son of Man spoken of in Daniel who is the Son of God the Messiah So did Christ in these words look that way VERS XXX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As I hear I judge HE seems to allude to a custom amongst them q q q q q q Sanhedr cap. ult hal â— The Judge of an inferior Court if he doubts in any matter goes up to Jerusalem and takes the determination of the Sanhedrin and according to that he judgeth VERS XXXV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A burning and shining light HE speaks according to the vulgar dialect of that Nation who were wont to call any person famous for life or knowledge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Candle r r r r r r Beresh rabba fol. 95. 4. Shuah the Father-in-law of Judah Gen. XXXVIII was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Candle or light of the place where he lived The Gloss is One of the most famous men in the City inlightning their eyes hence the title given to the Rabbins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Candle of the Law 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Lamp of light VERS XXXIX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Search the Scriptures THIS seems not to be of the imperative but indicative mood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ye search the Scriptures and in them ye think ye have eternal life and they are they that testifie of me yet ye will not come to me that ye might have life What 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 means is not unknown to any that have but dipt into Jewish Authors It denotes a something more narrow search into the Scriptures something between 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an enquiry into the literal and Cabbalistical sense of the words as R. Bechai in every leaf shews by several
send drink-offerings the drink-offerings are offered but if he send no drink-offerings drink-offerings are offered at the charge of the Congregation Observe that We have the same elsewhere b b b b b b Fal. 166. 2. Vajicra Rabba fol. 166. 2. And it is every where added that this is one of the seven things that were ordain'd by the great Council and that the sacrifice of a Gentile is only a whole burnt-offering 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the thank-offerings of a Gentile are whole burnt-offerings and the reason is given 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The mind of that Gentile is toward heaven Gloss. He had rather that his sacrifice should be wholly consum'd by fire to God than as his thank-offerings be eaten by men d d d d d d See also Menacoth fol. 72. 2. Temura◠fol. 103. 1 c. That of Josephus is observable e e e e e e De Bell. lib. 2. cap. 30. Eleazar the Son of Ananias the High Priest a bold young man perswaded those that ministred in holy things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they should accept of no sacrifice at the hands of a stranger 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This was the foundation of the war with the Romans For they refus'd a sacrifice for Cesar. f f f f f f Ibid. cap. 31. The Elders that they might take off Eleazar and his followers from this resolution of theirs making a speech to them among other things say this That their fore-fathers had greatly beautify'd and adorn'd the Temple 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from things devoted by the Gentiles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Always receiving the gifts from forreign Nations not having ever made any difference in the sacrifices of any whomsoever for that would be irreligious c. When they had spoken this and many more things to this purpose they produc'd several Priests skill'd in the ancient customs of their forefathers who shew'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that all their ancestors received offerings from the Gentiles II. Nor did the Gentiles only send their gifts and sacrifices but came themselves personally sometimes to the Temple and there worship'd Hence the outward Court of the Temple was call'd the Court of the Gentiles and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the common Court to which that in the Book of the Revelations alludes Chap. XI 2. But the Court which is without the Temple leave out and measure it not for it is given to the Gentiles And of those there shall innumerable numbers come and worship And they shall tread the Holy City forty and two months It is not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they shall tread it under foot as enemies and spoilers but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they shall tread it as worshippers So Isa. I. 12. g g g g g g Remid◠rab fol. 224. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Syrians and those that are unclean by the touch of a dead body enter'd into the mountain of the Temple h h h h h h Hieros Avodah Zarah fol. 40. 1. Rabban Gamaliel walking in the Court of the Gentiles saw an heathen woman and blessed concerning her i i i i i i Ioseph ubi sup◠They would provoke the Roman armes espouse a war with them introduce a new worship and perswade an impiety with the hazard of the City 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If no stranger but the Jews only may be allow'd to sacrifice or worship Hence that suspicion about Trophimus being brought by Paul into the Temple is not to be suppos'd to have been with reference to this Court but to the Court of the women in which Paul was purifying himself k k k k k k Pesachin fol. 3. 2. There is a story of a certain Gentile that eat the Passover at Jerusalem but when they found him out to be an heathen they slew him for the Passover ought not to be eaten by any one that is uncircumcised But there was no such danger that an uncircumcised person could run by coming into the Court of the Gentiles and worshipping there VERS XXIV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Except a corn of wheat HOW doth this answer of our Saviours agree with the matter propounded Thus Is it so indeed do the Gentiles desire to see me The time draws on wherein I must be glorify'd in the conversion of the Gentiles but as a corn of wheat doth not bring forth fruit except it be first thrown into the ground and there die but if it die it will bring forth much fruit so I must die first and be thrown into the earth and then a mighty harvest of the Gentile world will grow up and be the product of that death of mine Isa. XXVI 19. Thy dead men shall live 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 together with my dead body shall they arise so our translation with which also the French agrees Rescusciteront avec mon corps They shall rise with my Body But it is properly Corpus meum resurgent They shall arise my Body so the interlineary Version The Gentiles being dead in their sins shall with my dead body when it rises again rise again also from their death Nay they shall rise again my Body that is as part of my self and my Body Mystical VERS XXVIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I have both glorify'd it and will glorifie it again THIS Petition of our Saviours Father glorifie thy name was of no light consequence when it had such an answer from heaven by an audible voice And what it did indeed mean we must guess by the Context Christ upon the Greeks desire to see him takes that occasion to discourse about his death and to exhort his followers that from his example they would not love their life but by losing it preserve it to life eternal Now by how much the deeper he proceeds in the discourse and thoughts of his approaching death by so much the more is his mind disturbed as himself acknowledgeth ver 27. But whence comes this disturbance It was from the apprehended rage and affault of the Devil whether our Lord Christ in his agony and passion had to grapple with an angry God I question but I am certain he had to do with an angry Devil When he stood and stood firmly in the highest and most eminent point and degree of obedience as he did in his sufferings it doth not seem agreeable that he should then be groaning under the pressures of Divine wrath but it is most agreeable he should under the rage and fury of the Devil For I. The fight was now to begin between the Serpent and the seed of the woman mention'd Gen. III. 15. about the glory of God and the salvation of man In which strife and contest we need not doubt but the Devil would exert all his malice and force to the very uttermost II. God loosed all the reins and suffered the Devil without any kind of restraint upon him to
h h h h h h De Bell. Sacr. lib. 10. cap. 31. VERS VIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. He will reprove the world of sin c. THE Holy Spirit had absented himself from that Nation now for the space of four hundred years or thereabout and therefore when he should be given and pour'd out in a way and in measures so very wonderful he could not but evince it to the world that Jesus was the true Messiah the Son of God who had so miraculously pour'd out the Holy Spirit amongst them and consequently could not but reprove and redargue the world of sin because they believed not in him VERS X. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Of righteousness c. THAT this righteousness here mention'd is to be understood of the righteousness of Christ hardly any but will readily enough grant but the question is what sort of righteousness of his is here meant whether his personal and inherent or his communicated and justifying righteousness we may say that both may be meant here I. Because he went to the Father it abundantly argu'd him a just and righteous person held under no guilt at all however condemn'd by men as a malefactor II. Because he pour'd out the Spirit it argu'd the merit of his righteousness for otherwise he could not in that manner have given the Holy Spirit And indeed that what is chiefly meant here is that righteousness of his by which we are justify'd this may perswade us that so many and so great things are spoken concerning it in the Holy Scriptures Isai. LVI 1. My Salvation is near to come and my righteousness to be revealed Dan. IX 29. To bring in everlasting righteousness Jer. XXIII 6. This is his name by which he shall be called THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS And in the Epistles of the Apostles especially those of St. Paul this righteousness is frequently and highly celebrated seeming indeed the main and principal subject of the Doctrines of the Gospel In the stead of many others let this serve for all Rom. I. 17. For therein viz. in the Gospel is the righteousness of God reveal'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from faith to faith which words may be a good Comment upon the foregoing Clause I. The Law teacheth faith that is that we believe in God But the Gospel directs us to proceed from faith to faith viz. from faith in God to faith in Christ for true and saving faith is not a meer naked recumbency immediately upon God which faith the Jews were wont to profess but faith in God by the mediation of faith in Christ. II. In the Law the righteousness of God was reveal'd condemning but in the Gospel it was reveal'd justifying the sinner And this is the great mystery of the Gospel that sinnes are justify'd not only through the grace and meer compassion and mercy of God but through Divine justice and righteousness too that is through the righteousness of Christ who is Jehovah the Lord our righteousness And the Spirit of Truth when he came he did reprove and instruct the world concerning these two great articles of faith wherein the Jews had so mischievously deceiv'd themselves that is concerning true saving faith faith in Christ and also concerning the manner or formal cause of Justification viz. the righteousness of Christ. But then how can we form the Argument I go unto the Father therefore the world shall be convinc'd of my justifying righteousness I. Let us consider that the expression I go unto the Father hath something more in it than I go to Heaven So that by this kind of phrase our Saviour seems to hint That work being now finisht for the doing of which my Father sent me into the world I am now returning to him again Now the work which Christ had to do for the Father was various The manifestation of the Father Preaching the Gospel vanquishing the enemies of God sin death and the Devil but the main and chief of all and upon which all the rest did depend was that he might perform a perfect obedience or obediential righteousness to God God had created man that he might obey his Maker which when he did not do but being led away by the Devil grew disobedient where was the Creator's glory The Devil triumphs that the whole humane race in Adam had kickt against God prov'd a rebel and warr'd under the banners of Satan It was necessary therefore that Christ clothing himself in the humane nature should come into the world and vindicate the glory of God by performing an intire obedience due from mankind and worthy of his Maker He did what weigh'd down for all the disobedience of all mankind I may say of the Devils too for his obedience was infinite He fulfilled a righteousness by which sinners might be justify'd which answer'd that justice that would have condemned them for the righteousness was infinite This was the great business he had to do in this world to pay such an obedience and to fulfill such a righteousness and this righteousness is the principal and noble theme and subject of the Evangelical Doctrine Rom. I. 17. of this the world must primarily and of necessity be convinc'd and instructed to the glory of him that justifieth and the declaration of the true Doctrine of Justification And this rightequsness of his was abundantly evidenced by his going to the Father because he could not have been receiv'd there if he had not fully accomplisht that work for which he had been sent II. It is added not without reason and ye see me no more i. e. Although you are my nearest and dearest friends yet you shall no more enjoy my presence on earth by which may be evinced that you shall partake of my merits especially when the world shall see you enricht so gloriously with the gifts of my Spirit VERS II. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Of judgment because the Prince c. IT is well known that the Prince of this world was judged when our Saviour overcame him by the obedience of his death Heb. II. 14. and the first instance of that judgment and victory was when he arose from the dead the next was when he loos'd the Gentiles out of the chains and bondage of Satan by the Gospel and bound him himself Revel XX. 1 2. which place will be a very good Comment upon this passage And both do plainly enough evince that Christ will be capable of judging the whole world viz. all those that believe not on him when he hath already judg'd the Prince of this world This may call to mind the Jewish opinion concerning the judgment that should be exercis'd under the Messiah that he should not judg Israel at all but the Gentiles only nay that the Jews were themselves rather to judg the Gentiles than that they were to be judg'd But he that hath judg'd the Prince of this world the author of all unbelief will also judg every unbeliever too VERS XII
office there At the due time the Sacrifices appointed for the Chagigah were slain those parts of them that pertain'd to the Altar or to the Priest were given to them the rest of the beast was shar'd amongst the owners that had offer'd it and from thence proceeded their Feastings together and their great mirth and rejoycings according to the manner of that Festival This was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ver 14. The preparation of the Passover and that was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Passover to which the Elders of the Council reserving themselves would by no means enter into the Judgment-hall Chap. XVIII 28. II. That day drawing toward night those that were deputed by the Sanhedrin to reap the sheaf of the first-fruits went out f f f f f f Menacoth fol. 65. 1. Those that were deputed by the Sanhedrin to reap went forth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the evening of the Feast-day the first day of the Feast and bound their corn in sheafs pretty near the ground that the reaping might be the easier All the neighbouring Towns about gather'd together that it might be done with the greater pomp When it grew duskish he that was about to reap said The Sun is set and they answer'd Well The Sun is set and they answer'd Well With this Sickle Well With this Sickle Well In this Basket Well In this Basket Well And if it happen'd to be on the Sabbath-day he said On this Sabbath and they answer'd Well On this Sabbath Well I will reap and they said reap I will reap reap And so as he said these things thrice over they answer'd thrice to every one of them Well well well And all this upon the account of the Baithusians who said the sheaf of the first-fruits ought not to be reaped on the close of the Feast-day About that hour of the day wherein our Saviour was buried they went forth to this reaping and when the Sabbath was now come they began the work for the Sabbath it self did not hinder this work g g g g g g Ibid. fol. 63. 2. R. Ananias the Sagan of the Priests saith on the Sabbath-day they reap'd the sheaf only to the measure of one Seah with one Sickle in one Basket but upon a common day they reapt three Seahs with three Sickles in three Baskets But the wise men say The Sabbath-days and other days as to this matter are alike III. This night they were to lodg in Jerusalem or in Booths about so near the City that they might not exceed the bounds of a Sabbath-days journey In the morning again they met very early in the Court as the day before the Sacrifices are brought for the peoples appearing before the Lord the sheaf of first-fruits is offer'd in its turn the rites and usages of which offering are described in the place above quoted So that upon this high day there happen'd to be three great Solemnities in one viz. the Sabbath the sheaf-offering and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the appearing of the people in the Court before the Lord according to the command Exod. XXIII 17. VERS XXXIV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 With a Spear pierced his side THE Arab. Vers. of the Erpenian Edition adds the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he pierced his right side afraid as it should seem lest the miracle should not be great enough if the blood and water should have been suppos'd to have issued from his left-side because of the water that is said to be contain'd in the Pericardium which being pierced it is conceived blood and water could not but upon natural reasons flow out of it But this issue of blood and water had something of mystery in it beyond nature if nothing preternatural had been in it I hardly imagin the Evangelist would have used that threefold asseveration concerning the truth of the thing as we see he doth And he that saw it bare record c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 There came out blood and water It is commonly said that the two Sacraments of the New Testament Water and Blood flow'd out of this wound but I would rather say that the Antitype of the Old Testament might be here seen I. The Apostle teacheth us that the ratification of the old Covenant was by Blood and Water Heb. IX 19. Moses took the blood of calves and of goats with water c. I confess indeed that Moses makes no mention of water Exod. XXIV but the Apostle writing to the Hebrews does not write without such authority as they could not tell how to gainsay And if my memory do not fail me I think I have read some where among some of the Jewish Authors but the place its self is unhappily slipt from me that when there was some pause to be made betwixt the slaying of the Sacrifice and the sprinkling of the blood upon the Altar such a kind of pause as Moses made when he read to the people the articles of their Covenant they mingled water with the blood lest it should congeal and coagulate However the authority is sufficient that the Apostle tells us that the first Testament was dedicated by Blood and Water The Antitype of which is clearly exhibited in this ratification of the New Testament and hence is it that the Evangelist by so vehement asseverations confirms the truth of this passage because it so plainly answers the Type and gives such assurance of the fulfilling of it II. I must not by any means let pass that in Shemoth rabba h h h h h h Fol. 122. 1 He smote the rock 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the waters gushed out Psal. LXXVIII 20. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies nothing else but blood as it is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the woman that hath an issue of blood upon her Levit. XV. 20. Moses therefore smote the rock twice and first it gusht out blood then water The rock was Christ 1 Cor. X. 4. Compare these two together Moses smote the rock and blood and water saith the Jew flow'd out thence The Souldier pierced our Saviour's side with a Spear and water and blood saith the Evangelist flow'd thence St. John concludes this asseveration of his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that ye might believe It is not without moment what is commonly said viz. that by this flowing out of water and blood it is evident his Pericardium was pierced and so there was an undoubted assurance given of his death but I hardly believe the Evangelist in this clause had any direct eye toward it would he be so vehement in asserting he that saw bare record and he knoweth that he saith true that ye may believe that Jesus was indeed dead surely there was no need of such mighty asseverations for that questionless therefore he would intimate something else viz. that you may believe that this is the true blood of the New Covenant which so
