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
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
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
14. for Trachonitus r. Trachonitis l. 57. for 23. r. c. 33. p. 452. l. ult for fonte Abila r. fonte Abila p. 446 447. in the top should be Luke Chap. 2. p. 454. Luke 3. for Matth. p. 742. for Cainite read Canaanite A Map of CANAAN According to D r. Lightfoot A Chronicle of the Times AND THE ORDER OF THE TEXTS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT WHEREIN The Books Chapters Psalms Stories Prophecies c. are reduced into their proper order and taken up in the proper places in which the natural Method and genuine Series of the Chronology requireth them to be taken in WITH Reason given of dislocations where they come And many remarkable Notes and Observations given all along for the better understanding of the Text the difficulties of the Chronicle declared the differences occurring in the relating of Stories reconciled and exceeding many Scruples and Obscurities in the Old Testament explained The Book of GENESIS CHAP. I. Days of the Creation I THE ALMIGHTY TRINITY 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 having dwelt from all eternity in and with it self when it saw good to communicate it self did in the beginning of the being of things create Heaven and Earth the two parts of the World of nothing in a moment Verse 1. The earth newly created lay covered all over with water and there was darkness through the world in that vast vacuity that was between the face of that great deep which covered the earth and the clouds or cataracts of Heaven which were the inferior part of Heaven and were created in the same instant with the Heavens full of water and the Heavens in the instant of their creation were set a * * * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 moving by the Spirit that garnished them in a constant and continued motion and with their motion the course of nature began and the clock of time was set a going Verse 2. Twelve hours was there universal darkness through all the world and then was light created in this upper Horizon and there it inlightned twelve hours more and then flitted away as the light of the Sun now doth to the other Hemisphere and thus was the measure and work of the first day Verse 3 4 5. Days of the Creation II The air spread out through that great space that was betwixt the waters that covered the Earth and the waters that were in the cataracts of Heaven and as the light did remove the universal darkness so doth this spreading out of the air remove the emptiness and vacuity and this was the work of the second day but of this days work it is not said That God saw it good as it is said of the others because the partition and separation of all waters is not fully perfected till the next day Vers. 6 7 8. Days of the Creation III The waters that covered the Earth are brought into their channels and the dry land appearing is stored with trees and plants on this days work it is twice said That God saw it good once for the full and intire separation of the waters and again for the fructification of the ground Vers. 9 10 11 12 13. Days of the Creation IV When the light at the close of the third day was departed from this Horizon the Moon and Stars began to appear in the Sky and in the morning the Sun rose in the East and began his course and so this visible host of Heaven was the work of the fourth day The invisible host of Angels was in most probability created in the very same instant with the Heavens themselves Vers. 14 15 16 17 18 19. Days of the Creation V Fowle and fish and * * * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Crocodiles Hippopotames c. Amphibia created and the first blessing of generation pronounced upon them Vers. 20 21 22 23. Days of the Creation VI With Chap. I. from Vers. 24. to the end read Chap. II. from Vers. 4. to the end Beasts created and all manner of creeping things of the clean sorts of beasts there were seven created of every kind three couple for breed and the odd one for Adams sacrifice upon his fall which God foresaw Adam created in holiness and righteousness and high honor and happiness Dominion is given to him over all the creatures which is more clearly evidenced to him in that they are brought to him to receive their names from him which by the great wisdom that was in him he giveth them even at the first sight agreeable to their natures among them all he seeth no mate meet for himself but he observeth them all fitly mated one to another and so becometh the more sensible of his own being mateless therefore the Lord provideth a fellow meet for him even out of his own body having cast Adam the mean while into a trance God marrieth them together puts them in the garden and gives them a command Now fell the Angels for they seeing the honor and happiness in which man was created and set and the Lord giving the Angels themselves a charge concerning him to keep him in his ways and to be ministring spirits to him for his good some of them spited this his honor and happiness and despised this their charge and ingagement and so through pride against the command of God and for envy at the felicity of man they fell CHAP. III. THese Angels that were now become Devils through spite at man had no comfort at all left them in their fall but this miserable and mischievous one to bring man into the same condemnation with them For the effecting of this they lose no time but attempt it by tempting him in his wife the weaker vessel she not yet knowing that there were any Devils at all but well knowing that God had allotted her and her husband the custody of Angels mistook the Devil that spake in a Serpent for a good Angel and so was deceived by him and sinned and drew her husband into the same transgression with her this was about high noon the time of eating And in this lost condition into which Adam and Eve had now brought themselves did they lie comfortless till towards the cool of the day or three a clock afternoon Then cometh God to censure them but first promiseth Christ to be a Redeemer to them and a destroyer of Satan Curseth the earth that they might not fix their minds on things below doometh them to labour misery and mortality that they might look for rest in Heaven Adam layeth hold on the promise and in faith therein nameth his wife Eve or Life God teacheth him the rite of sacrifice and with the skins of the sacrificed beasts cloatheth them and expelleth them out of Eden and so fell Adam on the day that he was created and brought in death and so the first thing that dyeth in the world is a sacrifice or Christ in a figure CHAP. II. Ver. 1 2 3. At the end of the third Chapter in order of
time and story come in the three first Verses of the second Chapter and the story lyeth thus Dayes of the Creation VII GOD having thus created all things * * * Read ver 2. For on the seventh day God had ended his work otherwise there may be a doubt upon it whether God created not something on the seventh day This the lxx Saw and therefore they translate it different from the Original word And God ended his works on the sixth day in six days and man having thus fallen and heard of Christ and of death and eternal life and other like things on the sixth day the Lord ordaineth the seventh day for a Sabbath or holy rest and Adam spendeth it in holy duties and in meditation of holy things The mention of the institution of the Sabbath is laid in the beginning of the second Chapter though the very time and place of that story be not till after the end of the third 1. Because the holy Ghost would dispatch the whole story of the first week or seven days of the world together without interposition of any other particular story 2. Because he would shew that Adam should have kept the Sabbath though he had never sinned And therefore the mention of the Sabbath is before the mention of his sin CHAP. IV. THE exact times of the stories of the fourth Chapter are not to be determined and therefore they must be left to be taken up by conjecture in the times of the fifth as they are cast into the following table and so conjecturally also must we measure out the parallel and collateral times of the generations of Cain and Seth that are either named here or hereafter to the floud Cain and Abel born twins yet the one the seed of the Serpent and the other of the Woman In Cain was legible the poyson that Satan had breathed into fallen man and in Abel the breathing of grace into the elect and a figure of the death of Christ. God fireth Abels sacrifice from heaven but despiseth Cains yet readeth to him the first doctrine of repentance That if he did well he should certainly be accepted and though he did not well yet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a sin-offering lieth at the door if he repented there was hope of pardon Thus as God had read the first lecture of faith to Adam in the promise of Christ Chap. 3. 15. so doth he the first lecture of repentance to Cain under the doctrine of * * * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 very commonly taken for a sin offering and the sacrifices were constantly brought to the Tabernacle door a sin-offering But Cain despiseth his own mercy is unmerciful to his brother and is denied mercy from the Lord. He beggeth for death that he might be shut out of that sad condition to which God hath doomed him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Now therefore let it be that any one that findeth me may kill me but this God denieth him and reserve th him to a longlife that he might reserve him to long misery Lamech a branch of this root bringeth into the world the abomination of Polygamie or of having more wives at once than one for which God smiteth him with horrour of conscience that he himself might be a witness against that sin that he had introduced and he censureth himself for a more deplorate and desperate wretch than Cain For that Cain had slain but one man and had only destroyed his body but he himself had destroyed both young and old by his cursed example which was now so currently followed and entertained in the world that ere long it was a special forwarder of its destruction that if Cain was to be avenged seven-fold Lamech deserved seventy and seven-fold In this stock of Cain also began Idolatry and worshipping the creature instead of the Creator blessed for ever and in a mournfull feeling of this dishonour done to God by it Seth calls his Son that was born to him in those times Enosh or sorrowfull because 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then began profaness in calling upon the name of the Lord. Noah in 2 Pet. 2. 5. seemeth to be called the eighth in reference to these times namely the eighth in succession from Enosh in whose times the world began to be profane CHAP. V. THis fifth Chapter measureth the time and age of the world between the Creation and the Flood which was 1655. years compleat Being cast into a Table it will not only shew the currency but the concurrency of those times or how those Patriarchs whose times it measureth lived one with another The Reader will not need any rules for the explaining of the Table his own Arithmetick will soon shew him what use to make of it The first Age of the World From the Creation to the Flood This space is called Early in the morning Mat. 2. Hilar. in loc Ten Fathers before the Flood  Adam hath Cain and Abel and loseth them both Gen. 4. unhappy in his children the greatest earthly happiness that he may think of Heaven the more 130 130 Seth born in original sin Gen. 5. 2 3. a holy man and father of all men after the Flood Numb 24. 17. to shew all men born in that estate 235 235 105 Enosh born corruption in Religion by Idolatry begun Gen. 4. 25. Enosh therefore so named Sorrowful 325 325 195 90 Kainan born A mourner for the corruption of the times 395 395 265 160 70 Mahalaleel born A praiser of the Lord. 460 460 330 225 135 65 Jared born when there is still a descending from evil to worse 622 622 492 387 297 227 162 Enoch born and Dedicated to God the seventh from Adam Jude 14. 687 687 557 452 362 292 227 65 Methushelah born his very name foretold the Flood The lease of the world is only for his life 874 874 744 639 549 479 414 252 187 Lamech born A man smitten with grief for the present corruption and future punishment 930 930 800 695 605 535 470 308 243 56 Adam dieth having lived 1000. years within 70. Now 70 years a whole age Psal. 90. 10. 987  857 752 662 592 527 365 300 113 57 Enoch translated next after Adams death mortality taught in that immortality in this 1042 Enoch the seventh from Adam in the holy line of Seth prophecâ—ed against the wickedness that Lamech the seventh from Adam in the cursed line of Cain had brought in 912 807 717 647 582 Enoch lived as many years as there be days in a year via 365. and finished his course like a Sun on earth 355 168 112 55 Seth dieth 1056   821 731 661 596  369 182 126 69 14 Noah born a comforter 1140   905 815 745 680  453 266 210 153 98 84 Enosh dieth 1235    910 840 775  548 361 305 248 193 179 95 Kainan dieth 1290     895 830  603 416 360 303 248 234 150 55
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
by Othniel 3 Urim and Thummini who should first begin that expedition the success of Othniel 4 which beginning would have much influence to daunt or incourage the enemy Othniel 5 according as it should prove Judah the royal Tribe is chosen for that purpose Othniel 6 and Caleb the son of Jephunneh is general for that Tribe till his age and Othniels Othniel 7 prowess caused the command to devolve upon Othniel Simeon joyneth with Othniel 8 Judah in the expedition who was mingled with him in possession as Josh. 19. 1. Othniel 9 Civil wars among the Canaanites have made the way the easier for Israels victories Othniel 10 for Judah conquereth seventy Kings in the conquest of Adonibesek they bring this Tyrant before Jerusalem for the greater terrour of the Jebusites and there kill him and then they sack and burn that City This story of the taking of Jerusalem lieth in its proper place here for though the King of it had been slain in the field Josh. 10. yet was not the City taken nor it nor any other City fired in Joshua's time but only Jericho Ai and Hazor Josh. 6. 24. 8. 26. 11. 3. and therefore the eight Verse should be read And the children of Judah warred against Jerusalem and took it and smote it c. and not as if it had been done before Now the children of Israel had warred Hebron and Debir taken by Caleb and by Othniel Calebs uncle but younger then he and so are those words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be understood And Othniel the son of Kenaz a kinsman of Calebs younger then he took it For Othniel and Jephunneh Calebs father were brethren both sons of Kenaz see Numb 32. 12. and 1 Chron. 4. 13 14. Hebron and Debir had been taken by Joshua in the first or second year of his wars Josh. 10. 36 37 38 39. and about the seventh year of his wars he sweeps those places again of the Canaanites and Anakims that had swarmed thither again in the space between Josh. 11. 20. And when the land begins to be divided he allotteth Hebron unto Caleb as Josh. 14. Now ten or twelve years passed since that allotment and the publick service had been acting all this while for the dividing of the land and bringing every Tribe into its possession so that Caleb hitherto had had little leasure because of the publick or if he had leasure yet left to his own strength and forces which he can make a part and distinct from the publick he is too weak to work his own settlement and the Canaanites are still growing upon him till now that the whole Tribe of Judah and Simeon ingage for him and he their General and then he takes Hebron and Debir and destroyes the Anakims and Canaanites clear out that they grow no more there Othniel marrieth his nephews daughtet or his own great neece and hath an inheritance of land with her though she had three brethren 1 Chron. 4. 15. Jethro's family called Kenites because they dwelt in the Country called Kain Numb 24. 22. had come up with Joshua and Israel into the land of Canaan and resided about Jericho the City of Palm-trees among the Tribe of Judah till now and now that Judah hath cleared his portion and begins to spread into plantations they go along and plant with them in the South upon the coasts of the Amalekites and so in Sauls time are mingled among them 1 Sam. 15. 6. These Kenites were the root of the Rechabites Jerem. 35. 1 Chron. 3. 55. Judah conquereth Horma for Simeon and Azza Askelon Ekron for himself but the Philistims soon recover these three last Towns again Chap. 3. 1 2. The several Tribes are working themselves into settlement in their several possessions but are not careful to root out the Canaanites but suffer them to live amongst them and so hazzard themselves to be corrupted by them and forget the command of God which had ingaged them utterly to destroy and not to spare them CHAP. II. to Ver. 11. Othniel 11 FOR this Christ himself cometh up from Judahs camp at Gilgal to the people Othniel 12 assembled at some solemnity at Shiloh or Bethel and telleth them Othniel 13 plainly that he will no more conquer for them he had offered himself to Othniel 14 Joshua to lead the field in all the wars and so had done Josh. 5. 14. He had Othniel 15 been with Judah and made him victorious till he also spares the Canaanites and Othniel 16 either for fear or neglect le ts the inhabitants of the vale inhabite there still Othniel 17 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ver 19. it is left to construe indifferently either he would not or Othniel 18 could not or durst not drive them out And then the Captain of the Lords Othniel 19 hoast the Angel of the Covenant that had brought them from Egypt thitherto Othniel 20 departs from them for which all the people have good cause to weep and Othniel 21 they call the place Bochim the dimission of the people by Joshua and his age Othniel 22 and death and the death of that generation are mentioned here that the Othniel 23 foundation of the future story may be the better laid and the time of the peoples Othniel 24 beginning to degenerate may be marked out CHAP. XVII XVIII XIX XX. XXI Othniel 25 AFter the tenth Verse of the second Chapter is the proper place and order of these Chapters for though they be laid at the end of the Book yet were the things mentioned in them acted even in the beginning of their wickedness after Joshua's and the Elders death for the better evidencing of which it will be pertinent to consider first the connexion of the passages there mentioned one to another and then the reason of the dislocation of them all CHAP. XVII IDolatry is begun in Israel by a woman and in Ephraim where afterwards Jeroboam established it by Law Micahs mother devoteth eleven hundred shekels to the making of an Idol and nine hundred of them go for materials and two hundred for workmanship Micah setteth it up in his own house for his own use and the use of the neighbour-hood round about him The Text in the Original calleth him Micaiahu with a part of the name Jehovah affixed to his name till he have set up his image and from thence forward viz. from ver 5. it calleth him Micah CHAP. XVIII Othniel 26 THE Danites take Micah's Idol from him and set it up publickly in their own Tribe there Jeroboam setteth up one of his calves afterward also For this first publick Idolatry begun in the Tribe of Dan that Tribe is not named among the sealed of the Lord Rev. 7. A great grandchild of Moses is the first Idolatrous Priest but Moses his name is written 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Manasseh with the letter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 above the word partly for the honour of Moses in the dust and partly because this his
captive saith in his seventh year they were three thousand and twenty three Jews and in his eighteenth three thousand and thirty two from Jerusalem in which if the Reader ruminate well upon the matter he will find a great deal of difficulty For 1. He never mentioneth in this reckoning either the Captivity in the fourth of Jehoiakim which was the first Captivity not the Captivity of Jechoniah in which the most people were carried away And. 2. There is no mention else-where of Nebuchad-nezzars carrying away into captivity from Jerusalem either in his seventh year or in his eighteenth but of his doing so in his eighth there is mention 2 King 24. 12. and in his nineteenth Jer. 25. 12. Now for answer 1. To the First The Prophet doth not here speak simply of the persons that were captived but of persons that were captived and put to death for that was the very tenour of his speech in the verse immediately before And for the confirming of this it is observable that in these two verses he mentioneth only the Captives that were caused by an open Rebellion Jehoiakims and Zedekiahs and upon those followed slaughter upon cold blood but in the fourth of Jehoiakim when Daniel and his fellows were captived and when Jechoniah was captived with 18000 more there was no such slaughter because there was no such rebellion And by this very consideration we may learn what was the end of Jehoiakim against whom Jeremy threatned the burial of an Ass although the Scripture hath not clearly expressed it else-where To the second we have given some piece of an answer before more fully now Nebuchad-nezzars first year was properly in Jehoiakims third for then is the first news you hear of him Dan. 1. 1. but withal his first year is counted with Jehoiakims fourth in which the seventy years Captivity began for then he had captived Jerusalem and according to these two reckonings the Scripture reckons sometime by the first as Nebuchad-nezzars first year properly some-time by the second as being his first year over Israel and of the seventy of Captivity after which matter the Scripture looketh with special notice Now Jehoiakims Captivity was in Nebuchad-nezzars eighth according to the first date but it is said to be in his seventh according to the second and the rather because Jechoniah was captived the same year and so the one is distinguished from the other And so Zedeliahs captivity was in Nebuchadnezzars nineteenth according to the first date and propriety but said here to be in the eighteenth according to the second and the rather to include in the number of the captived and slain those whom Nebuchad-nezzar caught of the Jews when he marched away from the siege of Jerusalem the year before when the King of Egypt raised it for then it is not imaginable but he caught some and how he would deal with them they being in open rebellion we may well suppose JEREMY XL. from vers 7. to the end And XLI all 2 KING XXV vers 22 23 24 25. THE dispersed Captains and Companies that had fled for their safety up and down for fear of the Chaldean Army do ralley and come together to Gedaliah the Governour for protection Jeremy amongst these reckoneth Jonathan and the Sons of Ephai the Netophathite which the Book of Kings omitteth either for that these were slain with Gedaliah by Ismael as Jer. 41. 3. and never came to Egypt whither the Book of Kings and Jeremy bringeth those rallied Captives and People after Gedaliahs death Or that Jonathan came as an inferiour to Johanan his brother and that these sons of Ephai the Netophathite came under the colours of Seraiah the Netophathite and so the Book of Kings reckons only the Colonels or chief Commanders In the seventh Month Ismael some younger brother of the Royal blood and ten Nobles of the Court envying Gedaliahs promotion do traiterously murder him This was a very solemn month in it self for the Feast of Trumpets expiation and Tabernacles that should have been in it and in this month of old had Salomon kept the dedication of the Temple and sent the people home with joyful hearts afterwards but how is the matter altered now Ismael also killeth seventy Samaritan Proselites such as were coming to the Feast of Tabernacles and casteth them into a trench that Asa had made to be a stop betwixt the Samaritans and himself then made to keep off Samaritans enemies to their Religion now filled with Samaritans friends to it The little dealing that the Jews had with the Samaritans and the flying about of the Chaldean Troopers had made such interception of intelligence that these poor men knew not of the firing of the Temple though it were in the fifth month till they be upon the way towards it and then understanding of it they rent their clothes c. JEREMY XLII XLIII And 2 KING XXV vers 26. THE Captains and people upon the death of Gedaliah go into Egypt though they had promised to be ruled by the voice of the Lord and though the Lord had flatly forbidden them to go thither and so had done of old that they should never return to Egypt Poor Jeremy is carried along with them and when he comes there he prophesieth both against Egypt and them World 3421 Captivity 20 The Jews are now setled in Egypt and in time they fall to a common and open Idolatry for which Jeremy reproveth them and threatneth them very sore In vers 9. he seemeth to give a close touch upon the Idolatry of Salomons wives the first original of Idolatry to the Kings of Judah 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The wickednesses of the Kings of Judah and the wickednesses of his wives which indeed may be well construed of every one of their wives But the quaintness of the phrase seemeth to hint some such a particular thing and it may the rather be so understood because he is here taxing the present Idolatry of the Jews wives in Egypt and ripping up the sore to the very head which indeed was first those wives of Solomon Observe in vers 25. how the Hebrew Syntax seemeth to twit these mens base uxoriousness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 using the Verb in the feminine Gender though he speak to the men Now in the 45 Chap. of this Book of Jeremy vers 1. It is said that Baruch had written these words in a Book at the mouth of Jeremy in the fourth year of Jehoiakim what these very last words mentioned before But this is very unlikely for these last speeches appear to be uttered upon emergency the meaning of it therefore is that Jeremy in the fourth of Jehoiakim had uttered Prophesies to this purpose that Jerusalem should be destroyed and the Land left desolate and the people captived and mischief and misery following them which is cleered to be accomplished in the story of these Chapters and therefore this 45 Chapter is laid here though the story
about to judge in such a matter The Woman was espoused and not yet married as see Deut. 22. 24. for their Judicials punished him that lay with an espoused maid with stoning Sanhedr per. 7. halac 4. but him that lay with a married wife with strangling Ibid. per 11. halac 1. Christs words at ver 25. I am even the same that I said to you from the beginning refer to his open and manifest asserting himself for the Messiah a year and a half ago before the Sanhedrin Joh. 5. Their words to him ver 57. Thou art not yet fifty years old mean Thou art not yet come within the compass of old age no not to the first skirts of it for fifty years was the beginning of superannuation to the Levites at the Temple Numb 4. and the Jews had a common opinion that whosoever died before fifty or at least fifty two died untimely and as it were by cutting off SECTION LX. LUKE Chap. X. from Ver. 17. to the end of the Chapter And Chap. XI and XII and XIII to Ver. 23. THe observing of the beginning and end of this Section will cleer the subsequence of this to the preceding and the order of all the stories comprehended in it It begins with the seventy Disciples returning from the imployment upon which their Master had sent them Now that they returned to him at Jerusalem whither he was gone to the Feast of Tabernacles appears by this that after they are come up to him he is in Bethany in the house of Mary and Martha Luke 10. 38 39. The Section ends with this relation And he went through the Cities and Villages teaching and journeying towards Jerusalem Luke 13. 22. So that in Chap. 10. 17. he is at Jerusalem having come thither to the Feast of Tabernacles And in Chap. 13. 22. He hath been abroad and is now travelling up to Jerusalem again to the Feast of Dedication Therefore this whole Section is the story of his actions from the one Feast to the other Chap. X. Upon the Disciples relating that the Devils were subject to them in his Name he answers I saw Satan fall from Heaven like lightning Which referreth partly to his death shortly to be by which Satan was overthrown and partly if Heaven mean the Church of the Jews and the state of Religion there as it means not seldome to the power of the Gospel this very year and forward among them casting him out With these words of Christ and the consideration of the time they refer to we may fitly compare several places which give and receive light mutually with it As Matth. 12. 45. where Satan cast out of this nation returns again 1 Cor. 6. 3. Rev. 12. 9. Rev. 20. 1 2. c. Unto a Lawyer Christ defineth who is a Neighbour by the Parable of the wounded man and the good Samaritan vastly differing from the Doctrine of the Pharisees in that case Take these two or three assertions of their own Schools for some illustration of this Parable 1. They accounted none under the term Brother but an Israelite by blood and none under the term Neighbour but those that were come into their Religion Aruch in voce 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 By using the word Neighbour are excluded all the Heathen Maym. in Retseah per. 2. An Israelite that slayeth a stranger sojourning among them is not to be put to death by the Sanhedrin for it because it is said If a man come presumptuously upon his Neighbour By which it is apparent they accounted not such a one a Neighbour 2. They have this bloody and desperate tenet Hereticks that is Israelites that follow Idolatry or such as commit provoking transgressions as to eat a carcass or to wear linseye woolsey for provocation this is an Heretick And Epicurians which are such Israelites as deny the Law and Prophets it is commanded that a man kill them if he have power i◠his hand to kill them and he may boldly kill them with the sword but if he cannot he shall subtilly come about them till he can compass their death As if he see one of them fallen into a well and there was a ladder in the well before let him take it up and say I must needs use it to fetch my Son from the top of the House and then I will bring it thee again But Heathens betwixt whom and us there is no war as also the feeders of small Cattle in Israel and such like we may not compass their death but it is forbidden to deliver them if they be in danger of death Observe this As if one see one of them fall into the Sea he shall not fetch him up for it is said Thou shalt not stand up against the blood of thy Neighbour But such a one is not thy Neighbour 3. Of all other people in the World they abhorred Samaritans as appeareth by John 4. 9. 8. 43. and by exceeding many expressions to that purpose in their own writings and therefore our Savious urging for cleer and free charity in this Parable exemplifieth in a Samaritan the unlikeliest man in the world to do any charitable office for a Jew and he a Neighbour though so remote in blood religion and converse Christ is at Bethany ver 30. in the house of Mary and Martha Martha was an usual Womans name in the Nation Joshua the Son of Gamla married Martha the Daughter of Baithus Juchas fol. 57. Abba the Son of Martha Id. fol. 72. and Aruch in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Isaac bar Shemuel bar Martha Jerus in Shab fol. 3. col 4. c. And now let the Reader cast his eye back from hence and calculate when or how it was that Christ came so acquainted with this family and he will find no time or occasion so likely as when the Woman-sinner washed his feet Luke 7. which we proved there was Mary the sister of Lazarus who was also called Magdalen Chap. XI ver 2. The Lords prayer rehearsed Christ had taught it almost a year and a half ago in his Sermon in the Mount and now being desired to teach them to pray he gives the same again They that deny this for a form of prayer to be used either know not or considered not what kind of prayers the eminent men among the Jews taught them John had taught his to pray after the same manner and use of the Nation and Christ being desired to teach the Disciples as John had taught his rehearseth this form which he had given before They that again deny this Prayer is to be used by any but real Saints because as they say none but such can call God Our Father either know not or consider not how usual this compellation was among the Nation in their devotions and Christ speaketh constantly according to the common and most usual language of the Country At ver 14. and forward there is a story of casting out a Devil so like that in Sect. 35. the Jews
and his blood sprinkled under the name of a Paschal for thirteen persons For no Lamb could be eaten for a Paschal whose blood was not sprinkled at the Altar and that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the name of a Paschal and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by count for such a number of persons as had agreed to be at the eating of him Talm. in Pesachin per. 5. as Christ died but for a certain number Which shews had not the Evangelists done it otherwise that Christ ate his Passover on the same day that the Jews did theirs which some upon misunderstanding of Joh. 18. 28. have denied nay that it was not possible otherwise for how impossible was it to get the Priests to kill a Paschal for any upon a wrong day Having got the Lamb thus slain at the Temple they were to bring him home to the house where he was to be eaten to get him roasted and to get bread and wine ready and what other provision was usual and requisite for that meal At Even Jesus cometh and sitteth down with the twelve and as he ate he gave intimation of the Traitour who was now at the table and eating with him Which might seem to make this story the same with that in John 13. 21 22. and so might argue that this and that were but one and the same Supper But herein is an apparent difference in the stories 1. At the Supper in John 13. Christ giveth only a private signification of the Traitour by a token given secretly to John but here he points him out openly 2. There he gives him a sop here he only speaks of dipping with him in the dish Only there is some diversity in the Evangelists in relating this story Matthew and Mark have laid this taxation and discovery of the Traytour before the administration of the Lords Supper but Luke after And there is the like variety in their relating the time of these words of Christ I will no more drink of the fruit of the vine c. for Luke hath brought them in as spoken before the Sacrament but the other two after In both which first the main intent of the relation is to be looked after and then may we better state the time The intent in the former is to shew Judas at the Table and at the Table all the time both of the Paschal and the Lords Supper those symboles of love and communion yet he such a wretch as to communicate in both and yet a Traitour The two Matthew and Mark would shew that he was at the Table and so the mention of that they bring in upon Christs first sitting down and beginning to eat and Luke makes the story full and shews that he was at the Table all the time both at Passover and Sacrament and the words of Christ upon the delivering of the Cup But behold the hand of him that betrays me c. cannot possibly be mitigated from such a construction As to the later the meaning of Christ in the words I will no more drink of the fruit of the vine c. is that the Kingdom of God was now so near that this was the last meat and drink or the last meal that he was to have before that came By the Kingdom of God meaning his resurrection and forward when God by him had conquered death Satan and Hell And whereas he saith Till I drink it new with you in the Kingdom of God he did so eating and drinking with them after his resurrection This therefore being the aim of his speech it was seasonable to say so any time of the meal This is the last meal I must eat with you till I be risen again from the dead and hereupon the Evangelists have left the time of his uttering of it at that indifferency that they have done And indeed these two passages had such reference one to another that the one might bring on the other and both of them might very well be spoken by Christ twice The observing of the direct order of Christs actions at this meal which the Evangelists have related will help to clear this matter When he was set down with them he first saith I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer for this is the last I must eat with you before the Kingdom of God be come And thereupon he taketh the first cup of wine that was to be drunk at that meal and drinks of it and gives it them and bids Divide it among your selves for I shall not drink of the fruit of the vine c. meaning this is the last time I shall eat and drink with you c. And this speech properly brought in the other One of you shall betray me as paraphrased speaking thus I shall no more eat with you for there is one now at the Table with me hath compassed my death Hereupon they question who it should be c. After this passage they eat the Paschal Lamb after its rite and after it he ordaineth the Lords Supper bread to be his Body henceforward in the same sense that the Paschal Lamb had been his Body hitherto and the Cup to be the New Testament in his Blood now under the Gospel as the blood of Bullocks had been the Old Testament in his Blood Exod. 24. And after the administring of the Cup he tells them again that that was the last that he must drink for the hand of him that betrayed him was at the Table SECTION LXXXIV LUKE Ch. XXII from Ver. 24. to Ver. 39. A contest among the Disciples about priority LUKE himself is a clear warrant of the order And withall the joynt consideration of the story before will help to confirm it The question among themselves about the Traitour helpeth to draw on this other question about priority an unseasonable and a very unreasonable quarrel To which their Master giveth closely this twofold answer besides proposing his own example of humility 1. That let not them stand upon priority for he would equally honour them in his Kingdom c. 2. That this was not a time to stand upon such business as seeking to be preferred one before another for this was a time of sifting and a time when all the care they could take for their safety should be little enough therefore they had now something else to do then to look after precedency SECTION LXXXV JOHN Chap. XV XVI XVII CHRISTS last words to his Disciples and a Prayer for them JOHN in Chap. 18. 1. informs us that when Jesus had spoken the words contained in these Chapters he went over the brook Kidron by which it appeareth that they were spoken at his last Supper instantly before he rose and went to the garden where he was apprehended At their Passover Suppers they used large discourses seasonable and agreeable to the occasion and especially in commemorating what God had done for that people Whatsoever Christ had spoken upon that subject is not recorded but