lookt toward one another but when they did not then they turn'd their faces toward the walls Thus Onkelos comments upon this place of the Chronicles I hardly think he Targumizeth on the Book for the Targum at least that is in our hands renders it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 both the Cherubins are made of lilly-work VERS XVII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Touch me not for I am not yet ascended c. THESE words relate to what he had spoken formerly about sending the Comforter and that he would not leave them comfortless c. And this probably Mary Magdalen's mind was intent upon when she fell at his feet and would have embraced them But he I must first ascend to my Father before I can bestow those things upon you which I have promised do not therefore touch me and detain me upon any expectation of that kind but wait for my Ascension rather and go and tell the same things to my Brethren for their encouragement VERS XXIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted HE had formerly given them a power of binding and loosing and therefore probably bestows something more upon them now than what he had conferr'd before For I. It would seem a little incongruous for our Saviour to use an action so new and unwonted such as was his breathing upon them to vest them only with that power which he had before given them II. The power of binding and loosing was concern'd only in the articles and decisions of the Law this power which he now gives them reacht to the sins of mankind That power concern'd the Doctrines this the persons of men Now that we may understand the words that are before us let us a little consider what is said Luk. XXIV 46. Thus it is written and thus it behoved Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all Nations beginning at Jerusalem Which words we may suppose he spoke before he utter'd what is in this verse And so might there not upon the occasion of those words arise some such scruple as this in the Apostles breasts Is it so indeed must remission of sins be Preached to those in Jerusalem who have stain'd themselves with the blood of the Messiah himself Yes saith he For whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them To this those words of his upon the Cross have some reference Luk. XXIII 34. Father forgive them c. And indeed upon what foundation with what confidence could the Apostles have preacht remission of sins to such wretched men who had so wickedly so cruelly murder'd their own Lord the Lord of life unless authoriz'd to it by a peculiar commission granted to them from their Lord himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whose soever ye retain they are retained Besides the negative included in these words that is If you do not remit them they shall not be remitted there is something superadded that is positive That is I. There is granted to them a power of smiting the rebellious with present death or some bodily stroke II. A power of delivering them over to Satan Whence had St. Peter that power of striking Ananias and Sapphira with so fatal a bolt whence St. Paul that of striking Elymas blind whence of delivering over Hymeneus and Alexander to Satan if not from this very commission given them by Christ Christ himself never exercis'd this power himself it was not one person whom he stroke either with death or any afflictive disease some indeed he raised when they had been dead and infinite numbers of the sick and diseased whom he cured He snatcht several from the power of the Devils he deliver'd none to them That the Apostles therefore might be capable of performing things of so high a nature it was necessary they should be backt and encourag'd by a peculiar authority which if we find not in this clause Whose soever sins ye retain they are retained where should we look for it And therefore when he endows his Apostles with a power which he never thought fit to exercise in his own person no wonder if he does it by a singular and unusual action and that was breathing upon them ver 22. But we must know that whereas amongst other mighty powers conferr'd we reckon that as one viz. delivering over unto Satan we are far from meaning nothing else by it but Excommunication What the Jews themselves meant by that kind of phrase let us see by one instance d d d d d d Succah fol. 53. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Those two men of Cush that stood before Solomon Elihoreph and Ahijah the Scribes Sons of Shausha On a certain day Solomon saw the Angel of Death weeping he said why weepest thou He answer'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Because these two Cushites entreat me that they may continue here 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Solomon deliver'd them over to the Devil who brought them to the borders of Luz and when they were come to the borders of Luz they dy'd Gloss. He calls them Cushites Ironically because they were very beautiful They entreat me that they might continue here For the time of their death was now come But the Angel of death could not take their souls away because it had been decreed that they should not die but at the Gates of Luz Solomon therefore deliver'd them over 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the Devils for he reign'd over the Devils as it is written And Solomon sat upon the Throne of the Lord for he reigned 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 over those things that are above and those things that are below Josephus also makes mention of the power that Solomon had over Devils e e e e e e Antiq. lib. 8. cap. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God taught him an art against Demons The belief of either of these stories is at the liberty of the Reader Only from the former we may make this observation that a power of delivering over to Satan was even in the Jews opinion divine and miraculous We acknowledg this to have been in the Apostles and in the Apostles only and I know no where if not in the words we are now treating of from whence otherwise the original of this power and authority can be deriv'd III. It seems further that at this very time was granted to the Apostles a commission to confer the Holy Spirit on those whom they found qualify'd and that in these words Receive ye the Holy Ghost i. e. Receive ye it to distribute it to others For although it cannot be deny'd but that they receiv'd the Holy Ghost for other reasons also and to other ends of which we have already discours'd yet is not this great end to be excluded which seem'd the highest and noblest endowment of all viz. that Christ breathing upon them inspir'd them with the Holy
For so was he indeed distinguished from all mortals and Sons of men And God saith he had then begotten him when he had given a token that he was not a meer man by his divine power whereby he had raised him from the dead And according to the tenor of the whole Psalm God is said to have begotten him then when he was ordained King in Sion and all Nations subdued under him Upon which words that passage of our Saviour uttered immediately after he had arisen from the dead is a good Commentary All power is given unto me c. Matth. XXVIII What do those words mean Matth. XXVI 29. I will not henceforth drink of this fruit of the Vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Fathers Kingdom They seem to look this way viz. I will drink no more of it before my Resurrection For in truth his Resurrection was the beginning of his Kingdom when he had overcome those enemies of his Satan Hell and Death from that time was he begotten and established King in Zion I am mistaken if that of Psal. CX v. 3. doth not in some measure fall in here also which give me leave to render by way of paraphrase into such a sense as this Thy people shall be a willing people in the day of thy power it shall be a willing people in the beauties of holiness it shall be a willing people from the Womb of the morning thine is the dew of thy youth Now the dew of Christ is that quickning power of his by which he can bring the dead to life again Isai. XXVI 19. And the dew of thy youth O Christ is thine That is it is thine own power and vertue that raiseth thee again I would therefore apply those words from the womb of the morning to his Resurrection because the Resurrection of Jesus was the dawn of the new world the morning of the new Creation VERS XXXIV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The sure mercies of David IT hath been generally observed that this phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is taken from the Greek Version in Isai. LV. 3. But it is not so generally remarked that by David was understood the Messiah which yet the Rabbins themselves Kimchi and Ab. Ezra have well observed the following Verse expressly confirming it The Resurrection of our Saviour therefore by the interpretation of the Apostle is said to be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The sure mercies of Christ. And God by his Prophet from whence this clause is taken doth promise the raising again of the Messiah and all the benefits of that Resurrection He had fortold and promised his death Chap. LIII But what mercies could have been hoped for by a dead Messiah had he been always to have continued dead They had been weak and instable kindnesses had they terminated in death He promises mercies therefore firm and stable that were never to have end because they should be always flowing and issuing out of his resurrection Whereas these things are quoted out of the Prophet in the words of the LXX varying a little from the Prophets words and those much more 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Behold ye despisers and wonder c. vers 41. it might be enquired in what language the Apostle preached as also in what language Moses and the Prophets were read in that Synagogue vers 15. If we say in the Greek it is a question whether the Pisidians could understand it If we say in the Pisidian language it is hardly to be believed the Bible was then rendred into that language It is remarkable what was quoted above out of Strabo where he mentions four tongues amongst them the Greek and the Pisidian distinct from one another But this I have already discusst in the Notes upon Verse 15. of this Chapter VERS XLI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Behold ye despisers c. DR Pocock a a a a a a Poc. Miscell 3. here as always very learnedly and accurately examines what the Greek Interpreters Hab. I. read saving in the mean time the reading which the Hebrew Bibles exhibit for it is one thing how the Greek read it and another thing how it should be truly read VERS XLII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The Gentiles besought c. IT is all one as to the force of the words as far as I see whether you render them they besought the Gentiles or the Gentiles besought them the later Version hath chiefly obtained but what absurdity is it if we should admit the former And doth not the very order of the words seem to favour it If it had been 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one might have inclined to the later without controversie but being it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there is place for doubting And if it were so that the Jews resented the Apostles doctrine so ill that they went out of the Synagogue disturbed and offended as some conjecture and that not improbably we may the easilier imagine that the Apostles besought the Gentiles that tarried behind that they would patiently hear these things again 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 On the next Sabbath I. The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Lexicons tell us amongst other things denotes hence forward or hereafter Now this must be noted that this discourse was held in the fore noon for it was that time of the day only that they assembled in the Synagogue in the afternoon they met in Beth Midras Let us consider therefore whether this phrase will not bear this sense They besought that afterwards upon that Sabbath viz. in the afternoon they would hear again such a Sermon And then whether the Gentiles besought the Apostles or the Apostles the Gentiles it dot not alter the case II. Let us inquire whether the Apostles and the Christian Church did not now observe and celebrate the Lord's day It can hardly be denyed and if so then judge whether the Apostles might not invite the Gentiles that they would assemble again the next day that is upon the Christian Sabbath and hear these things again If we yield that the Lord's day is to be called the Sabbath then we shall easily yield that it might be rightly called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Sabbath after And indeed when the speech was amongst the Jews or Judaizing Proselytes it is no wonder if it were called the Sabbath As if the Apostles had said to morrow we celebrate our Sabbath and will you on that day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 have these words preached to you III. Or let 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be the week betwixt the two Sabbaths as that expression must be rendred 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I fast twice in the week then as the sense is easie that they besought them the same things might be repeated on the following week so the respect might have more particularly been had to the second and fifth day in the week when they usually meet together in the Synagogue
speak two or three LET one sing who hath a Psalm let another teach who hath a doctrine and if a third bath exhortation or comfort as vers 3. Let him also utter it VERS XXX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But if any thing be revealed to another that sitteth by THAT is very frequently said of the Jewish Doctors 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He sate which means not so much this barely He was sitting as He taught out of the Seat of the Teacher or he sate teaching or ready to teach So that indeed he sate and he taught are all one Examples among the Talmudists are infinite In the same sense the Apostle If something be revealed to some Minister who hath a seat among those that teach c. not revealed in that very instant but if he saith that he hath received some revelation from God then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 let the first be silent let him be silent that hath a Psalm and give way to him VERS XXXV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For it is a shame for women to speak in the Church COmpare that q q q q q q Megill fol. 23. 1. The Rabbins deliver 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Every one is reckoned within the number of Seven of those that read the Law in the Synagogues on the Sabbath day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Even a child even a woman But the Wise men say let not a woman read in the Law 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For the honour of the Synagogue Note that it was a disgrace to the Church if a woman should read in it which was allowed even to a child even to a servant much more if she usurped any part of the Ministerial Office It was also usual for one or the other sitting by to ask the Teacher of this or that poynt but this also the Apostle forbids women and that for this reason Because it is not allowed women to speak but let them be subject to their husbands vers 34. It was allowed them to answer Amen with others and to sing with the Church but to speak any thing by themselves it was forbidden them CHAP. XV. VERS V. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And that he was seen of Cephas NAmely going to Emmaus See what we have said at Mark XVI VERS VI. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Then he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once IN a Mountain of Galilee Mat. XXVIII 16. When it is added by the Evangelist 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But some doubted which is to be warily understood not that some of the Eleven now still doubted of his Resurrection for Thomas himself had believed before but that some of that multitude assembled there with the Eleven doubted Therefore it is not only congruous but necessary to render that verse thus And they the Eleven Disciples seeing him worshipped him but others doubted Not some of the Eleven but others of the company VERS VII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 After that he was seen of Iames. WHAT James The Son of Zebedee or of Alpheus It is more probable to understand it of James the Son of Alpheus and that he was alive when Paul wrote this and that the Apostle seems on purpose to treat of the appearance of Christ to Peter and James the Minister of the Circumcision and to himself the Minister of the Uncircumcision See the story of one James a Disciple as he is stiled of Jesus a a a a a a Avodah Zarah fol. 16. 2. 27. 2. VERS VIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. As one born out of due time c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 An untimely birth Job III. 16. to the LXX Interpreters is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and which is to be marked they render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 An hidden untimely birth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an untimely birth proceeding out of his mothers womb when the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hidden seems rather to denote the contrary namely That it never went out of its mothers womb but was always hidden there So the Chaldee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an untimely birth hidden in the womb Hence the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 very usual among the Talmudists for a woman bringing forth an abortive 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A b b b b b b Cherithuth cap. 1. hal 3. woman that comes before her time and brings forth in the figure of a beast or a bird 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Coming before her time and bringing forth a sandal secundine or a figured lump c. Numb XII 12. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As an untimely birth coming out of the mothers womb and devoureth the half of her flesh As though the Apostle should say How far am I from an Apostle As much as some mishapen and desormed lump brought forth by an abortive birth differs from the shape of a man You may render the words in English more apt and clear unless I am mistaken in my conjecture after this manner As to a thing born out of due form than as they are rendred As to one born out of due time 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A child not shaped So the LXX in Exod. XXI 22. VERS XX. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The first fruits of them that slept ALthough the Resurrection of Christ compared with some first fruits hath very good harmony with them yet especially it agrees with the offering of the Sheaf commonly called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not only as to the thing it self but as to the circumstance of time For first there was the Passover and the day following was a Sabbatic day and on the day following that were the first fruits offered So Christ our Pasover was crucified The day following his crucifixion was the Sabbath and the day following that he the first fruits of them that sleep rose again VERS XXIX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They are baptized for the dead I. IN this sense you may best understand these words Otherwise what shall they do who undergo martyrdom and are baptized in that sense as baptism denotes death by martyrdom if the dead are not at all raised For I. That Baptism is taken for martyrdom appears enough Mat. XX. 22 23. II. See how very well the connection of the following verse agrees to this sense What shall they do who have undergone and do undergo martyrdom if there be not a Resurrection 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And why do we also every day and every moment go in danger of martyrdom III. He argues from them that die in Christ that is in the Faith of Christ ver 18. And do you believe he would omit an argument from those that die for the Faith of Christ IV. He saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 What shall they do Not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 What do they Not what they mean or denote or signifie by this that they are baptized c. But what shall they do Or what shall become of them They have delivered their bodies
cursed that Adam and all the Saints of God might not look for blessedness upon the Earth but in Christ nor for Christ nor his Kingdom upon this cursed Earth but in Heaven O Jew the Earth is cursed where canst thou find a place upon it for Messias blessed Kingdom All is but as Meshek and the Tents of Kedar to him he finds not a place here to lay his head I may say the title over Christs head was and is a stumbling block under the Jews feet where it was written Jesus of Nazareth and they looked for Messias of Bethlehem King of the Jews and they saw nothing in him but poverty and contempt In Joh. XVII 24. Father I will that those whom thou hast given me be with me where I am Where I am where is that Not here wherein is poverty contempt and dishonor as he experienced when he was here but to see my glory there where he is glorified Alas What treatment can he provide for them here Can he spread a table for their full satisfaction in this Wilderness where he found none for himself The dish he sets before them is In this world you shall have tribulation but be of good chear there is better chear provided for you in my Fathers house This is but a Wilderness you are passing through Canaan is the land provided for the flowing with milk and hony In my Fathers house there are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 many abiding places here you are flitting from place to place and no abiding but I have prepared a Rest for the people of God An unfit place here where there is nothing but changes and vicissitudes and where in a moment Amnons mirth and feasting may be turned into mourning and misery All the days of my appointed time will I wait till my change cometh saith Job Why he met with changes enough but he means his great change when he should be changed no more than that that he looks for and trusts in An unfit place this when the house may be blown down whilst we are feasting in it as it happened to Jobs children This World then is no fit place for Christ to entertain his people in Secondly A believer in this World is not yet capable of the Entertainment that Christ has to give him therfore that is reserved for him in his Fathers house As Christ tells his Disciples I have many things to speak to you but you cannot bear them So I say in our present case Christ hath many excellent treatments to entertain them withal but here they are not fit for them while we are in this corruptible flesh we want the wedding garment Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God So corruptible bodies are not garments fit for these divine entertainments 1. The Soul in these bodies does not act to the utmost extent its nature is capable of It is like a bird that let out injoys a whole World of liberty but not before There is a kind of immensity in the Soul and this is one part of Gods image Any one Soul among us could hold as much wisdom goodness c. as God in its degree and capacity but it is straitned in these bodies that it cannot act to such an extensiveness As the River is straitned within its banks till it fall into the Ocean so the Soul here is straitned by ignorance infirmities pressures but at death it slips into the Ocean of Eternity where there is no more straitness 2. How impossible is it in these mortal bodies to see God as he is How hard through the fogs of flesh to see the things of God How impossible to behold God in his essence In the mount will the Lord be seen and not in the low vallies of mortality and corruption Oh! I cannot but with rapture consider of the strange and blessed change that blessed Souls find as soon as ever departed Here we are groping after him and much ado we have to discern a little of him here one cloud or other is interposing twixt our contemplation and that Sun But as soon as we are got out of the body we behold that incomprehensible light as he is Oh! what rapture of Soul will it be to see all clouds dispelled and to look with open full eye upon the Sun Oh! this is our God we have groped we have waited for him What the Apostle saith II Cor. III. ult But we all with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord are changed into the same image from glory to glory This is of transcendent comfort for believers it being their happiness here to behold as in a glass the glory of the Lord and to be changed into the same image What ravishment of Joy will it be to find it effected to the utmost in Eternity 3. How impossible is it to keep the heart fixed on God here While flesh hangs on it that will be making it to flag aside A SERMON PREACHED AT HERTFORD Assise April 6. 1666. I JOHN V. 16. There is a sin unto death I do not say that he should pray for it AND it is a deadly sin indeed that outvies and excludes the charity of this Apostle A man as his Writings evidence of him and as Ecclesiastical History testifies concerning him composed altogether of Charity His Epistles evidence to you how urgent he is for love one to another and Ecclesiastical History will tell you that his common salutation to all he met was Let us love one another But here he hath met with a wretch to whom he cannot find in his heart to say God speed A deadly sin and a deadly sinner to whom he cannot allow the Christian the Common the needful Charity of his own or other mens prayers O no It is a sin unto death The uttering of the first clause There is a sin unto death may not undeservedly nor impertinently move such another inquiry in the Congregation as the uttering of those words of our Saviour One of you shall betray me did move at his Table every one then to say Is it I and every one here to say is the sin mine As it was time for every one of Israel to look about him lest the thing should fall to his share when Joshua proclaimed among them There is an accursed thing in the midst of thee O Israel Josh VII 13. So when the Holy Ghost proclaimeth in the words of the Text There is a sin unto death is it not time is it not pertinent for every one that is within hearing to look about and take heed lest this dead Concubine do lie at the threshold of his door as she did in Gibeah Judg. XIX And what hath any notorious sinner to say for himself why the Law of the Text should not proceed against him and condemn his profaneness uncleanness wickedness unconscionableness under the name and title of a sin unto death seeing it seemeth a great deal more currant that
there is sin unto death than that there should be any sin that is not unto death as our Apostle saith there is in the words immediately going before these that I have chosen In these that I have chosen you see there are two clauses and out of either of them arise two Questions Out of the former I. What sin it is the Apostle means And II. Why he titles it by such a name A sin unto death Out of the latter I. Why he forbideth to pray for it And II. Why he forbideth not to pray for it I mean why he speaketh not out in down right terms I say that he should not pray for it but says only I say not that he should The Rhemists Popish Expositors upon the place will answer you even all these questions with a breath if you will but take their words and little more than their bare word must you expect for the proof and confirmation of what they tell you 1. They will tell you that the sin our Apostle means is any sin whatsoever that any one lives in unrepentant all his time 2. They will tell you that it is titled A sin unto death because he lives in it till his death and so dies in it 3. They will tell you that the Apostle by not praying for him means not praying for him when he is dead but he that sins not a sin unto death that is that lives not in his sin till he die but repents of it before for him you must pray after his death For that the place is most properly or only meant of praying for the departed say they this convinced that neither the Church nor any man is debarred here from praying for any sinner while living nor for remission of any sin in this life And so they go on When I read these mens Annotations on this Scripture they often mind me of Benhadads servants with ropes about their necks catching at any word that fell from the King of Israels mouth that might be for any advantage to their forlorn and lost cause and condition These mens Popish cause hath had the rope about its neck now a long time and been in a lost and forlorn case and I cannot tell whether I should laugh or frown to see what pitiful shift and shameful scrambling they make for it by catching at any word or syllable in the Scripture or Fathers and wresting and twisting and twining it to any seeming or colourable advantage to their condemned cause to save it from execution Certainly they are at a very hard pinch for proof of praying for the dead when they make such a scraping in this portion of Scripture to rake it out thence whereas the words are as far from meaning the living praying for the dead as the dead praying for the living And at the very same game they be in their notes upon our Saviours words concerning the sin against the Holy Ghost that it shall never be forgiven in this World nor in the World to come Matth. XII 32. Their note is that some sins may be remitted in the next life and consequently this proves Purgatory As the poor frantick distracted wretch at Athens that fed and pleased himself with this fancy that every ship that came into the Port was his ship that all the goods that came into the Town were his goods whilst he himself in the mean time was miserably poor naked and ready to famish so these men think every verse in Scripture brings in something to their stock every saying of the Fathers something to their bank whilst in the mean while their pitiful cause walks starven and poor and blind and naked and stands in need of all things The sin against the Holy Ghost indeed is distinct and something different from this sin unto death that our Apostle speaketh of yet since there is such a particular sin against the Holy Ghost that is so deadly why should not these men think that sin in the Text that carries so deadly a name is a particular sin likewise It is true indeed that a sin in which a man continues unrepenting until his death and in which he dies may very justly be called A sin to death that is a sin until his death and it will prove A sin to death eternal but that the Apostle means here a particular sin and that he estimates it not by its length but by its weight not by how long the party continues in it but by how grievous the sin is in it self will appear as we go along partly by discovery of the reason of the title he puts upon it and partly by discovery of the very sin it self that is here intended But before we begin with the discovery of the reason of the title let us a little look first into the meaning of those words of our Saviour Joh. XX. 22. He breathed on them and saith unto them Receive ye the Holy Ghost whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted to them and whose soever sins ye retain they are retained Do not the Apostles here receive a new power or priviledge or guift which Christ had not imparted to them before Else why such an action as he had never used toward them before so breathing on them The common acceptation of these words whose soever sins ye remit or retain are remitted or retained is to make them to mean the same thing with what ye bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven c. But besides that the expressions are of a vast difference why if Christ had given them the very same power in those words that he doth in these why should he repeat it especially why should he use such a solemn and unusual rite toward them to breath upon them He had given them power of miracles and healing and casting out Devils before without breathing upon them He had given them power of binding and loosing that is of establishing or abolishing the rites and Laws of Moses for so the Phrase in the common acceptation of the Nation did only signifie and this he did without breathing upon them Therefore certainly in this his new action and these his new words as I may call them he gives them some new power and that in two kinds 1. In his breathing upon them and bidding them receive the Holy Ghost he gives the Holy Ghost to give again or he gives them power by the imposition of their hands to bestow the Holy Ghost as the sacred Story tells you the Apostle did and none but the Apostles could do And 2. In his words whose soever sins ye remit or retain he gives them a punitive or executive double power viz. To strike desperate or incorrigible and horrid transgressors with some corporal punishment or stroke or else to give them up to Satan to be tortured and scourged in body and vexed and disquieted in mind Where had Peter his warrant to strike Ananias and Sapphira with death but from these words And Paul
to strike Elymas with blindness and to deliver Hymenaeus and Alexander unto Satan but from that Apostolick power which Christ granted to the Apostles in these words Well might not these sins very well be called sins unto death that were overtaken with such deadly and dreadful penalties Was not that sin a sin unto death that was to be retained as retaining is set in di rectopposition to remitting Thus may we bring the subjectum quaestionis into a farnarrower compass than the Rhemists bring it who do bewray their ignorance one way that they may serve their own turn another their ignorance of the proper original of the Phrase sin unto death that they may serve their turn about praying for the dead The greatest difficulties of the Scripture lie in the Language for unlock the Language and Phrases and the difficulty is gone And therefore they that take upon them to preach by the spirit and to expound the Scripture by the spirit let them either unlock to me the Hebrew Phrases in the Old Testament and the Greek in the New that are difficult and obscure or else they do nothing Now to attain to the meaning of such dark and doubtful Phrases the way is not so proper to put on them a sense of our own as to consider what sense they might take them in to whom and among whom the things were spoken and written in their common Speech If it were well considered how the Jewish Nation understood binding and loosing in their Schools and in their common Speech we should never need to mint such senses of our own to put upon the Phrase it would so be done to our hands Such an obscure Phrase is that of our Saviours about the sin against the Holy Ghost that it shall never be forgiven neither in this life nor c. And the collection that the Rhemists make upon it may seem very Logical for in that he saith that sin shall not be forgiven in the World to come doth it not argue that some other sins are then forgiven But this is their own sense and Logick it is not our Saviours Now how should we know our Saviours sense By considering how they would understand it to whom the words were spoken in their common acceptation and Language viz. they would soon understand it to be a direct facing and confuting of their foolish opinion concerning forgiveness of blasphemy against God which was that repentance and the day of expiation expiated a third part of the sin corporal punishment inflicted by the Magistrate expiated another third part but death did quite wipe it clean out for say they it is written This sin shall not be purged from you till you die which argues that it was purged by death No saith our Saviour neither in this life either by repentance nor day of expiation nor corporal punishment nor pardon in the life to come by the purging and wiping out of death Such an obscure Phrase is this before us A sin unto deâ—th and it seems a fair sense which the Rhemists have put upon it of their own viz. that it should mean A sin a man liâ—es in till he die But this is their own sense it is not the Apostles Now how should we know the Apostles sense By considering how they understood this Phrase in their common Language to whom he wrote And how was that Take it up by this Observation That in the Jewish Schools and Nation and Language this was a most frequent and ordinary saying 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If a man do such or such a thing as should not be done ignorantly he is to bring a sin offering and that attones for him But 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if he do it wilfully he is bound over to cutting off And in this they speak but the words of the Law in Numb XV. 27 28. If any soul sin through ignorance he shall bring a she goat of the first year for a sin offering And the Priest shall make an attonement for him that sinneth ignorantly But the soul that doth ought presumptuously whether he be born in the Land or a Stranger the same hath reproached the Lord That soul shall be cut off from among his people Now what is meant by cutting off If you ask some they will put a sense of their own upon the Phrase and tell you it means a cutting off or separating a person from the Congregation and publick Assemblies by Excommunication But ask the Jews to and among whom the thing was spoken what it means in their common speech and acceptation and they will tell you cutting off means 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Death by the hand of Heaven Death or destruction by the hand of God Interpreting the matter to this purpose that if a person sinned wilfully and presumptuously there was no sin offering allowed in that case but the party so offending fell immediately under liableness to divine vengance to be destroied or cut off by the hand of Heaven And this interpretation of the Phrase of cutting off the Apostle Paul doth justifie in that passage Heb. X. 26. If we sin wilfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin but a certain fearful looking for of judgment c. That Text of Moses lots out the family of the Achan that we are speaking of the sin unto death and this Text of the Apostle takes him by the poll and tells what sin it is It tells you what sin it is viz. Sinning wilfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth It limits to you why it is called a sin unto death because there is no other way upon the committing of it but a certain fearful expectation of judgment and fiery indignation And it gives you some intimation why no praying for it because no sacrifice for it Before we come to speak upon the words we have some cause to muse and mourn over them As it is said Origen wept over that passage of the Psalmist that after his Apostasie stung him in Psal. L. 16 17. But unto the wicked God said what hast thou to do to declare my statutes or that thou shouldest take my Covenant in thy mouth seeing thou hatest instruction and casteth my words behind thee If there be no sacrifice for sin but a fearful expectation of judgment and fiery indignation when we have sinned wilfully after we have once received the knowledge of the truth Men and brethren what shall we do Take the truth in the sense that may help most to favour us for the Gospel as it means there indeed And take sinning wilfully for as exclusive a term as you can to shut and exclude us out of the guilt here intended yet who can say but he hath sinned wilfully since he received the knowledge of the Gospel over and over If I should take Jeremiahs course in his fifth Chapter and vers 4. and forward sending first to the poor or inferior rank and ask