to shew that they had the man sure whom he so much desired to be secured and to take his grave advice what further to do with him He was brought bound to him and so bound he sends him to Caiaphas His Arraignment before the Sanhedrin At Caiaphas his house was the Sanhedrin now assembled Whether we take this for his lodgings in the Temple or his house in the City it is not much material Peter follows thither and by another Disciple that was acquainted there he is helped into the Hall and sits with the Servants by the fire The Chief-Priest and Elders were busie to find out Witnesses that might accuse him and though many false Witnesses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Talmudick language come in yet all will not do for it was not possible to touch him of any offence He all this while standing silent Isa. 37. 7. Caiaphas adjures him to tell whether he were the Christ or no he confesseth it and withal tells them that the time should come that they should find the truth of this by experience when he should shew his power and vengeance in his judgment against them and their City coming in clouds c. This confession and words they account blasphemy and that they might have the surer impression of so construing them Caiaphas rent his garments and by that action would as it were force them to agree with him that it was so when his garments had paid so dear for the confirming of it Their custom and reason of renting their clothes upon the hearing of blasphemy is handled in Jerus in Sanhedr fol. 25. col 1. 2. and in Maym. in Avrdah Zarah per. 2. where those two Canons being observed Every one that hears Gods Name blasphemed is bound to rent his garments And the Judges hearing blasphemy must stand upon their feet and must rent their clothes and may not sew them up again It will cause us to observe something in it that the Highpriest only rent his clothes and not the rest of the Bench with him Which though they did not yet they vote with him that it was blasphemy and therefore he was guilty of death which had it been executed must have been by stoning Sanhedr per. 7. halac 4. And now they begin to spit on him to buâ—â—et him and abuse him Peters denial Here Peter first denies him for being challenged as he sate by the fire by the damsel porter for one of his company he denies it and shrinks away into the porch and then the first Cock crew Luke saith that the maid came to him as he sate by the fire Matthew and Mark that he was now beneath in the Palace and without in the Palace meaning beneath or without from that place or room where the Bench sate Betwixt this first denial and the second there was but a little while Luke 22. 55. In the space between the Highpriest is questioning Jesus of his Disciples and Doctrine and because he answers Ask them that have heard me c. an officious Officer smites him as if he had not answered with reverence enough Peter this while was in the porch where he was when the Cock crew after his first denial and there another maid sees him and brings him to the company that stood by the fire and challenges him for one of his Disciples and now he denies with an oath And about an hour after Luke 22. 59. which space of time the Bench took up in examining Christ about his Disciples and Doctrine a kinsman of Malchus challengeth him and tells the company he saw him with Jesus in the Garden and he pleading the contrary is discovered to all the company to be a Galilean by his Dialect but he denies with execrations and presently the second Cock crew And Jesus looking back upon him he remembers what he had done and goes out and weeps bitterly And so presently after the second Cock the Bench riseth and leaveth Jesus in the hands of their Officers by whom he is taunted stricken and shamefully used His being delivered up to the Roman power In the morning the Sanhedrin met formally in their own Council chamber and again question Jesus brought there before them and they resolved to put him to death Whether he were the Messias or no he giveth the same answer as before that though they would not believe him if he told them he was which was the truth yet the time was coming when they should find it true They question him again Art thou the Son of God which he not denying they judge him a blasphemer again and deserving to die and so deliver him up to the secular power It is observable in both these questionings of him upon this point both in the night and now in the morning how convertible terms the Son of God and the Son of man are made In the night they question him Art thou the Son of God He answers Ye shall see the Son of man c. Mat. 26. 63 64. And now in the morning again he saith Ye shall see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power and they reply Art thou then the Son of God Luke 22. 69 70. Iudas his Recantation and Ruine Judas unquiet in mind for what he had done in betraying attends the trials and waits the issue and when he now saw that he was condemned by the Bench to be delivered up to the Heathen power he steps in and offers his money again and confesseth he had betrayed innocent blood and this probably as Christ stood by Having received a surly answer again from them he flings down his money in the Temple where they sat Gazith or Hhanoth it is not seasonable to question here and departing is snatched by the devil who was bodily in him into the air and there strangled and flung down headlong to the earth and all his bowels burst out With the thirty pieces of silver his wages of iniquity the Priests consult to buy the Potters field And here a quotation of Matthew hath troubled Expositors so far that divers have denied the purity of the Text. His words are these Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy the Prophet And they took the thirty pieces of silver c. Matth. 27. 9. Whereas those words are not to be found in Jeremy at all but in Zechary they are found Zech. 11. 13. Now Matthew speaks according to an ordinary manner of speaking used among the Jews and by them would easily and without cavil be understood though he cited a text of Zechary under the name of Jeremy For the illustration of which matter we must first produce a record of their own The Babylon Talmud in Bava Bathra fol. 14. facie 2. is discoursing concerning the order in which the Books of the Old Testament were ordered and ranked of old And first they shew that there was this general division of it into 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Law the Prophets and the Hagiographa By
execution was without the City 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Talmudists do determine in Talm. Bab. Sanhedr fol. 42. 2. See how the Apostle applies this to his suffering for the Gentiles Heb. 13. 12. By the time he was come out of the City gates they observe that he is overburdened with his Cross and thereupon they force Simon a Cyrenian some noted Disciple belike to bear the end of it after him They come to the place of Execution commonly called Golgatha not the place of graves but the place of sculs where though indeed there were some burial of the executed yet was it in such a manner that the place deserved this name rather then the other for they buried not an executed person in the grave of his Fathers but there were two places of burial for such one for them that were slain with the sword and strangled and the other for them that were burnt and stoned and when the flesh was wasted the bones were gathered and buried in the graves of their Fathers Talm. ubi sup fol. 46. 1. The proper writing and pronunciation of the word had been Golgolta but use had now brought it to be uttered Golgotha which very pronunciation the Samaritan Version useth in Num. 1. They first strip him and then offer him intoxicating wine which when he tasted he refused to drink 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 When any person was brought forth to be put to death they gave him to drink some frankincence in a Cup of Wine that it might stupifie him as it is said Give strong drink to him that is ready to perish and wine to those that be of heavy hearts And there is a tradition that the Gentlewomen of Jerusalem afforded this of their good will c. Tal. Bab. ibid. fol. 43. 1. And let it not be impertinent to add that which immediately follows in the same page A crier went before him that was to be executed which proclaimed N. the Son of N. is going to execution because he hath committed such a fact and N. and N. are witnesses against him if there be any that can clear him let them speak And instantly after There is a tradition that they hanged Jesus on the eve of the Passover and a Crier went before him fourty days Such a one goes to be put to death because he hath bewitched deceived and perverted Israel if any one can say any thing for his clearing let him come and speak but they found no clearing of him therefore they hanged him upon the eve of the Passover c. He is nailed to his Cross hands and feet and so the Jews themselves confess Abel his figure to have been wounded by Cain Tanch fol. 3. col 4 and Isaac to have been bound on the Altar Idem fol. 12. col 2. And with him are crucified two malefactors compare Joseph betwixt two offenders Gen. 40. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Josephus his construction will help us to understand the sense of the word here Four souldiers part his garments and cast lots for his coat and sit down to watch him Over his head was his cause written in the expression of which the variety of the Evangelists shews their stile and how where one speaks short another inlargeth and what need of taking all together to make up the full story Mark hath it The King of the Jews Luke This is the King of the Jews Matthew This is Jesus the King of the Jews John Jesus of Nazareth the King of the Jews Where the main thing regarded is that he was condemned for taking on him to be King of the Jews as they pretended which was also pretended to be Treason against Cesar and to this point all the Evangelists speak alike and their variety is only in wording this for the readers understanding and he that spake shortest spake enough to express the matter of his accusation and the rest that speak larger are but a comment upon the same thing The three tongues in which this was written Hebrew Greek and Latine are thus spoken of in Midras Tillin fol. 25. col 4. R. Jochanan saith There are three tongues The Latine tongue for war The Greek tongue for speech and the Hebrew for prayer All sorts of people had followed him to the execution Some openly wept for him and bewailed him which was not a thing usual in such cases In the Talmudick Tract last cited fol. 46. 2. there is this strange doctrine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They bewailed not him that went to be executed but only mourned inwardly for him And what think you was the reason The Gloss tells you thus They bewailed him not because his disgrace might be his expiation meaning that whereas they accounted that the more shame and punishment a condemned person suffered the more these tended to his expiation they therefore would not openly bewail him for that would have been some honour to him and so would have abated of his expiation but none lamenting for him it was the greater disgrace and the greater the disgrace the better was his sin as they thought expiated and atoned for This strange custom and opinion doth set forth this publick bewailing of Christ the more remarkably Others when he was now raised upon his Cross reviled him among whom were the chief Priests Scribes and Elders who had so little to do or rather their malice so much as to attend the execution They were at first in some hesitancy whether he would not deliver himself by miracle but when they saw he did not then they triumph and insult at no measure Nay the theeves that were crucified with him spared him not for so Matthew and Mark tell us but at last one of them becomes a convert and receives assurance of being that day with him in Paradise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a phrase very usual with them Compare the case of Josephs fellow prisoners Gen. 40. the one desiring him to remember him and escaping and the other not It may be the darkness now begun in an extraordinary and dreadful manner was some means of working upon this thief for his conviction that Jesus was the Messias For instantly upon his raising upon his Cross it was now the sixth hour or high Noon compleat and the darkness began and continued till three a clock afternoon the very space of time of the day that Adam lay in darkness without the promise from the time of his fall till God came and revealed Christ to him By the Cross stood the Mother of Jesus now a Widdow and as it seemeth destitute of maintenance therefore he commendeth her to the care and charge of his beloved Disciple John 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A widdow was to be maintained out of the estate of her husbands heirs untill she received her dowry Maym. in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 per. 18. But the poverty of Joseph and Mary afforded neither heritage nor dower nor had they any Children but Jesus who was now dying If those that
heard Paul and one of these parents disputing upon this point Circumcise not thy Child saith Paul for if thou dost thou laiest an obligation upon him to observe the whole Law and this may note to us that the Sacrament carried an obligation with it and obliged an Infant though he knew not what Law or Obligation ment Baptism is for Obligation as well as this and a Child capable of the Obligation though he understood not what it means I but saies the Parent I will not look upon it as in way to Justification I will only use it for the Childs admission into the Covenant of grace If Infants Baptism were not now in use for such a purpose let one that denies it tell me what Paul had to answer James urgeth not Paul at all to any publick recantation of his Doctrine but adviseth him by purifying himself and Judaizing a little in the Temple to give some publick testimony for their satisfaction that he was not such an enemy to Moses as he was reported which he agreeth to For the Temple rites might have better plea while the Temple stood then Circumcision which was none of them On the second or third day of his Purification some Asian Jews raise a tumult against him It is not so properly rendred And when the seven daies were almost ended ver 27. as rather And as the seven daies were to have been accomplished the computing of these twelve daies mentioned Chap. 24 11. inforce that they should be so interpreted They found him in the second Court of the Temple the Court of the Women whither no Heathen came though they might come into the outer Court called the mountain of the House and thither they supposed and pretended that he had brought a Gentile Trophimus an Ephesian For which he is fallen upon with that they called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The rebels beating stripes without number the people falling pell mell upon him Which was the way as the Jews records inform us that the Priests were dealt withal that came into the next court above this when any of them was deprehended there in their uncleanness they never stood upon it to bring him to judicial trial but his fellows fell upon him with the fagot sticks of the Altar or what came to hand and mawled him with blows without measure even unto death And so had Paul been served now had not the Roman Commander come and been his rescue Yet did he suppose him an offender and questions him whether he were not that Egyptian that not long before that time had made an insurrection Josephus giveth this story Antiq. lib. 20. cap. 6. thus At that time there cometh one to Jerusalem out of Egypt pretending himself to be a Prophet and he counselled the common people that they should go with him to Mount Olivet and that there he would shew them how at his command the walls of Jerusalem would fall But Felix understanding this sent some horse and foot against them and slew 400 of them our text here saies 4000. and took two hundred prisoners ACTS Chap. XXII PAUL Apologizeth to the people telleth his Education Conservation and Conversion and relating how by a Divine Vision he was appointed to go to the Gentiles they begin a new commotion which the chief captain again pacifieth but yet thinks Paul some notable villain or else that there would never have been so terrible cries against him He would now have scourged him but that he understood he was a Roman therefore he turns to another course and the next day brings him before the Sanhedrin The sitting of that Bench was little at Jerusalem now For as we have observed they were unnested from Jerusalem divers years ago and their most constant residence at present was at Jabneh only they were now come up to the Festival ACTS Chap. XXIII XXIV to Ver. 27. RAbban Simeon the Son of Rabban Gamaliel Pauls Master was President of the great Council at this time for Gamaliel was dead some two or three years ago Of him the Jews have this saying in Sotah per. 9. From the time that old Rabban Gamaliel died the honour of the Law ceased for till then they read and learned the Law standing but after his death sitting Onkelos the Targumist of the Law burnt a great quantity of frankincense for him at his Obsequies Juchasin fol. 53. Whether Rabban Simeon the President were present at this Session or no Ananias the High-priest is as busie as if he had been chief President himself But Paul cares for him as little as he busied himself much He calls him whited wall or arrant painted Hypocrite And when he was checked for reviling Gods Highpriest I know not brethren saith he that he is Highpriest for if I took him for such a one I would not so have spoken to him since it is written Thou shalt not speak evil of the Ruler of my People It is not possible that Paul should not know who and what Ananias was but it is very indifferent whether we understand this as not owning this man for a lawful Highpriest or not owning any lawful Highpriesthood now at all The man base and usurping and the Function of the Highpriesthood disanulled by the great Highpriest who had accomplished all that it typified and the place of the Highpriesthood being become a common Merchandise obtained by money and favour and dispatching one another By a holy policy he divides the Council and professing himself by education a Pharisee and of that belief in the point of the Resurrection he not only sets Pharisees and Sadduces to a hot contestation between themselves but he makes the Pharisees so far as to that opinion to take his part It had been possible to have set the Hillelian and Shammaean party together by the ears by a bone handsomly cast between them for the Council had these factions in it and their feud was as deadly but Paul could own no article of their divisions that was worth his owning they were so trivial and below his cognisance It is the confession of the Jerusalem Gemarists in Joma fol. 38. col 3. That the fault of their great ones under the second Temple was love of money and hatred one of another Paul in the hubbub is rescued again by the Souldiery and that night by revelation is warranted to appeal to Caesar by being informed he must go to Rome A Conspiracy of a pack of cut-throats to murder him is prevented and he is sent to Caesarea to Felix where he lies prisoner two years By such packing and combining of murderers it may easily be conjectured what temper the Nation was now in Josephus his charecter of it at these times is That the affairs of the Jews grew every day worse and worse and that the Country was full of theeves and Sorcerers but Felix was daily picking them up to penalty after their desert the greater thief the less for his character yields him no better Tacitus saies
and fixeth it to this year or else it would be easier for Tychicus his travel to have supposed that he brought it the last year when he came to Timothy to Ephesus and Colosse was not far off but the observing of Marks being now at Rome puts the matter out of doubt And whereas it might be thought more likely that Epaphras that came with the visit from the Church should bring this return of Paul back again it appeareth by Chap. 4. 12. that he staied still with Paul and was fellow-prisoner now with him Philem. ver 23. The Colossians had never seen Pauls face no more had the Laodiceans for no less can be gathered from his own words Chap. 2. 1. yet had he been a means by some of his agents to plant these Churches or at least to afford them plentiful watering The Apostles had subordinate Ministers under them that they imployed to this purpose I know not how the word Helps 1 Cor. 12. 28. can be better understood The Laodiceans had sent him an Epistle as the Corinthians had also done 1 Cor. 7. 1. and this is that Epistle that he speaketh of Chap. 4. 16. See that ye reade likewise the Epistle from Laodicea Not that he had written any Epistle from thence which is now lost as is conceived by some for he was never there but it meaneth that Epistle which the Laodiceans had sent to him Not that he would have it read as of equal Divine authority with his own but as a good copy and example to the Colossians If any be not satisfied with this construction we shall offer another when we come to the Epistles of John rather then conceive that any Epistle of Paul is lost that was once read in the Churches Among those whose salutations he sends he nameth Demas who the last year was departed from him and imbraced as he thought the present world 2 Tim. 4. 10. but now is come in a good man again The sparks of grace once kindled can never be quenched yea though not discernable to the eye of a Paul which however raked up under the ashes by vehement temptation or corruption yet covered with an everlasting decree of everlasting love are unextinguishable The Act of grace it is true may be in a swone and seem dead to the eyes of a Paul himself whilst yet there is the habit in life I mean that gracious changedness which by regeneration is wrought in the soul the stony heart turned into flesh which though it may congeal into ice again yet can never again congeal into the stone it was Fides qua apprehendens its hand may slip but â—ides qua apprehensa his hand cannot slip that hath laid hold upon it By these same bearers Tychicus and Onesimus by whom he sends the Epistle to the Colossians he also sends THE EPISTLE TO PHILEMON For he was a Colossian as appeareth by this that Paul calls Onesimus his servant one of the Colossians Col. 4. 9. and Archippus which was Minister at Colosse Col. 4. 17. seemeth to have been Philemons son or at least to have sojourned in his house Philem. ver 2. In this Epistle he sendeth salutations from the persons he did in the Epistle to the Colossians Epaphras Marcus Aristarchus Demas Lucas only there is this difference about two of them that here he calls Epaphras his fellow-prisoner which there he did not and there Aristarchus his fellow-prisoner which here he doth not This doing of the Apostle needeth to breed no scruple but it may rather justly be inquired how these men came prisoners Aristarchus set out with Paul from Jerusalem and he only is named of all his company Act. 27. 2. either because he was a prisoner then as Paul was or because the rest with Paul were his attendants and Ministers constantly with him and therefore needed not to be named Or if Aristarchus were not committed to prison till now the consideration of Epaphras his case will include his Epaphras came from Colosse but very lately Col. 1. 7 8. and how and for what is he now got into prison For answer to this we may properly take in something out of the Roman story Suetonius in the Life of Nero speaking of those times of his that carried some moderation in which he was not broke out to his extream wickedness and mentioning some things that he did and enacted that looked somewhat like a Reformation he saith thus Multa sub eo animadversa severe coercita nec minus instituta Adhibitus sumptibus modus Publicae caenae ad sportulas redactae Interdictum ne quid in popinis cocti praeter legumina aut olera veniret cum antea nullum non opsonii genus proponeretur Afflicti suppliciis Christiani genus hominum superstitionis novae maleficae This last particular is it that we have to deal with The Christians were put to punishment a sort of men of a new Religion c. Suet. in Nerone cap. 16. Tacitus in the Life of the same Tyrant telleth of a dreadful fire that befel in Rome in the tenth year of his reign of which we shall speak when we come there which common report buzzed and rumored up and down that he had kindled Abolendo rumori Nero subdidit reos quaesitissimis paenis affecit quos per flagitia invisos vulgus Christianos appellat Nero to stop that report brought in as guilty those who were called Christians and tortured them with exquisite torments The author of that name was Christ who in the reign of Tiberius was put to death by Pontius Pilate Repressaque in praesens exitiabilis superstitio rursus erumpebat non modo per Judaeam originem ejus mali sed per urbem etiam quo cuncta undique atrocia aut pudenda confluunt celebranturque Igitur primo correpti qui fatebantur c. For the Englishing of this the words repressa in praesens will breed some dispute as doubtful whether they mean that the Christian Religion was suppressed by Nero at that time when he inflicted those tortures upon them pretending them guilty for firing the City which was in his tenth year but it brake out again after for all that suppression or that they mean that that Religion had been suppressed in former time but now by that tenth year of Nero was broken out again and he falls upon it anew The words you may wind to whether construction you will construing them either That dangerous superstition suppressed for the present broke out again or That dangerous superstition having been suppressed for a time was broke out again or that had been suppressed till the present Now though there be this dubiousness in that phrase yet the observation of these things may state it that there was some such suppression of Christianity before that open persecution that broke out in his tenth year 1. Because Sueton speaks of his afflicting the Christians as done in his way of Reformation of Religion and that in his good
of the new Moons he had scored upon his wall several forms and appearances of it and those that came to bear witness that they had seen the new Moon he brought thither and asked How saw you it In this form or this or the other c. Rosh hashanah per. 1. hal 8. SECTION V. The Sanhedrin still at Iabneh R. Akibah President THE twelve years of Rabban Jochanan and Rabban Gamaliel reached from the second year of Vespasian when the Sanhedrin was first setled at Jabneh to the second year of Domitian there begins R. Akibah his Presidency and sate fourty years namely to the time of the sacking of the Town Bitter or Beth tar which the Jews generally six fifty two years after the fall of the Temple or at most fifty five So that he sate all the time of Domitian and Trajan to the fifth or at most the eighth year of Hadrianus His time was a troublesom time with the Jews In Domitians days Judaicus fiscus praeter caeteros acerbissime actus Above all others the Jews were plagued with taxes and conâ—iscations Sueton in Domit. cap. 12. where he adds I remember when I was a boy I was present when a man of ninety years old was searched before a great company whether he were Circumcised or no. In Trajan's time was that horrd insurrection of the Jews mentioned by Dion lib. 68. about Cyrene where they murdered Romans and Greeks to the number of two hundred and twenty thousand eat their flesh devoured their intrails and dawbed themselves with their blood And the like insurrection they made in Egypt and Cyprus and murdered to the number of two hundred and fourty thousand Tsemach David makes Ben Coziba a chief leader in this business who if he were received his just reward in the time of Hadrian He took on him to be Messias made himself a King stamped Coyn of his own 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Jerus Maasar Sheni fol. 52. col 4. brought the Romans against him who destroyed him and the City Bitter and multitudes of thousands of Jews with him The Jews commonly write it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but in Jerus Taanith fol. 68. col 4. it is written 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Beth tar which properly signifies the house of spies And there a story is told that makes it no better of the great ones that had escaped at the ruine of Jerusalem and dwelt here and intrapped any man that they saw go toward Jerusalem Eusebius Hist. lib. 4. cap. 6. calls it Betheka and saith it was not far from Jerusalem which Barronius boldly translates Bethlehem The Jews do character the doleful slaughter at this place as the saddest stroke that ever they received but the fall of Jerusalem Rabbi Akibah himself perished in it dotingly having become Armour bearer to Ben Coziba as holding him to be the Messias You may observe what kind of a Messias they expect Dion tells that in this War Severus whom Hadrian had sent to quel them took fifty of their strongest Garrisons and destroyed nine hundred fourscore and five fair Towns And he also destroyed all the Olive trees in Judea Jerusal Peah fol. 20. col 1. How they themselves record the slaughter at Beth tar may be seen in the Jerusalem Talmud in Taanith the place cited above and the Babylonian in Gittin fol. 57. 2. Whence their first tumultuating took its rise is of some obscurity only it may be resolved into Gods just judgment upon them to stir to their own ruine Yet Spartianus speaking of their stirring in the time of Hadrian saith it was because they were forbidden Circumcision Moverunt ea tempestate Judaei bellum quod vetabantur mutilare genitalia In vit Hadrian Trajan put a restraint upon Christianity and persecuted it Plin. Epist. lib. 10. ep 97. It may be he did the like upon Judaism and that might move them to an insurrection The horrid Massacres that they committed in Cyrene Egypt and Cyprus might be looked upon as a just judgement for his persecution of Christianity if multitudes of Christians did not also perish in those slaughters if Ben Coziba were ringleader in them For Justin Martyr Apol. 2. saith that Barchochebas brought Christians only to torture unless they would deny Christ and blaspheme him And Euseb. in Chron. Chocebas the ringleader of the Jews put to death with all exquisite torture those Christians that would not assist him against the Romanes That is worth observing which is spoken by Jerus Jevamoth fol. 9. col 1. There were many that had retracted their foreskin in the days of Ben Coziba were Circumcised again which R. Nissim speaks out more at large There were many Circumcised ones in the days of Ben Coziba who had retracted their foreskin perforce in the Town of Bitter but the hand of Ben Coziba prevailed and reigned over them two years and an half and they were Circumcised again in his days In Alphes in Jevam fol. 428. their retracting their foreskin perforce speaks much like to that which was mentioned before out of Spartianus In these times also of Trajane I suppose there was an Edict against the Jews Ordination upon pain of death to him that did Ordain and him that was Ordained and ruine of the place where any Ordination should be Talm. Bab. Avodah Zarah fol. 8. 2. And from the time of these tumults forward that began to take place which is spoken in Jerus Sanhed fol. 24. col 2. That in the days of R. Simeon ben Jochai who was now alive the judging even in pecuniary matters was taken away In fol. 18. col 1. This is said to have been in the days of Simeon ben Shetah but that is a mistake which is corrected in the place cited Upon these Wars and Tumults Hadrian forbids the Jews to go to Jerusalem or so much as to look upon it from any hill where it might be seen Euseb. hist. lib. 4. cap. 6. Triphon the Jew that hath the long dispute with Justin Martyr fled from these Wars Justin. Dial. cum Tryph. he might very well be R. Tarphon a great associate with R. Akibah and one much mentioned in the Talmuds SECTION VI. The Sanhedrin at Usha and Shepharaam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rabban Simeon President THUS did the just vengeance of God follow the Nation but far were they from being rooted out and as far from laying to heart any plague that light upon them Besides R. Akibah we can hardly name you another of note that perished in all those deadly combustions though some of them were in the thickest of the danger but reserved as it seemeth as a further plague for the seduction of their Nation Some of their expressions about the sad slaughter at Bethtar or Bitter are to this purpose The horses waded in blood up to the nostrils There were slain 400000 And Adrian walled a Vineyard of sixteen miles about with dead bodies a mans height And there were found the brains of 300 children upon one stone and
hill Luke 4. 29. Nazaret in the Arabick Tongue signifieth Help in the Hebr. a Branch by which name our Saviour is called Esa. 11. 1. Vers. 27. To a Virgin Rabbi Oshua the Son of Levi said Israel was comforted in a Virgin as saith Jeremy The Lord â—roateth a new thing in the earth A Virgin shall compass a Man Jer. 31. 21. Beresh Rabb See also Lyra and Gloss. intenlin in loc Vers. 28. Highly favoured 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This word is used by the Greek Scholiast in Psal. 18. 26. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the word from which it is derived in Ephes. 1. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. which let the indifferent Reader view and judge of the propriety of our English translation here in comparison of the vulgar Latine The Virgin had obtained the highest earthly favour that ever mortal did or must do to be the mother of the Redeemer and the Holy Ghost useth a singular word to express so much Superstition is ever too officious but it hath shewed it self more so to the Virgin Mary then to any other For as it hath deified her now she is in Heaven so hath it magnified her in all her actions while she was upon the earth So that no relation or story that concerneth her but it hath strained it to the utmost extremity to wring out of it her praises though very often to a senseless and too often to a blasphemous issue As in this story of the annuntiation there is not a word nor tittle that it thinketh will with all its shaping serve for such a purpose but it taketh advantage to patch up her Encomions where there is no use nor need nor indeed any truth of and in such a thing This word that is under hand 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 bears the bell that ringeth lowdest with them to such a tune For having translated it in their vulgar Latine Gratia plena or full of grace they hence infer that she had all the seven gifts of the Spirit and all the Theological and moral vertues and such a fulness of the graces of the Holy Ghost as none ever had the like Whereas first The use of Scripture is when it speaketh of fulness of grace to express it by another phrase as Joh. 1. 14. Act. 6. 5. c. Secondly The Angel himself explaineth this word in the sense of our translation for favour received and not for grace inherent Vers. 30. Thou hast found favour with God Thirdly And so doth the Virgin her self also descant upon the same thing throughout her Song Fourthly Joseph her husband suspected her for an adultress Matth. 1. 18. which he could never have done if he had ever seen so infinite fulness of grace in her as the Romanists have spied and he was the likelier to have espied it of the two Fifthly Compare her with other renowned women and what difference but only this great favour of being the mother of the Messias They had the spirit of Prophesie as well as she they had the spirit of sanctification as well as she and she no more immunity from sin and death then they Sixthly She was one of the number of those that would have taken off Christ from preaching Mark 3. and this argued not such a fulness of grace Seventhly See Jansenius one of their own side expounding this word according to our reading of it in loc The Lord is with thee Many understand this of the Incarnation it self or of the Lords being in her womb Whereas first This is to take a common manner of speech out of the common manner of interpreting it Secondly The Lord was not at this very instant come in that manner into her womb But the words only mean the Lords being with her in regard of that favour and respect which he was about to shew her as Judg. 6. 12. And this among other things sheweth how senseless Popery is in its Ave Maries using these words for a Prayer and if occasion serve for it for a charm As first Turning a Salutation into a Prayer Secondly In fitting these words of an Angel that was sent and that spake them upon a special message to the mouth of every person and for every occasion Thirdly In applying these words to her now she is in Heaven which suited with her only while she was upon Earth As first to say full of grace to her that is full of glory And secondly to say The Lord is with thee to her that is with the Lord. Blessed art thou among women Not above but among them See Gen. 30. 13. Judg. 5. 24. Vers. 29. And when she saw him So readeth the Syrian Arabick and generally all other translations but only the vulgar Latin that swarving as it is to be suspected wilfully from the truth of the Original that hereby there might be the greater plea and colour for the Virgins familiarity with Angels Whereas indeed apparition of Angels till this very occasion to Zachary and the Virgin was either exceeding rare or just none at all What manner of salutation c. Judge how Superstition straineth the Text to the Virgin Maries praises when it infers from hence that she had never been saluted by a man in all her life before An opinion and gloss not worth the examining Vers. 31. Behold thou shalt conceive c. From Esa. 7. 14. the Angel giveth her to understand that she is the Virgin spoken of in that place and of her apprehension of this ariseth her question Vers. 4. And shalt call his Name This followeth the same Prophesie still and is one of the significations of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for it hath more then one For first it denoteth the third person feminine as Deut. 31. 29. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so it is to be taken in that Prophesie And she shall call his Name Immanuel Secondly It betokeneth also the second person as the Chaldee the Lxx and the other two Greek translations render it and the Angel here And thou shalt call Thirdly It is also applied to the third person plural as in the Greek Matth. 1. 23. and in the Chaldee Esa. 60. 18. Jesus The same with Jehoshua in Hebrew as Act. 7. 45. Heb. 4. 8. and Joshua in Chaldee Ezra 2. 2. These were two renowned ones before the one whereof brought the people into Canaan after the death of Moses and the other that brought them thither out of Babel and so were both lively figures of our Jesus that bringeth his people to the heavenly Canaan Vers. 32. The Son of the Highest From 2 Sam. 7. 14. as it is explained Heb. 1. 5. the Angel now draweth the Virgin to remember that glorious promise made to David as the words following concerning an eternal Throne and Kingdom do evince and upon the rumination upon that to reflect upon her self and to consider that she was of the seed of David and so he leadeth her on by degrees to believe and