God the true Messias And the Jews that would not believe that no sign would serve to make them believe That indeed you 'l say gave assurance to all men that he was the Son of God the true Messias but how did that give assurance that there should be an universal Judgment and he the Judge Truly he that knows what the true Messias means needs no more proof and demonstration of that than his very Character He is heir of the World he is Prince and Saviour he is King in Sion he is set up above all Principality and power as the Scripture speaks these and divers other things of him and doth any man need more evidence of his being judge of all the World But our question is how that is inferred or argued from his Resurrection The Resurrection of Christ did beget and effectuate a double Resurrection for you have mention of a two fold Resurrection in Scripture First There is mention of the first Resurrection Rev. XX. 5. The Millenary not able to clear the notion whereof nor to spell out the meaning hath bewildred himself in those wild conceptions as he hath done The first Resurrection began and took place presently after our Saviours own Resurrection for it means no other than the raising the Heathen from their death in sin blindness and Idolatry to the life light and obedience of the Gospel And so the Apostle titles their estate writing to the Ephesians which had been some of them Ephes. II. 1. You hath he quickned who were dead in trespasses and sins And to that very tenor are those words of the Prophet Esay XXVI 19. Thy dead men shall live together with my dead body shall they arise The Gentiles to be raised from their spiritual death presently upon his raising from his bodily And who so shall well weigh those words of our Saviour Joh. V. 25. The hour is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God and they that hear shall live will clearly find them to mean nothing else So that the Resurrection of Christ had first influence and virtue to cause this spiritual Resurrection the Resurrection of souls the raising up of the Gentiles from the death of sin And whence it had this influence it is easie to read viz. because by his Resurrection he had conquered the Devil who had so long kept the poor Heathen under that spiritual death Will you have a Commentary upon that passage in Psal. CX 3. Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power First His Resurrection day of power Rom. I. 4. Then look into the story of the Acts of Apostles the history of the times next following his Resurrection You may wonder there to see people coming in by flocks and thousands to the acknowledgment and entertaining of the Gospel three thousand at one Sermon Chap. II. five thousand at another Chap. III. and further in that book in a little time the Gospel running through the World and imbraced and intertained of all Nations Oh! It was the day of his power and thy people shall be willing in day of thy power He had now Conquered Hell and Satan by his death and rising again whose captives those poor heathen had been two and twenty hundred years and now he said to the captives Go free and to the prisoners Go forth and so they did And upon the very like account his Resurrection hath influence to the causing and effectuating the general Resurrection at the last day For though it might be a little too long to hold that the wicked shall be raised by the very same virtue of Christs Resurrection that the godly shall yet it is not too large to hold that they shall be raised by some virtue of his Resurrection viz. as his Resurrection had conquered death and brought him to those articles that he must in time give up and restore all prisoners and dead that they may come and give account to him that conquered him I have the keys of the grave and death faith he in the Revelations he had wrung the keys out of the jaylors hand and opened the prison doors that the prisoners should come out when he calls Very observable to the purpose we are upon viz. that Christs Resurrection did assure that judgment and that he should be judge is that in Phil. II. 8. 9. He humbled himself and became obedient unto death even the death of the cross Wherefore also God hath highly exalted him Obedience was that debt that was to be paid to God Whereas much stress is laid upon the torments that Christ suffered it is very true that he suffered as much as I may say God could lay upon him short of his own wrath and as much as the Devil could withal his wrath but that was not the debt that was due and to be paid to God Wrath and torment and damnation was rather the debt that was to be paid to man But the debt was obedience For easie is it to observe how Satan had got the day of God as with reverence I may speak it when he had brought the chief creature of Gods creation and in him all mankind to disobey God and to be obedient to him and had carried it for ever had not an obedience been paid again to God that outvied that disobedience How might Satan triumph Man that is the darling creature to the Creator and that is set up Lord and Ruler of all Creatures and to whom even the Angels are appointed to be ministring Spirits I have brought this brave Gallant to forsake his Creator and to follow and obey me But forth steps this noble Champion of God and in the form of a servant incounters this triumpher and mauger all his spite and power and vexatiousness he pays God an obedience incomparably beyond the obedience that Adam should have paid incomparably outweighing the disobedience that Adam shewed He paid an obedience that should answer for the disobedience of all his people An obedience that should be a stock for all his people Nay he paid an obedience that outvied all the disobediences of all men and Devils For he paid an obedience that was infinite Now his Resurrection did demonstrate that he had made full payment or else Satan and Death might have kept him still in the grave their prison if a farthing had been yet unpaid Now he having by his Resurrection consummated the payment of so great obedience and vindicated the honour and quarrel of God against his enemies In all justice and equity the Lord exalted him above all that all should be subject and homagers to him and that he might take account and reward accordingly those that obey him and that obey him not And so the Lord hath appointed a day in which he will judge the World in righteousness by him whereof he hath given assurance unto all men in that he raised him from the dead And are you assured that there will be
when the Judge cometh to plead their cause and behold the Judge standeth before the door If we should take the words in this sence and pointing at such a time and matter I suppose it might not be far from the Apostles meaning But do his words reach no further Are not these things written for our learning as well as for theirs to whom he wrote Is it not a truth spoken to us as well as it was spoken to them Behold the Judge standeth before the door Dispute it not but rather down on our knees and bless and magnifie the patience and goodness of this Judge for that he is standing at the door and hath not yet broke in upon us In handling of the words I suppose I need not to spend time in explaining the Phrases For none that hears of this Judge but he knows who is meant and none can but know what is meant by his standing at the door viz. as near at hand and ready to enter And if the Apostle speak here of the nearness of the destruction of Jerusalem our Saviours words of the very same subject may help to explain him Matth. XXIV 33. So likewise ye when ye see all these things know that it is near even at the doors So behold the Judge is near even at the door But the Judge of whom And at the door of whom These shall be the two things that my discourse shall enquire after The Jews in their Pandect mention several things of which they say they are two and yet are four and when they explain themselves they shew they speak very good sence I may speak much like of the Propositions that rise out of the words that they are two but indeed are four The two are these That there is a Judge or God is a Judge and That this Judge stands before the door But the very stile and expression doth double it That God is the Judge of all and That this Judge stands at the door of all Because there is no exception about whom he judgeth nor any exception at whose door he standeth I cannot say it is as essential to God to be a Judge as it is essential to him to be holy infinite eternal good c. because he had been there had these never been creature to judge as he was these from eternity before the creature was but since there is a creature to judge I may say it is as essential to God to be Judge of his creature as it is to be God For we may truly say if he were not Judge he were not God For what kind of God were that that had not to do about judging the creature I need not to produce places of Scripture to prove that that is before us for what more plain what more frequent than such testimonies That God is Judge himself Psal. L. 6. That he is the Judge of all the Earth Gen. XVIII 25. That he is the Lord the righteous Judge 2 Tim. IV. 8. That he sits upon the Throne judging right Psal. IX 5. That with righteousness he shall judge the world and the people with equity Psal. XCVIII ult But because the language of the Text is Behold the Judge let me speak as I may say unto your eyes according to the expression O generation see ye the word of the Lord Jer. II. 31. So let me lead your eyes to behold some specimens of this great Judges judging and some demonstrations and assurances that he hath given that he will so judge Eternal Judgment is one of the first principles of Christian Religion Heb. II. 6. viz. the judgment that doth determine of every mans state for eternity for of Gods temporal judgments we shall not speak here And that judgment is either particular passed upon every one at death or general which shall be at the last day Of either of these I shall take some prospect I. Concerning the particular Judgment When mans day is done the day of the Lord begins with him and when his work is done he is to receive his wages according as his work hath been good or evil Lazarus and the rich man no sooner dead but the one is in torment and the other in Abrahams bosom And how come they there Conceive you see their passage The souls of all good or bad as soon as ever departed out of the body are slipt into another world And what becomes of them there Do they dispose of themselves Do they go to Heaven or Hell by their own disposal There would never soul go to Hell if it were at those terms But the departed soul meets with its Judge as soon as ever it is departed and by him it is doomed and disposed to its eternal estate The Judge stands at the very door of that World of Spirits to dispose of all that come in there to their everlasting condition according as their works have been here good or evil So that those words of the Apostle as they speak the subsequence of judgment to death so they may very well speak this nearness It is appointed for all men once to die and then cometh the judgment Heb. IX ult Those words of our Saviour are very regardable Luk. XX. 30. He is not the God of the dead but of the living for all live unto him Though dead and gone to the World and to themselves yet to him they are not dead but alive and he deals with them as such as are alive And though he be not the God of all that so live yet he is the Judge of them all He calls himself the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob when they had been now dead and in the dust a long time for they lived though they were dead And so Cain and Cham and Pharaoh lived though they were dead that is were not utterly extinct and yet God was far from owning himself the God of Cain Cham and Pharaoh but he was their Judge And do but think how these men looked upon their Judge when they met him A carnal wretch that never thinks of God never dreams of judgment but is all for his pleasures and delights here when he dies and instantly meets his dreadful Judge to doom him Can any tongue express what a horrid surprizal that soul is taken at I cannot but take some scantling of conception of it from that passage Rev. I. 17. And when I saw him I fell at his feet as dead The beloved Disciple to be thus terrified at the sight of his beloved Master He that used friendly to lean in his bosom now to fall at his feet for fear as dead And Christ not coming to him neither with any message of terror but in a friendly manner with instructions concerning things that were to come to pass thereafter And if so dreadful a consternation fell upon him upon meeting and seeing the glory of his dear what is the wretched souls case when it so unexpectedly meets with the dreadful terrors of its angry Judge
II. And thus much of the instrumental cause of this poor Prophets death A Lion The efficient cause was his transgressing a command of God Upon which if any heart be moved any whit to murmur or dispute against the severity of God in this case let me calm it much after the manner that Joabs messenger must calm David If the Kings anger arise and he seem vexed and displeased saith Joab to the messenger then say thou to him Thy servant Uriah is dead also If thy heart sinner arise against Gods dealing here and thou think it very severe that this poor man must die thus let me say this to calm thee But thou art not dead who art as great a transgressor as he Why he died a reason may be given but canst thou or all the World give a reason why thou art a live This then let it be the first application of this story Every one to consider with themselves That they after all their sinning are yet alive when this poor man but for one sin came to so fatal a death Let me use our Saviours stile and question a little Think you that these Galileans were sinners above all others or that those eighteen on whom the Tower of Siloam fell were sinners above all others Thinkest thou this man was a greater sinner than thou art that he came so to his end and to so fatal an end Nay speak heart from the very bottom and in sincerity Thinkest thou not that this man was an hundred fold a thousand fold less sinner than thou art And yet he was thus taken away and thou yet alive He a good man a holy man a holy Prophet and yet he so fearfully cut off for violating but one command and deceived into that miscariage too And how many commands hast thou broke knowingly wittingly wilfully and how far how many degrees art thou short of the holiness of this man and yet alive Hast thou any heart to complain of Gods severity against this poor man look home and see what cause thou hast to stand amazed at his patience toward thee He for breaking one command How many ones hast thou broken Nay if God had reckoned to cut thee off at the hundredth the thousandth breach of his commands had not the account been up an hundred a thousand times over And yet thou art here David questions Lord what is man Take the Philosophers answer Homo mirum Man is a wonder And so he is a wonder in his creation and so David himself owns Psal. CXXXIX I am fearfully and wonderfully made A wonder in his preservation when there are so many concurrents that might dash him all to pieces and yet he lives I will draw nigh saith Moses and see this great sight that is before me The bush burning and yet is not consumed And a great sight indeed that fire that devours all things that it lays hold on should burn so vehemently in the bush and yet the bush nothing at all impaired Draw nigh and turn thine eyes to such a kind of sight in thine own preservation So many things concurring that might cause thy consuming dust and ashes frailty mortality sinfulness provoking of God and yet not consumed What account can we give of our preservation First Let us look upon this man and then let us look upon our selves As the man that fell among thieves travailing from Jerusalem to Jericho lay by the way side half dead So this poor man is fallen into the paâ—s of the Lion and lieth by the way side wholly dead And is this nothing to us that we should like the Priest and Levite thus slightly pass by him The man was a good and holy man and I make no question but he was saved though he came to such a fatal end Saved Will you say when he came to such an end for transgressing Gods command He died in his sin certainly and can we think that he was saved 1. Consider what follows immediately in his story 28. ver The Lion had not eaten the carcass nor torn the Asse God that so severely punished him to the death yet shewed a miracle for him when he was dead Which sheweth that God had not cast away all care of him though he had so sorely punished him And it was a very fair sign that God had not suffered the great roaring Lion to devour his soul in that he suffered not this Lion to devour his carcass It s Davids saying Doest thou shew wonders for the dead Yes in one sense he did here And can we think that God would shew such a miracle for a castaway and for one whose soul was now in Hell would he shew such a wonder for his body 2. It s true indeed that he died for transgressing of Gods command but had he not repented of that transgression It s observable what is said of the Prophet that had brought him back again vers 21. That he cried to the man of God that he had brought back When God had revealed to him what wrong he had done in lying to the poor Prophet and making him transgress Gods command and what a sad fate should befal him for his transgression he cried out with sadness and affection and told him how it should be with him And can we think that the good man having his sin so laid before him and his dreadful punishment was not deeply touched with the sense of his sin and with all earnestness sought to God for pardon We may not judge of him by our selves we little take to heart what we have misdone and what is denounced by God against our sinning A holy Prophet was of better temper and of a tenderer heart and deeply sorrowed for his transgression when he was convinced of it and sought for pardon and obtained it So that though he died for his sin yet he died not in it The case of David may give some illustration to this case When Nathan told him home of his sin about Uriah and his wife he instantly repents is pardoned that he falls not under condemnation for it but he is not quit from temporal judgment and punishment for it The sword shall never depart from thine house And the child shall die So this man is told of his fault by the other Prophet he repents is pardoned that he falls not under condemnation but he is not acquitted from a temporal punishment and that a severe one that cost him his life We may here take notice of divers things First Of the wild opinions of Antinomians that say a Believer is not punished for his sins whatsoever befals him But the reason they give spoils what it would prove For Christ say they hath born his punishment which if it be true yet it is punishment as to satisfaction not to castigation For who among us ever said that a Believer was punished for the satisfaction of his sin God punisheth him upon other accounts Davids sin was pardoned and satisfied for by Christ
of these Commandments or to go beyond the Sea to learn the equity of these precepts Do we need to dig deep to find a reason why we should be bound to these things Do they not of themselves speak all equity and reason in the World And as it is Rom. XII that we should offer up our selves a holy living sacrifice to God is it not a most reasonable service that is required of us Upon what hath been spoken these two consequences must needs be concluded First That if there be so great reason to keep the Commandments of God how unreasonable a thing then is it not to keep them The Scripture speaketh not in vain when it calls wicked men Fools for they go against all reason and have even lost their reason unreasonable men as the Apostle calls them men that are without all reason Is there any pleading for Baal as Gideons Father spoke Is any reason to be pleaded for mens transgressing the Commands of God Produce your arguments bring forth your strong reasons to plead for your Idols and Idolatry saith God in derision to those that worshipped stocks and stones Produce your arguments bring forth your strong reasons why you should transgress any of the Commands of God And think you you can answer or satisfie God with all the arguments you can invent I must break such a Command or I shall lose my pleasure such a Command or I shall lose my profit such a Command or I am crost and shall lose my will Excellent reasons Wherewithal to out-argue the divine will of God and excellent pleadings To lay before God at the great day of judgment and very likely to come off fairly with A good man according to S. Peters counsel should be ready to give a reason of the hope that is in him Can a wicked man give any reason either of any hope in him or of the evil that proceedeth from him Sinning is a thing unreasonable and where there is so great reason for the keeping of Gods commands the breaking them must needs be against all reason And from this very thing if there were no other must the Conscience of ungodly men in Hell torture them for ever because reason is now awaked with them which they lulled a sleep in their lusts here and now they see how it was against all reason that they transgressed Gods commands Secondly If there be so great reason and equity to bind men to keep the Commandments of God certainly there is some reason and equity to bind them over to punishment if they keep them not Does God ever Command and never demand what becomes of his Commands Did he give them in such terror and will no terror follow the breach of them A SERMON Preached upon REVELAIONS XX. 5. But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished This is the first Resurrection WHAT is meant by the first Resurrection here is to be discerned by the verses preceding They tell you of Christ the Great Angel binding the Devil in a great chain and casting him into the bottomless pit a thousand years 1 2 3 verses and of thrones set and some sitting on them and judgment given to them and those that were martyred for the profession of Christ living and reigning with him a thousand years vers 4. But the rest of the dead lived not again c. The end for which Christ thus bound the Devil being considered will help to clear and unfold the whole matter and that you have vers 3. That he should deceive the Nations no more i. e. that he should not delude the Heathen or Gentiles as he had done From the casting off the Gentiles at Babel the Devil had kept all the world under a perpetual cheat to worship Idols to sacrifice to Devils to live and walk in all the ways of the Devil till Christ sent his Gospel among them to teach them better This then was the Chain whereby the Great Angel of the Covenant Christ tyed up the Devil that he should not cheat the world as he had before done viz. sending the Gospel among them by the preaching and power of which he restrained and quelled that power and deluding of the Devil The Heathen by the instruction of the Gospel come to know and worship and fear the true God to cast away their Idols to defy the Devil and his works and to laugh his Oracles and delusions to scorn Dagon is now fallen before the Ark of God and his head and hands broken off and now Dagon is left but a meer stump Jericho's walls are fallen flat with no other Engin but only the sound of Trumpets made of rams-horns the strong hold of Satan cast down with the only sound of the great trump of the Gospel and he himself tyed up that he shall no more cheat and cousin the world till a thousand years be expired and then he is loosed again and cousins the world by Popery now as he had done by Heathenism then The poor Heathen thus recovered out of the power of Satan by the coming in of the Gospel among them did creep out of their graves of Ignorance Idolatry and Sinfulnss in which they had layn stinking and rotting so many ages together had life put into them to live to God they are awaked out of their dust and long sleep to see and act and live as the children of God And this is that which is here called The first Resurrection And the very same title doth our Saviour give to the very same thing John V. 25. Verily verily I say unto you The hour is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God and they that hear shall live That he speaks of the first resurrection and of the last at vers 28 29. Marvel not at this for the hour is coming in which all that are in the grave shall hear his voice And shall come forth they that have done good unto the resurrection of life and they that have done evil unto the resurrection of damnation And do but consider how great and near a parallel there is twixt this first and that last resurrection That last shall raise men from the death of the body this raised the Heathen from the death of the Soul That shall be by the powerful sound of the Trump of God this was by the powerful sound of the Trumpet of the Gospel That will be acted by an infinite power raising men dead in the grave this was acted by an infinite power raising men dead in sins But the rest of the dead lived not again till the thousand years were finished And did they live then The Millenary will tell you Yes For his conceit about these thousand years is this That at the begining of the thousand years those that suffered martyrdom for Christs sake shall be raised out of their graves and reign with Christ a thousand years and when the thousand years are
finished there shall be the general resurrection And accordingly they construe the words before us to this sence The rest of the dead lived not until the thousand years were finished And then lived An opinion as like the opinion of the Jews as one egg is like another They think Christ shall reign among them on earth a thousand years pompous reign So do these They think that at the beginning of his reign the holy Prophets and Patriarchs shall be raised from death and reign with him So these They think that at the end of his thousand years reign there shall be the general resurrection and world of Eternity so do these So that the Millenary doth Judaize and he knows it not he is fallen into the Jews opinion and is not aware of it This book of Revelations is exceeding full of expressions that allude to the Jewish customs and opinions I say again is exceeding full but it were ridiculous to think that such passages are to be construed in the same literal sense that the Jews took them in Only those common and well known things as being familiar to the Nation are used to signifie or illustrate some spiritual sence or matter Expressions are used in this place that are agreeable in sound to the opinion of the Jews but not agreeable in sence but signifying something else They conceit a personal pompous reign of Christ on earth a thousand years in all earthly state and gallantry These words speak of a reign of Christ a thousand years but they mean his reign and ruling by his Word and Spirit and of his subduing and bringing the Nations into subjection and obedience but by the Ministry of the Gospel They speak of those that had been martyred reigning with him but the meaning only is to intimate that the children of his kingdom must suffer persecution and that they shall lose nothing by their persecution but as the Apostle speaks If they suffer with him they shall also reign with him Let us read the verse before I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus and for the Word of God And which had not worshiped the beast neither his image neither had received his his mark upon their foreheads or in their hands and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years But the rest of the dead lived not again till the thousand years were finished And did they live then That is not imaginable the time of reviving being then past and over For at the end of the thousand years Satan is let loose again brings in Popery and Mahumetism and the World grows as Heathenish as it had been before Satans binding and imprisoning So that they had lost the opportunity of reviving which was in the thousand years The word Until signifies doubly either concluding or else excluding you may see my meaning by these examples The Master in the Parable gives Talents to his servants and bids them Occupy till I come Here the word until concludes that he would come again This iniquity shall not be purged from you till you dye Es. XXII 14. Here the word till excludes them from ever having their iniquity purged The word until in the text is of this latter construction and means that they let slip and embraced not the opportunity of reviving all the thousand years when was the time of reviving and so they lived not again at all And if we well observe the Histories both of the Heathen and of the Church we shall find that all along this time that the Gospel was dispersing through the World there were multitudes of Heathens that would not forsake their Heathenism and multitudes in the Church in a little time fell to superstition and worshiping of Images and so even turned to Heathenism also Therefore God suffers Satan to be let loose again to go about in the world again with his delusions he brings in Popery in the West and Mahumetism in the East and so the whole World is returned to blindness and darkness again because when the light shone they would none of the light They would not embrace the offer of reviving when the time and opportunity of reviving was therefore they lived not again till those thousand years were finished and then the time of living again was over So that in the words before us we observe three things I. That the raising of the Gentiles from the Death of Sin is called the first Resurrection II. That in that time of raising some lost the opportunity and would not be raised III. That they losing the opportunity of rising and living missed always of rising and living I. As to the first thing named That the raising of the Gentiles from the death of sin is called the first Resurrection It gives us occasion to consider how a mans getting out of the state of sin into the state of grace is a Resurrection or a rising from the dead And with all to compare this first and last resurrection together and to see what connexion there is between them I. To Sadduces and Atheists that deny the resurrection at the last day because they can see no reason for it I should propose this question Whether there hath not been a raising of dead souls from the death of sin Abraham once an Idolater was not his soul dead then Yet afterwards he was the great Father of the faithful Was there not then a Resurrection of that dead soul Manasseh the King an Idolater a Conjurer a Sacrificer of his Sons to Molech was not this man dead in trespasses and sins and yet this man afterwards was a Penitent a Convert a Promoter of piety and the true worship of God Was not here a Resurrection of a dead Soul Is God less able to raise a dead body out of the grave than to raise a dead soul out of its sins Nay is not this as great a work of God as that will be Christ that can make such vile souls that they may be like unto his most glorious soul cannot he make these vile bodies that may be like his most glorious body according to the mighty working whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself II. But let us look upon this first resurrection a little and blessed and holy is he that hath part in it over such an one shall the second death have no power In some things it is not parallel or like to the second resurrection in more it is First The Second Resurrection shall be of all bodies this First is not of all souls And if we come to seek for the reason of the difference where shall we find it Cannot the same power that shall raise all bodies also raise all souls The reason of the difference lies not in the difference of that power Were it not as much for the glory of God to raise all souls as to raise all bodies The reason of the difference lyes not there neither For God chooseth freely the
ways of glorifying himself and is not tyed to this or that way by any necessity But the reason of the difference lyeth First In his own Will as the Apostle resolves it He will have mercy on whom he will have mercy and whom he will he hardneth But Secondly As in reference to the persons raised he raiseth what souls he raiseth by virtue of his Covenant of grace but he raiseth not all the bodies he raiseth by the same virtue It is said concerning Christ himself that God brought him from the dead by the bloud of the everlasting Covenant Heb. XIII 20. So doth he by the blood and virtue of the same Covenant bring from the dead every soul that he brings from the dead but he doth not so every body that he brings from the dead Now the tenor of the Covenant is Hearken to my voice and live Es. LV. 3. Incline your ear and come unto me hear and your soul shall live And to the very same tenor are those word of our Saviour mentioned before Joh. V. 25. The hour is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voice of the son of God and they that hear shall live What kind of language is this The Dead shall hear All the Dead shall hear and yet only they that hear shall live What needed more to have been said than that the Dead shall hear his voice and live But his meaning is all the dead Heathen shall have the Gospel and hear the word of it brought among them and they that hear it that is obey it and follow it shall live Let me repeat that which I alledged from Esay LV. 3. and add what follows there Hear and your soul shall live and I will make an everlasting Covenant with you even the sure mercies of David Now that by sure mercies of David is meant the resurrection of Christ the Apostle teacheth us in Act. XIII 34. And as concerning that he raised him from the dead now no more to return to corruption he said on this wise I will give you the sure mercies of David The resurrection of Christ therefore are the sure mercies of Christ. For that by David is meant Christ it were easy to shew and it is so confessed by the Jews themselves in their expositions of that place It was the sure mercy that God gave to Christ himself of which he so rejoyceth Psal. XVI 9. My heart is glad my glory rejoyceth and my flesh also shall rest in hope Because thou wilt not leave my Soul in Hell c. And it is the sure mercy of Christ that God gave to the members of Christ that he raised him from the dead and imparts to them the benefit of his Resurrection And this is called there an Everlasting Covenant that he makes with them That as he gave Christ a resurrection so he will give them a resurrection The first and the latter rain the first and the latter resurrection First to raise their Souls by the virtue of his Covenant from the death of sin in his good time and to raise their bodies by virtue of the same Covenant at the last day Of which last our Saviour speaks three times over Joh. VI. ver 39. This is my Fathers will which hath sent me that of all that he hath given I should lose none but raise him up at the last day ver 40. And this is the Will of him that sent me that every one that seeth the Son and believeth on him should have eternal life and I will raise him up the last day And ver 44. None can come to me except the Father which sent me draw him and I will raise him up at the last day Will Christ raise up all persons in the world at the last day upon these terms Ye see No but only those that comply with his Covenant to come to him see him believe in him His power and justice will raise all others the virtue of his Covenant will raise these Now I suppose you easily see how to distinguish twixt the Tenor of his Covenant and the Virtue of his Covenant The Tenor of his Covenant is Hear and obey my voice and live The Virtue of his Covenant is his unfailing truth power goodness that will give life to them that hear his voice and obey him Thus you see one reason of the difference why he raiseth but some souls here from the death of sin but will raise all bodies from the death of the grave Thirdly Another reason of difference may be given for that at the last day he will raise all the persons in the world from their graves that he may glorifie himself but he raiseth only some few from their sins that they may glorify him And there is a great deal of difference twixt Gods glorifying himself upon men as he did upon Pharaoh and the Egyptians and bringing men heartily and laboriously to glorifie him and to live to his glory But Secondly a main difference in these two resurrections the soul from sin and the body from the grave is that the first resurrection is with the desire of him that is raised the latter will be in despite of thousands that will have no mind of it God will bring thee to jugement Eccles. XI 9. is a cutting saying but all the World shall never be able to take the edge of it off But let wicked men struggle and strive and tug never so hard against the resurrection God will bring them to it and no resisting But the first resurrection or the raising a soul from the death of sin how sweet how welcome how comfortable is it to every one to whom it comes Thy people will be willing in the day of thy power and help forward their own rising as much as they can and the Spirit and Bride say come and the soul and heart say Come Lord Jesus come quickly and let me see this resurrection And thus have we seen some circumstances in which the first and second resurrection differ and are at distance let us now consider wherein they agree and shake hands one with another Observe that the Scripture speaks in some places of the Resurrection as if it were to be no Resurrection but of just and holy ones only as you may take notice in 1 Cor. XV. and 1 Thes. IV. That there shall be a Resurrection of the unjust as well as of the just the Scripture assures us over and over again but it more especially calls that a Resurrection that is a Resurrection indeed and and not a raising to be cast down again Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more as the Apostle tells us Death hath no more dominion over him And the Scripture doth more especially call that a Resurrection that is written after his Copy for a man to rise from the dead to die no more That man is but little helped which we read of in the Prophet that in the way met a Lyon and flying
and as thy soul is risen from the death of sin so mayest thou expect thy bodies rising from death in the grave The Jews speak of a little bone in some part of a mans body they call it Luz which they say will never be consumed in the grave but will be as it were a seed sown in the ground out of which will spring the Resurrection of the whole body I may say graciousness in the soul is rather the seed of the Resurrection of the body that will cause it to rise to life and happiness And thus much concerning the first Observation II. That in the time of the first Resurrection that is the raising the Gentiles from the Death of sin some lost the opportunity and would not be raised The rest of the dead lived not again because they were not raised by a first Resurrection when season and opportunity of living again was in date that is for the thousand years mentioned in the Text. Whether you take the thousand years for a certain determinate time of exactly so many years or that a certain number is used for an uncertain and this number the rather because it is used by the Jews whether the one or the other you are to begin to count from the time the Gospel was first sent among the Gentiles And count such a space of time forward and you will find in story that though the Gospel had gone through the world in that time and made the world Christian and vast numbers were converted to Christianity yet there was still a struggling to have kept the World Heathen and multitudes were unwilling to come off from their old Heathen and Idolatrous Religion For three hundred years the Emperors and all the Magistrates were enemies to the Gospel and if any of them did not persecute the Christians as but few but did yet they maintained their Heathen Religion might and main And the great wise men of the World as they were esteemed the Philosophes and learned ones were the greatest sticklers for the maintaining of the worshiping of their many false and idol Gods all along when the Emperours were become Christians Which may very well make us to remember the words of the Apostle 1 Cor. I. 26. Not many wise men after the flesh not many mighty not many noble are called but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise I cannot omit two remarkable passages The one of Julian the Emperor who was brought up a Christian but turned Heathen nay who as stories relate of him had been a Lecturer in a Christian congregation but became the bitter enemy to Christianity He when the Emperors had been Christian for two successions viz. Constantine and Constantius and the Christian Religion had flourished in their times well towards forty years and the Heathen Idolatrous Temples shut up and Christian Churches opened He opens the Heathen Temples shuts up the Christian promotes Idolatry again and the worship of the Heathen Gods and hath many Heathen Philosophers Jamblichus Maximus Ecebolus Libanius and I know not how many more to spur him on to it And the other passage I have is a clause in a letter of Adrian the Emperor to one of his Nobles in which he tells him I have been in Egypt and there I observed the Christians worshiping Christ and Idols yea the Christian Bishops worshiping Christ and Serapis Which Serapis was the great God and Idol of the Egyptians By all which we may see the truth of what is asserted in the Text That the rest of the dead lived not again but continued still in their dead condition of blindness and Heathenism And may also see the reason why they lived not again viz. because they would not but chose death before life to continue in their dead condition of being Heathens rather than to become Christians and live And from this we may see how just it was with God to let Popery and Mahumetism invade the world and to reduce it to its heathenish ignorance blindness and superstition again because it was so unwilling to part with its ignorance blindness and superstition Because they would not receive truth in the love of it as the Apostle sayes it was just with God to give them up to strong delusions to believe a ly And by that sad example we may observe how men lose and let slip the opportunities that God affords them for their own good and so losing them they lose themselves Jerusalem knows not the time of her Visitation and the things of her peace and so poor Jerusalem is lost and her opportunity gone for ever There is a critical time when there is a season opportune for the good of the Souls and the clock strikes Time is but foolish men too commonly take so little notice of it that the brazen head cryes Time is past and breaks to pieces If we should take up the Dispute whether God do not set his time and stint how long he will let men have opportunity of rising from the death of sin are there not many evidences for the affirmative that he doth He sets his stint and date how long he will afford a man the opportunity that his body may live and doth he not the like for the living of the Soul Doth not God shut the gates of mercy against sinful Souls even in this life and doth he not shut the gates of Repentance These in the Text that lived not again was not all possibility of living again taken again from them because they had let the time and opportunity of reviving let slip and go and neglected it Esau lost his opportunity and having lost that he found no place of recovery though he sought it with tears And Joh. XII 39 40. They could not believe because Esaias had said he hath blinded their eyes c. Why were Esaias words a charm to them that they could not believe No they could not believe because those words of Esaias were verified upon them And they had so long wilfully blinded their own eyes and hardned their hearts that God had put to his Seal and blinded and hardned them that they were now past all possibility of believing In that great dispute and iniquiry how God hardneth mens hearts of which there is so frequent mention and intimitation in Scripture the first crisis toward the determination of it is that God hath set such men a time how long they may be in a possibility of repenting and believing which when it is come and they are still impertinent and unbelieving and will not repent and believe he shuts the door against them that they shall not repent and believe Upon the consideration of all which we have advertisement what we have to do viz. to strive after this first Resurrection while the Lord affords time and opportunity and when God offers the advantage of our living again not to be enemies of our own reviving A SERMON Preached upon 2 SAMUEL XIX 29.