26. 1. 29. 1. 31. 1. 32. 1. 40. 1. The whole sum of the three fourteens is the renowned number of two and forty the number of the knops and flowers and branches of the Candlestick of the journeys and stations of Israel betwixt Egypt and Canaan Numb 33. of the children of Bethel 2 King 2. 24. And see Rev. 11. 2. 13. 5. Vers. 18. Before they came together c. That is to dwell together in the same house Nay it is very probable that as yet they dwelt not in the same Town but Joseph in Capernaum and Mary in Nazeret Vers. 19. To make her a publick example 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A word used by the LXX Numb 25. 4. Ezek. 28. 17. c. And by the New Testament Heb. 6. 6. And ever saith Erasmus in an evil sense Brucioli hath strangely translated this clause Non lo volendo Publicare and divers of the Papists have more strangely expounded it as non volens traducere not willing to take her to himself or to his own house and why Because he thought himself unworthy of her society and because the brightness of her face was such that he could not look upon it And he thought it more possible for a woman to conceive without a man then for Mary to sin And thus will they make Joseph to divorce his wife or at least to use unkindly for her too great excellencies * * * * * * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to divorce her as Mat. 5. 31. 19. 7. Mark 10. 4. Luk. 16. 18. Erasm. Voluit clanculum ab ea divertere And so Brucioli La volse oâ—cultamente â—asciare making Joseph a patient in the divorce rather then an agent or rather divorcing himself then her To put her away privily The Law bound him not to bring her either to shame by trial before the Priest Numb 6. or to punishment by the sentence of the Judges The adulteress indeed was to be put to death if she were accused prosecuted and convicted but to accuse and prosecute her the Law bound not but upon deprehension in the very act Joh. 8. 4. 5. Deut. 22. 22. Numb 25. 8. If a man took a wife and hated her Deut. 22. 13. he might bring her to tryal and upon conviction to punishment but if he love her for all his suspicion and will connive at her fault and not seek her death he is a liberty to connive and tolerated by the Law so to do and blameless if he did it as Judg. 19. 2 3. But if a couple were deprehended in the act of Adultery then must there be no connivence Deut. 22. 22. explaining Levit. 20. 10. And the case of the unbetrothed Damosel Deut. 22. 28. explaining the case of the betrothed And thus is the question easily answered which hath so toiled many expositors How Joseph can be said to be just when in this very matter that is now in hand he violateth It is answered by denying that he violated the Law For that tolerated him thus to do Vers. 21. Jesus for he shall save Rabenn haccadosh saith Because Messias shall save men he shall be called Joshua But the Heathen of another Nation which shall imbrace the belief of him shall call his name Jesus And this is intimated in Gen. 49. Chi jabbo shiloh until Shiloh come Vid. Galatin lib. 3. cap. 20. Vers. 23. Behold a Virgin The Jews seek to elude this Prophecy of Isaiah by expounding it either of the Prophets wife as Isa. 8. 3. or of the Kings wife and from Prov. 30. 19. they plead that Almah doth not strictly signifie a virgin but a woman that hath known a man Answ. 1. There are three words in the Hebrew that signifie and betoken Virginity but this most properly First 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth a Virgin but not always for it properly denoteth a young woman yea though she be not a virgin but hath been touched Secondly Bethulah is the common word used to denote Virginity yet as Galatine observeth out of Prov. 30. it seemeth sometime to be taken otherwise But thirdly Almah properly importeth a young Virgin and not at all one touched So that Naarah signifieth any young Woman though she be not a Virgin Bethulah a Virgin though she be not young but Almah importeth youth and virginity both Secondly the LXX in the place of Isaiah cited translate the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which denoteth no otherwise then a Virgin Thirdly it is given for a sign to Ahaz that Almah should bear a Son now for one that had known a man to do so were no sign at all See Galatine lib. 7. cap. 15. They shall call his name Emmanuel Nomen naturae not impositionis they shall own him for God in our nature and not denominate him Emmanuel for his imposed name See the like Phrase Esa. 60. 18. Ezek. 48. 35. Which is being interpreted First this and other passages of the same nature in this Evangelist argue strongly that Matthew wrote not his Gospel in the Hebrew tongue as is very commonly held For first then had this word needed no interpretation and it had been very hard to have interpreted it but by the same word again Secondly the Jews in those times that Matthew wrote understood not the Hebrew tongue in its purity but had degenerated into the use and speech of the Syrian Thirdly Jonathan Ben Uzziel translated the Prophets out of Hebrew into Chaldee a little before the coming of Christ and Onkelos did as much by the Law a little after and both did so because the Jews could not at that time understand or read the Bible in its own Hebrew tongue and how improper then was it for Matthew to write his Gospel in that language Fourthly all the world that used the Old Testament at those times unless it were such as had gained the Hebrew tongue by study used it in the translation of the LXX or the Greek and it was requisite that the Pen-men of the New Testament should write in that language and according to their stile as Paul writing for and to Romans and Matthew and he to Hebrews that their quotations out of the Old Testament might be examined by the Greek Bible Fifthly let those that hold the opinion we are confuting but seriously consider that Christ calleth himself by the name of two Greek letters and why Rev. 1. 8. Vers. 25. He knew her not till she had brought forth This properly falleth in order at Luke 2. 7. and there shall it be taken up again SECTION V. S. LUKE CHAP. I. The Birth and Circumcision of Iohn the Baptist and the tongue of his Father restored c. Vers. 57. NOW Elizabeths a a a a a a Though the conceived her child above the course of nature yet his time in the womb was according to it full time came that she should be delivered and she brought forth a Son 58. And b
maintained upon the foundation or because she was a Prophetess and so lodged in some of the buildings or chambers belonging to the Temple For so might women do as 2 Chron. 22. 11 12. SECTION VII S. MATTHEW CHAP. II. Christ at two years old is visited and honoured by the Wisemen The Children of Bethlehem murthered Herod dyeth soon after Christ returneth out of Egypt NOw when Iesus was born in Bethlehem of a a a a a a Vulg. of Juda and this is conceived by Jerom to be the better reading because it is so written ver 6. But in this verse the Evangelist telleth it was in Bethlehem of Judea to distinguish it from Bethlehem in Galilee Joh. 19. 15. and in ver 6. he saith it was in the land of Judah to distinguish it from the lot of Benjamin Judea in the days of Herod the King behold there came b b b b b b Wisemen Gr. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which word is reserved by the Syr. Arab. Ital. and generally by all Latines the French readeth it Sages in the sense of our English Wisemen from the East to Jerusalem 2. Saying where is he that is born King of the Jews For we have seen his Star in the East and are come to worship him 3. When Herod the King had heard these things he was troubled and all Jerusalem with him 4. And when he had gathered all the chief Priests and c c c c c c 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the LXX Exod. 5. 6. Joh. 1. 10. 2 Sam. 8. 17. Jer. 36. 10. Ezr. 4. 8. and 7. 12. And 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Deut. 1. 15. Scribes of the people together he demanded of them where Christ should be born 5. They said unto him in Bethlehem of Judea For thus it is written by the Prophet 6. And thou Bethlehem d d d d d d 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as John 1. 4. the Preposition is understood in the Land of Juda art not the e e e e e e the LXX in Mic. 5. use 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 speaking of smalness of number but Matthew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 speaking of smalness of bulk or dignity least among the Princes of Juda for out of thee shall come a Governour that shall rule my people Israel 7. Then Herod when he had privily called the Wisemen enquired diligently of them what time the Star appeared 8. And he sent them to f f f f f f Bethlehem distant from Jerusalem 35 furlongs Just. Matt. Apol. 2. Four miles and almost an half Bethlehem and said Go and search diligently for the young child and when ye have found him bring me word again that I may come and worship him also 9. When they had heard the King they departed and lo the Star which they saw in the East went before them till it came and stood over where the young child was 10. When they saw the Star they rejoyced with g g g g g g As 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Isa. 61. 10. exceeding great joy 11. And when they were come into the house they saw the young child with Mary his Mother and fell down and worshipped him and when they had opened their treasures they presented unto him gifts h h h h h h Gold and Frankincense they shall bring in Merchandize and also for a present to the King Messias and for the house of the Lord D. Kim◠on Esa. 60. 6. Gold and Frankincense and Myrrhe 12. And being warned of God in a dream that they should not return to Herod they departed into their own Country another away 13. And when they were departed behold the Angel of the Lord appeareth to Joseph in a dream saying Arise and take the young child and his Mother and flee into Egypt and be thou there until I bring thee word for Herod will seek the young Child to destroy him 14. When he arose he took the young child and his mother by night and departed into Egypt 15. And was there until the death of Herod that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the Prophet saying Out of Egypt have I called my Son 16. Then Herod when he saw that he was mocked of the Wisemen was exceeding wroth and sent forth and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem and in all the Coasts thereof from two years old and under according to the time he had diligently inquired of the Wisemen 17. Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremie the Prophet saying 18. In i i i i i i Rama was the birth place of Samuel 1 Sam. 1. 19. c. Rama was there a voice heard lamentation and weeping and great mourning Rachel mourning for her children and would not be comforted because they are not 19. But when Herod was dead behold an Angel of the Lord appeareth in a dream to Joseph in Egypt 20. Saying Arise and take the young child and his mother and go into the Land of Israel for k k k k k k Compare Exod. 4. 19. they are dead which sought the young childs life 21. And he arose and took the young child and his mother and came into the Land of Israel 22. But when he heard that Archelaus did reign in Judea in the room of his Father Herod he was afraid to go thither notwithstanding being warned of God in a dream he turned aside into the parts of Galilee 23. And he came and dwelt in a City calleth Nazareth that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Prophets He shall be called a Nazarite Reason of the Order TO confirm and prove the Order of this Section and Story requireth some labour because of an opinion ancient and current among men that crosseth the laying of it in this place It hath been generally held and believed almost of every one that the Wisemen came to Christ when he was but thirteen days old and it is written in red Letters in the Kalendar as if it were a golden truth by the title of Epiphany at the sixth of January An opinion which if it were as true as it is common it were readily known where to place this Story of the Wisemens coming namely between the Circumcision of our Saviour and his Presentation in the Temple betwixt Ver. 21 and 22 of Luke 2. But upon serious and impartial examination of this opinion these rubs and unliklehoods lie in the way and make it as incredible for the improbability as it seemeth venerable for its antiquity First to omit the length of their journey from their own Country to Bethlehem their preparation for so long a journy before they set out and their stay at Jerusalem by the way for I cannot think that all that passed there while they were there was done in an instant Secondly how utterly improbable it is that after all this hubbub at Jerusalem upon the Wisemens
they entred into their function Exod. 29. 4. Lev. 8. 6. the equity of which appeared in him when he was baptized at his entrance into his Ministry And this indeed was the manifest and properest end and reason of Christ being baptized namely that by baptism he might be installed into his Ministerial office Luke 3. ver 21. Now when all the people were baptized c. Not all that were to be baptized by John for the contrary is evident Joh. 3. 23. where John is baptizing a twelve month after this but all those that were reckoned by the Evangelist before from Jerusalem and Judea of Phrarisees Sadduces Publicans and Soldiers which he now reckoneth up in this summa totalis of All the people to shew what multitudes were baptized into Christ before Christ came to be revealed But it may be questioned among all this number whether there were any women baptized by John or no. And the doubt may seem to be equally ballanced for as the silence of the Text doth seem to deny it so reason on the other side doth strongly affirm it For first the baptism of John was such a thing as women might receive as well as men in regard of possibility which they could not possibly do by Circumcision Secondly it was such a thing as they might receive as well as men in regard of capability for women were as ready to repent as they But thirdly that which putteth it out of all doubt that women were baptized by him is the testimony of our Saviour Matthew 21. 32. John came unto you in the way of righteousness and ye believed him not but the Publicans and the Harlots believed him § Jesus also being baptized About the time place and manner of our Saviours baptism the Evangelists have been so silent in this place that what is to be resolved upon them is to be fetched from and by comparison of other texts and collection from other places which about the first will give very full satisfaction about the second indifferent and about the last little or none at all The time then of his being baptized that is the time of the year is only or at least chiefly to be found by computing the time or length of his Preaching and therewith considering the time or season of his death Now the length of his Preaching or from his baptism to his death was justly and exactly three years and an half as was touched before And from that very thing or in relation to it that number is so very renowned in Scripture being sometimes expressed in the plain terms of three years and six months Luke 4. 25. sometimes by half a week Dan. 9. 27. sometimes by a time times and half a time Dan. 12. 7. Rev. 12. 14. and sometimes by a thousand two hundred and threescore days Rev. 11. 3. 12. 6. and sometimes by forty and two months Rev. 11. 2. To evidence which account of his Ministery first may be produced the Text of Daniel alledged instantly before chap. 9. 27. where it is said that Messias should confirm the Covenant for many for one week or in that one week rather namely which he reckoneth the last of the seventy for first he nameth seven weeks by themselves and then sixty two by themselves ver 25. which every one knoweth made sixty nine and then coming to speak of the last week which was to make up the seventy he saith that in that one week Christ shall confirm the Covenant for many and then describing and declaring the exact time of that his work he saith And in half that week shall he cause sacrifice and oblation to cease Now that by these weeks are meant weeks of years or as many years as a week hath days hardly any man ever denyed or suspected the contrary and that then by half a week is meant half seven years or three years and an half there can be as little doubt or scruple This then the Angel Gabriel telleth was the exact time in which the Messias did confirm the Covenant and was bringing to an end Sacrificing and other Ceremonies or the time of his Preaching the Gospel which was from his Baptism to his death Secondly if not for proof yet for better illustration of the same may be produced that place of the Gospel alledged so lately also before namely Luke 4. 25. where Elias is a glorious type and resemblance of Christ in a sweet and harmonious discord and difference For as he shut up heaven by his prayer and there was no rain for three years and six months so Christ opened heaven at his baptism as it is said in the verse in hand and continued to distil the divine dew and rain of his heavenly doctrine as Deut. 32. 2. for the same space of time And thirdly as there is such evidence for the time averred from a Prophecy and such illustration from a type so is there a full confirmation of it in the Evangelicall story For John hath plainly parcelled out the three years by four Passeovers as the first chap. 2. 13. the second chap. 5. 1. the third chap. 6. 4. and the fourth chap. 13. 1. c. and the odd half year which since he dyed at the last Passeover must be laid before the first was taken up in these particulars of his journey into the wilderness and forty days fast Mat. 4. 1. his return to Jordan and abode thereabout John 1. 29. 35. 44. his voyage into Galilee and miracle at Cana John 2. 1. his removal after some space to Capernaum and some abode in it chap. 2. 12. and thence his journy to Hierusalem to the first Passeover of the four John 2. 13. So that it being thus apparent that the length or space of his Preaching was three years and an half from his baptizing to his suffering it being withall considered that he dyed at Easter it will readily follow that he was baptized half a year before that time of the year namely in the month Tisri or September And it being again considered that he was baptized when he was just entring upon a new year of his age as shall be observed anon it will thence likewise follow that he was born at the same time of the year also And who is he that can imagine that the renownedness and fame of this month in the Old Testament both befor the Law and under it was for any other thing so much as in reference and prefiguration to and of these glorious things Now though there be these assured evidences of the time of the year when our Saviour was baptized yet is there but conjecture of the time of the month And that may most constantly be conceived to have been at the Feast of Tabernacles which began on the fifteenth day of the month Levit. 23. 33. upon these probable and not altogether un satisfactory reasons First because he dyed on the fifteenth day of the month Abid or Nisan the day after the Passeover and
first of these the Evangelist means when he saith He departed from him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and indeed includeth the other two The words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if we render them till a season which is the most natural signification of them may be taken in a double sense either till a season opportune or till a season fixed And I take the latter to be the most proper and very meaning of the words For a more opportune season for his temptations than he had had already Satan could not have wished for he had had Christ alone he had had him so in the bitter inconveniences of hunger cold and watchfulness and had had him so much in his power as to carry him in the air from place to place and yet with all these advantages on his side he could not have his will over him and therefore there was no expecting any better convenience or season to bring him to sin as he would have had him But there was a season fixed when Satan must bruise his heel for God had so told him in the garden and when he must have some power over him in something else though he could have none over him to bring him to sinning and therefore he departs now unsped of what he came about for he could not cause Christ to sin but he will wait till that fixed time come when he is sure he shall speed against him some other way and that was when he caused his death And to this very thing Christ himself seemeth to allude in those words Joh. 14. 30. The Prince of this world cometh and hath nothing in me where almost every word in a manner faceth something in this story that we have in hand The phrase The Prince of this world answereth that offer that Satan had made him of giving him all the Kingdoms of the World For they saith he are mine to give The word cometh answereth the words here Departed till the season And the words He hath nothing in me meaneth his not being able to infuse any sin into Christ in any of these temptations that he might thereby lay any claim to him And this coming of this Prince of the world was to work his death as is apparent by the very verse it self and as our Saviour himself doth further explain it Luke 22. 53. This is the power of darkness Satans departure therefore from him at this time when he had ended all the temptation was 1. With intent to assault him again at the fixed season when he knew he should have power over him to do him some hurt though he could not now 2. Then to bruise his heel and to cause his death though he could not now break his head and cause him sin 3. To assault him then by his wicked instruments whom he could not now damage by his wicked self In one instrument not properly his but abused by him for such a purpose he once tempted Christ to sin before he assaulted him to bring him to suffer and that was in the mouth of Peter Mark 8. 32. who received the very same check for his pains Get thee behind me Satan that Satan himself did for his last temptation Matth. 4. ver 11. And behold Angels came and ministred unto him Mark hath told the story of the temptation very short He was there in the wilderness forty days tempted of Satan and was with the wild beasts and the Angels ministred unto him In which relation as he hath given us account of his temptation which shewed him man so hath he also of two other things which shewed him more and those were his safety among wild beasts and his visible attendance by Angels Now he mentioneth only his forty days temptation which was by Satan invisibly and speaketh not a word of the three temptations when Satan assailed him in a bodily shape and yet he saith that the Angels ministred unto him which if you will strictly construe according to the very letter of his relation you must conclude that this ministration of Angels was before Satan appeared visibly to him and so it will follow that the Angels ministred to him visibly and Satan tempted him invisibly at the same time But since the briefness of one Evangelist is to be cleared by the larger relation of the other we are to understand Mark by the fuller story of Matthew and so as Matthew doth shew you the full history of the temptation and teacheth you how to construe Marks briefness upon it so must he also explain the time of the Angels ministration namely after all the temptation was ended which Mark hath left undetermined It were no very great Solecism in Divinity to hold that the Angels might be visibly attending of Christ all those forty days that the Devil was invisibly tempting him but since it is most probable that Christ exposed himself in the nakedst manner I mean in the greatest plainness and meanness that might be to Satans tempting that so his victory over him might be the more glorious it is also very probable that he called not for such attendance of Angels but suspended it till his combate was done and the victory obtained And then howsoever they did before The Angels came saith Matthew and ministred unto him When the Scripture speaketh of Spirits or Angels coming or going it doth most generally mean it of a visible and apparent manner as Gen. 19. 1. 32. 1 2. Jude 6. 11. and in very many other places and so is it to be understood here that after the evil Angel or the Prince of the evil spirits was departed who had assailed Christ in a visible shape the good Angels in visible appearances also came and gave their attendance on him Their ministring unto him as to particulars was in bringing to him necessaries and provisions in that his hunger and in that place where it is likely provisions were not otherwise suddenly to be had so the Son of man eateth Angels food and like Elias is fed by the Angels of the Lord in a desert place And thus hath Christ been shewed the Son of God by the voice of the Father and anointed for the great King Priest and Prophet visibly by the Holy Ghost And thus hath he shewed his power and command over the evil Angels and the good Angels have owned his Lordship and dominion over themselves and thus every way attested is he presently to appear amongst men as the Minister of the Gospel SECTION XII S. JOHN Chap. I. Vers. 15. JOHN a a a a a a In the Greek it is John beareth witness and cryed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the former word in the present tense and the latter in the praeter tense the tenses being either indifferently put one for another as the the Translator of Cyrill hath rendred them Testatur clamat or Nove hoc as Erasmus phraseth it this strange construction is used by the Evangelists to shew in the former word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
to be the proper reason why the Evangelist useth the preterimperfect tense which Beza could see no reason why he should because he speaketh of Christ which had been with John at Jordan and was but newly gone out of his sight So that the first verse of this Section according to this construction doth properly come in its order in the time between Christs baptizing and his getting into the wilderness and accordingly it might have been laid after the very first verse of the last Section and there have made this series of the Story And immediately after the baptism of Jesus the Spirit driveth him into the wilderness and when he was rapt away and but newly out of sight John bare witness and cried saying This was he of whom I spake but I was unwilling to part that story which lieth so joined and it is timely enough to give notice of the order in this place Now the next story in this Section of the discourse betwixt the messengers of the Jews and John they questioning who he was and what he meant to baptize it was just in the time while Christ was under the last temptation or as he was returning from the high mountain wheresoever it was to Jordan again for the Text telleth expresly that on the next day after this dispute Jesus appeareth at Jordan in the sight of John ver 29. and from thence forward the connexion of the stories following is so clear ver 35. 43. that it needeth no further demonstration Harmony and Explanation Ver. 15. Iohn bare witness of him and cried c. THE Evangelist from the beginning of the Chapter to this place and in it doth purposely go about to shew what declarations and demonstrations were given of Christ both before his coming in the flesh and after what before we shewed in their proper place upon the Chapter to the fourteenth vers what after is shewed in this verse and the next that follows In the fourteenth verse he tells that Christ declared himself to be the only begotten of the Father by conversing among his Disciples full of grace and truth And in this verse he sheweth how John declared and published him to all that came to be baptized and in the next verse how his Disciples received of his fulness c. Now Johns manner of testimony of him he expresseth by these two words He beareth witness and cried words of different tenses as was observed before and of some difference of sense in that diversity The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the present tense is properly to be understood 1. Of Johns whole Ministery Function and Office as vers 7. explaineth it He came for a witness not to be restrained to this or that particular vocal and verbal testimony that John gave of Christ no nor to all the vocal testimonies that he gave of Christ but to be dilated to Johns whole course and ministry that he beareth witness to Christ in that God raised up such a one to be his fore-runner And the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the praeter tense is to be applied to the particular testimony that John gave of Christ in that his ministery so that the former word referreth to Johns person and his whole function and the latter only to the manner of his executing of one particular of that function 2. The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may also include Johns martyrdom for the truth by which he beareth witness unto Christ even unto this time as Abel being dead yet speaketh as Heb. 11. 4. And in this sense should I understand those words of this same Evangelist in his first Epistle Chap. 5. vers 6 8. Jesus Christ came by water and blood and the Spirit beareth witness And there are three that bear witness in earth the Spirit and the Water and Blood that is the Spirit of Prophesie Baptism and Martyrdom all three agreeing in one testimony of Christ that he is he The Prophets speaking so jointly of him Baptism bringing in so many unto him and Martyrs sealing unto him with their dearest blood The scores that have prophesied of him the thousands that have suffered death for him and the many thousands that have been baptized into him bearing witness of him on earth as the Father the Word and the Holy Ghost do in heaven §. He that cometh after me is preferred before me We do not find that John had at any time before Christs baptism given any such testimony as these words He had said indeed A mightier than I cometh after me whose shoos I am not worthy to bear and whose shoo latchet I am not worthy to unloose as the other three Evangelists agree in the relating of it but these words He is preferr'd before me for he was before me we heard not of till now Yet is it to be conceived that the Baptist speaketh to the same sense now that he did before as vers 27. sheweth his intention though he have altered his expressions For it is a very common custom of Scripture in alledging of former speeches to give the sense but not to keep exactly to the words And yet it is not without its weight that whereas Johns constant testimony of Christ before his baptism was A mightier than I cometh he should as constantly after his baptism use this He coming after me is preferr'd before me as here and vers 27. 30. Now the reason of this seemeth to be because Christ had now appeared and no mighty work had been yet shewed among the people by him no nor any thing done in their eyes or hearing which might give them occasion to conceive that he was mightier or stronger than John The appearance of the Holy Ghost and the voice from heaven they had neither seen nor heard only his catching away from Jordan at this time it is probable they saw therefore John to clear their apprehensions from any carnal misconstruction of his words explains himself that by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A mightier than I they were not so to understand as to look for any present visible demonstration of power or miraculousness from him but that they should take notice that he of whom he spake those words was before him in rank and dignity for he was before him in time and office nature and qualifications though he came after him §. Is preferr'd before me 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Vulgar Latine hath dangerously translated Ante me factus est he was made before me and accordingly the Arians in ancient time made use of this place in this sense against the eternity of the Son Whereas the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Beza well observeth it in the New Testament doth constantly refer to place and not to time as Mar. 1. 2. Matth. 17. 2. Luke 12. 8. 19. 27 28. and divers other places and therefore our English hath well expressed it with an intimation of such a thing is preferr'd before me For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
by such like passages as these All the commandments of the Law be they preceptive or prohibitive if a man transgress against any of them either erring or presuming when he repents and turns from his sin he is bound to make confession Whosoever brings a sin or trespass offering for his error or presumption his sin is not expiated by his offering until he make a verbal confession And whosoever is guilty of death or of whipping by the Sanhedrin his sin is not expiated by his whipping or his death unless he repent and make a confession And because the Scapegoat is an atonement for all Israel the High Priest maketh a confession for all Israel over him The Scapegoat expiateth for all transgressions mentioned in the Law be they great or little Maym. in Teshubah per. 1. This their wild doctrine about repentance and pardon being considered in which they place so much of the one and the other in such things as that the true affectedness of the heart for sin or in seeking of pardon is but little spoken of or regarded we may well observe how singularly pertinent to the holding out of the true doctrine of repentance this word is which is used by the Holy Ghost which calleth for change of mind in the penitent and an alteration of the inward temper as wherein consisteth the proper nature and vertue of repentance and not in any outward actions or applications if the mind be not thus changed And thus as our Saviour urging the duty of repentance upon them from this reason because the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand argueth to them from one of their own confest opinions so in this original word by which repentance is called for another opinion of theirs seemeth also to be looked upon but with gainsaying and confutation because they placed so much of repentance if not all repentance in outward things And so when the Ministery of the Gospel calleth for Repentance and in such a word as betokeneth a change and alteration of the mind it doth at once confute the double error that was amongst them which was either about not needing of repentance but insisting upon legal righteousness or if they were to repent it was to be chiefly performed by confession or offerings or some outward action III. Thirdly It is observable in this preaching of Christ that to his admonition to repent he also adjoyneth the other To believe the Gospel which John the Baptist that we read of had not done Matth. 3. 2. And yet John preached the Gospel too for his Ministery is called the beginning of it Mark 1. 1 2. and he preached that they should believe Joh. 1. 7. But his doctrine did mainly aim at the declaring of him that was to preach the Gospel that when he came to preach it he might the more readily be believed Joh. 1. 31. Act. 19. 4. Johns chiefest and most intended task and purpose was to point out Christ and to bring the people to be acquainted with his person and to take notice of him as the Messias the great Prophet to whom it was reserved to publish the great things of the Gospel that when he came openly to preach it as now he doth he might be the better intertained and hearkned after And thus John makes ready a people prepared for the Lord Luke 1. 17. And now that this great Preacher for whom attention and regard was prepared by all the bent of Johns Ministery is come to preach and publish the Gospel in its full clearness and manifestation He calleth for repentance and belief of it as Act. 20. 21. Repentance towards God and Faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. Faith or believing in order of the work of grace is before repentance that being the first and mother grace of all others yet is it here and in other places named the latter 1. Because though faith be first wrought yet repentance is first seen and evidenced both to the heart of him that hath it and to the eyes of others 2. Because a poor broken and penitent heart is the most proper receptacle of the Gospel Esay 61. 1. Matth. 11. 5. Now by the Gospel is not only here meant the good and glad tidings of Salvation as the word signifies in the original and as it is taken in other places but it is also held out here by our Saviour with a singular emphasis and circumstance namely as the new Law and Covenant which God had promised to give unto his people and which they expected from the Messias The Gospel as it signifies the good tidings of Salvation and Salvation by Christ was very abundantly held out in the Law and the Prophets and if Christ proposed the word here but in that sense he proposed his Ministery but like unto theirs But as in the Synagogue of Nazareth he had begun to assert himself the highly anointed one of the Lord for the singular work of publishing the new Law Luk. 4. 18. so now and forward he doth openly proclaim himself to be he whom the Lord had appointed and anointed for that end and that his Ministry and doctrine was that Gospel or glad tidings which God had promised to send by the Messias And in this sense it is that he calls upon them to believe the Gospel not only in regard of the tenour but also in regard of the dispenser and dispensation of it he the great Prophet and that according to the promises of God and the expectation of the Nation The Lord had foretold them copiously by the Prophets that Messias should be the great Teacher and Lawgiver in the last days and this had put them in expectation of a new Law and doctrine when he should come Esay 2. 1 2 3. In the last days the mountain of the Lords house shall be established on the top of the mountains c. And many people shall say Come and let us go up c. And he will teach us of his ways and we will walk in his paths c. This Teacher saith David Kimchi is the Messias And wheresoever it is said in the last days it meaneth the days of Messias And so in Esa. 11. 4. With righteousness shall be judge the poor and reprove with equity This the Chaldee Paraphrast expresly and nominatim understandeth of Messias And so he doth that in Esa. 42. 1. c. And so in Esa. 52. 7. How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings or that preacheth the Gospel which though the Apostle in Rom. 10. 15. apply generally to the Ministry of the Gospel yet doth the Context in the Prophet shew that it is primarily and especially to be understood of Christ whom the Chaldee Paraphrast nameth Syllabically at vers 13. Such another Prophesie of Christ being the great Teacher when he should come is that which is so much retched and abused towards the countenancing of Enthusiasm Esa. 54. 13. And all thy children shall be taught of God where