in his two great works viz. His offering himself a sacrifice by his death and his offering the continual incense of his mediation And how methodically did the representation proceed suitable to the reality For first the Priest offered the Sacrifice upon the Altar and then went in within the Tabernacle and offered incense So Christ first offered himself at his death and then went into the highest Heaven to make Intercession The Papists in their Mass take upon them to offer Christ as a Propitiatory sacrifice for quick and dead So they are the Altar and Christ is the offering But we learn better to make Christ the Altar and we our selves and our services the offering offered upon it For the clearing of the thing before us and to reduce these words of the Apostle to a Doctrine of Faith whither he intends them let us premise these four things I. That every Christian hath three spiritual Sacrifices to offer to God Himself his Devotions and Religious services and his good works and Religious walking 1. Himself Rom. XII 1 2. I beseech you Brethren that you present your bodies a living sacrifice holy acceptable unto God 2. His prayers Devotions and Religious services Mal. I. 11. In every place incense shall be offered unto my Name and a pure offering And 3. His holy walking 16 ver of this Chapter To do good and to communicate forget not for with such sacrifice God is well pleased Christ is to be offered to God no more as Papists take on them to offer him every Mass but man is to offer himself to God the only sacrifice that God now requireth Now II. On what Altar is this spiritual Sacrifice to be offered and presented to God On some spiritual Altar as it is a spiritual offering Those Sacrifices that were earthly and material required an earthly and material Altar but those that were spiritual must be offered on some spiritual Altar else the manner of offering them contradicts their nature Now what the Apostle speaks concerning the Rock in the Wilderness The Rock was Christ so we may say concerning the Altar under the Gospel The Altar is Christ. In the Law the offering was to be put into the hands of a Priest or it could not be accepted so our services are to be put into the hands of Christ to be presented to God else no acceptance And the sacrifice was to be laid upon the Altar or it could not be accepted so must ours be laid on the altar Christ or no acceptance For III. The Altar must sanctifie the Sacrifice to make it acceptable and so our Saviour tells Mat. XXIII 19. It was not enough that the Sacrifice was a clean Beast and not unclean nor that it was without fault or blemish to make it an acceptable Sacrifice But it must be laid upon the Altar for that to sanctifie it and to make it a right Sacrifice IV. And here I cannot but take up the Jewish Doctors most true and pertinent explication of that point about the Altars sanctifying the gift viz. The Altar sanctified that that was fit for it The Altar could not sanctifie an unclean Beast a Dog or an Ass or a Cat to make it a Sacrifice but only a Beast that was clean And if the Beast were a clean Beast in his nature yet if he had faults or blemishes the Altar did not sanctifie him for a sit Sacrifice but it sanctified only that that was fit for it By all which laid together we may learn and observe the great Doctrine of Faith about our acceptance with God only by Christ. Which to view particularly let us begin from this First None can come to God to find acceptance with him but he must first give himself into the hand of Christ to bring him to God for acceptance The Apostle tells us that all acceptance is in the Beloved and to be expected no other way Ephes. I. 6. This is the great mystery of the Gospel For the want of which duly owned Turks and Jews are at loss and are lost from God for ever They both pretend for Religion pretend for Heaven but they both miss the door by which alone they are to enter and so are excluded eternally missing of Christ by whom only we come there Our Saviour indeed speaks of entring and getting into the sheepfold some other way than at the door but he saith they are thieves and robbers His meaning is of false teachers that can find a way to creep into the sheepfold the Church to seduce and destroy the sheep some other way than at the right door But whosoever will get either into Heaven or indeed into the true and sincere Religion that leadeth thither must enter by Christ the Door or he will never come there Joh. XIV 6. I am the Way the Truth and the Life none can come to the Father but by me Consider of that I am so the Way that none can come to the Father but by me Then sure the Papists are out of the way as well as Turks and Jews when they think to come to God by the mediation of Saints and Angels None can come to God but by me saith our Saviour but I can come to God saith a Papist by the Virgin Mary by Peter Paul and the mediation of other Saints in Heaven Certainly they must have some nice distinction here or they contradict Christ to his face and take his honour and give it to another Heb. VII 25. Christ having an unfailing Priesthood is able to save to the uttermost those that come to God by him If you come to God you must come by him and that only is the way to be saved But if you expect to come to God by any other means whatsoever you are out of the way and will be lost 1 Pet. III. 18. Christ suffered once for sins the just for the unjust that he might bring us to God If there were any other way to come to God than by Christ the death of Christ was but to little purpose and our believing in him to as little And we may justly say with the Apostle 1 Cor. XV. 14. Our preaching is in vain and your faith is also vain It is said of Christ that he is a Priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek Psal. CX Though he died and offered himself the great Sacrifice for sinners yet he is a Priest for ever still offering sacrifice to God but no more himself but his peoples sacrifice And that offering is twofold viz. offering the persons of his people to God as an acceptable living sacrifice and offering their services as an acceptable spiritual sacrifice to God Of the former you have testimony from his own words Isa. VIII 18. Behold I and the children which the Lord hath given me Of the later Revel VIII 3. where you read of his offering the prayers of all Saints upon the Golden Altar which was before the Throne What the manner of Christs mediation is is
other standers by reviled him with If he be Christ let him come down from the Cross And let God deliver him if he will have him And so it doth magnifie Divine grace the more if it checkt him in his very reviling and made that tongue that reproached Christ in the very next instant to confess and adore him So Saul was happily checked even while he was breathing rage and revenge against the Church and he brought to be a most special member and minister in it The cause of this mans Conversion we must all ascribe to Gods infinite grace and goodness But the means that that grace and goodness used for his conversion I cannot but ascribe to these two things a Doctrine and a Miracle as in those times Doctrines and Miracles went very commonly together I. I cannot but suppose that the darkness that then began to be over all the Land wrought something with this man to bring him to some consideration with himself of the present case which he had not before His fellow Thief it seems was not moved with it at all but I cannot but believe that This was so deeply affected with it that it proved a means of his Conversion They both of them knew very well that Jesus suffered meerly because he professed himself to be the Christ. That is plain by their saying to him If thou be the Christ save thy self and us And now this man seeing so strange an occurence as had been not seen or heard of at any mans Execution before begins to be convinced that he was the Christ indeed for whom such a wondrous miracle was wrought and manifested And then II. It may very probably be conceived that he remembred those passages of the Prophet Esay describing his Passion and suffering Chap. LIII and particularly that vers 12. He was numbred with the transgressors A clause which the Jewish Expositors wrest some one way some another because they cannot abide to hear of Messias sufferings But which we may very well think that as Divine grace brought his Soul to the acknowledgment of Christ so it brought also that prediction of Christs sufferings and with such company to his remembrance as a means to work him to that acknowledgment For how might he argue This Jesus after all the great miracles that he hath done agreeable to the working of Messiah hath asserted and maintained that he is Messiah to the very death this strange and wondrous darkness that is begun over all the Land cannot but bear witness to such a thing And when it is so plainly prophesied by the Prophet Esay that he should suffer and be numbred with such Malefactors as I and my fellow are I am past all doubting that this Jesus is the promised Messiah Therefore He said unto Jesus Lord remember me when thou comest into thy Kingdom A great faith that can see the Sun under so thick a Cloud that can discover a Christ a Saviour under such a poor scorned despised crucified Jesus and call him Lord. A great Faith that when he sees Jesus struggling for his own life and no deliverer come to him yet sees reason to cast himself upon him for his Eternal state and Everlasting condition and pray to him Lord remember me A great Faith that could see Christs Kingdom through his cross and grave and death and where there was so little sign of a Kingdom and pray to be remembred in that Kingdom I doubt the Apostles reached not to such a Faith in all particulars They acknowledged Jesus indeed to be Christ while he lived but when he is dead they are at it We trusted that it had been he that should have redeemed Israel Luk. XXIV 21. But now they could not tell what to make of it But this man when he is dying doth so stoutly own him They looked for a Kingdom that Christ should have indeed but they little looked that Christ should suffer and so enter into his kingdom as it is intimated in the same Chapter vers 26. But this man looks for it through and after his sufferings That it is no wonder if he sped at the hands of Christ when he brings so strong a Faith with him and that when he pours out his Prayer Lord remember me c. in such strength of believing it is no wonder if he hear from him in whom he so believes Verily I say unto thee To day shalt thou be with me in Paradise And could such a Faith be without a parallel and sutable measure of Repentance Our Saviour very well saw that it was not And the Evangelist gives some intimation that it was not For he tells that he confessed his own fault which is one sign of his Repentance We are here justly and receive the due reward of our doings And that he reproveth his fellow and would fain have reduced him which is another Fearest thou not God seeing thou art in the same condemnation And that he pleadeth for the innocency of Christ which is a third This man hath done nothing amiss And in what words and meditations he spent the three or four hours more that he hung alive upon the Cross it is easie to conjecture though the Evangelist hath spoken nothing of it The great sum and tenor of the Gospel is Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved And as Christ himself did seal the truth of the Gospel with his own death so was he pleased that that main truth of the Gospel should be proved and confirmed by this noble and notable example even whilst he was dying And accordingly it hath pleased the Spirit of God to give a demonstration of this mans believing in the Lord Jesus Christ more copiously and apparently than of his repantence though he hath given very fair demonstration of that also That as all posterity was to read that great Doctrine of Believing in the Lord Jesus Christ for Salvation so they might have this illustrious and lively Commentary of the truth and proof of it in this mans believing and in his Salvation And now having seen this great monument of Faith and Repentance and Pardon What say we to it As the Evangelists tell us that they that had seen the passages at Christs death returned from the Cross striking upon their breasts and no doubt very full of cogitations So what are the thoughts of our hearts upon this passage which was not the least remarkable among them A great matter that the light of the Suu should be so darkned and not a small that such a dark soul should be so enlightned A great matter that the Earth should quake the Rocks rent and the Vail of the Temple be torn from top to bottom and not a small matter that such a stupid soul should be moved that such a strong heart should be dissolved broken and brought to softness The spactators then present considered of those things Our present work is to consider of these and what do we think of them I
how they undervalue the Scriptures by that very opinion But yet will own and wrest and strain the Scriptures where they think it may serve their opinion Men will have their own minds and would have every thing to serve their humor and to maintain their conceits The Arian and Socinian will have Christ to be a Creature and not God the Holy Ghost a Creature and not God What do they gain by this toward Heaven Do they not set themselves further off when they make him that should redeem them but a Creature like themselves and him that should sanctifie them to be but a Creature like themselves But they must have their own minds These Sadducees what gained they by their opinion against the Resurrection and world to come What either profit or credit or comfort could their opinion carry with it that men should die like dogs or other beasts and there is an endof them But they must have their own minds And it is like they were well content there should be no Resurrection nor World to come For this opinion might very well serve a voluptuous life For a man to live as he pleased in all voluptuousness and pleasure and to hear no more of it never to be judged or called to account for what he had done This is a brave opinion to maintain lust and loosness and all manner of villany They in Esai XXII cry Let us eat and drink for to morrow we die One would think they should have been in another tune when they thought death was so near and left their jovializing to day when they think they must dye to morrow But dying was all the business they looked on and looked no further That was bitter to think of when they must perish with all their delights and pleasures and braveries but beyond death they little thought of any thing And so Historians report of the Egyptians that when they were feasting and in the height of their frolic and joviality a man brought in a dead mans skull and shewed to every one of them with these words added Eat and drink and make merry for you know not how soon you may be like to this One would think that the sight of such a spectacle should have called them to repentance and mourning and weeping and girding with sackcloth But they aimed it a clean contrary way viz. that since they were sure they should die they should take as much pleasure as they could while they lived and lose no time from their voluptuousness because they knew not how long or short their time might be and how soon they might be cut off from those delights It is more than probable that the Sadducees maintained their opinion to the like purpose and were very well content to forgoe the world to come that they might the freer and with less disquieture enjoy this The Pharisee fasted and was of a strict and severe life and conversation but the Sadducee thought it more delightsome to live more at large and not to deprive himself of those contents and pleasures that he might have here And it is more than probable that he so maintained his opinion upon that account at least his opinion did suite most properly with such a course The Sadducees denying of the Resurrection may justly mind us to make it our Hope and Awe unless we also should be Sadducees Let me use the strain of Paul to Agrippa Men and Brethren do you believe a Resurrection I know you believe it May I add and say I know you remember it This I dare say that if you do not I know you have no cause not to remmember it A thing of the greatest concernment that ever will befal you a thing as sure to come to you as you are sure you have come hitherto a thing that you can as little avoyd as you can avoyd death and a thing that must determine of your eternal state And do you not remember it I am sure we have all cause to remember it The Prayer of Moses for the people is very reasonable pathetical and affectionate Deut. XXXII 29. O that they were wise that they understood this that they would consider their later end Do you not consider this out of these words That they that are not wise do not consider this and out of the thing it self we are speaking of that the Resurrection is our later end beyond our later end Death is our later end but the Resurrection is a later end beyond it And if the continual remembrance of death be needful as who will deny it the continual remembrance of the Resurrection is as needful I had almost said is more needful according to the rate that most men think of death Oh! how bitter is the remembrance of death to them that are at ease and in earthly prosperity But upon what account Because they must part with all their delights here and must be no more as they have been jocund and jovial and florid The Roman Emperor of old spoke not only his own sense but the sense of others when dying he cryed out Ah! poor soul wither must thou go now Thou must never jest more nor enjoy thy pleasures more as thou hast done So they thought of death but as an end and determining of their bravery here But the Resurrection must determine of their state for ever hereafter And if Solomons whips be whips Rehoboams whips are scorpions If death be so sharp to them to part them from their present delights what will the Resurrection be that will state them in a state undelightsome for ever Oh! how many sins might we have avoided in the course of our lives if we had had the serious remembrance and apprehension of the Resurrection And how many might we yet avoid In the midst of all our security and mirth and musick to have this as Belshhazzars hand writing upon the Wall in our eye But will this hold in the day of Resurrection Will this follow me in another world In the midst of our Pride and Bravery to think shall I be so drest at the Resurrection at the last day And will this Gallantry stand me in any stead in that day I cannot but fancy how a Sadducee that denies the Resurrection or any that are mindless of it will be surprized at that day He thought none should ever rise from the dead at all and he himself will be raised whether he will or no. Oh! let me lye still in the dust will his heart cry Let the earth cover me and the Mountains and rocks lie upon me No will the alarm of the great Trump sound Arise thou wretch and come to judgment And thou must come and no avoyding Eccles. X. 9 Know that for all these things God will bring thee to Judgment He will do it and thou canst not hinder him And so much concerning the first Article that a Sadducee put out of his Creed He II. would not own that there will be
it did begin So though the Passover be appointed to be in that first month that began the new year and be called an Everlasting Ordinance Exod. XII 16. Yet upon occasion the Lord ordained it to be kept in the second month Numb IX To this we may add Gods changing the very end and memorial of the Sabbath to Israel themselves Changing said I or rather adding a new memorial which it had not before In Exod. XX. the memorial is to remember Gods creating and resting in Deut. V. where the Ten Commandments are repeated it is in memorial of their redemption out of Egypt Not unclothed of its first end and memorial but clothed upon So if Adam had continued innocent he must have kept the Sabbath and then it had been to him but the memorial of Gods creating and resting But when Christ and redemption by him was set up and come in before the Sabbath came in then it was clothed with another memorial viz. the remembrance of the redemption II. Christ had power and authority to change the Sabbath Mark II. 28. The Son of man is Lord of the Sabbath He had power over all Divine Ordinances Hebr. III. 5 6. Now Moses verily was faithful in all his house as a servant c. But Christ as a Son over his own house He is not a Servant in the house but a Son to dispose of the affairs of the house as he sees good He is greater than the Temple and so may order the affairs of the Temple as he saw good If a Jew question why he laid by the Ceremonies of Moses The answer is ready because he was greater than Moses Lord of the house in which Moses was but a Servant Nay it was he that appointed Moses those Ceremonies and he might unappoint them at his pleasure That is observable Act. VII 38. This is that Moses that was in the Church in the wilderness with the Angel which spake to him at Mount Sinai and with our Fathers who received the lively Oracles to give us With the Angel who was that It was Christ the great Angel of the Covenant as he is called Mal. III. 1. The Angel of Gods presence as he is called Esai LXIII 9. Then who spake with Moses at Mount Sinai It was Christ. Who gave him the Lively Oracles Laws Testimonies Statutes It was Christ. And then might Christ that gave them dispose of them as seemed him good So that if a Jew question why Christ changed Circumcision into Baptism the Paschal Lamb into Bread and Wine the Jewish Sabbath into the Christian Sabbath The answer is ready he was Lord of them and might dispose of them Het set up Circumcision the Passover the Jewish Sabbath and might take them down and alter them as he pleased III. Ye read once and again in Scripture of Gods creating a new world Esai LXV 17. Behold I create new Heavens and a new Earth 2 Pet. III. 13. We according to his promise look for new Heavens and a new Earth Rev. XXI 1. And I saw a new Heaven and a new Earth Now when was this done The Apostle tells us when viz. in his own time 2 Cor. V. 17. If any man be in Christ he is a new Creature The meaning of it is Gods creating a new Estate of things under the Gospel a new Church the Jews cast off and the Gentiles taken in new ordinances in his Church Ceremonious worship taken down and Spiritual set up new Sacraments Baptism and the Lords Supper instead of the Circumcision and Passover a new Command of love to one another a new Covenant a new and living way into the most holy a new Creature and in a word all things become new Then certainly a new Sabbath was fit for a new Creation Lay these two places together Gen. I. 1. In the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth and Esai LXV 17. Behold I create new Heavens and a new Earth In fulness of time God created new Heavens and a new Earth and as the first Creation had the old Sabbath so was it not fit the new Creation should have a new Sabbath As our Saviour speaks Mat. IX 17. New cloth must not be put into an old garment nor new wine into old bottles but new wine must be put into new vessels and both are preserved So in this case a new manner of worship new Ordinances new Sacraments to be committed to the old Sabbath This is improper but a new Sabbath must be for these as well as they themselves are new How pied would Christianity have looked if it had worn a Coat all new in other respects but had had on the shirt or piecing of the old Sabbath And how unfit was it to have tyed Christians to the observation of the old Sabbath of the Jews IV. The Resurrection of Christ was the day of his birth and beginning of his Kingdom Observe the quotation Acts XIII 33. The promise which was made unto the Fathers God hath fulfilled to us their Children in that he hath raised up Jesus as it is also written in the second Psalm Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee When was the day wherein Christ was begotten In the day that God raised him from the dead That is strange for as he was God was he not begotten from Eternity and as he was man was he not conceived by the Holy Ghost and born three and thirty years and an half before his Resurrection Yes both most true and yet that true too that he was begotten from the day of his Resurrection And the Apostle tells you how to understand it viz. He was the first begotten and first born from the dead begotten that day to the Gentiles and all the world from thenceforward a Saviour to them and by his Resurrection as the Apostle saith Rom. I. 4. Declared to be the Son of God with power by the Resurrection from the dead So likewise his Resurrection was the beginning of his Reign and Kingdom Consider upon that Mat. XXVI 29. I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Fathers Kingdom That is when I am risen from the dead And see Mat. XXVIII 18. Now I begin to reign All power is given unto me in Heaven and in Earth For now he had conquered all his Enemies Devil Death and Hell Now was not the first day of the week the day on which Christ rose fitter to be made the Sabbath to commemorate his Birth-day from the dead and his entrance into his Kingdom than the last day of the week the old Sabbath on which day he lay in the grave and under death Kings and Potentates use to celebrate their Birth-day and the day of entrance into their Kingdom and this King of Kings was it not fit that such a memorial should be of his Birth-day and entrance into his Dominion And compare the Creation and Christs Resurrection whether of
proves in the end to be but a curse as I have shewed before and they have the longer score to answer for the greater heaps of sin to be arraigned upon the sadder account of so much time mispent But for Answer to this as I said before There is no temporal thing which in it self is a blessing but wicked men by abuse of it make it a curse They make their Table a snare their wealth a trap their long life a curse And it is no wonder if they do so by these things for they make Divine Ordinances which in themselves are a savour of life to become to them the savour of death nay Christ himself to become a stumbling block and their ruine Now the goodness or blessing in things is not to be judged of by such mens using but by what they are in their own nature As thousands in Hell curse the time that ever they lived so thousands in Heaven bless God for ever that ever they lived here so long Long life to the one party was balm the other made it poison There is another Objection That long life to many proves but long misery therefore is not such a promise and blessing Such are the miseries of this life even to them that spend their time the best that Solomon tells us Eccles. VII 1. That the day of death is better than the day of birth And Chap. IV. 2 3. I praised the dead which are already dead more than the living which are yet alive Yea better is he than both that hath not yet been which hath not seen the evil which is done under the Sun And how many of the Saints of God that have spent their lives as well as ever men did as ever men could spend their lives yet because of the miseries of life have desired that their lives might be cut off and that they might live no longer How oft is this Job's mournful tune over and over Chap. VI. 8 9. O that I might have my request and that God would grant me the thing I long for Even that it would please God to destroy me and that he would loose his hand and cut me off And Chap. VII 15 16. My soul chooseth strangling and death rather than my life I loath it I would not live always And so alomst in every one of his speeches And the same tune is Elias at 1 King XIX 4. It is enough now O Lord take away my life for I am no better than my Fathers And Jeremy sings the same doleful ditty when he curseth the day of his birth Chap. XX. 14. How is long life then a blessing when the sorrows of it make men so weary of it I Answer This were true indeed if the blessing of long life consisted only in enjoying earthly prosperity and then the Children of God were of all men most miserable For they have the least earthly prosperity But the blessing of long life consists in things of another nature For those holy mens desiring because of their afflictions here to have their lives cut off 1. We neither wronged them nor Religion should we say it was an humane frailty and failing in them But 2. It was not so much for that they undervalued the prolonging of their lives and the blessing in having life prolonged as that they placed not their blessedness in living here but were assured and longed after a better life Not one of them was unwilling to live but because he was very well prepared to dye therefore he wished for death rather And now that we may come to consider wherein the blessing of long life consisteth let us a little take up some places and passages of Scripture and some arguments in reason that declare and proclaim it as of it self to be a blessing 1. Prov. III. 16. Solomon urging men to espouse and marry Wisdom tells what Portion and Dower they shall have that get her Length of days is in her right hand and in her left riches and honour Observe that he accounts length of days a right hand Dower and riches and honour but a left hand one And indeed what are riches and honour if a man have not length of days to enjoy And the same Solomon commending old age saith Prov. XVI 31. It is a Crown of glory or a glorious Crown if the long life that brought it up thither have been spent as it should I might heap up many such passages but these suffice II. Consider that it is threatned for a curse and punishment that the bloody and deceitful man shall not live out half his days Psal. LV. 23. That the men of Eli's House should dye in their prime 1 Sam. II. 31. But I will name but one for all how oft threatned such and such shall be cut off I need not to cite places the Books of the Law are full of such expressions shall be cut off from his people from the congregation c. Which some understand of Excommunication but it means cutting off by the hand of God by some untimely or fatal death or shortning of life It is threatned as a curse that his days shall not be prolonged but cut off III. Ye have holy men in Scripture praying for prolonging of their lives and that upon this warrant that God promised long life as a blessing Psal. XXI 4. He asked life of thee and thou gavest it him even length of days for ever and ever And Psal. XXXIX ult O spare me that I may recover strength And Psal. CII 24. I said O my God take me not away in the midst of my days And so in the case of Ezekiah how bitterly did he take the tidings of the cutting off of his days Whether it were that it went sadly with him to dye of the Plague or that he saw not Jerusalem delivered from Sennacherib yet certainly it cost some tears to think he was to be taken away even in his prime and his life prolonged no further IV. To this may be added that God promised it for a peculiar blessing Thou shalt come to thy grave in a good old age Job V. 26. And how feeling a promise is that Zech. VIII 4. Thus saith the Lord of Hosts There shall yet old Men and old Women dwell in the streets of Jerusalem and every man with his staff in his hand for every age Methinks I see the streets full of such venerable heads and gravity every one crowned with gray hairs and old age a crown of blessing But what need I arguments to prove this What one thing is there in the world that hath more votes and voices than this For who is there that desires not to live long and see many days And skin for skin and all that he hath will he give for his life that it may be prolonged And who but will be contented to part with any earthly blessing so his life may be preserved Now wherein it is that long life is a blessing is best observed
conquer Hell then If he did what was it with What did his Soul there to conquer Hell How he conquered Hell and Death by dying and rising we can tell but how his Soul conquered with bare going thither who can tell you Or did he augment the torments of the Devils and damned That needed not nor indeed could it be done as I shall shew afterwards What then did Christs Soul there in its Triumph unless as He Veni vidi vici I came I saw I overcame it conquered Hell by looking into it Natura nihil facit frustra Nature does nothing in vain much less the God of nature And Christ in his life time never did spoke thought any thing in vain And it is unhansom to think that his Soul after death should go out of the bosom of his Father into Hell to do no body can imagine what For who can tell what it did in Triumphing there II. Was not Christ under his Humiliation till his Resurrection Was he not under it whilst he lay in the grave He himself accounts it so Psal. XVI 10. Thou wilt not suffer my Soul being in the state of separation my Body to see corruption to be trampled on by death to be triumphed over by Satan that yet had it there If you imagine his Soul triumphing or vapouring in Hell for I cannot imagine what it should do there unless to vapour how might Satan vapour again Thou Soul of Jesus dost thou come to triumph here Of what I pray thee Have I not cause to triumph over thee Have I not procured his death Banished thee out of his body and got it into the grave And dost thou come to triumph here Let us first see whether he can get out from among the dead before we talk of his triumph over him that had the power of death So that if we should yield to so needless a point as Christs going to triumph in Hell yet certainly it would be but very unseasonable to have gone thither when he had not yet conquered but his body was still under death and as yet under the conquest of Satan This had been to triumph before Victory as Benhadads vapour was to Ahab when he received that answer Let not him that girdeth on his sword boast himself as he that putteth it off The beginning of Christs Kingdom was his Resurrection for then had he conquered death and him that had the power of death the Devil And so the Scripture generally states it I need cite no proof but two of his own speeches Matth. XXVI 29. I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the Vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Fathers Kingdom that is after my Resurrection when I have conquered the Enemies of God and set up his Kingdom And Matth. XXVIII 18. And Jesus came and spake unto them saying All power is given unto me in Heaven and in Earth And this was after his Resurrection But is it not improper to dream of a Triumph before a Conquest That Christ should Triumph as King before he had put on his Kingdom As Esth. V. 3. On the third day she put on the Kingdom For so it is in the Hebrew The days before she had been under fasting mourning humiliation and that was not a time of Royalty and Triumph So on the third day Christ rose and put on his Kingdom the days before he had been under death had abased himself a very unfit and unseasonable time for his Soul to go and triumph III. As concerning Christs triumphing over Devils His Victory over Satan was of another kind of nature than to go amongst them to shew terribly or speak terribly for what else can we imagine his Soul did in that Triumph in Hell It is said Heb. II. 14. That through death he might destroy him that had the power of death that is the Devil Destroy him How We may say of him as he of the Traitor Vivit etiam in Senatum venit He lives yea he comes into the Council-house So Is the Devil destroyed He is alive walketh rageth ruleth He walked about the Earth before Christs death Job I. So hath he done ever since 1 Pet. V. 8. Your adversary the Devil as a roaring Lion walketh about seeking whom he may devour He was a murtherer from the beginning to Christs death Joh. VIII 44. So hath he been ever since he goes about seeking to devour and he doth devour He wrought in the children of disobedience before and he now worketh Eph. II. 2. And how hath Christ conquered destroyed him You must look for the Conquest and Triumph of Christ over him not so much in destroying his Person as destroying his Works 1 Joh. III. 8. For this purpose the son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the Devil I might here speak of many things I shall only mention two or three particulars wherein the Victory of Christ over the Devil by his death doth consist 1. By his death he hath conquered the very clamors of Satan paying a ransom for all his people Rom. VIII 33. Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods elect Satan is ready to say I lay a charge and claim to them for they have been disobedient But Christ hath paid a satisfaction for all their disobedience Satan thou art cast in thy suit the debt is paid How is the Devil confounded at the loss of such a prize as he expected And how does the Death and Merits of Christ here Triumph Now Goliah David defies thee touch one in the Camp of Israel if you can or dare they are all redeemed and ransomed thou hast nothing to do with them And the ransomed of the Lord shall go to Sion with everlasting joy Rejoyce O Heathens for the false accuser is cast out Here is a glorious Triumph by the righteousness and holiness of Christ delivering all his people 2. By his death he brake the partition wall and brings in the Heathen Oh! how did Satan hold them in slavery Pharaoh let my people go No. I know not the Lord nor will I let them go But thou shalt be brought to it and by the death of a Paschal Lamb they shall go whether thou wilt or no. Two thousand years had they been in his slavery sure thought he this shall be for ever But by the death of poor despised Jesus at Jerusalem the prison doors are open and all these captives are gone free Rejoyce ye prisoners of hope as they are called Zech. IX 11 12. I cannot but think of the case of Paul and Silas Act. XVI in an inner prison their feet in the stocks the doors fast and a strong guard and there comes one shake and all fly open and all the prisoners are loosed Jaylor what sayest thou now Thou mayst even draw thy sword and end thy self all thy prisoners are gone 3. Nay yet further Jaylor thou must to prison thy self Ponder on those words Rev. XX. 1