all appearing exceeding rare ever since the death of the last Prophets or thereabout And upon this reason I cannot but hold that this miraculous virtue was but of a later date because miracles and Angels had not been so conspicuous among them till near Christs coming Vers. 5. A certain man which had an infirmity 38. years Our Saviour is pleased to choose out for his cure a man and malady of the longest languishing and of the greatest unlikelihood of recovery If we run back these eight and thirty years to the first beginning of his infirmity we shall find that he was entred into this his disease seven years and an half before Christ was born for Christ was now compleat thirty years old and an half and it may be his disease was as old as was this virtue of Bethesda waters It began upon him immediately after the Temple was finished and completed by Herod as it will appear to him that will calculate and compute the times Now I should assoon date this healing virtue of Bethesda from about those times as any times I can think upon For as the providence of God did bring on and usher in the coming of the Messias when it drew near by several dispensations and degrees so the bringing of the Temple to the highest glory that ever it must have but only that the King of glory came into it and the restoring of Angelical and miraculous administrations were not the least of those dispensations But be it how it will whether the mans disease were as old as the pools virtue or no it was so old as doubtless the oldest in all the pack and as to glorifie the power of Christ most singularly in the healing of it Vers. 6. He saith unto him Wilt thou be made whole Christ doth not question this as doubting of his desire but to stir up his faith and expectation His lying and waiting there so long did resolve the question That he would be made whole but the greater question was Whether he had faith to be healed as Acts 14. 7. and that our Saviour puts to trial by this interrogation Vers. 8. Iesus saith unto him Rise take up thy bed and walk Here is a question also not unjustly moved Why would Christ injoyn him to carry his bed on the Sabbath day It was contrary to the letter of the Law Jer. 17. 21 22. Bear no burden on the Sabbath day c. It was extreamly contrary to their Traditions For bringing a thing out and in from one place to another was a work and one of the special works forbidden to be done on the Sabbath day Mayim in Shab per. 12. And he that carryeth any thing on the Sabbath in his right hand or left or in his bosom or upon his shoulder he is guilty Talm. in Sab. per. 10. And it was dangerous to bring him either to whipping or to suffer death The most general answer that is given is that Christ would have him hereby to shew that he was perfectly and entirely healed when he that could not stir before is able now to carry his bed and so by this action at once he gives a publick testimony of the benefit received and an evident demonstration of the perfectness of the cure But both these might have been done abundantly only by his walking sound and well seeing that he could not walk nor stir of so long before A man that had been so diseased so long a space and had lain at these waters so great a time for him now to walk strongly and well would shew the benefit received and the cure done as well as walking with his bed on his back There was therefore more in this command of Christ than what did barely refer to the publication of the miracle and that may be apprehended to have been partly in respect of the man and partly in respect of the day In respect of the man it was to trie his faith and obedience whether upon the command of Christ he durst and would venture upon so hazardous an action as to carry his bed on the Sabbath day which might prove death or sore beating to him and he relies upon the word of him that commanded and casts off fear and does it And to this sense his own words do construe the command when the Jews question him upon the fact He that made me whole gave me warrant to do it for he bad me and said Take up thy bed and walk He whose power was able for such a cure his word was warrant for such an action And as our Saviour stirs up his faith in his question before Wilt thou be made whole so he tries what it is in this command Take up thy bed and carry it home for so we must construe that Christ ment by walking from the like expression Mark 2. 9. with vers 11. In respect of the day it was to shew Christs power over the Sabbath And as in healing of the palsick man Mark 2. 9. he would not only shew his power over the disease but also over sin and so forgave it So it pleased him in this passage to shew his power over the Sabbath to dispence with it and to dispose of it as he thought good as he shewed his command over the malady that he cured And here is the first apparent sign toward the shaking and alteration of the Sabbath in regard of the day that we meet withall and indeed a greater we hardly meet with till the the alteration of the day came To heal diseases and to pluck off ears of corn for necessary repast on the Sabbath day had their warrant even in the Law it self and in all reason but to enjoin this man to carry his bed on that day and to bear it home whereas the bed might very well have lain there till the Sabbath was over and his home was no one knows how far off certainly it sheweth that he intended to shew his authority over the Sabbath and to try the mans faith and obedience in a singular manner It was easie to foresee how offensive and unpleasing this would be to the Jews for it stuck with them a long time after Joh. 7. 23. and how dangerous it might prove to the man himself and yet he purposely puts him upon it that he might hereby assert his own divine power and God-head as it appeareth by his arguing for it when they cavil at him all along the Chapter Even the same power that could warrant Abraham to sacrifice his own son and Joshua to march about Jericho on the Sabbath day Vers. 14. Afterward Iesus findeth him in the Temple c. The Faith and Obedience of the man upon Christs command though it were of so nice consequence do argue to us that his appearance at the Temple was to render his thanks for the great benefit he had received The poor wretch had hardly been at this Temple for eight and thirty years together the date of Israels wandring
here to Moses the first Prophet of the Church of Israel it also descended to a succession of Prophets in that Congregation from time to time But with this excellent gift it was also given Moses himself to know and so likewise them that did succeed that they had this double power not from themselves but from another Moses his stammering tongue taught himself and them so much for Prophesie and his leprous hand taught so much for Miracles This succession of Prophets began from Samuel and ended in the death of Christ Acts 3. 24. Not that there were not Prophets betwixt Moses and Samuel but because they were not expressed by name as also because vision in that space of time was exceeding rare 1 Sam. 3. 1. Now from the beginning of the rule of Samuel to the beginning of the captivity in Babel were four hundred and ninety years and from the end of that captivity to the end of Christs life upon earth were four hundred and ninety years more The seventy years of captivity between which were the seventh part of either of these two Numbers that lay on either side are called by Habbakkuk The midst of years namely from the beginning of Prophesie in Samuel to the sealing of Prophesie in the death of Christ. Revive thy work in the midst of the years in the midst of the years make known Then was it justly to be feared that the spirit of Prophesie would quite have ceased from Israel when they were captived among the Heathen This made the Prophet to pray so earnestly that God would preserve alive or revive his work of Miracles in the midst of years and in those times of captivity that he would make known things to come by that gift of Prophesie And he was heard in what he prayed for and his supplication took effect in the most prophetick and powerful Spirit of Daniel The Jews had an old Maxim That after the death of Zachary Malachy and those last Prophets the Spirit of God departed from Israel and went up So that from thence forward prediction of future things and working of miracles were rarities among them To this aimed the answer of those holy ones Act. 19. 2. We have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost Not that they doubted of such a person in the Trinity but that whereas they had learned in their Schools that the Holy Ghost departed away after the death of Malachy they had never yet heard whether he was restored again in his gifts of Prophesie and Miracles till now or no. SECTION VII The two first miracles Exod. 4. 1. THE turning of Moses rod into a Serpent did utterly disclaim any power of the Devil in these wonders which he was to work which power only the Magicians wrought by For as a Serpent was the fittest Embleme of the Devil as Gen. 3. and Revel 12. 9. 80 was it a sign that Moses did not these Miracles by the power of the Devil but had a power over and beyond him when he can thus deal with the Serpent at his pleasure as to make his rod a Serpent and the Serpent a rod as he seeth good Yet it is worth the observing that he is commanded to take it by the tail vers 9. for to meddle with the Serpents head belonged not to Moses but to Christ that spake to him out of the bush as Gen. 3. 15. His rod at Sinai is said to be turned into Nahash a common and ordinary Snake or Serpent but when he casts it down before Pharaoh it becometh Tannin Chap. 7. 10. a Serpent of the greatest dimensions be like a Crocodile which beast the Egyptians adored and to whose jaws they had exposed the poor Hebrew Infants in the River 2. His Leprous hand disclaimed also any power of Moses his own in these wonders which he wrought for it was not possible that so great things should be done by that impure and unclean hand but by a greater 3. Both of these Miracles which were the first that were done by any Prophet in the world did more specially refer to the Miracles of that great Prophet that should come into the world by whose power these Miracles were done by Moses at this time For as it belonged to him only to cast out the power of the Devil out of the soul and to heal the soul of the leprosie of sin so was it reserved for him first to cast out the Devil out of the body and to heal the leprosie of the body For though the Prophets from Moses to Christ had the gift of doing Miracles and performed wonders many of them in an high degree yet could never any of them or any other cast out a Devil or heal a Leper till the great Prophet came Elisha indeed directed Naaman how he should be healed but he neither touched him nor came out to him at all that he might shew that it was not his power but such cures were reserved for Christ to come SECTION VIII Moses in danger of death because of distrust Exod. 4. 24. THE fault of Moses that brought him into this danger was not the uncircumcision of his Son as it is commonly held for that had been dispensable withal in him as it was with thousands afterwards of the Israelites in the Wilderness but his fault was grievous diffidence and distrust For this is that that makes him so much so oft and so earnestly to decline so glorious and honourable a message as the Lord would send him on and this was that that brought him into this danger of death when he was even going on this message Observe therefore his evasions and how they sound exceeding hollow and empty of belief First Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh Chap. 3. 11. This the Lord answereth I will be with thee and this my appearing to thee may be an undoubted token to thee that I have sent thee vers 12. Secondly But who shall I say hath sent me For forty years ago they refused me saying Who made thee a Prince and a Ruler over us Chap. 4. 1. This scruple the Lord removeth by giving him the power of miracles Thirdly But I am not eloquent neither heretofore nor since thou hast spoken to me for though I may work miracles upon others yet is not this wrought upon my self that I speak any whit better than I did before This receiveth this answer I will be with thy mouth vers 10. 11 12. Fourthly But I pray thee send by that hand that thou wilt send or stretch out vers 13. for thou saidst to me I will stretch out mine hand and smite Egypt c. Chap. 3. 20. Now therefore I pray thee stretch out this hand of thine for the hand of man is not able to perform it At this the Lords anger was kindled against him and that deservedly For in this he denied the mystery of the Redemption which was to be wrought by a man the God-head going along with him Now it
Suetonius Quid scribam vobis P. C. aut Sueton in Tibâ—â— c. 67. quomodo scribam aut quid omnino non scribam hoc tempore Dii me Deaeque pejus perdant quem perire quotidie sentio si scio What I shall write to you O fathers conscript or how I shall write or what I shall not write at all at this time the gods and goddesses confound me worse than I feel my self to perish daily if I can tell Whereupon Suetonius saith that being weary of himself he almost confesseth the sum of his miseries But my other author thus largely Thus did even his villanies and flagitiousness turn to punishment to himself Nor was it in vain that the wisest of men was wont to affirm that if the minds of Tyrants were but opened tortures and stripes might be spied there seeing that the mind is butchered with cruelty lust and evil projects as the body is with blows For not solitariness not fortune could protect Tiberius but that he confesseth the torments of his breast and his own punishment PART III. The affairs of the JEWS §. 1. A commotion of them IF the Method of Josephus were Chronical and the order of his ranking of Stories to be presumed for the order of their falling out at this time or hereabout should be taken in that * * * Egesip de â—â—cid â—eâ—us l. 2. cap â— famosum ludibrium as Egesippus calleth it or villanous abuse of Paulina a noble chaste and vertuous wife and Lady of Rome by Mundus a Knight under pretext of the god Anubis in the Temple of Isis for this hath * * * Ioseph Antiq lib. 18. c. 4. he mentioned the very next thing after the mention of our Saviours death and with this link of connexion About the very same time another grievance troubled the Jews and shameful things happened about the Temple of Isis at Rome c. But since the story concerning the troubles of the Jews that he relateth after seemeth to have some near dependence and consequence to this of the Lady and that * * * Annal. lib. 2 Tacitus hath laid that occurrence of the Jews expulsion out of Rome thirteen years before this under the consulship of Junius Silanus and Norbanus Flaccus we will omit to meddle with them and will take in another story of the Jews which though Josephus hath placed a little before Christs death yet Eusebius hath set it after and upon his word shall it be commended to the reader for its time and upon the others and Philoes for its truth Pilate as * * * Antiq. lib. 8. cap. 4. de bello Iud. 2. c. 1â— saith Josephus having secretly brought into Jerusalem by night certain Images of Caesar and set them up the people when the matter was known repaired to him to Caesarea begging that they might be taken down which when he denied as a thing prejudicial to Caesar they fell flat upon the ground and there lay five days and five nights and stirred not thence On the sixth day he pretending to give them an answer from the judgment seat doth suddenly inviron them with armed men threatning their death if they cease not their importunity But they falling upon the ground again and laying their necks bare return him this answer That they would gladly imbrace death â—ather than transgress the wisdom of their Laws Whose resolution when Pilate saw he caused the Images to be fetched away from Jerusalem to Caesarea To this purpose Joseâ—hus but Philo far differently thus * * * Philo in lâ—gat ad Cajâ—â—â— Pilate saith he dedicated golden shields in the Palace of Herod in the holy City not so much for the honour of Tiberius as to vex the people of the Jews upon them there was neither picture nor any thing that was forbidden but only the inscription shewed who had dedicated them and to whom Yet when the multitude had understanding of the thing and the matter was divulged they chose certain of the highest rank among them for their advocates who besought him that the innovation might be taken away and that their Laws might not When he roughly denied for he was naturally inflexible and self-wilfully sturdy they make fair before him as if they would petition to Tiberius Now that fretted him worst of all for he was afraid lest they should do so indeed and accuse him for his other crimes his bribery wrongs rapines injuries oppressions murders and horrid cruelties and yet durst he not take down again what he had dedicated nor had he any mind to pleasure the people Which when they perceived they sent a most humble petition to Tiberius who understanding what Pilate had done and what he had threatned rebuked and checked him for his innovating boldness and commanded him speedily to take the shields away and so they were removed from Jerusalem to Caesarea Thus Philo and thus differently these two Country men and that in a matter which so nearly concerned their own Country and which also befel so near unto their own times For Philo was now alive and in his prime and so was Josephus less than thirty years after Be it referred to the readers choice which of these relations he will take and when he hath made his choice another difference falleth under his arbitration concerning the time betwixt Eusebius which placeth this occurrence after our Saviours passion and Baronius that hath set it three years before his baptism The Cardinal certainly too forward in bringing it in in the first year of Pilate for it appeareth by Philo that he had done a great multitude of villanies among the Jews before he did this and the Father if any whit too backward in ranking it after our Saviours death yet excusable for a thing of so pregnant application as to shew how soon the Jews that had chosen Caesar before Christ have now their belly full of their Caesar in his Images §. 2. Of James his being Bishop of Jerusalem The two last cited Authors though they differ about the time of the story forenamed yet have they agreed unanimously and many others with them about this in hand namely that James was made this year the Bishop of Jerusalem For thus Eusebius Ecclesiae Hierosolymorum primus Episcopus ab Apostolis ordinatur Jacobus frater Domini But Baronius far larger that he was ordained Bishop by Peter that his chair was preserved and reverenced to posterity that he wore a plate of gold upon his head like the High Priest in the Law from whence he would derive the Miter that he alone might go into the Sanctum Sanctorum that he refrained from wine and flesh that he was a Nazarite that his knees were hardned with continual praying till they were unsensible and such like stuff for which he citeth his seveal Authors that if common sense were not a better informer than common fame we should be made to believe any thing whatsoever The question indeed whether James
his translater hath rendred fames ingens Dion lib. 60. Now although it might seem that that famine only referred to the City of Rome and was caused there through the unnavigableness of the River Tiber which should have brought in Provisions because he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. that Claudius provided not only for the present famine but also for future times by mending the Haven and clearing the River yet Suetonius writing the very same story ascribeth the cause of the famine not to the fault of the River or Haven but to a constant sterility or barrenness and so inlargeth the extent of it further than Rome Arctiore autem annona ob assiduas sterilitates c. In Claud. cap. 18. Josephus Antiq. lib. 20. ca. 2. speaketh of this great famine in Judea and relateth how Helena the Queen dowager of the Adiabeni and Izates her son then reigning she being at Jerusalem in her own person and he in his own kingdom did bring in provisions in an exceeding plenty to the Jews at Jerusalem for their sustenance in the famine for they were both converted to the Jews Religion and Izates circumcised Eusebius hereupon hath set this famine in Claudius his fourth year and after the death of Herod Agrippa because that he found that Josephus had placed it after Agrippa's death which was in Claudius his third But we find not in Josephus any thing that may fix it to that year more than the subsequence of one story to another which is an argument of no validity only this he relateth as concerning the time of Izates that when he first came to the Crown and found his elder Brethren imprisoned that he might come to the Throne the more quietly he was grieved at the matter and on the one hand accounting it impiety to kill them or to keep them prisoners and on the other hand knowing it unsafe to keep them with him and not imprisoned he chose a mean between both and sent them for hostages to Rome to Claudius Caesar And after this he relateth how he hasted upon his coming to the Crown to be circumcised and after his Circumcision how his Mother Helena went to Jerusalem and relieved it being much affamished Now in what year of Claudius any of these things were done he hath not mentioned but hath left it at large and therefore we may as well suppose that Izates was made King in the first year of Claudius and Helena his Mother went to Jerusalem in his second as Eusebius may that she went thither in his fourth II. That Paul going at that time of the famine to Jerusalem to bring the almes and collection to the poor Brethren of Judea had his trance in the Temple Acts 22. 17. and in that trance he was rapt into the third Heaven 2 Cor. 12. 2. It may be thought indeed by the juncture of Story that Luke hath made that this his trance was at his first journey which he took to Jerusalem after his conversion which journey is mentioned Acts. 9. 28. and Gal. 1. 18. for having from the sixth verse of Acts 22. and forward related the Story of his conversion and of Ananias coming to him and baptizing him he presently subjoyneth this when I was come again to Jerusalem and was praying in the Temple I was in a trance as if that had been the very first time that ever he came there after he was converted But besides that it is very common with Scripture to make such juncture for times and Stories as if they were close together when often times there is very much space of time betwixt them as Mat. 19. 1. Luke 4. 13 14. Acts 9. 20 21 26 27. the proper intent of the Apostle in that Oration of his Acts 22. is to vindicate himself from the accusation laid against him for polluting the Temple and chiefly to plead his authority and commission and why he had to deal among the Gentiles and therefore he insists upon two particular Commissions one to preach and the other to preach to the Gentiles and this is the reason why he joyns his conversion and his rapture in the Temple so close together and not because they were so in time Now this scruple being thus removed and that considered which was said before that in this trance in the Temple God said he was to send him to the Gentiles and that accordingly he was dispatched to that work as soon as he came to Antioch it cannot but be concluded that his trance in the Temple was in the second of Claudius and that this was his rapture into the third Heaven since we read not of any rapture or trance that he had but this III. That this trance or rapture was somewhat above fourteen years before he wrote his second Epistle to Corinth 2 Cor. 12. 2. Now in that he saith it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before or above fourteen years ago he speaketh not of an indefinite time for then for ought any reason can be given to the contrary he might as well have let the mention of the time alone but that it was but a little above that space though it were somewhat above exact fourteen years IV. When he wrote that second Epistle to Corinth he was in Macedonia as is apparent by very many passages in that Epistle chap. 1. 14. and 2. 13. 7. 5. 9. 2 4. And thither he went upon the hubbub at Ephesus raised against him Acts 20. 1. where he had even the sentence of death in himself 2 Cor. 1. 9. V. Now to count fourteen years compleat from the second of Claudius in which was Pauls rapture it will bring us to the second year of Nero. And let us but cast and compute those shreds of time that we can find hinted in the Acts of the Apostles and we shall find them agreeing with this account and giving some light unto it As first it is said by Paul that after he had been at Jerusalem he must also see Rom Acts 19. 21. Now this doth argue the death of Claudius for if he had expelled all the Jews out of Rome as it is averred both by the Scripture Acts 18. 2. and by Suetonius in Claud. chap. 25. and never revoked his Edict for ought we can read in any Story it is very unlikely and unreasonable to think that Paul should think of going thither if Claudius were alive for thither could he neither go without evident and inevitable danger of his own life nor could he find so much as one person of his own Nation in the City when he came there By this therefore may be concluded that Claudius was now dead and Nero was going on his first year when Paul publisheth his resolution to go for Rome And the times from hence to his apprehension at Jerusalem may be cast by these Counters After this his declaring his intention for Rome he stayeth in Asia for a season Acts 19. 22. Now that this season was not long
exercised the pens of Christians applying it as an Embleme of the resurrection of Christ. PART II. The Affairs of the JEWS §. A commotion of the Iews caused by Pilate BEsides the tumult mentioned before caused by Pilate among the Jews about some images of Caesar Josephus hath also named another raised by the same Spleen and rancor of his against that people which because Eusebius hath placed it at this year be it recommended to the reader upon his Chronology Pilate a constant enemy to the Nation of which he was Governor sought and dogged all occasions whereby to provoke them to displeasure that the displeasure might provoke them to do something that would redound to their own disadvantage At this time he took in hand a great work of an Aquaeduct or watercourse to Jerusalem to bring the water thither from a place two hundred furlongs or five and twenty miles off as Josephus reckoneth it in one place but in another he crosseth himself and doubleth the measure to four hundred and for this purpose he took the money out of their Corban or holy treasure to expend upon this his fancy The people displeased with what was done come together by multitudes some crying out against the work and others plainly against Pilate For they of old did know his conditions that his affection was not so much to the people or to do them good by his Aquaeduct as it was to tyrannize over their consciences which were nailed to their ancient rights and rites But he suborning some of his Souldiers in the common garb and garments and they hiding clubs under their coats disposed themselves so about the multitude that they had them within them And then when the people continued still in their outrage and railing upon a signal given they fall upon them and beat without distinction all before them both those that were seditious and those that were not so that many died in the place and the rest departed away sore wounded This is the tenour of the story in Josephus in Antiq. lib. 18. cap. 4. Bell. Judaic lib. 2. cap. 14. In the allegation of which History by Baronius to omit his placing of it in the first year of Pilate about which he sheweth himself indifferent I cannot pass these two things without observing 1. That he saith that Pilate took the head of his watercourse three hundred furlongs off whereas in the Greek there is no such sum in either of the places where the story is related but in the one two hundred and in the other four 2. That whereas the Greek readeth the transition to the next story de Bell. Jud. l. 2. cap. 15. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. At that time Agrippa the accuser of Herod went to Tiberius c. His Latin readeth it Atque ab hoc accusator Herodis Agrippa c. losing both scantling of the time which the Author hath given and Eusebius followed and seeming to bring Agrippa to Rome about this matter of Pilate In the twentieth year of Tiberius hath the same Josephus placed the death of Philip the Tetrarch although he hath named it after the entrance of Vitellius upon the Government of Syria which was in the next year but such transpositions are no strange things with him This Philip was Tetrarch of Trachonitis Gaulonitis and Batanaea he died in the City Julias and was interred with a great deal of funeral pomp His tetrarchy was added to Syria but the tributes of it were reserved within it self THE CHRISTIAN HISTORY THE Jewish and the Roman For the Year of CHRIST XXXVI And of TIBERIUS XXI Being the Year of the WORLD 3963. And of the City of ROME 788. Consuls C. Cestius Gallus M. Servilius Rufus PART I. §. Affairs of the Jews Vitellius their Friend VItellius the last years Consul at Rome is sent this year Proconsul into Syria to govern that and Judea which was incorporated into that Province A man more Honorable abroad than at his own doors renowned in his youth but ignominious in his old age brave in ruling in forain parts but base in officiousness and flattery at Rome At the time of the Passover he cometh up to Jerusalem whether induced by curiosity to see the Festival or by the opportunity of the concourse to behold the whole body of his Dominion collected in so small a compass and to disperse among them his commands or for what other cause let him keep it to himself But so well did he like his intertainment and the people that had given it him that he remitted to all the inhabitants the Toll or Impost of all the fruits bought and sold and he permitted to the Priests the keeping of the High-Priests garments which of late had been in the custody of the Romans For Hircanus the first of that name having built a Tower near unto the Temple and living in it himself and after him some of his successors he laid up there those holy garments which they only might wear as in a place most convenient both where to put them on when they came into the Temple and to put them off when they went into the City But Herod in after times seising upon that Tower and repairing it and naming it Antonia in honour of the great Antony he seised also upon the custody of those robes when he found them there and so also did Archelaus his son But the Romans deposing of Archelaus and usurping his whole Dominion if reassuming of that which they had bestowed before may be called usurpation they also as he had done kept these sacred garments under their hands Laying them up in a room under the seals of the Priests and the keepers of the Treasury and the keeper of the Tower set up a Candle there every day Seven days before any of the Feasts they were delivered out by the same Keeper and purified because they came out of heathen hands and used the first day of the Feast and restored the second and laid up as before Vitellius graciously restored the custody of them to the Priests as had been used of old But Joseph who was also called Caiaphas who should have first worn them after was removed by him from the High Priest-hood and Jonathan the son of Ananus placed in his stead And thus is one of the unjust Judges of our Saviour judged himself and the next year and by this same Vitellius we shall have the other judged also PART II. §. 1. Affairs in the Empire A rebellion in Parthia c. AT this year hath Eusebius in his Chronicle placed the Spleen of Sejanus against the Jews which was some years before and the spleen of Herod against James and Peter which was some years after and * * * In Chron. Mundi l. 8. Massaeus in his Chronicle hath placed the assumption of the Virgin Mary which was no body knows when A story first published to the world by revelation as the common cry went of it but invented indeed by
her husbands promotion may not unfitly be yoaked the mother of Sex Papinius that made her own lust her sons overthrow Whether this were the Papinius that was the last years Consul or his son or some other of the same name and family it is no great matter worth inquiring but whosoever he was infortunate he was in his mother for she caused his end as she had given him his beginning She being lately divorced from her husband betook herself unto her son whom with flattery and loosness she brought to perpetrate such a thing that he could find no remedy for it when it was done but his own death The consequent argueth that the fault was incest for when he had cast himself from an high place and so ended his life his mother being accused for the occasion was banished the City for ten years till the danger of the slipperiness of her other sons youth was past and over PART II. The JEWISH Story §. 1. Preparations of war against Aretas THE terrible and bitter message of the Emperor to Vitellius against King Aretas must be obeyed though more of necessity than of any zeal of Vitellius in Herods quarrel He therefore raising what forces he accounted fitting for his own safety in the Emperors favour and for his safety with the enemy marcheth toward the seat of the war intending to lead his Army through Judea But he was diverted from this intention by the humble supplication of the Jews to the contrary who took on how contrary it was to their ancient Laws and customs to have any Images and pictures brought into their Country whereof there was great store in the Romans Arms and Banners The gentleness of the General was easily overtreated and commanding his Army another way he himself with Herod and his friends went up to Jerusalem where he offered sacrifice and removed Jonathan from the High-priesthood and placed Theophilus his brother in his stead This was saith Josephus at a feast of the Jews but he named not which and Vitellius having stayed there three days on the fourth receiveth letters concerning Tiberius his death I leave it to be weighed by the Reader whether this festival were the Passover or Pentecost For on the one hand since Tiberius died about the middle of March as the Roman Historians do generally agree it is scarce possible that the Governor of Syria and the Nations of the East should be unacquainted with it till Pentecost which was eight or nine weeks after For all the Empire must as soon as possible be sworn unto the new Prince as Vitellius upon the tidings did swear Judea and so long a time might have bred some unconvenience And yet on the contrary it is very strange that the intelligence of his death should be so quick as to get from Rome to Jerusalem between the middle of March and the middle of the Passover week Vitellius upon the tidings recalleth his Army again and disposeth and billeteth them in the several places where they had wintered for he knew not whether Caius would be of the same mind with Tiberius about the matter of Aretas and Herod you may guess how this news was brooked by the Arabian King and yet was it no other than what he looked for if he believed what he himself spake For hearing of the preparations of Vitellius against him and consulting with Wizards and Augury This Army saith he shall not come into Arabia for some of the Commanders shall die Either he that commandeth the war or he that undertaketh it or he for whom it is undertaken meaning either Tiberius Vitellius or Herod §. 2. An Omen to Agrippa in chains Such another wizardly presage of the Emperors death had Agrippa at Rome as Josephus also relateth who relateth the former For as he stood bound before the Palace leaning dejectedly upon a tree among many others that were prisoners with him an Owl came and sate in that tree to which he leaned which a Germane seeing being one of those that stood there bound he asked who he was that was in the purple and leaned there and understanding who he was he told him of his inlargement promotion to honour and prosperity and that when he should see that bird again he should die within five days after And thus will the credulity of superstition have the very birds to foretel Tiberius his end from the Phenix to the Owl The Roman Story again §. 1. Tiberius near his end TWice only did Tiberius proffer to return to the City after his departure from it but returned never The later time was not very long before his end For being come within the sight of the City upon the Appian rode this prodigy as he took it affrighted him back He had a tame Serpent which coming to feed as he used to do with his own hand he found him eaten up by Pismires upon which ominous accident being advised not to trust himself among the multitude he suddenly retired back to Campany and at Astura he fell sick From thence he removed to Circeii and thence to Misenum carrying out his infirmity so well that he abated not a whit of his former sports banquets and voluptuousness whether for dissimulation or for habitual intemperance or upon Thrasyllus his prediction let who will determine He used to mock at Physick and to scoff at those that being thirty years of age yet would ask other mens counsel what was good or hurtful for their own bodies §. 2. His choise of a successor But weakness at the last gave him warning of his end and put him in mind to think of his successor and when he did so perplexity met with such a thought For whom should he choose The son of Drusus was too young the son of Germanicus was too well beloved and Claudius was too soft should he choose the first or the last it might help to disgrace his judgment should he choose the middle he might chance to disgrace his own memory among the people and for him to look elsewhere was to disgrace the family of the Caesars Thus did he pretend a great deal of care and seriousness for the good of the Commonwealth whereas his main aim and respect was at his own credit and families honour Well something he must pretend to give countenance and credit to his care of the common good In fine his great deliberation concluded in this easie issue namely in a prayer to the Gods to design his successor and in an auspicium of his own hatching that he should be his successor that should come first in to him upon the next morning which proved to be Caius It shewed no great reality nor earnestness for the common good in him at all when so small a thing as this must sway his judgment and such a trifle be the casting voice in a matter of so great a moment His affection was more to young Tiberius his nephew but his policy reflected more upon Caius he had rather Tiberius