2 3. The great Angel is Christ the old Serpent is the Devil there Christ binds and imprisoneth him and that with the great chain of the Gospel Observe the passage He shut him up in the bottomless pit What In Hell for ever That he should never go abroad again Yea you have him loose again vers 7. and he hath been always going about as in 1 Pet. V. but he tyes him up that he should not deceive the Nations vers 3. and when he is loosed again vers 8. it is his being loose to deceive the Nations Observe by the way the phrase He shuts him up that is restrains him from deceiving and seducing people It is Hell and Prison to the Devil not to be doing mischief So the Psalmist speaks of the wicked children of the Devil They sleep not rest not if they do not evil It is a torment to them if they may not be sinning Well how doth Christ bind Satan that he do not deceive By sending the Gospel to undeceive them So that this is the Victory of Christ against the Devil The very telling of his Death and Merits is that that overcomes the Devil the very Word of his Death and Resurrection is that that overthrows the Devil and his power So is 1 Cor. VI. 3. to be taken Know ye not that we shall judge Angels Now needed Christs soul to go to Hell to tell the Devil these tidings and to triumph there He felt the building of his Kingdom fall about his ears every moment He needed no such message to go and tell him he had conquered him This is the Triumph of Christ over the Devil by the virtue and power of his death and not by any Vocal or actual Declaration of it by his Soul now separate from his Body IV. As to Christs Soul triumphing over the damned needed there any such thing Or could his Soul do any such thing Think you Christs Soul doth or could rejoyce in the damnation of the damned There is joy in Heaven when a sinner is saved Is there joy too when he is damned That tender expression of God As I live I delight not in the death of a sinner doth it give us any room to think that he can rejovce in their damnation That tender Soul of Christ that but six or eight days before wept for the destruction of Jerusalem with O! that thou hadst known in this thy day the things that belong to thy peace Can we think that that Soul could go to Hell to triumph and insult over poor damned Souls He had cause to triumph and rejoyce over the conquered Devils but had he the like cause or heart to triumph over damned Souls What was the reason of his triumphing over the Devils Because he had subdued themselves only He mastered them while alive in casting them out and commanding them at his pleasure He cast them into Hell by his Divine Power as soon as they had sinned but his triumph over them by his Death and Resurrection was for his peoples sake We cannot say Christ hath any pleasure in the damnation of the very Devils but he had pleasure in the Conquest of Devils because he had delivered his people from them Ah! most Divine Soul of Christ so infinitely full of charity that gave it self a Sacrifice for sin that men might not be damned can that rejoyce and insult over poor Souls damnation Look but upon Christs tenderness and earnestness for Souls here that they come not to damnation and then guess how little delight he taketh in it when they are damned Let us apply these two passages to this Ezek. XVIII 23. Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should dye And vers 31. I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth In the Hebrew it is in the strictest propriety In the death of him that is dead I have not pleasure that he dye and no pleasure in his death when he is dead What is there more plain in Scripture and in all Gods actings than this That God would not have men damned if they would embrace Salvation What speak these expressions 1 Tim. II. 4. Who will have all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the Truth 2 Pet. III. 9. Not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance Certainly whatsoever else this is plain enough that God had rather men should be saved than damned How is this written in Scripture as in letters of gold that he that runs may read it How was it written in letters of Christs own blood that was shed that men might not be damned but that whosoever believeth might have eternal life And how is this written in Gods patience beseechings in his affording means of Salvation I need not to instance in particulars Well men will not be saved but choose death before life Doth Christ delight rejoyce to damn them when they must come to it Think ye he pronounceth Go ye cursed with as much delight as Come ye blessed That he insults triumphs over poor damned wretches in their damnation Read his heart in such passages as these Gen. VI. 6. And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the Earth and it grieved him at his heart What Because he had made them No but because he having made them must now destroy them Lam. III. 33. He doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men So he doth not damn willingly nor destroy the children of men And once for all Esa. XLII 14. I have long time holden my peace I have been still and refrained my self now will I cry like a travailing woman I will destroy and devour at once I will cry and destroy but it is grievous to God as pangs of a travailing woman Thus much as hath been spoken may shew how unlikely and indeed how unchristian a thing it is to conceive that Christs Soul went purposely into Hell to triumph and insult over the miserable and damned And so you see that this Article cannot mean his Souls descending into the place of torment to triumph over the Devils and damned so that we must yet look for another sense of it III. A third interpretation then is this That it means the Torments he suffered in Soul III. upon his Cross. Some word it That he suffered the extream wrath of God some the very torments of Hell some that he was for the time in the state of the damned I reluct to speak these things but this Gloss some make upon this Article and while they go about to magnifie the Love of Christ in suffering such things for men they so much abase and vilifie his Person in making it lyable to such a condition The sense of the Article we must refuse unless we should speak and think of Christ that which doth not befit him The dearly beloved of the Soul of God to lye under the heaviest wrath of God The Lord of Heaven and Earth to
seeing it is most holy and God hath given it you to bear the iniquity of the Congregation to make attonement for them before the Lord. Let me ask those that hold this Opinion two or three questions Was Christ so much as punished by God Much less then was he overwhelmed by the wrath of God damned by God Was a Lamb punished that was sacrificed He was afflicted but not punisht for punishment argues a crime or fault preceding Lam. III. 39. Wherefore doth a living man complain a man for the punishment of his sins Were the sad sufferings of Christ laid on him as punishments Certainly not for his own sins no nor for ours neither He suffered for our sins bare our sins but his sufferings were not punishments for our sins For observe two things First Christ merited by suffering Is it good sense to say he merited by being punished Strange sense to say he merited Salvation for his by being punisht for their sins but most divine to say by suffering for the redeeming of them He suffered as a Sacrifice to attone not as a sinner to be punished Secondly Did Christ dye upon any debt to the Law Much less upon any debt that he owed to Gods wrath Did the Law lay any thing to Christs charge did the Law condemn him And then can we dream of the wrath of God charging him and damning him It is true that it is said Gal. III. 13. Christ hath delivered us from the curse of the Law being made a curse for us as it is written Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree But doth this mean accursed of God Was the good Thief accursed of God when he hung upon the cross The meaning is that he appeared so to the view of men So that as it is impossible that Christ should lye under the wrath of God for any fault of his own so it is not imaginable that he did for ours V. It is impossible that Christ should suffer the torments of Hell or be in the case of the damned A Priest could not fall under the Plague of Leprosie and yet is the high Priest under a damned condition Certainly if his Body could not see corruption his Soul could not feel damnation If his Body were not under that which the Bodies of the best Saints fall under certainly his Soul could not be under that which damned Souls fall under I might clear this by considering especially three things which are the chief torments of Hell 1. Separation from God without any glimpse of his favour 2. Horror and Hell in the Conscience because of guilt 3. Utter despair Now need I to shew that it was not possible that any of these should seize upon Christ And these things be spoken to shew first what is not the meaning of this Article Now to come to the sense of the Article And for a beginning I may say as Moses does Numb XI 29. Would all the Congregation were Prophets So would all the Congregation were Grecians for then this would be easie The Creed was written in Greek and in the interpretation of this Article we are not tyed to the strictness of the English word but we must fly for refuge to the sense of the Greek word And if any of the opinions mentioned before should urge It is Hell therefore must be so understood as he said once To the Law and to the Testimony so I would answer To the original Greek and to the propriety of the phrase there In Isa. XXIX 10. The Lord hath poured out upon you the Spirit of Slumber In the Greek and in Rom. XI 8. it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 compunction clean contrary to the Prophets meaning What shall we do here Not stick to the strict propriety of the Greek Translation but have refuge to the word in the original Hebrew and construe the Greek word by that So in our English Translation Hell seems to speak that that is neither warrantable by Scripture nor reason therefore we must not stick to the strict propriety of the word but to the Greek In the Greek it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He went down to Hades Which I shall explain to you by and by I. The Article refers to the passage of Christs Soul after his death I say of his Soul For what was done to his Body is specified in the Articles before Crucified dead and buried But what became of his Soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He descended into Hell Now this Article is left out of divers Confessions of Faith in the Fathers and out of divers Creeds Vice plurium instead of more observe the Nicene Creed Was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate He suffered and was buried And the third day he rose again Which shews it was added occasionally and for some illustration Councils and Fathers commonly inserted some Articles into Confessions to face some Heresie then appearing And this Article was inserted to outface some error about Christs person The Heresies and mistakes about Christs person were numerous and among others this was one that he had not a real humane Body but Airy and again that though he had a real Body yet he had not a humane Soul but that the Divine Nature supplied the place of his Soul These Articles that concern his death outface both these He had a real Body for he was really Crucified dead and buried And a real Soul for when dead he went to Hades Or whether it had been enough to have said He died and was buried but of him such addition was not needless because of misconstruction II. The Heathens owned another World and the immortality of the Soul though they had no Bible to tell them it yet they believed that there was another World after this Socrates discoursed of this before his death which Cleombrotus reading cast himself from a Tower that he might become immortal A strange affectedness with this point and a strong perswasion It is a wonder the Sadducees that had the Scriptures should deny this and Christians that hear so much of it be affected so little Tully shews arguments whereby they gathered that men lived in another World one of which was from the apparitions of some dead men In which thing while the Devil went about to cosin them to think them dead men which indeed was his own appearing yet he cosined himself too while he taught them by it to believe a life after death How they came thorowly to be grounded in this point I shall not insist upon to examine but they did believe that there was another World after this when the dead lived again III. This place and state they called Hades that is a place obscure and invisible The Phrase is infinitely frequent Achilles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sent him before to Hades Sophocles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Before the going to Hades Leonidas to his Souldiers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To sup in Hades that is in another World Shall I give you
they would argue from this reason God finished creating in Principio in the beginning therefore he creates not a Soul now I answer He finished creating genere specierum the kinds of all species but not Species generum the Species of all kinds When he brought Frogs and Lice on Egypt it was a creation of the things but the kind was created from the beginning The same must be said of Souls Let Christs Soul be the instance Was the Soul of the Messias created at the beginning If so what did it all the while till it was united to the Body Where was it What did it Was Christs Soul ever not acting for the good of his people As soon as ever it was put into the Body it began the work of Redemption viz. Christ there sanctifying our Nature by the Union of the humane nature to the Divine His Soul is now in Heaven in the work of mediation for his people It is hard to think that his Soul should be almost four thousand years in being and doing nothing for mens Salvation And we cannot call Christ Christ till he be compleated in our nature Soul and Body So that Christs Soul as ours was infused by immediate Creation in the Body which Body was prepared in the womb for the receiving of it So that though he was not like to us in regard of his begetting in the womb yet he was like in the Union of his Soul to his Body there For II. Christ had a Soul like ours in all things sin excepted It is a question Whether all Souls are equal There is some colour for it Psal. XXXIII 15. Hesashioneth their hearts alike And thence some argue the equality of Souls But I answer 1. That place may be taken thus That God alike is the Creator of all Souls rich and poor wise and foolish 2. It is undoubted all Souls are alike in regard of the ' Essentials of Souls they are all intellectual Spiritual immortal and in regard of their Essential faculties Whether they are alike as to the use and excellency of those faculties I shall not dispute Doubtless Christs Soul was the most excellent and yet like ours in all things that simply relate to the Essence of Souls or the humane nature I need not speak of the Essentials of a Soul he had the Infirmities of a humane Soul viz. those that in themselves are sinless I might so apply that Matth. VIII 17. Himself took our infirmities and bare our sicknesses He was subject to grief in Soul Matth. XXVI 38. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 My Soul is exceeding sorrowful To fear Heb. V. 7. In that he feared Joh. XI 33. He groned in spirit and was troubled These are natural infirmities or affections to humane Souls Adam might have had these in innocency if occasion offered The Apostle makes comfortable use of this likeness of Christs Soul to ours Heb. IV. 15. For we have not an High Priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities but was in all points tempted like as we are yet without sin And so may a Christian in sadness fear hunger persecution he may refuge to a High Priest that himself was sensible what these things were Non ignara mali c. Oh! what access hath God given to sinners Not only to one in their own nature but that partook of the very infirmities of nature Except sin Name but one that he had not A poor man dying assaulted with Satan fearing pains How comfortably may he refuge to Christ who by experience knew all these III. He was like other Souls in the manner of his departure out of the body and going to another World And this I shall speak to in three Particulars I. Although the reason of Christs death was different from the reason of the death of all other men yet the nature and definition of Christs death agrees withal Though the conception and birth of Christ was different from all others yet the nature of his death was not different the manner of dying indeed differed That in Heb. IX penult reacht Christ as well as others it was appointed for him to dye though upon a far different reason from what other men dye It is worth observing that Christs death was published and pronounced of before the death of Adam was denounced against him In Gen. III. 15. the death of Christ is mentioned in vers 19. the Death of Adam Which speaks that Christ died not of the Plague of mortality of which Adam and all his posterity dye but that his death was upon another kind of account Though Christ the second Adam was incomparably above the first in his innocence in regard of the Perfection of his nature and Person yet in regard of the certainty of Death as I may say he was beneath him For the excellency of his nature so far beyond him that whereas Adam was without sin Christ was without possibility of sinning But for certainty of dying so far otherwise that whereas Adam might not have dyed Christ could not but dye Socinians say Adam was created mortal because he was in a possibility to dye and because he died whereas indeed actually he was created immortal not as yet having any seeds or principles of mortality in his nature sin not being yet come there Christ was so much more without principles of mortality in him as that whereas Adam was sinless He could not sin and yet as I may say he had the principles of dying in him but not so much in his body as mind not in any failing of nature but in the holy bent of his own Will Death was not to him the wages of sin as it is to others nor to end sinning as it is to others but from clear contrary principles viz. Love to Man and Obedience to God The Death of Adam and of all other Men proceeded from disobedience the Death of Christ only from obedience The Death of Adam because he loved not himself nor his seed the death of Christ because he loved his people more than himself So that as to the reason of the death of Christ Jordan was driven back the stream ran a clean contrary way to the reason why other men dye and yet as to the nature and definition of his dying it agreed with the nature of the dying of other men For II. Define death What is it It is the separation of Soul from Body Mortal thou must once find this definition to be most true The Soul that that inliveneth the Body that gives it freshness of colour warmth life and motion when the Soul is departed all these are gone and the Body dead Here is the difference twixt death and a swoon or trance God shewed in Enoch and Elias what he would have done if man had continued innocent viz. Have translated Body and Soul to glory But when sin came in death came in and Soul and Body must be parted the Body to corruption the Soul into the World of