would he have the month September to be called by his name placing him in the Calendar next Augustus His Grandmother Antonia he also dignified and deified equally with Livia and that by the consent and decree of the Senate His Uncle Claudius he honoured with partnership with him in the Consulship and his Brother and partner Tiberius with adoption to put him in future hopes now he had lost his present ones and he titled him The Prince of the Youth to stop his mouth belike when he had put him beside his being the Prince of Men. But as for his Sisters the sequel shewed that it was more doting and lust than pure brotherly affection that caused him to shew these expressions that in all oaths that were administred to any this must be one clause to which they must swear That they neither accounted themselves nor their children dearer than Caius and his Sisters and this in all the Records of the Consuls Which he for the happiness of Caius and his Sisters c. The like popularity used he likewise to the people releasing the condemned and recalling the banished condemning on the contrary all enormities in Judicature and banishing all incentives to evil manners Forgiving his own private grievances and satisfying for injuries done by his Predecessors that it was no marvail if the whole State were sick in the sickness of such a Prince §. 9. Caius beginning to shew himself in his own colours Not to insist longer upon the vizor of this dissembler but to take him as he was and not as he seemed his nature began more evidently to shew it self after his recovery of his sickness mentioned and then the State began by degrees to be sick indeed His beginnings were in lightness sports and lavishing of money but his proceedings were in bestiality cruelty and effusion of blood His Banquets Plays Sword-fights Fighting of Beasts as 400 Bears and as many other African wild Beasts at one time his Musick Shews strictness that none should be absent from them and expensiveness in all insomuch that he spent above twenty millions in such vanities in less than three years may be thought as vertues in him in comparison of that that followed and of the mischiefs that he mingled between §. 10. Caius cruel The recovery of the Emperor Caius from that disease under which we left him ere while proved the sickness of the whole State and the death of divers For now he began to shew himself in his own colour and to lay open the inside of his barbarous nature which hitherto he had hid under strange dissimulation P. Asranius Petitus a Plebeian and Atanius Secundus a Knight had bound themselves by oath in the Emperors sickness partly in flattery partly in hope of reward the one that he would die on condition the Prince might recover and the other that he would venture his life in combate on the same condition Caius understanding of this obligation and pretending that he would have neither of them perjured seeing he was now well again constrained them both to perform their vows and brought them to repent their flattery with repentance too late and vain and to a reward clean contrary to their expectation Nor was his cruelty any whit less though for very shame it must be better dissembled to his Father in Law the noble Silanus A man hated of him for the two main things that in humane society are the tyes of love vertue and alliance and so indignly used him that he found no way to regain his love nor any better to avoid his hate than to murder himself with his own hands Claudia the daughter of Silanus was his wife but he divorced her from him and took Cornelia Orestilla from her husband Calpurnius Piso on their very wedding day where he was present at the solemnization and he kept her not two months but sent her to her Piso again §. 11. Young Tiberius brought to a miseriable end These entries being made for the fleshing as it were the Tyrant in bloodiness and cruelty he is now made ready and fit to execute a more horrible design upon his poor Brother partner and son by adoption the young and innocent Tiberius He poor Prince having been thrust by him out of his right and patrimony by the nullifying of old Tiberius his will must now also be deprived of life This was it that the old Testator did presage and yet would leave him for a prey to his inhumanity The pretences against this young Prince were that either he had been a means to cause his sickness or at least had rejoyced in it and desired his death A sleight accusation to bring such a Person to death yet might he only have died it might have seemed more tolerable but the manner of it made the cruelty double He is commanded to die by his own hand though Tribunes Centurions and men of war fitter far to have done such an execution stood by and would have done it He desired but this mercy that he might have been slain by some of them but that was denied him upon a point of Honor and Justice forsooth because it was not fit that such a Prince should die by inferior hands The poor Prince offered his neck to every one that stood near but they durst not strike for fear of their own The only favour that he could obtain was this that they might teach him where to wound himself for his soonest dispatch and so he did And thus is the Tyrant delivered as he thinketh from all fear and danger of compartnership and corrivality in the Empire next will he take a course with those that any way may cross him in or advise him against his headlong humors and of them we shall hear in their course The last six months of this year he had taken the Consulship upon himself and had chosen his Uncle Claudius for his colleague but we have reserved the names of the old till now to avoid confusion THE ROMAN AND JEWISH Story For the Year of CHRIST XXXIX The second Year also of CAIUS CALIGULA Being the Year of the WORLD 3966. And of the City of ROME 791. Consuls M. Aquila Iulianus P. Nonius Asprenas PART I. The ROMAN Story §. 1. Cruelties at Rome THIS year began at Rome with a fatal Omen For on the first of January Machaon a Servant went up to the shrine of Jupiter Capitolinus and there having presaged and prophecied many fearful and terrible things first he slew a whelp that he had with him and then he slew himself These beginnings had answerable sequels for Caius addicted himself wholly to bloodiness sometimes for his sports sometimes in cruel earnest He commanded sword-plays to be made in which he set not man to man but multitudes to multitudes to slaughter each other He slew in the same manner six and twenty Roman Knights with great contentment taken by him in the effusion of their blood He set also another Knight to the same
terrible sports and when he came off victorious he caused him and his father to be slain and divers others with them inclosing them in a strong Chest or Press When once there were not enough of poor condemned wretches to cast to the wild beasts he caused divers that stood upon the Scaffolds for spectators to be cast unto them causing their tongues first to be cut out that they might not cry or complain yet did he with these cruelties mingle some plausible actions tending to popularity as creating of Knights priviledging the commons and lavishing in gifts that strengthing himself with these curtesies in the hearts of some men he might with the more confidence be cruel to other § 2 An end of Macro It cannot be expected that he should come to a good end himself that had brought so many to a bad His course is now come to tast of the same sauce that he had provided for so many others and it would half move the spectator to some kind of pity to see him slaughtered for such a cause as he was slaughtered for How he had been a means to curry Caius favour with Tiberius and to skrew him into the Empire and himself into his good opinion even by the prostitution of his own wife we have heard before and this his extraordinary officiousness he did not forelet or slacken when he had brought him where he desired to have him to the Empire But now he turned his observance a better way and what he had done before by baseness flattery and senseless obsequiousness to bring him to the rule he changeth into good counsel to keep him well in it For when he saw him fall asleep at Banquets amongst his cups he would freely check him for it as being neither for his credit nor for his safety The like would he do when he saw him misbehave himself by lightness profuse laughter and ridiculous gestures in the Theater and in beholding of plaies In brief so round and plain was he with him when he saw just cause that in fine the uncounselable humorist became his enemy and at last his death His end is reported to have been the same with young Tiberius forced to slay himself and Ennia his wife or the wife of Caius whether you will to have been constrained to the same extremity and end with him An end well befitting and well deserved of them both but from all men living least deserved from Caius Philo after the death of Macro placeth the death of M. Silanus which upon the warrant of Dion we have set before and in things so indifferent will not spend labour to examine PART II. The JEWISH Story § 1. Troubles of the Jews in Alexandria FLACCUS Avilius was now Governour of Aegyt and had been so for some years before A man that ruled well while Tiberius lived but after his death could not govern himself For when he heard of the death of the old Emperour and the succession of the new sorrow for the one and fear of the other did so transport him besides himself that forgetting the bravery and glory wherewith he had governed hitherto he let loose the reins of himself to these two passions and the reins of the government to desperate carelesness and neglect He did nothing but weep for the loss of old Tiberius to whom he had been very intimate and dear and he might well weep the more because he could meet hardly with any that would bear any part and share in that sorrow with him This his grief was augmented by the fear that he had of Caius and of his displeasure and that by the intelligence that his conscience gave him that he had deserved it partly for his propensity to young Tiberius and siding with him but chiefly because he had had some hand or at least some consent and inclination to the death of Agrippina Caius his Mother Both these his miserable passions were brought to their height when he heard of the death of young Tiberius and of his old friend Macro The thought of these two was the only comfort he had against his dejectedness and discontent for all his hope was that these two might make his peace with Caius whose displeasure he so much doubted But what must he do now when they cannot make their own peace He yeeldeth himself therefore wholly to his discontented mood and neglecteth utterly both himself and the State His old friends he groweth jealous of and rejecteth his professed enemies he receiveth to his favour and to his counsels These rule him that should have ruled Egypt and he had done it worthily but now is drawn any whither that ill advise fullenness and melancholy doth direct him These his wicked Counsellors invent a course to procure his peace and the Emperours favour a course indeed bloody barbarous and inhumane but such as suited with their own malice and as it proved took place with the Governors desperateness and cowardize if so be he may be called a Governor still Caius the Emperour say they is an enemy to the Jews and a friend to the Alexandrians Let this be the opportunity whereby to work thy reconciliation to suffer the City to rise against the Jews and to commit outrage upon them and thou canst not perform an act more acceptable to the Prince nor more profitable for thy self The wretched Flaccus that took to heart no mans misery but his own and cared not who suffered so he might escape gave ear to this damnable and devilish counsel and put it in practice first plotting mischief against the Jews in secret then oppressing them in judgment and in their suites openly and at the last professing and publishing himself their resolved enemy § 2. Agrippa at Alexandria an unexpected and unwilling occasion of further troubles Those incendiaries that had kindled this fire will be sure to lose no blast that may make it flame and keep it burning Agrippa that had not long ago departed from Alexandria a poor private man returneth now thither in prosperity and a King Caius that had promoted him to his kingdom did lovingly direct him by Alexandria as the safest way to it Thither he came with as great privacy as such a personage could do and yet was he espied by the jealous eyes of these rare counsellours and his coming misconstrued through their malice to the Jews They perswade Flaccus that his coming thither was an affront to him in his own Province that his Pomp and Train was more sumptuous than his that the eyes of all men were upon the new King Agrippa and in short that his presence there was his present disgrace and would prove his future disadvantage The ill governed Governour was ready enough to hearken to such buzzings as these and to yeeld them impression in his mind yet durst he not put any thing in execution against the King for fear of him that sent him He therefore thought it best to carry a fair outside to Agrippa and to his
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
speech now made among them in the Senate and reviving an act of treason for speaking against the Prince he suddainly departed out of the Senate and the City In what case the Senate and the people were that were guilty of either words or actions that he had charged them with all it is readily guessed but how they shall come off and what they shall do to escape is not easily to be resolved Their presentest help is to fawn and speak fair and that course they take praising him infinitely at their next meeting for his justice and piousness and giving him as infinite thanks that he suffered them to live and decreeing that sacrifices should be offered annually to his clemency on that very day that those charges were published against so many seeking to appease his senseless and foolish anger by as senseless and foolish a pacification But how little they could sacrifice or pray or praise him into any better mind than he hath been in hitherto you shall see by the sequel § 2. An inhuman Cruelty Among the many cruelties of this monster the murder of Esius Proculus may bear some bell because he slew him for nothing but only for this for that he was such an one as God had made him This man was the goodliest man of person and shape in all the City insomuch that he was commonly called Colosseros for his extraordinary properness and stature One day as he sate a spectator upon the scaffolds of the bloody sports below Caius commanded him suddainly to be put down among the combatants and there to fight for his life When he had had a tryal with two several men and came off victorious the inhuman Tyrant caused him speedily to be bound and arraied in tatters and rags to be led about the City shewed to the women and then slain So much of beast had this monster in him that he could not indure the goodliness of a man § 3. Caius his Luxury Lavishness and prodigality Thus bestial was he towards men and no less was he in another kind towards women This appeared in the deflouring of his own sisters and adulterating the most of the noble Ladies of the City He was his own Pimp and purveyer for his lust with this open and hideous way of brothelry He would invite the great men and their Ladies to supper and as the women passed by him in way of salutation he would earnestly and leasurely view them mercantium more saith my Author as they do that are to buy any thing and if any matron for modesty held down her head he would lift it up that he might have his full survey she that pleased him he took into a retiring room and adulterated and presently would he bring her forth again and tell openly whether she had given him content or no. Nor was he content with this choice and variety of women neither but that he might be beastly in every kind he abstained not from the abomination of Sodomie with men But let us stay no longer upon him in this his filthiness but trace him a little in his more tolerable vices of fantastickness and prodigality He seemed to affect a singularity in these three things singing working and spending according to the uncontroledness of his will the vastness of his command and the hugeness of his revenue He invented new manner of bathings and prodigious kinds of meats and feasts he would disolve most rich and precious Jewels in Vinegar and then drink them off And because he doubted as it seemeth that he could not wast his treasure fast enough with such tricks as these he would stand upon a Tower divers days together and fling great sums of mony among the people To all which ways of lavishing and expensiveness he joyned monstrous works and machinations which shewed at once his folly in their undertaking and the vastness of his power in their performance As levelling mountains to even the plain and in other places filling up the plain to equal mountains sometimes causing rocks of flint to be cut through to make a passage and sometimes foundations of houses or walls to be laid in the bottom of the Sea bringing soil and rubbish to fill up the place and to make it firm ground ambitious to bring to pass seeming impossibilities and cruelly hasty in the accomplishing of what he undertook punishing the slacking of the work with certain death § 4. His strange Bridge and Ships In the list of these his vanities and ungodly ways of spending let his bridge between Puteoli and Bauli come in the first place or else you do it some injury These two places were about three miles and a half distant an arm of the Sea of that breath severing them and lying between The ambition of the vain Emperour was to ride on horseback and in his chariot between these two places What his fancy or Phrenzy rather was that stirred up such a humor in him is diversly related and it is no great matter to inquire after it Some say it was that he might terrifie Germany and Britain against whom he intended hostility with the very rumor of so great a work others that he might intimate or rather excel Xerxes who made a bridge of Ships over the Hellespont But the rumor of it at Court where his mind was likeliest to be best known was that he did it in confutation of a prediction of Thrasillus who had told Tiberius that Caius should no more rule then ride over the bay of Baiae on hoseback Dion guesseth this to have been his reason that whereas the Senate upon their fear and fawning mentioned before had decreed an Ovation for him or a kind of triumphant riding on horseback he thought it too poor a thing to ride so by land and therefore invented this trick of his own vain head to ride so by Sea For this purpose all the ships that could be got were sent for in and when they were not enough others were made and so they all were set two and two linked together till they made a bridge of that three miles and an half long Then caused he an infinite number of workmen to carry on earth and make a causey like the Apion road over all those ships from the continent to the Island If this were not a Pontifex Romanus with a witness let all men judge When his dear bought way was thus prepared he prepares for it and for his Phantastick journey over it His garb in which he would ride was this He put a breast plate on which he said had been Alexanders and over that a rich purple robe then his sword and buckler and an oaken garland about his head and having sacrificed to Neptune and to the other Gods and even to the Deity Envy lest the bridge should miscarry he sets forth on horseback with a great troop of armed men attending him and takes his strange and idle voyage When he had ridden thus one day on horseback he
XLII And of CAIUS CALIGULA V. CLAUDIUS I. Being the Year of the WORLD 3969. And of the City of ROME 794. Consuls Caius Caesar IV. Cn. Sentius Saturnius PART I. The ROMAN Story §. 1. Caius his death contrived THIS madness of Caius could not last long it was so mad and it was so violent and he could not expect a dry and timely death himself which had brought an untimely and bloody to so many hundreds He began a Consulship this year with Cn. Sentius but it was soon out of date as he was himself but he not so soon as the people desired as he had deserved and some had compassed had their plot but taken effect One or two conspiracies had been contrived against him before this but had failed in the success and he escaped to do more mischief still But now a design is in undertaking that will run the business to the full and men are entred into the combination that have mettle and want not fortune These were Cassius Chaereas and Cornelius Sabinus that contrived in chief and they intertained many others into the conspiracy with them as Callistus and Eparchus Regulus and Minutianus While the plot was in hatching Caius gave an extraordinary offence and disgust unto the people which hastned and ripened it the more upon his own head There were solemn sports kept now in the City at which time it was the custom that if the people asked a boon the Emperor did freely grant it Now therefore they begged that he would ease their taxes and release somewhat of the grievous impositions under which they groaned But he was so far from granting that he caused many of the petitioners to be slain hastning his own death by theirs and condemning himself by their condemnation For what now remains thought the conspirators but a speedy course when neither his own reason nor their petitions nor their Countries custom can any whit move him to goodness nor divert him from his cruelties Besides this general quarrel of their Country some of them had their peculiar heart-burnings against him for particular abuse As Minutianus for the death of his friend Lepidus and for fear of his own life but Cassius Chereas for divers affronts and disgraces which the Tyrant not only used but loved to put upon him above other men He was Tribune of the Praetorian band or as it were Captain of the guard and a man as valiant as that place required or any whatsoever Yet was it the sensless and inconsiderate Tyrants delight and continual custom to jeer him with the tauâ—ts of Cowardise or Effâ—mâ—nacy Whensoever he came to him to ask of him a word or ticket for the Watch he would give him Venus or Priapus when he offered him his hand to kiss he would frame it into an obscene form and so hold it to him And that which might make him odious to others he caused him to be the wracker and tormentor of delinquents himself standing by that he might use no mercy for fear and yet when he had cruelly and miserably torn and rent the poor wretches would the spiteful Prince speak pitifully to them bemoan the extremity condole their condition and sometimes give them rewards thus turning the detestation of all the cruelty upon the head of Chereas only such things as these set the abused man all of a fire for revenge that was hot enough already for the common cause and he wanteth nothing to end his own disgrace and his Countries misery but partners and opportunity He therefore first assaieth Cleâ—â—â—â— the chief commander of the souldiery and Papinius the chief Querry or Squire of the Emperors body with feeling words and forcible arguments to draw them into the same design with himself of freeing the Common wealth from the common misery and themselves from the common guilt that lay upon them not only for not redressing but also for promoting it For Caius saith he indeed commandeth such cruelties but we are the men that execute them he guilty in word only but we in action Whilst we obey his bloodiness we incourage it and the weapons that our offices have put into our hands for our Country we use only against it forwarding that cruelty which when it wanteth further objects will not stop to fall upon our selves Come let us at the last right our Country and our own consciences and give an end to those butcheries which we promote by our obedience and of which we are doubly guilty because we execute them and because we avenge them not With these or such expressions as these did Chereas easily bend these men to his opinion who were in the same guilt danger and misery with him But Clemens whether for cowardise or variableness of his disposition fell suddainly off again and persisted not either in resolution or in secrecy but began to divulge the conspiracy all abroad Now therefore was it time for Chereas to hasten his enterprize or it would be too late such undertakings as these will not brook long delays especially when any one of the faction beginneth to run out and leak He therefore speedily addresseth himself to Sabinus and to Minutianus though a kinsman to Caius and prevaileth with them both to be of the same mind and action with him and all of them having men ready for this exploit do but wait for an opportunity to bring it to effect §. 2. The manner of his death Chereas afraid to lose any time thought several times to have thrown the Tyrant headlong from an high place which he used to stand in in the Capitol to throw and sâ—atter money to the people but he was withheld partly by his own judgment which doubted whether the fall would kill him or no and partly by the advise of his friends which perswaded him to hold till a solemn festival which was now coming on in which they might have better access in a mixed crowd and multitude This time was come and three days of the festival and of the shews were past before opportunity would serve their turn On the fourth and last of the solemnity which must be the day or none and this was the ninth of the Calends of February or January the three and twenty Chereas provideth his confederates for the expedition both for mettle and weapons In the morning betime people of all conditions flock to the place of the shews and solemnity to get them places disposing of themselves where they could so that men and women bond and free noble and base sat mixedly together and happy was he that could get a place no matter where At last comes Cains way forced for him through the crowd all eyes upon him but theirs especially that meant him mischief His first beginning of that days solemnity was with sacrifice with the blood whereof when the cloaths of Asprenas a Senator were accidentally bedawbed it afforded matter of laughter to the Emperor but it proved a fatal omen to himself After his sacrifice he
is exceedingly delighted with and given to the cruelty of the Sword-plays in which he swept away a world of Servants and Freemen that had been accusers of their Masters in the time of Caius And which was most ridiculous he caused the statue of Augustus to be removed out of the place because it should not behold such bloody work being inhumanely himself delighted in that butchery which he thought too barbarous for a brazen statue to look upon These bloody spectacles brought him to an habit of cruelty which was augmented and hardened in him by the damnable counsels of his Empress Messalina a woman wicked above parallel or expression and by the spurrings on of other sycophants C. Appius Silanus is put to death because he refused to incestuate Messalina when she desired him for he had married her mother but because Claudius must not hear of this beastly cause of her displeasure Narcissus a freeman of the Emperor accused him for this that in a dream he had seen Appius slay the Emperor Upon his death the people began to expect no more goodness from Claudius at all but gave him up for a Tyrant like the two that had gone before him whereupon Annius Vincianus and Futius Camillus Scribonianus and others conspired against him but being deserted of their souldiers in the enterprize they are glad to end their lives by their own hands that they might escape the executioners Messalina and Narcissus and others of their faction using the stupid folly of the Emperor to the compassing of their own wills involve in false accusations and in miserable deaths an infinite multitude of men and women honorable and inferior of all qualities and conditions according as the spleen of any of them moved or was provoked Among them that thus perished Arria the wife of Caecinna is upon record for her Roman valour for when her husband trembled and was afraid to slay himself she took the sword out of his hand and fell upon it and gave it him again reeking with her blood with these words Behold boy how I feel no pain And now saith my Author were matters come to such a pass that nothing was reputed a greater vertue than to die valiantly and like a Roman To such a cruelty had custom and evil counsel brought him that of himself was of a reasonable gentle nature but wanted constancy and discretion to manage it THE CHRISTIAN HISTORY THE Jewish and the Roman Of the Year of CHRIST XLIV And of the Emperor CLAUDIUS III. Being the Year of the WORLD 3971. And of the City of ROME 796. Consuls Claudius Caesar III. L. Uitellius ACTS CHAP. XII Vers. 2. And he killed Iames. §. 1. The Martyrdom of James the great WE are now come to the time of Great James his death For Agrippa coming the last year into Judea as we saw from Josephus and it not being probable that he should do this exploit before Easter as the circumstances told us we may justly take this year for its proper time and place Now about that time saith St. Luke Herod the King the Syriack addeth who is called Agrippa stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the Jews and he killed James the brother of John with the sword The first words About that time relate to what went before in the preceding Chapter vers 28. and meaneth in the days of Claudius Caesar. Now what should be the incentive of the spleen of Agrippa against the Church is not specified it may well be supposed it proceeded from that his Ceremoniousness and strict observance of Mosaick Rites which is mentioned by Josephus Concerning the Martyrdom of James under this his spleen we will content our selves with the words of the Text He killed James the brother of John with the sword accounting all other additional circumstances which may be found in officious Authors to be nothing else but gilded legends and fond inventions As that mentioned by Eusebius out of Cleniens his Hypotyposeon concerning his accuser that seeing his constancy to the death confessed the faith and was martyred with him That by Epiphanius that he lived and died a Virgin and that by * * * Tom. 2. Iulii 25. Surius who is the bell-weather for old winter tales that telleth That his body after his martyrdom was shipped by Ctesiphon and his fellow-Bishops for Spain that the Ship in six days was directed thither without Pilot or Compass but only by the influence of the Corps that it carried That at the landing the body was taken up into the air and carried near the place of its burial twelve miles off That Ctesiphon and his fellows werâ— led to it by an Angel And more such trash that it is but labour lost either to read or mention §. 2. The Apostles Creed The Creed was made upon this occasion saith a a a De Institut Cleric l. 2. c. 56. extat in Auctario ad Biblioth Patrum â—ol 620 Rabanus Maâ—…s as our Ancestors have delivered unto us The Disciples after the Ascension of our Saviour being inflamed with the Holy Ghost c. And being charged by the Lord to go to all Nations for the preaching of the Gospel when they are to part one from another they first make a common platform among themselves for their future preaching Lest being severed in place divers and different things should be preached to those that were invited to the faith of Christ. Being therefore together in one place and filled with the Holy Ghost they compose a short platform for their preaching conferring together what they thought And this they appoint to be given to them that believe and to be called Symbolum c. Thus he and very many others with him conceiving that the Apostles supplied not only the matter of the Doctrine contained in the Creed but the very form and words also For Peter said say they I believe in God the Father Almighty John The maker of Heaven and Earth James And I believe in Jesus Christ his only Son our Lord. Andrew Which was conceived by the Holy Ghost born of the Virgin Mary Philip Suffered under Pontius Pilate was crucified dead and buried Thomas He descended into Hell the third day he rose again from the dead Bartholomew He ascended into Heaven sitteth at the right hand of God the Father Almighty Matthew From thence shall he come to judge both the quick and the dead James the son of Alpheus I believe in the Holy Ghost the Holy Catholick Church Simon Zelotes The communion of Saints the forgiveness of sins Judas the brother of James The resurrection of the flesh Matthias The life everlasting Amen Thus the hundred and fifteenth Sermon de Tempore that goeth under the name of b b b Tom. 10. col 849. Austen but apparent that it is not his by this that here is reckoned the descent into Hell which in his book c c c Tom. 3. p. 143. de Fide Symbolo is quite omitted Now were this
under Heaven but only of the Corn that grew in the Land of Israel 2. Walled Cities were more holy than the rest of the Land For 1. Lepers were not suffered to be in them but were turned out 2 Kings 7. 2 3. and this their turning out was called e e e Maymon in hiath Mikdash per. 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Shilluah and it may be possibly the fountain Siloam took its name from such a thing it being without the City a place whither such poor creatures were sent 2. A dead body carried out of the walls might not be brought in again 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they might carry it up and down in the City as they thought good but if it were once carried out of the gates it might not be brought in again 3. A dead corps was not to be buried within the walls Luke 7. 12. And none saith f f f Avoth R. Nathan per. 34. Rabbi Nathan were buried within the walls of Jerusalem but the Kings of the house of David and the Prophetess Huldah 3. Within Jerusalem was holyer than within any other walled City for g g g Rambam in Kelim per. 1. there they might eat the Peace-offerings the first fruits and the second tithe which they might not eat in any City else whatsoever And there alone while Jerusalem was theirs did they eat the Passover 4. The mountain of the Temple was more holy than Jerusalem for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Men or Women that had Issues or Fluxes and Women that were unclean in their menstruis and upon child-bearing might not come in thither yet such were in Jerusalem continually And the reason of this their restraint was h h h Maymon ubi supr because they made that unclean that either they sate or lay upon yea even the place where they stood which in this circumstance was a deeper defiling than defiling by the dead for a dead corps might if there were occasion be brought in hither as to save the dead body of an eminent person from violence and as they give the example of Moses carrying the bones of Joseph with him even within the camp of Levi but one of these unclean persons might not come in here 5. The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 chel or alley was holyer than the mountain of the House for strangers and those that were defiled by the dead might not come within it which they might do into the other By strangers here we are not to understand Proselytes that were circumcised and baptized for they were as Israelites to all purposes but strangers were such as were of other Nations that were not come to that conformity with the Jews in Religion were they Proselytes of the gate or were they strangers in the most proper sense For we shall observe hereafter that even Gentiles unproselyted yea while they were yet Idolaters might and did sometimes bring their offerings to the Temple and so might come into the mountain of the House and hence that is ordinarily called among Christian writers The Court of the Gentiles But though they might come within the mountain of the House yet might they not enter into the chel upon pain of death which was signified to them by inscriptions upon pillars at the entrance into it as is observed in its place And from hence rose that tumult against Paul Act. 21. who being himself and four others attending upon their purification in the court of the Women shaving their heads and burning their hair in the Nazarites room and doing what was to be done by those whose vow was out an bubbub ariseth upon supposal that one of the four had been a Gentile namely Trophimus an Ephesian whom they had seen walking with Paul in the City and indignity was taken at this as if Paul had brought in a stranger within the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 chel 6. The Court of the Women was more holy than the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tibbul iom might not come in thither that is whosoever was defiled with such an uncleanness as required his washing and his Sun going down before he was clean though he had washed yet if the Sun were not set he or she might not come in there 7. The Court of Israel was more holy than the Court of the Women i i i Id. ubi supra Kâ—lim per. 1. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they might not enter into it that were indeed acquitted from their uncleanness but had not as yet their atonement made for their purification k k k Id. in Mechosere capparah per. 1. There were four sorts of these the Leper a man that had an Issue a Woman that had had been in her Separation and she that had born a Child l l l Ioseph de bell â— cap. 14. As for the Women they might not go into the Court at all m m m Tosâ—pheta in Erachim per. 2. unless it were when they brought a sacrifice but men who were capable of going in at other times yet might they not enter the Court in this condition till their atonement made 8. The Court of the Priests was more holy than the Court of Israel for no Israelite might come in there but upon necessity and that was in these three occasions n n n Piskâ— Tosâ—ph ad Mid. either for the laying of his hands upon the head of the sacrifice to be slain or for slaying of it or for waving of some part of it being killed 9. Between the Porch and the Altar was more holy than the lower part of the Court for even no Priest might come there that had a blemish or bareheaded that is without his bonnet or without his vail for they used the covering of their heads as one most solemn rite in their greatest devotions as shall be shewed afterward 10. The Temple was more holy than that because none might go in thither unless with washed hands and feet which up and down the Court they might more tolerably do with both unwashed if they did not meddle with some part of the service 11. The Oracle or within the vail was most holy of all because that none might go in thither but only the High-priest and that but one day in the year only Thus many risings and degrees of Holiness were in that Land and in these places now and many hundreds of years ago raked up in as many and many more degrees of misery difilement and desolation The blinded Nation despising the life and marrow of those holy things whereby these places received all their holiness and honour and so losing the things places and holiness it self The Jews do parallel Jerusalem and the Temple to the Camp of Israel in the wilderness and the Tabernacle in these proportions o o o R. Sol. in Kelâ—m per. 1. Maym. in Beth habbech per. 7. From the gates of Jerusalem to the mountain of the House was the camp
three reason First when they cannot carry their minds Aug. de Trin. lib. 1. cap. 1. further than their senses and so think God hath a Body as they have that is coloured c. Secondly when they measure God by themselves and so make him passionate like man For men not able to conceive what God is what his Nature what his Power c. fall into such opinions that they frame Gods of themselves and as is their own humane nature so they attribute to God the like for his will actions and intentions saith Arnobius Arnob. con lib. Thirdly when they mount above Nature and Sense and yet not right feigning that God begat himself c. Hence came the multitude and diversity of Deities among the Heathen minting thousands of Gods to find the right and yet they could not Hence their many names and many fames made by them that it seems thought it as lawful to make Gods as it was for God to make them At first they worshipped these their Deities without any representation only by their Names Caelites Inferi Heroes Sumani Sangui and thousands others the naming of which is more like conjuring than otherwise Nature it self taught men there was something they must acknowledge for supream superintendent of all things This light of Nature led them to worship something but it could not bring them to worship aright Hence some adored bruit Beasts some Trees some Stars some Men some Devils Some by Images some without some in Temples some without Thus was Gideons fleece the Heathen piece of the World all dry set in the darkness of the shadow of death But in Jury was God known and his Name great in Israel By his name Jehovah he exprest himself when he brought them from Egypt and his glory he pitched among them They knew him by his Names and Titles of Elohim Adonai El Shaddai Elion and his great Name Jehovah as the Jews do call it There the Scriptures of the Law and Prophets did teach them yet they thus nearly acquainted with the true God forsook him so that wrath came upon Israel The Rabbinical Jews beside Scripture words have divers Phrases to express God by in their Writings As frequently they call him Hakkadhosh baruch hu the holy blessed he in short with four letters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sometime they use El jithbarech the Lord who is or be blessed Sometimes Shamaiim Heaven by a Metonymy because there he dwelleth The like Phrase is in the Gospel Father I have sinned against Heaven Luke 15. 18. The like Phrase is frequent in England The Heavens keep you Shekinah they use for a Title of God but more especially for the Holy Ghost So saith Elias levita in Tishbi Our Rabbins of happy memory call the Holy Ghost Shekinah gnal shem shehu shaken gnal hannebhiim because he dwells upon the Prophets Accordingly saith our Nicene Creed I believe in the Holy Ghost who spake by the Prophets Shem a name or the name they use for a name of God and Makom a place they place for the same because he comprehendeth all things and nothing comprehendeth him Gebhurah Strength is in the same use They are nice in the utterance of the name Jehovah but use divers Periphrases for it Shem shel arbang the name of four letters Shem hammejuhhad the proper name and others One in Eusebius hath eloquently expressed it thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Seven sounding Letters ring the praise of me Th' Immortal God th' Almighty Deity The Father of all that cannot weary be I am th' Eternal Viol of all things Whereby the melody so sweetly rings Of Heavens Musick which so sweetly sings What these seven Letters are that do thus express God is easie to guess that they be the Letters of the name Jehovah which indeed consisteth but of four Letters but the Vowels must make up the number Of the exposition of this name Jehovah thus saith Rabbi Salomon upon these words I appeared to them by the name of God Omnipotent but by my name Jehovah I am not known to them Exod. 6. 3. He saith unto him saith the Rabbin I am Jehovah faithful in rendring a good reward to those that walk before me and I have not sent thee for nothing but for the establishing of my words which I spake to their fathers And in this sense we find the word Jehovah expounded in sundry places I am Jehovah faithful in avenging when he speaks of punishing as and if thou profane the name of thy God I am Jehovah And so when he speaketh of the performing of the Commandments as And you shall keep my Commandments and do them I am Jehovah faithful to give to you a good reward thus far the Rabbin The Alchymistical Cabalists or Cabalistical Alchymists have extracted the name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or number whether you will out of the word Jehovah after a strange manner This is their way to do it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which great Mystery is in English thus Ten times ten is an hundred five times five is twenty five behold 125. Six times six is thirty six behold 161 and five times five is twenty five behold 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 186. Thus runneth their senseless multiplication multiplying numberless follies in their foolish numbers making conjectures like Sybils leaves that when they come to blast of trial prove but wind Irenaeus hath such a mystical stir about the name Jesu which I must needs confess I can make nothing at all of yet will I set down his words that the Reader may skan what I cannot Nomen Jesu saith he secundum propriam Hebraeorum linguam c. The name Jesu according to the proper speech of the Hebrews consisteth of two letters and an half as the skilful amongst them say Signifying the Lord which containeth Heaven and Earth For Jesu according to the old Hebrew signifieth Heaven and the Earth is called Sura usser Thus that Father in his second Book against Hereticks Cap. 41. on which words I can critick only wit hdeep silence Only for his two letters and half I take his meaning to be according to the Jews writing of the name Jesu 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who deny him the last letter of his name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because they deny him for a Saviour So the Dutch Jew Elias Levita saith in express words The Christians say that their Messias was called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the commandment of the Angel Gabriel because he should save all the world from Gehinnom but because the Jews do not confess that he is a Saviour therefore they will not call him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Jeshuang but they leave 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the last letter out and call him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Jesu After this kind of writing as Irenaeus saith the word consisteth of two letters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and half a letter that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which may be so called because it
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
she was now returned home from her Cozin Elizabeth See Luke 1. 56. and compare Gen. XXXVIII 24. The Masters of the Traditions assign this space to discover a thing of that nature A Woman o o o o o o Maim in Geâ—â—â—hin cap. 1. â—aâ—â—â— in Ieâ—aâ—â—â—n cap. 4. â—â—etabboth cap. 5. largely say they who is either put away from her husband or become a Widdow neither marrieth nor is espoused but after ninety days Namely that it may be known whether she be big with child or no and that distinction may be made between the offspring of the first husband and of the second In like manner a husband and wife being made proselytes are parted from one another for ninety days that judgment may be made between children begotten in holiness that is within the true Religion See 1 Cor. VII 14. and children begotten out of holiness VERS XIX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. But Ioseph being a just man c. THERE is no need to wrack the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 just to fetch out thence the sense of gentleness or mercy which many do for construing the clauses of the verse separately the sense will appear clear and soft enough Joseph being a just man could not would not indure an adulteress but yet not willing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to make her a publick example being a merciful man and loving his wife was minded to put her away privily 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To make her a publick Example This doth not imply death but rather publick disgrace 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To make her publick For it may not without reason be enquired whether she would have been brought to capital punishment if it had been true that she had conceived by adultery For although there was a Law promulged of punishing adultery with death Levit. XX. 10. Deut. XXII 22. and in this case she that was espoused would be dealt withal after the same manner as it was with her who was become a wife yet so far was that Law mollified that I say not weakned by the Law of giving a bill of Divorse Deut. XXIV 1. c. that the husband might not only pardon his adulterous wife and not compel her to appear before the Sanhedrin but scarcely could if he would put her to death For why otherwise was the bill of Divorse indulged Joseph therefore endeavours to do nothing here but what he might with the full consent both of the Law and Nation The Adulteress might be put away she that was espoused could not be put away without a bill of Divorse concerning which thus the Jewish Laws p p p p p p Maimon in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cap 1 A woman is espoused three ways by mony or by a writing or by being lain with And being thus espoused though she were not yet married nor conducted into the mans house yet she is his wife And if any shall lye with her beside him he is to be punished with death by the Sanhedrin And if he himself will put her away he must have a bill of divorse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Put her away privily Let the Talmudic Tract Gittin be looked upon where they are treating of the manner of delivering a bill of Divorse to a wife to be put away among other things it might be given privately if the husband so pleased either into the womans hand or bosom two witnesses only present VERS XXIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Behold a Virgin shall be with child THat the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Prophet denotes an untouched Virgin sufficiently appears from the sense of the place Esa. VII King Achaz there was affraid lest the enemies that were now upon him might destroy Jerusalem and utterly consume the House of David The Lord meets with this fear by a signal and most remarkable promise namely that sooner should a pure Virgin bring forth a child thaâ— the family of David perish And the promise yields a double comfort namely of Christ hereafter to be born of a Virgin and of their security from the imminent danger of the City and house of David So that although that Prophesie of a Virgins bringing forth a son should not be fulfilled till many hundreds of years after yet at that present time when the Prophesie was made Ahaz had a certain and notable sign that the house of David should be safe and secure from the danger that hung over it As much as if the Prophet had said Be not so troubled O Ahaz does it not seem an impossible thing to thee and that never will happen that a pure Virgin should become a Mother But I tell thee a pure Virgin shall bring forth a son before the House of David perish Hear this O unbelieving Jew and shew us now some remainders of the House of David or confess this Prophesie fulfilled in the Virgins bringing forth or deny that a sign was given when a sign is given 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which is being interpreted § In what language Matthew wrote his Gospel I. All confess that the Syriac Language was the Mother Tongue to the Jewish Nation dwelling in Judea and that the Hebrew was not all understood by the common people may especially appear from two things 1. That in the Synagogues when the Law and the Prophets were read in the original Hebrew an Interpreter was always present to the Reader who rendred into the Mother Tongue that which was read that it might be understood by the common people q q q q q q Bab. Megill fol. 25 c. Massech Sopherim cap. 11. 12 c. Hence those rules of the office of an Interpreter and of some places which were not to be rendred into the Mother Tongue 2. That Jonathan the son of Uzziel a Scholar of Hillel about the time of Christs birth rendred all the Prophets that is as the Jews number them Joshua Judges Samuel the Books of the Kings Esaiah Jeremiah Ezekiel and the twelve lesser Prophets into the Chaldee Language that is into a Language much more known to the people than the Hebrew and more acceptable than the Mother Tongue For if it be asked why he translated them at all and why he translated not rather into the Mother Tongue which was known to all and if it be objected concerning S. Matthew and S. Paul that writing to the Jews one his Gospel the other his Epistle to the Hebrews must have written in the Syriac Tongue if so be they wrote not in Hebrew that they might be understood by all We answer First It was not without reason that the Paraphrast Jonathan translated out of the Hebrew original into the Chaldee Tongue because this Tongue was much more known and familiar to all the people than the Hebrew The holy Text had need of an Interpreter into a more known Tongue because it was now in a Tongue not known at all to the Vulgar For none knew the
Kingdom of Heaven to Repentance since they themselves to whom this is preached do acknowledge that thus the Kingdom of Heaven or the manifestation of the Messias is to be brought in For however the Gemarists who dispute of this were of a later age yet for the most part they do but speak the sense of their fathers III. The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Repentance as it does very well express the sense of true repentance so among the Jews it was necessary that it should be so expressed among whom repentance for the most part was thought to consist in the confession of the mouth only r r r r r r Maimon in Teshubah cap. 1 Whosoever out of error or presumption shall transgress the precepts of the Law whether they be those that command or those that forbid when he repents and returns from his sins he is bound to make confession Whosoever brings an offering for a sin committed either out of ignorance or presumption his sin is not expiated by the offering untill he makes an oral confession Or whosoever is guilty of death or of scourging by the Sanhedrin his sin is not taken away by his death or by his scourging if he do not repent and make confession And because the scape Goat is the expiation for all Israel therefore the High Priest makes confession over him for all Israel It is worthy observing that when John urgeth those that came to his Baptism to repent it is said that they were baptized Confessing their sins which was a sign of repentance highly requisite among the Jews and necessary for those that were then brought in to the profession of the Gospel that hereby they might openly profess that they renounced the Doctrine of Justification by the works of the Law It is worthy of observing also that John said not repent and believe the Gospel which our Saviour did Matth. IV. 17. And yet John preached the Gospel Mark I. 1 2. Joh. I. 7. for his office chiefly was to make Christ known who when he should come was to be the great Preacher of the Gospel Therefore the Baptist doth very properly urge repentance upon those that looked for the Messias and the Text of the Gospel used a very proper word to express true and lively repentance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand I. The Kingdom of Heaven in Matthew is the Kingdom of God for the most part in the other Evangelists Compare these places The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand Matth. IV. 17. The Kingdom of God is at hand Mark I. 15. The poor in Spirit theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven Matth. V. 3. Blessed are the poor for yours is the Kingdom of God Luke VI. 20. The least in the Kingdom of Heaven Chap. XI 11. The least in the Kingdom of God Luke VII 28. The mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven Chap. XIII 11. The mysteries of the Kingdom of God Luke VIII 10. Little children of such is the Kingdom of Heaven Chap. XIX 14. Little children of such is the Kingdom of God Mark X. 14. And so we have it elsewhere very often For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heaven is very usually in the Jewish dialect taken for God Dan. IV. 25. Matth. XXI 25. Luke XV. 21. Joh. III. 27. And in these and such like speeches scattered in the Talmudists 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Death by the hand of Heaven 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The name of Heaven is profaned 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Worship of Heaven 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 By the help of Heaven c. s s s s s s Eâ—ias Levit. in â—â—â—â—â— For they called God by the name of Heaven because his habitation is in Heaven The story of the Jews is related groning out under their persecution these words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O Heavens that is as the Gloss renders it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ah! Jehovah II. This manner of speech the Kingdom of Heaven is taken from Daniel Chap. VII 13 14. Where after the description of the four earthly and Tyrannical Monarchies that is the Babylonian Mede-Persian Grecian and Syro-grecian and the destruction of them at last the entrance and nature of the reign of Christ is described as it is universal over the whole World and eternal throughout all ages Under whom the Rule and Dominion and Authority of Kingdoms under the whole Heaven is given to the people of the Saints of the most High vers 27. that is Whereas before the Rule had been in the hands of Heathen Kings under the Reign of Christ there should be Christian Kings Unto which that of the Apostle hath respect 1 Cor. VI. 2. Know ye not that the Saints shall judge the World Truly I admire that the fulfilling of that Vision and Prophesie in Daniel should be lengthened out still into I know not what long and late expectation not to receive its completion before Rome and Antichrist shall fall since the books of the Gospel afford us a Commentary clearer than the Sun that that Kingdom of Heaven took its beginning immediately upon the preaching of the Gospel When both the Baptist and Christ published the approach of the Kingdom of Heaven from their very first preaching certainly for any to think that the fulfilling of those things in Daniel did not then begin for my part I think it is to grope in the dark either through wilfulness or ignorance III. The Kingdom of Heaven implies 1. The Exhibition and manifestation of the Messias Matth. XII 28. But if I by the finger of God cast out Devils the Kingdom of God is come upon you that is Hence is the manifestation of the Messias See Joh. III. 3. XII Chap. 13 c. 2. The Resurrection of Christ Death Hell Satan being conquered whence is a most evident manifestation that he is that eternal King c. See Matth. XXVI 29. Rom. I. 4. 3. His vengance upon the Jewish Nation his most implacable enemies this is another and most eminent manifestation of him See Matth. XVI 28. Chap. XIX 28. 4. His Dominion by the Scepter of the Gospel among the Gentiles Matth. XXI 43. In this place which is before us it points out the exhibition and revelation of the Messias IV. The Phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Kingdom of Heaven very frequently occurs in the Jewish Writers We will produce some places let the reader gather the sense of them t t t t t t Beracoth cap. 2. hal 2. R. Joshua ben Kercha saith In reciting the Phylacteries why is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hear O Israel Deut. VI. 4. c. recited before that passage 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And it shall come to pass if you shall harken Deut. XI 13. c. To wit that a man first take upon himself the Kingdom of Heaven and then the yoke of the Precept So the Jerusalem Mishnah hath it but the Babylonian thus That
carries with it a very proper sense if you interpret it To according to its most usual signification Moses to the hardness of your hearts added this that he permitted divorces something that favours of punishment in it self however you esteem it for a priviledge II. But you may interpret it more clearly and aptly of the Inhumanity of husbands towards their wives but this is to be understood also under restriction fo r Moses permitted not divorces because simply and generally men were severe and unkind towards their wives for then why should he restrain divorces to the cause of Adultery but because from their fierceness and cruelty towards their wives they might take hold of and seek occasions from that Law which punished Adultery with death to prosecute their wives with all manner of severity to oppress them to kill them Let us search into the Divine Laws in case of Adultery a little more largely 1. There was a Law made upon the suspicion of Adultery that the wife should undergo a trial by the bitter waters Numb 5. but it is disputed by the Jewish Schools rightly and upon good ground whether the husband was bound in this case by duty to prosecute his wife to extremity or whether it were lawful for him to connive at and pardon her if he would And there are some who say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is he was bound by duty and there are others who say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That it was left to his pleasure c c c c c c See Hierof Sotah as before 2. There was a Law of death made in case of the discovery of Adultery Deut. XXII 21 22 23. If a man shall be found lying with a married woman both shall die c. not that this Law was not in force unless they were taken in the very act but the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall be found is opposed to suspicion and means the same as if it were said When it shall be found that a man hath lain c. 3. A Law of Divorce also was given in case of Adultery discovered Deut. XXIV for in that case only and when it is discovered it plainly appears from our Saviours Gloss and from the concession of some Rabbins also that Divorces took place For say they in the place last cited Does a man find something foul in his wife he cannot put her away 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because he hath not found foul nakedness in her that is Adultery But now how does the Law of death and that of Divorce consist together It is answered They do not so consist together that both retain their force but the former was partly taken off by the latter and partly not The Divine Wisdom knew that inhumane husbands would use that law of death unto all manner of cruelty towards their wives for how ready was it for a wicked and unkind husband to lay snares even for his innocent wife if he were weary of her to oppress her under that law of death And if she were taken under guilt how cruelly and insolently would he triumph over her poor woman both to the disgrace of wedlock and to the scandal of Religion Therefore the most prudent and withal merciful Law-giver made provision that the woman if she were guilty might not go without her punishment and if she were not guilty might go without danger and that the wicked husband that was impatient of wedlock might not satiate his cruelty That vvhich is said by one does not please me That there was no place for divorce where Matrimony was broke off by capital punishment for there vvas place for Divorce for that end that there might not be place for capital punishment That Law indeed of death held the Adulterer in a snare and exacted capital punishment upon him and so the Law made sufficient provision for terrour but it consulted more gently for the woman the weaker vessel lest the cruelty of her husband might unmercifully triumph over her Therefore in the suspicion of Adultery and the thing not discovered the husband might if he would try his wife by the bitter waters or if he would he might connive at her In case of the discovery of Adultery the husband might put away his wife but he scarce might put her to death because the Law of Divorce was given for that very end that provision might be made for the woman against the hard heartedness of her husband Let this story serve for a Conclusion d d d d d d Bab. Berac fol. 19. 1. Shemaiah and Abtalion compelled Carchemith a Libertine woman-servant to drink the Bitter waters The husband of this woman could not put her away by the Law of Moses because she was not found guilty of discovered Adultery He might put her away by the Traditional Law which permitted Divorces without the case of Adultery he might not if he had pleased have brought her to trial by the bitter waters but it argued the hardness of his heart towards his wife or burning jealousie that he brought her I do not remember that I have any where in the Jewish Pandect read any example of a wife punished with death for Adultery e e e e e e Hierof Sanhedr fol. â—4 2. There is mention of the daughter of a certain Priest committing fornication in her fathers house that was burnt alive but she was not married VERS XII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eunuchs from their mothers womb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eunuchs which were made Eunuchs of men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In the Talmudists VERS XIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Then were little children brought unto him NOT for the healing of some disease for if this had been the end propounded why did the Disciples keep them back above all others or chide any for their access Nor can we believe that they were the children of unbelieving Jews when it is scarcely probable that they despising the Doctrine and person of Christ would desire his blessing Some therefore of those that believe brought their Infants to Christ that he might take particular notice of them and admit them into his Discipleship and mark them for his by his blessing Perhaps the Disciples thought this an excess of officious Religion or that they would be too troublesome to their Master and hence they opposed them but Christ countenanceth the thing and favours again that Doctrine which he had laid down Chap. XVIII namely That the Infants of believers were as much Disciples and partakers of the Kingdom of Heaven as their Parents VERS XVIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Thou shalt not kill c. IT is worthy marking how again and again in the New Testament when mention is made of the whole Law only the second Table is exemplified as in this place so also Rom. XIII 8 9. and Jam. 11. 8. 11 c. Charity towards our neighbour is the top of Religion and a most
truth as to the thing it self for from the Resurrection of Christ the glorious Epoch of the Kingdom of God took its beginning as we said before which he himself also signifieth in those words Mat. XXVI 29. and when he arose not a few others arose with him What they thought of the Resurrection that was to be in the days of Messias besides those things which we have already mentioned you may see and smile at in this one example y y y y y y Jerus Cheâ—ubboth fol. 35 â— R. Jeremiah commanded when you bury me put shoes on my feet and give me a staff in my hand and lay me on one side that when the Messias comes I may be ready VERS LIV. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Truly this was the Son of God THAT is This was indeed the Messias Howsoever the Jews deny the Son of God in that sense in which we own it that is as the second person in the holy Trinity yet they acknowledged the Messiah for the Son of God not indeed by nature but by adoption and deputation see Mat. XXVI 63. from those places I Chron. XVII 13. Psal. II. 12. LXXXIX 26 27. and such like The Centurion had learnt this from the people by conversing among them and seeing the Miracles which accompanied the death of Christ acknowledged him to be the Messias of whom he had heard so many and great things spoken by the Jews In Luke we have these words spoken by him z z z z z z Chap. XXIII 47. Certainly this was a righteous man Which I suppose were not the same with these words before us but that both they and these were spoken by him Certainly this was a righteous man Truly this was the Messias the Son of God Such are those words of Nathaniel Joh. I. 49. Thou art the Son of God thou art the King of Israel Peter when he declared that Christ was the Son of the living God Mat. XVI 16. spoke this in a more sublime sense than the Jews either owned or knew as we have said at that place VERS LVI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mary Magdalen THAT Magdalen was the same with Mary the sister of Lazarus Baronius proves at large a a a a a a Annal. ad An. Christ. 32. pag. 147 148 c. whom see It is confirmed enough from this very place for if Mary Magdalene was not the same with Mary the sister of Lazarus then either Mary the sister of Lazarus was not present at the Crucifixion of Christ and at his burial or else she is past over in silence by the Evangelists both which are improbable whence she was called Magdalene doth not so plainly appear whether from Magdala a Town on the Lake of Genesareth or from the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies a playting or curling of the hair a thing usual with harlots Let us see what is spoken by the Talmudists concerning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mary Magdala who they say was Mother of Ben Satda b b b b b b Bab. Sanhedr fol. 67. 1. They stoned the Son of Satda in Lydda and they hanged him up on the evening of the Passover Now this Son of Satda was Son of Pandira Indeed Rabh Chasda said the husband of his mother was Satda her husband was Pandira her husband was Papus the Son of Juda but yet I say his mother was Satda 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 namely Mary the plaiter of women's hair as they say in Pombeditha 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 she departed from her husband These words are also repeated in Schabbath c c c c c c Fol. 104. 2. c Chagigah fol. 4. 2. Rabh Bibai at a time when the Angel of death was with him said to his Officer Go 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 bring me Mary the plaiter of womens hairs He went and brought to him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mary the plaiter of young mens hair c. The Gloss The Angel of death reckoned up to him what he had done before for this story of Mary the Plaiter of women's hair was under the second Temple for she was the mother of N. as it is said in Schabbath See the Gloss there at the place before quoted d d d d d d Gittin fol. 90. 1. There are some who find a fly in their cup and take it out and will not drink such was Papus ben Judas who lockt the door upon his wife and went out Where the Glossers say thus Papus ben Juda was the husband 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Mary the Plaiter of womens hair and when he went out of his house into the street he lockt his door upon his wife that she might not speak with any body which indeed he ought not to have done and hence sprang a difference between them and she broke out into adulteries See Alphesius on Gittim e e e e e e Fol. 605. I pronounce 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ben Satda not that I am ignorant that it is called Ben Stada by very learned men The reason of our thus pronouncing it we fetch from hence that we find he was called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ben Sutdah by the Jerusalem Talmudists f f f f f f Sanhedr fol. 25. 4. to which the word Satda more agrees than Stada By the like agreement of sounds they call the same Town both 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Magdala and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mugdala as we have observed elswhere As they contumeliously reflect upon the Lord Jesus under the name of Ben Satda so there is a shrewd suspition that under the name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mary Magdala they also cast reproach upon Mary Magdalen The title which they gave their Mary is so like this of ours that you may with good reason doubt whether she was called Magdalene from the Town Magdala or from that word of the Talmudists 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Plaiter of hair We leave it to the learned to decide VERS LVI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ioses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Josi A very usual name in the Talmudists g g g g g g Jerus â—â—vamâ—tâ— fol. 2. 2. five were called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Be R. Josi Ismael Lazar Menahem Chelpatha Abdimus Also h h h h h h Ibid. fol. 4. 3. R. Jose ben R. Chaninah c. g g g g g g See Jathasiâ— fol. 61. 62. One may well enquire why this Mary is called the mother of James and Joses and not also of Judas and Simon as Mark VI. 3. VERS LVIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Begged the body of Iesus IT was not lawful to suffer a man to hang all night upon a tree Deut. XXI 23. Nay nor to lye all night unburied 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whosoever suffers a dead body to lye all night unburied violates a negative precept but they that were put to death
Mary whom he had espoused had owned Jesus for his Son from his first birth he had redeemed him as his first-born he had cherisht him in his childhood educated him in his youth and therefore no wonder if Joseph be called his Father and he was supposed to be his Son II. Let us consider what might have been the judgment of the Sanhedrin in this case only from this story s s s s s s Kiddushin fol. 80. 1. There came a certain Woman to Jerusalem with a child brought thither upon shoulders She brought this child up and he afterward had the carnal knowledge of her They are brought before the Sanhedrin and the Sanhedrin judged them to be stoned to death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not because he was undoubtedly her Son 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but because he had wholly adhered to her Now suppose we that the blessed Jesus had come to the Sanhedrin upon the decease of Joseph requiring his Stock and Goods as his heir Had he not in all equity obtained them as his Son Not that he was beyond all doubt and question his Son but that he had adhered to him wholly from his cradle was brought up by him as his Son and always so acknowledged III. The Doctors speak of one Joseph a Carpenter t t t t t t Sect. 13. of the same Treatise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 u u u u u u Shemoth rabba fol. 128. 4. Abnimus Gardieus askt the Rabbins of blessed memory whence the earth was first created they answer him there is no one skilled in these matters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but go thou to Joseph the Architect He went and found him standing upon the rafters It is equally obscure who this Joseph the Carpenter and who this Abnimus was although as to this last he is very frequently mentioned in those Authors They say w w w w w w Beresh rabba fol. 73. 4. That Abnimus and Balaam were two the greatest Philosophers in the whole world Only this we read of him x x x x x x Midr. Ruth fol. 43. 2. That there was a very great familiarity betwixt him and R. Meir 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which was the Son of Heli. I. There is neither need nor reason nor indeed any foundation at all for us to frame I know not what marriages and the taking of Brothers Wives to remove a scruple in this place wherein there is really no scruple in the least 1. Joseph is not here called the Son of Heli but Jesus is so for the word Jesus viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must be understood and must be always added in the Reader 's mind to every race in this Genealogy after this manner Jesus as was supposed the Son of Joseph and so the Son of Heli and of Matthat yea and at length the Son of Adam and the Son of God For it was very little the business of the Evangelist either to draw Joseph's Pedigree from Adam or indeed to shew that Adam was the Son of God which not only sounds something harshly but in this place very enormously I may almost add blasphemously too For when St Luke Vers. 22. had made a voice from Heaven declaring that Jesus was the Son of God do we think the same Evangelist would in the same breath pronounce Adam the Son of God too So that this very thing teacheth us what the Evangelist propounded to himself in the framing of this Genealogy which was to shew that this Jesus who had newly received that great testimony from Heaven this is my Son was the very same that had been promised to Adam by the seed of the Woman And for this reason hath he drawn his Pedigree on the Mother's side who was the Daughter of Heli and this too as high as Adam to whom this Jesus was promised In the close of the Genealogy he teacheth in what sense the former part of it should be taken viz. that Jesus not Joseph should be called the Son of Heli and consequently that the same Jesus not Adam should be called the Son of God indeed in every link of this chain this still should be understood Jesus the Son of Matthat Jesus the Son of Levi Jesus the Son of Melchi and so of the rest And thus the Genealogical stile agrees with that of Moses Genes XXXVI 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which words if you should render Aholibamah the Daughter of Anah the Daughter of Zibeon you emasculate Anah and make a Woman of him who was a Man and the Father of Aholibamah Vers. 24 25. 2. Suppose it could be granted that Joseph might be called the Son of Heli which yet ought not to be yet would not this be any great solecisme that his Son-in-law should become the Husband of Mary his own Daughter He was but his Son by Law by the Marriage of Joseph's Mother not by Nature and Generation y y y y y y Hieros Chagigah fol 77. 4. There is a discourse of a certain person who in his sleep saw the punishment of the damned Amongst the rest 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which I would render thus but shall willingly stand corrected if under a mistake He saw Mary the Daughter of Heli amongst the shades R. Lazar ben Josah saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That she hung by the glâ—ndles of her breasts R. Josah bar Haninah saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That the great bar of Hell's gate hung at her ear If this be the true rendring of the words which I have reason to believe it is then thus far at least it agrees with our Evangelist that Mary was the Daughter of Heli and questionless all the rest is added in reproach of the blessed Virgin the Mother of our Lord whom they often vilifie elsewhere under the name of Sardah VERS XXVII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The son of Rhesa the son of Zorobabel the son of Salathiel the son of Neri I. THAT Pedaiah the Father of Zorobabel 1 Chron. III. 19. is omitted here is agreeable with Ezra V. 2. Hagg. I. 1 c. but why it should be omitted either here or there is not so easie to guess II. As to the variation of the names both here and 1 Chron. III. this is not unworthy our observation That Zorobabel and his Sons were carried out of Babylon into Judea and possibly they might change their names when they changed the place of their dwelling It was not very safe for him to be known commonly by the name of Zorobabel in Babylon when the import of that name was the winnowing of Babel so that he was there more generally called Sheshbazzar But he might securely resume the name in Judea when Cyrus and Darius had now fanned and sifted Babylon So his two Sons Meshullam and Hananiah could not properly be called one of them Abiud the glory of my Father and the other Rhesa a Prince while they were
speaking according to the vulgar conceptions of the Jews For whereas it had been plain enough to have said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to day is the third day but he further adds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 beside all this and the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this too there seems a peculiar force in that addition and an emphasis in that word As if the meaning of it were this That same Jesus was mighty in word and deed and shewed himself such an one that we conceived him the true Messiah and he that was to redeem Israel And besides all these things which bear witness for him to be such this very day bears witness also For whereas there is so great an observation amongst us concerning the third day this is the third day since he was Crucified and there are some Women amongst us that say they have been told by Angels that he is risen again VERS XXX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. He took bread and blessed it c. IT is strange that any should expound this breaking of bread of the Holy Eucharist when Christ had determined with himself to disappear in the very distribution of the bread and so interrupt the Supper And where indeed doth it appear that any of them tasted a bit For the Supper was ended before it began 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If three eat together they are bound to say grace f f f f f f Beracoth fol. 45. 1. That is as it is afterwards explained One of them saith let us bless but if there be three and himself then he saith bless ye g g g g g g Ib. fol. 49. 1. Although I do not believe Christ tyed himself exactly to that custom of sayiny let us bless nor yet to the common form of blessing before meat yet is it very probable he did use some form of blessing and not the words this is my body VERS XXXII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Did not our heart burn within us BEZA saith In uno exemplari c. In one Copy we read it written 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was not our heart hid Heinsius saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in optimis codicibus legitur It is written hidden in the best Copies Why then should it not be so in the best Translations too But this reading favours his Interpretation which amounts to this were we not fools that we should not know him while he was discoursing us in the way I had rather expound it by some such parallel places as these My heart waxed hot within me while I was musing the fire burned Psal. XXXIX 3. His word was in mine heart as a burning fire Jerem. XX. 9. The meaning is that their hearts were so affected and grew so warm that they could hold no longer but must break silence and utter themselves So these were we not so mightily affected while he talked with us in the way and while he opened to us the Scriptures that we were just breaking out into the acknowledgment of him and ready to have saluted him as our Lord That is a far fetcht conceipt in Taanith h h h h h h Fol. 20. 2. R Alai bar Barachiah saith If two disciples of the wise men journey together and do not maintain some discourse betwixt themselves concerning the Law they deserve to be burnt according as it is said It came to pass as they still went on and talked behold a Chariot of fire and Horses of fire c. 2 Kings II. VERS XXXIV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Saying the Lord is risen indeed and hath appeared to Simon I. THAT these are the words of the Eleven appears from the case in which the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is put 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They found the Eleven and them that were with them saying They having returned from Emmaus found the Eleven and the rest saying to them when they came into their presence The Lord is risen indeed and hath appeared unto Simon But do they speak these things amongst themselves as certain and believed or do they tell them to the two Disciples that were come from Emmaus as things true and unquestionable It is plain from St. Mark that the Eleven did not believe the Resurrection of our Saviour till he himself had shewed himself in the midst of them i i i i i i Mark XVI 11. 13. They could not therefore say these words The Lord is risen and hath appeared to Simon as if they were confidently assured of the truth of them But when they saw Simon so suddenly and unexpectedly returning whom they knew to have taken a journey toward Galilee to try if he could there meet with Jesus they conclude hence Oh! surely the Lord is risen and hath appeared to Simon otherwise he would not have returned back so soon Which brings to mind that of the Messenger of the death of Maximin k k k k k k In Iul. Capitol The messenger that was sent from Aquileia to Rome changing his Horses often came with so great speed that he got to Rome in four days It chanced to be a day wherein some games were celebrating when on a sudden as Balbinus and Gordianus were sitting in the Theatre the Messenger came in and before it could be told all the people cry out Maximin is slain and so prevented him in the news he brought c. We cannot well think that any worldly affairs could have called away these two from the Feast before the appointed time nor indeed from the company of their fellow Disciples but something greater and more urgent than any worldly occasions And now imagine with what anguish and perplexity poor Peter's thoughts were harrast for having denyed his Master what emotions of mind he felt when the Women had told him that they were commanded by Angels to let Peter particularly know that the Lord was risen and went before them into Galilee and they might see him there Mark XVI 7. That it seems to me beyond all question that one of these Disciples going toward Emmaus was Peter who assoon as he had heard this from the Women taking Alpheus as a companion of his journey makes toward Galilee not without communicating before hand to his fellow disciples the design of that progress They therefore finding him so suddenly and unexpectedly returned make the conjecture amongst themselves that certainly the Lord had appeared to him else he would never have come back so soon Compare but that of the Apostle 1 Cor. XV. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He was seen of Cephas then of the twelve and nothing can seem exprest more clearly in the confirmation of this matter Object But it may be objected that those two returning from Emmaus found the Eleven Apostles gathered and sitting together Now if Simon was not amongst them they were not Eleven Therefore he was not one of those two Answ. I. If it should be granted that Peter was there and sate
became our Redeemer as in the beginning of time he had been our Maker Compare this with ver 14. Ver. 1. Ver. 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In the beginning was the word The word was made flesh 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Was with God Dwelt among us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The word was God Was made flesh and we beheld c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was the word There is no great necessity for us to make any very curious enquiry whence our Evangelist should borrow this title when in the History of the Creation we find it so often repeated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And God said It is observ'd almost by all that have of late undertaken a Commentary upon this Evangelist that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the word of the Lord doth very frequently occur amongst the Targumists which may something enlighten the matter now before us a a a a a a Exod. XIX 17. And Moses brought the people out of the Camp 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to meet the word of the Lord. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And the word of the Lord accepted the face of Job b b b b b b Job XLII 9. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And the word of the Lord shall laugh them to scorn c c c c c c Psal. II. 4. They believed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the name of his word d d d d d d Psal. CVI. 12. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And my word spared them e e e e e e Ezek. XX. 57. To add no more Gen. XXVI 3. Instead of I will be with thee the Targum hath it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and my word shall be thine help So Gen. XXXIX 2. And the Lord was with Joseph Targ. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the word of the Lord was Joseph's helper And so all along that kind of phrase is most familiar amongst them Though this must be also confest that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth sometimes signifie nothing else but I Thou He and is frequently apply'd to men too So Job VII 8. Thine eyes are upon me Targ. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Again Job XXVII 3. My breath is in me 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Targ. II Chron. XVI 3. There is a league between me and thee Targ. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chap. XXIII 16. He made a Covenant between him and between all the people and between the King Targ. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I observe that in Zach. VII 12. the Targumist renders 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by his spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by his word if at least that may in strictness be so render'd for by what hath been newly alledg'd it seems that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may be translated the Lord by himself or the Lord himself I observe further that the Greek Interpreters having mistaken the vowels of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Habbak III. 2. have render'd it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before his face shall go a word when it should have been 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the meaning of the Prophet there is before his face went the Pestilence VERS IV. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In him was life THE Evangelist proceeds from the Creation by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Word to the redemption of the world by the same word He had declar'd how this word had given to all creatures their first being v. 3. All things were made by him And he now sheweth how he restor'd life to man when he lay dead in trespasses and sins Adam call'd his wives name Hevah Life Gen. III. 20. The Greek reads 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Adam called his wifes name life He call'd her life who had brought in death because he had now tasted a better life in the promise of the womans seed To which it is very probable our Evangelist had some reference in this place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And the life was the light of men Life through Christ was light arising in the darkness of mans fall and sin a light by which all believers were to walk St. John seems in this clause to oppose the life and light exhibited in the Gospel to that life and light which the Jews boasted of in their Law They expected life from the works of the Law and they knew no greater light than that of the Law which therefore they extoll with infinite boasts and praises which they give it Take one instance for all a a a a a a Bereshith rabba Sect. 3. God said let there be light R. Simeon saith light is written there five times according to the five parts of the Law i. e. the Pentateuch and God said let there be light according to the Book of Genesis wherein God busying himself made the world And there was light according to the Book of Exodus wherein the Israelites came out of darkness into light And God saw the light that it was good according to the Book of Leviticus which is filled with rites and ceremonies And God divided betwixt the light and the darkness according to the Book of Numbers which divided betwixt those that went out of Egypt and those that enter'd into the land And God called the light day according to the Book of Deuteronomy which is replenished with manifold traditions A Gloss this is upon light full of darkness indeed VERS V. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And the light shineth in darkness THIS light of promise and life by Christ shined in the darkness of all the cloudy types and shadows under the Law and obscurity of the Prophets And those dark things comprehended it not i. e. did not so cloud and suppress it but it would break out nor yet so comprehended it but that there was an absolute necessity there should a greater light appear I do so much the rather incline to such a Paraphrase upon this place because I observe the Evangelist here treateth of the ways and means by which Christ made himself known to the world before his great manifestation in the flesh First in the promise of life ver 4. Next by Types and Prophecies and lastly by John Baptist. VERS IX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which lighteth every man that cometh into the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. All the men that are in the world g g g g g g Hieros Sanhedr fol. 26. 3. Doth not the Sun rise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 upon all that come into the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All that come into the world are not able to make one fly h h h h h h Ibid. fol. 25. 4. In the beginning of the year 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All that come into the world present themselves before the Lord i i i i i i Rosh Hashanah cap. 1. hal 1. There are numberless examples of this kind The sense
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
exercise his power and strength to the utmost of what he either could or would because he knew his Champion Christ was strong enough not only to bear his assaults but to overcome them III. He was to overcome not by his Divine power for how easie a matter were it for an omnipotent God to conquer the most potent created Being but his victory must be obtain'd by his obedience his righteousness and his holiness IV. Here then was the rise of that trouble and agony of Christs soul that he was presently to grapple with the utmost rage of the Devil the Divine power in the mean time suspending its activity and leaving him to manage the conflict with those weapons of obedience and righteousness only It was about this therefore that that petition of our Saviour and the answer from Heaven was concern'd which may be gather'd from what follows ver 31. Now shall the Prince of this world be cast out Now is my soul troubled saith he and what shall I say It is not convenient for me to desire to be saved from this hour for for this very purpose did I come that therefore which I would beg of thee O Father is that thou wouldst glorifie thy name thy promise thy decree against the Devil lest he should boast and insult The answer from Heaven to this prayer is I have already glorify'd my name in that victory thou formerly obtainedst over his temptations in the wilderness and I will glorifie my name again in the victory thou shalt have in this combat also Luk. IV. 13. When the Devil had ended all his temptations he departed from him for a season He went away baffled then but now he returns more insolent and much more to be conquer'd And thus now the third time by a witness and voice from Heaven was the Messiah honoured according to his Kingly office As he had been according to his Priestly office when he enter'd upon his Ministry at his Baptism Mat. III. 17. and according to his Prophetick office when he was declar'd to be him that was to be heard Mat. XVII 5. compared with Deut. XVIII 15. VERS XXXI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Prince of this world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Prince of this world a sort of phrase much us'd by the Jewish Writers and what they mean by it we may gather from such passages as these l l l l l l Sanbedr fol. 94. 1. When God was about to make Hezekiah the Messiah 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Prince of the world to him O eternal Lord perform the desire of this just one Where the Gloss is The Prince of this world is the Angel into whose hands the whole world is delivered Who this should be the Masters tell out m m m m m m Bemidb. rabâ— fol. 277. 4. When the Law was deliver'd God brought the Angel of death and said unto him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The whole world is in thy power excepting this Nation only the Israelites which I have chosen for my self R. Eliezer the Son of R. Jose the Galilean saith The Angel of death said before the Holy blessed God I am made in the world in vain The Holy blessed God answered and said I have created thee that thou shouldst overlook 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Nations of the world excepting this Nation over which thou hast no power l l l l l l Beresh rabb fol. 86. 4. If the Nations of the world should conspire against Israel the Holy blessed God saith to them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 your Prince could not stand before Jacob c. Now the name of the Angel of Death amongst them is Samael m m m m m m Targ. Jonath in Gen. III. 6. And the Woman saw 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Samael the Angel of death and she was afraid c. The places are infinite where this name occurs amongst the Rabbins and they account him the Prince of the Devils n n n n n n Ellâ—h haddâ—bharin rabba fol. 302. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The wicked Angel Samael is the Prince of all Satans The Angel of death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He who hath the power of death that is the Devil Heb. II. 14. They call indeed Beelzebul the Prince of the Devils Matth. XII but that is under a very peculiar notion as I have shown in that place They conceive it to be Samael that deceived Eve So the Targumist before And so Pirke R. Eliezer o o o o o o Cap. 13. The Serpent what things soever he did and what words soever he uttered he did and uttered all from the suggestion of Samael Some of them conceive that it is he that wrastled with Jacob. Hence that which we have quoted already The Holy blessed God saith to the Nations of the World your Prince could not stand before him Your Prince that is the Prince of the Nations whom the Rabbins talk of as appearing to Jacob 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the shape of Archilatro or a chief Robber And R. Chaninah bar Chama saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he was the Prince of Esau i. e. the Prince of Edom. Now the Prince of Edom was Samael p p p p p p Gloss in Maccoth fol. 12. 1. They have a fiction that the seventy Nations of the world were committed to the government of so many Angels they will hardly allow the Gentiles any good ones which opinion the Greek Version favours in Deut. XXXII 8. When the most high divided the Nations into seventy say they when he separated the Sons of Adam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He set the bounds of the Nations according to the number of the Angels of God Over these Princes they conceive one Monarch above them all and that is Samael the Angel of Death the Arch-Devil Our Saviour therefore speaks after their common way when he calls the Devil the Prince of this World and the meaning of the phrase is made the more plain if we set it in opposition to that Prince whose Kingdom is not of this world that is the Prince of the world to come Consult Heb. II. 5. How far that Prince of the Nations of the world had exercised his tyranny amongst the Gentiles leading them captive into Sin and Perdition needs no explaining Our Saviour therefore observing at this time some of the Greek that is the Gentiles pressing hard to see him he joyfully declares that the time is coming on apace wherein this Prince must be unseated from his throne and tyranny And I when I shall be lifted up upon the cross and by my death shall destroy him who hath the power of Death then will I draw all Nations out of his dominion and power after me VERS XXXIV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 We have heard out of the Law OUT of the Law that is as the phrase is opposed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the words
1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Calf and the young Bullock which they kill in the name of the Passover Or for the Passover Whence we may observe The Calf is the Passover as well as the Lamb. 2. The Elders of the Sanhedrin prepare and oblige themselves to eat the Chagigah the Passover on that day because the next day was the Sabbath and the Chagihah must not make void the Sabbath y y y y y y Pesachin ubi supr 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Chagigah doth not set aside the Sabbath Hence that we quoted before that the Chagigah was not to be brought upon the Sabbath day as also not in case of uncleanness because however the Chagigah and defilement might set aside the Passover yet it might not the Sabbath VERS XXXI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is not lawful for us to put any man to death DOTH Pilate jest or deride them when he bids them take him and judge him according to their own Law It cannot be denied but that all capital judgment or sentence upon life had been taken from the Jews for above forty years before the destruction of Jerusalem as they oftentimes themselves confess But how came this to pass It is commonly received that the Romans at this time the Jews Lords and Masters had taken from all their Courts a power and capacity of judging the capital matters We have spoken largely upon this subject in our Notes upon Matth. XXVI 3. Let us superadd a few things here z z z z z z Avodah Zarah fol. 8. 2. Rabh Cahna saith when R. Ismael bar Jose lay sick they sent to him saying pray Sir tell us two or three things which thou didst once tell us in the name of thy Father He saith to them an hundred and fourscore years before the destruction of the Temple the wicked Kingdom the Roman Empire reigned over Israel fourscore years before the destruction of the Temple 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they the Fathers of the Sanhedrin determined about the uncleanness of the Heathen Land and about Glass Vessels Forty years before the destruction of the Temple the Sanhedrin removed and sate in the Taberne What is the meaning of this Tradition Rabh Isaac bar Abdimi saith they did not judge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 judgments of Mulcts The Gloss is Those are the judgments about sining any that offered violence that entice a maid and the price of a Servant When therefore they did not sit in the room Gazith they did not judge about these things and so those judgments about mulcts or sines ceased Here we have one part of their judiciary power lost not taken away from them by the Romans but falling of it self as it were out of the hands of the Sanhedrin Nor did the Romans indeed take away their power of judging in capital matters but they by their own oscitancy supine and unreasonable lenity lost it themselves For so the Gemara goes on Rabh Nachman bar Isaac saith Let him not say that they did not judge judgments of Mulcts for they did not judge capital judgments neither And whence comes this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 When they saw that so many Murders and Homicides multiplied upon them that they could not well judge and call them to account they said it is better for us that we remove from place to place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For how can we otherwise sitting here and not punishing them not contract a guilt upon our selves They thought themselves obliged to punish Murderers whiles they sate in the room Gazith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the place it self engaged them to it They are the words of the Gemarists Upon which the Gloss. The room Gazith was half of it within and half of it without the Holy place The reason of which was that it was requisite that the Council should sit near the Divine Majesty Hence it is that they say whoever constitutes an unfit Judge is as if he planted a Grove by the Altar of the Lord as it is written Judges and Officers shalt thou make thee and it follows presently after thou shalt not plant thee a Grove near the Altar of the Lord thy God Deut. XVI 18 21. They removed therefore from Gazith and sate in the Taberne Now though the Taberne were upon the mountain of the Temple yet they did not sit so near the Divine Majesty there as they did when they sate in the room Gazith Let us now in order put the whole matter together I. The Sanhedrin were most stupidly and unreasonably remiss in their punishment of capital offendors going upon this reason especially that they accounted it so horrible a thing to sentence an Israelite to death Forsooth he is of the seed of Abraham of the blood and stock of Israel and you must have a care how you touch such an one a a a a a a â—ava Meziah sol 83. 2. R. Eliezer b. R. Simeon had laid hold on some Thieves R. Joshua b. Korchah sent to him saying 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O thou Vinegar the Son of good Wine i. e. O thou wicked Son of a good Father How long wilt thou deliver the people of God to the slaughter He answered and said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I root the Thornes out of the Vineyard to whom the other Let the Lord of the Vineyard come and root them out himself It is worth noting that the very thieves of Israel are the people of God and O they must not be touched by any means but referred to the judgment of God himself b b b b b b Ibid. fol. 64. 1. When R. Ismael b. R. Jose was constituted a Magistrate by the King there happened some such thing to him for Elias himself rebuked him saying how long wilt thou deliver over the people of God to slaughter Hence that which we alledged elsewhere c c c c c c Maccoth fol. 7. 1. The Sanhedrin that happens to sentence any one to death within the space of seven years is called a destroyer R. Eleazar ben Azariah saith it is so if they should but condemn one within seventy years II. It is obvious to any one how this foolish remissness and letting loose the reins of judgment would soon encrease the numbers of Robbers Murderers and all kind of wickedness and indeed they did so abundantly multiply that the Sanhedrin neither could nor durst as it ought call the Criminals to account The Laws slept whiles wickedness was in the height of its Revels and punitive justice was so out of countenance that as to uncertain murders they made no search and certain ones they framed no judgment against d d d d d d Sotah fol. 47. 1. Since the time that Homicides multiplied the beheading the Heifer ceased And in the place before quoted in Avodah e e e e e e Fol. 8. 2. When they saw the numbers of Murderers so greatly encrease that
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
But read and read again the whole story Act. XIX and there is not a syllable of any wrong that Paul at that time endured in his person VERS XXXVI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fool. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 would the Talmudists say Sot mad man g g g g g g Gloss. In Taanith fol. 1â— 1. Rabban Jochanan ben Zaccai answered the Baithuseans denying also the Resurrection of the dead and said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fools whence did this happen to you c. VERS XLV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And so it is written c. OF the former no doubt is made for it is written Gen. XI 7. But where is the latter Throughout the whole sacred book thence the Jews speak so many things and so great of the Spirit of Messias and of Messias quickning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The last Adam was made a quickning Spirit Job XIX 25. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I know that my Redeemer liveth and that he shall stand in the latter day upon the earth Job seems to me in this place in the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to speak in the same sense with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The last Adam Of the former Adam it was said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dust thou art and to dust thou shalt return And I know saith Job that my Redeemer liveth and he shall arise from the dust another or a latter and I shall see the Lord made of the same flesh that I am of c. Intimating the Incarnation of the Messiah 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A quickning Spirit The Spirit of the Lord moved upon the face of the waters Gen. I. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is the Spirit of King Messias So the Jews speak very frequently And also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Messias shall quicken those that dwell in the dust It cannot be past over without Observation by what authority Paul applies those words of Psal. XCII Thou Lord in the beginning hast founded the earth c. to the Messias Heb. I. 10. to prove his Deity and dignity But thou art deceived O Paul would a Hebrew say These words are to be applied to God the Father not to the Messias The Apostle hath what to reply from the very confession of the Jewish Nation You acknowledge that Spirit which was present at and president over the Creation was the Spirit of the Messias It ought not also be past by without observation that Adam receiving from him the promise of Christ and believing it named his wife Chava that is Life So the Seventy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And Adam called his wives name Life Gen. III. 20. What Is she called life that brought in death But Adam perceived 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The last Adam exhibited to him in the Promise to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A quickning Spirit and had brought in a better life of the Soul and at length should bring in a better of the body Hence is that Joh. I. 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In him was life VERS XLVII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The second man is the Lord. GEn. IV. 1. Eve conceived and brought forth Cain and said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I have possessed or obtained 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A man the Lord that is That the Lord himself should become man For let me so turn it depending upon these reasons I. That this Interpretation is without any manner of wresting the particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yea it is according to its most proper signification and use II. That without doubt Eve had respect to the promise of Christ when she named her son as Adam had respect to the promise in the denomination of Eve VERS LV. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. O death where is thy c. HOs XIII 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Seventy read it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Where is thy revenge O Death And thus speaks Aben Ezra There are some which invert the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I will be as though it were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Where And very truly as it is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vers 10. Where is thy King Where the Chaldee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Not I will be thy King but Where is thy King So that the Greek Interpreters and the Apostle after them translated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Where properly and truly The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Prophet is rendred by the Targumist and the Rabbins to signifie A Word but some as Kimchi acknowledges understand it to signifie The Plague and that upon good ground because the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Destruction is joyned with it as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Destruction and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Plague are joyned together Psal XCI Where see the Targum and R. Solomon and compare the Greek Interpreters with them CHAP. XVI VERS I. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Now concerning the Collection for the Saints UNLESS I am much deceived 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Jerusalem Writers denotes in the like sense 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Collection for the wise men They have this story a a a a a a Hoâ—aioth fol. 48. 1. R. Eliezer R. Josua and R. Akiba went up to Chelath of Antioch 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Employed in the Collection for the wise Men. One Abba Judah was there who performed the Law with a good Eye Being now reduced to poverty when he saw the Rabbins he was dejected He went home with a sad countenance His wife said to him Why doth thy countenance languish He answered The Rabbins are come and I know not what to do She said to him You have one field left Go and sell half of it and give to them Which he did And when they were departed he went to plow in the half of his field and found a great treasure c. I produce this the more willingly that it may be observed that collections were made among the Jews in forrain Nations for the poor Rabbins dwelling in Judea in the same manner as they were made among Christians in forrain Nations for the poor Jews converted to Christianity in Judea VERS II. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 On the first day of the Week 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In the first of the Sabbath would the Talmudists say I. That day was every where celebrated for the Christian Sabbath and which is not to be past over without observing as far as appears from Scripture there is no where any dispute of that matter There was controversie concerning circumcision and other points of the Jewish Religion whether they were to be retained or not retained but no where as we read concerning the changing of the Sabbath There were indeed some Jews converted to the Gospel who as in some other things they retained a smatch of their old Judaism so they did in the observation of days Rom. XIV 5. Gal. IV. 10. but yet not rejecting or neglecting the
stature of Christs mystical body the Church which was growing up from generation to generation and now when the Gentiles came in their full conflux was come to its full consistency and manhood And of the same body is his meaning in that obscure and much mistaken place Rom. VIII 23. And not only they i. e. the whole creation or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 every creature which means no other thing than the Gentile or Heathen World not only they grone to come into the Evangelical liberty of the children of God but we also of the Jewish Nation who have the first fruits of the Spirit grone within our selves waiting for the redemption to wit the adoption of our body we wait for the redeeming and adopting of the Gentiles to make up our mystical body To the same sence is the meaning of the same Apostle in that also mistaken place Heb. XI ult That they without us should not be perfect He little means that they that believed before the coming of Christ were not perfectly saved as the Papists from thence would prove their Limbo But his meaning is they without us were not the perfect body of Christ but we under the Gospel came in to make that up nor they so perfect in the Doctrine of Salvation as under the revealing of the Gospel at our coming in So that this is the first thing That Christ saw good to bring his Church through various administrations II. Secondly Though the manner of administration were thus various yet the way of Salvation in them all but one and the same viz. by Faith in Christ as the Apostle plainly evidenceth in the Chapter just now cited Heb. XI As the brazen Oxen under the Laver their faces looked several ways but their hinder parts met in one centre under the Laver so these Administrations indeed looked divers ways without Law with Law with Prophets without Prophets without Gospel with Gospel yet agreed in all one and the same centre Faith in Jesus Christ. I have a large field before me to shew that all the holy ones that lived and died before Christ were saved by believing in Christ. But I shall confine my self to observe this by a rule of contraries namely thus It is something to be wondred at that in our reckoning the various administrations under which Christ brought his Church to glory we may not number the firstborn administration that was in the World and which one would think was the likeliest way to have brought to Heaven and that was the state of innocency But this we must except from the general rule and leave it quite out He that will observe shall find that Christ descended most of younger brothers and answerably Salvation descended not from this elder brother in Gods administration that state of innocency but something else had the birth-right Ruben lost it and it descended to Joseph It was never Gods intent to bring men to Salvation by the way of innocence in which Adam was created This appears plain enough by the Issue Nay did God bring the holy Angels to Salvation by the way of the perfection of their nature in which they were created Meerly being in Heaven doth not denominate Salvation The Angels that fell were there and it proved but little Heaven to them And merely beholding God face to face doth not denominate Salvation for we have no cause to think but the Angels that fell had beheld his face as well as they that stood but this is Salvation to behold him as he is and to be like unto him I Joh. III. 2. Like him not in infinity omnipotency ubiquity but like him in holiness holy as he is holy Now though Adam was like unto him by Creation being formed in his Image and the Angels like unto him by Creation as eminently also carrying the same Image yet herein both come short of that Image that doth consummate the Saints and Angels in glory viz. that though they were perfectly holy by Creation yet they were not unchangeably holy for unchangeableness was not to be found in created nature And what the holy Man in the book of Job saith concerning Wisdom we may say concerning immutability Where is unchangeableness to be found and where is the place of immutability The Sea saith it is not in me and the Earth saith it is not in me Men say it is not in us the Angels say it is not in us but the Truth saith it is only in God Therefore to bring Men and Angels into the Estate of Glory that set Infinity aside they should be like unto God perfectly holy and unchangeably holy as God is holy eternally holy as God is holy it was needful not to leave them bottomed only upon the excellency of their created natures be that never so excellent but to ingraff and as I may say incorporate them even into the unchangeable God himself the Lord Christ. The Saints in glory are unchangeable how Both in nature and affection their estate unchangeable yea their very thoughts which were so unfixed and fluid become unchangeable They are so infinitely ravished with the beauty and love of God in beholding him as he is that they cannot turn the least thought away or aside from him And they are so ingraffed and united into Christ that the corruptibleness of them being now laid aside they are become unchangeable as Christ himself is unchangeable The Angels that fell wanted this uniting so that though they beheld the face of God yet their hearts turned away from him because they had no other uniting to God then what lay in their own created holiness which was changeable and soon changed So that I say God never intended to bring man to Salvation by the way of created innocency because he intends to glorifie grace and not nature and to bottom all that were to be saved upon Christ and not on themselves It may seem strange that Adam when his wife had brought in sin and death into the World should name her Eve life whereas before he had only named her Woman Call me not Naomi but call me Marah might she very well have said unto him Call me not life but call me death and misery for I have been the unhappy introducer of both But Adam had now heard of Christ he had received his promise and laid hold on it and found a better life now by him than before And to this refers that in Joh. 1. 4. In him was life and that life was the light of men In the verse next before he had said All things were made by him and without him was nothing made that was Then had all living things that were created their life from him What need he then to add in him was life Namely because he intends that life in Christ that we are speaking of Which life he saith was the light of men And the light shone in darkness and the darkness comprehended it not Life in Christ held out in the promise to
Adam was the light that all holy men from Adam forward looked after and walked by And that light shone in the darkness of mans now sinful and undone condition That light shone in the darkness before the Law when their was no light of a Law but what was written in the heart of man That light shone in the darkness of the Types and Figures that were in the Law when the Law was given And that light shone in the darkness and obscurities of the cloudy Prophesies of the Prophets And at last it shone out fully without any darkness at his coming in the Gospel and that at verse the ninth was the true light that inlightneth every man that came into the world that inlightneth the Gentiles even all the World So that all along even from the first day of Adam under the various administrations in which it pleased God to carry on this Light this was the life and light of men None but Christ none but Christ. They that went before him before the Law and under the Law and they that come after under the Gospel crying Hosanna to him expecting and finding Salvation from him III. And this leads me to the third thing we are to speak of viz. Christs entertaining all his that thus under these several Administrations believed in him in his Fathers house in Salvation and Eternity I at the last he did so will the Romanist say but first by your leave were all the believers before Christ came entertained in Limbo Truly very course entertainment when the good men had served God all the day and at night should have received their wages there was yet none for them but they must to Limbo and wait yet it may be two or three thousand years and then they shall be paid Poor Abel served his Master faithfully and truly all his time dies in his Masters service and for his Masters sake and when he comes to expect his reward in Heaven no Abel thou must to Limbo and there stay till Christ come and fetch thee out about three thousand five hundred years after thou comest thither Very hard payment And a strange business that Abraham whilst he lived should converse with God as a friend and walk and talk with him and entertain God at his Table and when he is dead he is become a mere stranger to God thrust into a hole in Limbo where no light of God no communion with him at all but God and Abraham are now mere strangers Such mad absurdities doth the limiting of the Spirit and operation of Christ to the bodily presence of Christ produce and bring into the World Such is the Doctrine of Transubstantiation and such this of Limbo Transubstantiation that maintains that there is no receiving Christ virtually in the Sacrament unless we receive him bodily his very flesh and blood And this of Limbo that none went to Heaven till Christ went in his real presence to Limbo after his Death to fetch them thence and bring them to Glory I had thought Abraham had been in glory before For when Christ before his death doth propose that parable of Abraham in joys and Lazarus in his bosom certainly he is proposed not as being in Limbo but in Heaven And when Moses appears to Christ in Glory Luke IX 31. do you think he came out of Limbo in that glory But what need I trouble you with the confutation of such absurdities If it be the Spirit and Power of Christ that operates for mans Salvation and not his bodily presence if it be the fruit and effect of Faith to unite to Christ and to bring into the enjoyment of all the benefits of Christ grace and glory and if all the holy ones under those various administrations before the Law under the Law and under the Gospel had such faith in Christ what doubt can be made of their Salvation when they died and that they were received and entertained by Christ in the Mansions of his Fathers house The last word You in the Text I suppose is that where the Emphasis especially lies I go to prepare a place for you as I have prepared place for others before you for Enoch Abraham c. before the Law for Moses Aaron Joshua David c. under the Law I am now going also to prepare a place for you and there is place for you that are come under an administration clean different from all theirs For in my Fathers house are many mansions Being then to speak of Christs entertaining all his in Heaven let me begin my discourse with sursum Corda Christians lift up your hearts that that you have to look after is above It is the Voice of my beloved I am going to prepare for you in my Fathers house O my soul look not after any lower preparation The husks and draff of this World is not the provision that Christ makes for his And why should I feed upon Onyions and Garlick when if I will seek after it there is Manna enough for me the food of Angels I am going to prepare a place for you in my Fathers house is a word that might make a Soul never to be quiet till it come there and that might make it to scorn and slight all this trash here below in reaching out and breathing after the provisions that are there Lift up your heads and hearts ye afflicted and dejected and despised servants of the Lord Jesus though your bread here be bread of affliction and you mingle your drink with weeping though ye walk in hunger and poverty under derision and persecution and trouble though oppressed afflicted tormented yet here is enough to make amends in the end for all I go to prepare for you Be content with your dinner of bitter herbs and sower sauce apud superos coenaturi there is a supper provided for you in eternal mansions What entertainment Jew and Millenary look for in Christs personal reign upon Earth let them enjoy when they can meet with it but if you be risen with Christ seek those things that are above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God preparing for you Let us begin at the lowest step of Jacobs ladder and climb up gradatim to the top of it where it is lodged in Heaven First This World is not a place for Christs entertaining of His as it proved but a course Entertainment of Christ when he was here My Kingdom saith he is not of this World nor indeed can it be let Jew and Millenary conceit what they please For observe that passage in III. Gen. 17. where as soon as Adam is fallen the Earth is cursed Cursed be the ground for thy sake in sorrow shalt thou eat of it Did I say as soon as he was fallen the Earth is cursed I should rather say as soon as Christ is promised the Earth is cursed for there is as proper a connexion between those two as between his fall and that curse Christ is promised and the Earth is
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
sin unto death viz. that brought to an immediate liableness to cutting off by divine vengeance Now this was a sin of presumption and despising the Word of God as Moses explains what that presumptuous sinning is in a high degree which as the Apostle tells in the same Chapter that it was a treading under foot the Son of God c. Therefore it is no wonder if with Paul there be no Sacrifice for it and with this Apostle no praying for it But why does not this our Apostle speak out and say I say he should not pray for it but says only I do not say that he should Let me lay to this expression that passage of our Saviour Matth. XVIII 17. If he neglect to hear the Church let him be to thee as a Heathen or a Publican By which our Saviour doth not excommunicate such a one out of the Church for he saith not let him be to the Church but thee as a Heathen But he dischargeth and acquitteth the party injured from those duties and offices which he ought otherwise to him as a brother Our Apostles expression is much like to the same tenor He takes care of the Consciences of the people of God as well as he sheweth the two conditions of the sinner he speaketh of There were some that might be in a strait what to do in this case They were commanded by their Lord and Master to pray for their enemies these enemies of theirs were become so like their Father the Devil that it might pose their Consciences whetheâ— they should pray for them or no. Therefore this divine Apostle useth a happy temper that he will lay no charge on them that are so pinched to pray for them nor indeed forbid those to pray for them that are more inlarged for undoubtedly the indifferent expression of the Apostle as I may call it seems plainly to carry with it such a consideration Ye see here in the Text a deadly wounded wretch like Amasa II Sam. XX. wallowing in his own blood if you call in Moses and Paul to give their Coroners verdict concerning the manner and cause of his death from those Texts of theirs that we have cited they will tell you that he is felo de se that he destroied himself and they will tell you that it was by wilful sinning after the knowledge of the truth wilful sinning against the Word of God That sin is the more desperately deadly by how much it is the more desperately wilful Hos. V. 11. Ephraim is oppressed and broken in judgment because he willingly walked after the Commandment One would think it should be because he did not willingly walk after the Commandment but by Commandment is meant the idolatrous Commandment of Jeroboam the Statutes of Omri and Ephraim was broken in pieces because he walked after them and broke the more because he walked after them willingly If the motions of sin which are by the Law do work in them to bring forth fruit unto death as the Apostle says Rom. VII 5. much more the motions of sin which are clean against the Law I must confess I do not understand the irritating or provoking power of the Law which some collect from this place for to me it is without doubt that the meaning of the Apostle is The motions of sin that were by the Law mistaken not efficiently for such was the Judgment of the Jews concerning the Law viz. That it did restrain only the outward action but regarded not the internal motion and so the Apostle seems to give some hint of his own mistake a while of the Law about the point of lust Now if the fruit of those motions of sin which are by the mistake of the Law be so deadly how must the actings of sin which are against the known Law wilfully committed be much more deadly Among the grains shall I call them or the talent weights that are cast into the scales to make sin weigh exceeding sinful this adds not the least aggravation if it do not indeed the greatest that it was done knowingly and wilfully And therefore in that cousen german sin to this we are speaking of for to me they are clearly distinct the sin against the Holy Ghost the grievousness of it in comparison of sinning against the Son lies not in regard of the persons sinned against as if the Holy Ghost were a nobler person than the Son but in regard of the manner of sinning the Son they knew not in so much humility and so blasphemed him out of ignorance but they saw the apparent evidence of the Holy Ghost in the miracles they saw and yet blasphemed him wilfully This dies the sins of wicked men of so deep a dye above the sins of the Saints of God because those sin with whole propensity of mind these of infirmity and against their wills And I cannot but remember the determination of St. Austin in a point of this nature About chaste Christian matrons and virgins that were ravished by the enemy when he broke into the City he determines well that they were not defiled though they were defiled their minds pure though the body polluted and he concludes Duo fuerunt ast unus adulterium commisit there were two in the action but one of them in the adultery And that here one sinned wilfully the other had no mind to the sin at all This then if there were nothing else doth sufficiently aggravate the grievousness of wilful sinning that it carries the very image and superscription of the sin of the Devil it is as it were flesh and bone of his bone and sin of his sin very Devil of very Devil Does any ask me what was that sin of the Devil It has been conceived by many that it was such a Pride as made him aspire to be equal with God or above him to set his Throne even with God or to unthrone him and to this purpose have those words been applied Esa. XIV 12 13. How art thou fallen from Heaven O Lucifer son of the morning c. For thou hast said in thine heart I will ascend into Heaven I will exalt my throne above the stars of God c. I will be like the most High Which words indeed mean only the arrogance and haughtiness of the proud King of Babylon Does any one then ask me what was the sin of the Devil I should answer desperate malicing the honour and happiness of man in which God had placed him and desperate despising and scorning of that charge and command that God had laid upon Angels concerning man that they should attend him and keep him in all his ways And both these desperately wilful for he could sin at no lower rate for he could not sin of ignorance being an Angel and an Angel could have no tempter to sin but himself I shall not go about to define or circumscribe exactly the bounds wherin to conclude wilful sinning I shall not confine this evil spirit with any circle
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
or when or whereupon did they lose this power If the Romans had taken it away from them how then did they afterwards arraign and condemn and execute S. Stephen and would have done no less without all doubt to S. Paul if they might have had their own way And their own stories tell us of their judging and condemning to the fire after this a Priests daughter for playing the whore in her fathers house and execution was done accordingly And yet they say they cannot judicially put any man to death which power indeed if they had lost they lost it more like fools than like slaves and it was not at all taken from them by the Romans but they let it drop from them by their own folly Their own Writers and Records do tell us at what pass it was with them at this time in this manner Forty years say they before the destruction of the Temple did the great Sanhedrin or chief Court or Councel rise and depart out of the room Gazith and then the power of judging in Capital matters was taken away from Israel Gazith the room where this great Court sat was in the Court of the Temple near unto the altar or as themselves express it near to the divine presence which they supposed dwelt upon the altar and looked on them how they acted in judgment They thought therefore that by the very reverence and venerableness of the place and presence they were bound to judge malefactors and to execute them unfailingly which at the last they saw they could not do and therefore they resolve to rise and depart from that place The case was now with them much like to that gloss of some of the Hebrew writers upon the first words of the book of Ruth The words properly are thus It came to pass in the days when the Judges judged But they invert it thus It came to pass in the days when they judged the Judges And a shrewd inversion indeed when the people judge their Judges and malefactors aw and over-power the Magistracy And just such was their case now Their Country did so swarm with all manner of wickedness and villanies that they were grown beyond the correction of the Magistracy that they out dared the Magistracy As Jezebel The Sanhedrin could not durst not judge them Nay these go further than defie and daâ—e they even conquer and master So that not any but is glad to yield and resolve that they will not go about to punish such villanies and wickedness any more for they saw that it was but in vain to go about it and that they could not do it without their own danger And so their own Records tell us That adulteries were grown so common and open that the Sanhedrin determined there should be no more trial of the suspected or adulterous wise by the bitter waters which God had prescribed Numb V. That murders were so common and ordinary that the Sanhedrin determined there should be no more the beheading of a Heifer which God had prescribed for the expiation of an uncertain murder Deut. XXI And Murtherers so numerous and potent and impudent that the Magistrate could not durst not judge them for fear of being themselves murdered And therefore the great Sanhedrin resolves Come let us rise and sit here no longer for it is better for us to rise and depart hence than by sitting here to contract guilt to our selves when the very place challengeth from us that we do judgment and execution and we cannot do it And so they rose and went thence and then ceased and failed the judging of Capital offenders through out all the Courts of Israel And this account do their Writers and Records give how it came to pass that they lost that power that they could not might not put any malefactor to death And so you have a Commentary of their own Nation and Historians upon their words here in the Text. I might yet add further from them 1. That sometimes they returned to the Hall or room Gazith to sit upon Capital offendors as blasphemers false Prophets notoriously incestuous c. when they thought good but never returned thither to sit upon murther 2. That when they did sit there and Judged and Sentenced yet they hardly ever executed but referred the offendors to the punishment of God And they will tell you That God at one time or other did bring them to some kind of death in some sort sutable to that the Sanhedrin should have put them to Sometimes indeed malice and spite made them venture an execution doing when they saw they might do it without their own danger when they executed S. Stephen for a Heretick and Bensatda for a Seducer if by him they meant not our Saviour himself But that that we have the most reason to consider of is how the Nation came to this pass of Vice and Villany that Vice and Villany were not only incorrigible but were grown terrible to those that should correct them Wickedness strong and Magistracy feeble Murthers Plunderings Assassinations all manner of Abominations swarming and no power in them that were in power to punish them Not to speak of the secret disposal of God for the executing of his vengeance upon that sinful Nation in giving them up to themselves and to confusion but to look only at those things that are apparent I. The growth of Villany was from the not punishing of villanies in time and the Magistrates want of executing Judgment made them lose the power of executing Judgment And they could not punish malefactors when they should because they would not do it when they might The sword of Justice rusted in the scabbard that they could not draw it because they let it rest in the scabbard when they should have drawn it As that generation was the wickedest that the Earth had carried in our Saviours character A wicked and adulterous generation a faithless and perverse generation a Serpent and Viper generation a generation wicked above expression as appears by that expression of the Prophet Esay LIII 8. Who shall declare his generation i. e. the generation wherein he lived so the same Prophet speaking of the very same time and generation shews from whence the above wickedness of the generation grew Esay LIX 14. Judgment is turned away backward and justice standeth afar off truth is fallen in the streets and equity cannot enter And it displeased the Lord that there was no judgment Which very Scripture the Jews themselves do produce to prove that the Messias should come in the worst of times and generations Now II. There were two things that hindred and spoiled the execution of Justice and Judgment like two worms lying at the root of Judicature that like the worm that smote Jonas gourd kild execution of Judgment at the very root that that tree was clean blasted dried up and withered The first let me Emblem by this homely Emblem The Ape loving and hugging her young so dearly that
You have mention of her armies Dan. IX ult but with this brand upon them that they are called The abominable army that maketh desolate there styled by their Vulgar Latine as in Matth. XXIV the abomination of desolation But thirdly That which tops up all is that she is called Babylon in this Book of the Revelations and described there as she is For that by Babylon is meant Rome the Romanists themselves will readily grant you if you will grant them the distinction of Rome Pagan and Christian Imperial and Pontifical And the last verse of Chap. XVII puts the matter out of all doubt where it says that the Woman the scarlet Whore which thou sawest is the great City which reigneth over the Kings of the Earth Upon which every one that is acquainted with the Rome-history must needs conclude that no City can there be understood like the City Rome Now it is a very improper inquest to look for the new Jerusalem in a place that must perish for ever to look for the holy City among the abominable armies and to look for Sion the City of God in Babylon that Mother of Harlots and abominations of the Earth Secondly Whereas old Jerusalem and the Jewish Nation incurred so great a curse and guilt for the murther of the Lord of life as we all know it did it requireth very cogent arguments to prove that Rome that had a hand as deep in that murther should obtain so great a blessing and happiness on the contrary as to be the only Church in the World and the Mother of all Churches There is no Christian but knoweth how deep a hand Jerusalem had in that horrid fact and he knoweth but little that knoweth not that Pontius Pilate was Deputy for Rome there and how deeply also he was ingaged in it as her Deputy And so much be spoken concerning the very Place and how unlikely it is to find the new Jerusalem there How improper it is to imagine that that should be the City of God of which God himself in his Word speaks not one good Word but evil to imagine that he should choose that of all Cities for his dearest spouse that of all Cities had the deepest hand in the murther of his dear Son II. Concerning their Church and Religion If these men that pretend to lead men to the new Jerusalem and lead them to Rome would but speak out and plain and tell them that they will lead them to the old Jerusalem and so lead them to Rome they speak something likely For what is the Church and Religion of Rome but in a manner that of old Jerusalem translated out of Judaick into Roman and transplanted out of Palestina into Italy And there is hardly an easier or a clearer way to discover that she is not the new Jerusalem then by comparing her with the old as God doth most clearly discover the Jerusalem then being Ezek. XXIII by comparing her with Samaria and Sodom divers hours would scarce serve to observe the parallel in all particulars and punctually to compare the Transcript with the Original I shall only and briefly hint two things to you to that purpose And First Let me begin with that distinction that the Jews have in their writings once and again of the Mosaick Law and the Judaick Law or the Law of Moses and the Law of the Jews And they will tell you such and such things are transgressions of the Mosaick Law and such and such are transgressions of the Judaick Law And as they themselves do make the distinction so they themselves did cause the distinction What they mean by the Mosaick Law we all understand and by their Judaick Law they mean their Traditional Law which they call the Law unwritten While they kept to the Law of Moses for a rule of faith and life as they did under the first Temple they did well in point of Doctrine and no heresie and heterodoxy tainted them but when they received and drank in Traditions as they did under the second Temple they drank in their own bane and poison There is in Scripture frequent mention of the last days and the last times by which is meant most commonly the last days of old Jerusalem and of the Jewish oeconomy when they were now drawing toward their dissolution But from what date or time to begin her last days may be some question If you date them from the time she first received and entertained her traditions you do but fit the calculation to the nature of the thing calculated For then did she fall into the consumption and disease that brought her to her grave then did she catch that infection and plague that never left her but grew upon her till it made her breath her last in a fatal end Traditions spoiled her Religion and brought her to worship God in vain teaching for Doctrines the commandments of men Matth. XV. 9. Traditions spoiled her manners and trained her up in a vain conversation received by tradition from the Fathers 1 Pet. I. 18. In a word Traditions as they made the Law so they made the Gospel of no effect and the doctrine of Christ the death of Christ the belief in Christ to be but needless business and things to no purpose Nay Traditions leavened them to hate the Gospel to murther Christ and to persecute his Disciples For by the principles of their Traditions they could do no less than all these Now surely Jerusalem that is above is above this infection and the new holy City certainly brought no such infection from Heaven nor was tainted with this contagion which was the death of the old as a Priest in Israel could hardly be infected with Leprosie But you may see the tokens upon the Church of Rome very thick traditions upon traditions some of so like stamp to those of old Jerusalem that you can hardly know them asunder but all of the like effect and consequence that they make the Gospel of none effect as those did the Law and causing men to worship God in vain while they are taught for Doctrines the commandments of men How great a part of their Religion is nothing else but the commandments of men and other Traditions and how great a part of their Church is built upon nothing else The very chief corner stone in all their fabrick is of no better substance and solidity viz. that S. Peter was Bishop there and there was martyred when the Scripture and reason gives a far fairer probability that he was Apostle to the circumcision in Babylonia and there ended his days Secondly You would hardly think that there was a worse brood in the old Jerusalem than those that we have spoken of the men so infected with the Plague and with a Frenzy with it of traditions And yet I can name you a worse and that was those that had forsaken their Judaism and entertained and embraced the Gospel but at last apostatized from it and revolted to their old
killed by a Lion V. That this poor man should suffer so severely for violating but one command of God Eat not and Jeroboam should escape so secure that had violated the greatest command in the two Tables Thou shalt have none other Gods but me and Thou shalt not make unto thy self any graven Image This poor man is induced to sin by another and that by ignorance and he speeds so sore and Jeroboam induceth all Israel to sin and that wilfully and yet he is Jovial and feels and fears no dangers VI. It is something obscure what this old Prophet of Bethel was a true Prophet or a false a good or a bad If a true Prophet why did he lie to him If a false how could he foretel him of his end He was a true Prophet and this poor good man knew that he was a true Prophet and the lie that he told was not with intention of any hurt to him but an officious lie to perswade him to go home with him He desired to have the company of this good man and to give him some entertainment at his house He sees no arguments will perswade him therefore he minteth that lie that an Angel had spoken to him and commanded him to bring him back and so is the poor man deceived and undone In this story of his fatal end we may first consider a little upon the instrument of his death a Lion and then concerning his death and fate it self I. A Lion met him and slew him How much praise have you in Scripture of the Land I. of Canaan that it was the pleasant Land the glory of all Lands Ezek. XX. 15. The Land flowing with milk and honey in multiudes of places A Land upon which the eye of the Lord was from one end of the year to the other A Land of Vineyards and Olive-yards c. And yet how sadly and dangerously was that Land infested with ravenous cruel wild beasts Where almost might a man be safe Samson walking by the vineyard of Timnah a Lion sets upon him and had served him as this Lion served this poor man if he had not met with his match and Samson had been too hard for him And a Lion and a Bear ravin upon Davids flock and had rob'd him of a Lamb and Kid had not he also been too strong for them But every one was not so As Jacob doubted concerning Joseph Certainly an evil beast hath devoured him undoubtedly my son Joseph is so dead What a sad havock was it when about this very place Bethel where the Lion destroys this Peophet two she-Bears at one clap tear in pieces two and forty Children And that passage is very remarkable in the story concerning the battel betwixt Davids men and Absaloms in the wood of Ephraim 2 Sam. XVIII 8. The battel was scattered over the face of all the Country and the wood devoured more people that day than the sword devoured The wood devoured How Why the Lions and Bears and ravenous beasts that were in the wood they pickt the men up as they were scattered up and down and made a greater slaughter than the sword It is something obscure that which is said Deut. VII 22. The Lord thy God will put out these Nations before thee by little and little thou mayst not consume them at once lest the beasts of the field increase upon thee And among other things that might be inquired upon it this might be one why God did not drive out the wild beasts out of the Land as well as he drove the Canaanites out And the answer might be various I. That he might shew that there is no absolute quiet and happiness and security to be expected here Canaan the choice Country upon Earth the only paradise on this side Heaven and yet even Canaan is not without its inconvenience and molestation There were Gardens and Orchards and Vine-yards and Olive-yards but it may be a Lion or Bear lurking in them there was all pleasure and plenty but there were wild and ravenous beasts ranging abroad that one could never say I will walk without danger So would God teach them that it was not their earthly Canaan that they were to look after but they must look higher if they would look for rest and quiet and secure habitation A man sat under his Vine or under his Fig-tree it may be on a suddain a wild beast rusheth upon him and he scapes narrowly if he scape devouring A man is binding sheaves in the field or a woman gleaning and suddainly a Lion or Bear is at their back that there is but a span betwixt them and death if there proved so much This was a very evincing lesson that absolute quiet and safety was not to be had there for all the bravery of the Land but that they must look for another Land of promise if they would be perfectly safe quiet and free from danger II. These wild and ravenous beasts in the Land were as it were a rod or scourge ready in the hand of God to whip transgressors withal as he saw cause as he did this poor transgressor in the Text. And he reckons them among the Plagues and punishments that he used to avenge himself by upon the rebellious Ezek. XIV 15. If I cause noisom beasts to pass through the Land and they spoil it so that it be desolate that no man may pass through because of the noisom beasts And vers 21. How much more when I send my four sore iudgments upon Jerusalem the sword and the famine and the noisom beast and the pestilence You have some emblem of a man persecuted with noisom beasts Amos V. 19. A man flees from a Lion and a Bear meets him and he gets home and leans his head upon the wall and a Serpent bites him And you have a real example of it 2 King XVII 25. They feared not the Lord therefore the Lord sent Lions among them which slew some of them And God doth give this as a promise of a singular blessing Levit. XXVI 6. I will give peace in the land and ye shall lie down and none shall make you afraid and I will rid evil beasts out of the land And how can we choose but remember the mercy of God to this our Land in this particular That no such ravenous dangerous beasts do range in our Nation if men themselves would not be Wolves and Bears and Lions one to another A man may take his journey and never fear being set upon by any wild beast No father sending out his son needs to fear any evil beast devouring him and no mother hath cause to weep with the women of Bethel for their children torn in pieces by he or she-Bears God hath so blessed our Land that such dangers are least feared of us We see no Lions or bears unless it be under grates and bars It is to be bemoaned with tears that we are such Lions and Bears and brute beasts one to another
meditate therein when thou sittest down and risest up when thou sittest in the house when thou walkest in the way and various such passages as these require and ingage all sorts and conditions of people to this study and meditation according to their several capabilities and atcheivances In some important points of Divinity some men have sometimes mistaken in stating them by mens benefit rather than by their duty If you did so in this point it would make one very good piece of an argument study the Scriptures for you may benefit by study of them But take the other and it argueth more strongly study the Scripture for it is your duty God calls for it lays his command upon you to do it the best you can II. Therefore upon this we may make such another inference as Samsons mother doth Judg. XIII 23. If the Lord were pleased to kill us he would not have accepted an offering neither would he have shewed us all these things If the Lord were pleased that the Scriptures should not be understood he would never have written them he would never have charged all to study them God never writ the difficulties of the Scripture only to be gazed upon and never understood never gave them as a book sealed and that could never be unsealed that learned and unlearned alike might never see what is in them but that they might be more seriously read more carefully studied that so being understood and practised they might become the means of Salvation unto all A SERMON Preached upon DANIEL XII 12. Blessed is he that waiteth and cometh to the thousand three hundred and five and thirty days 13. But go thou thy way till the end for thou shalt rest and stand in the lot at the end of days DOTH he not speak riddles T is hard to tell whether verse is harder And I have chosen to speak to them partly that I may explain them partly in subsequence to my late discourse about Gog Rev. XX 8. I shewed that meant an enemy to true Religion and more particularly the Pope styled by the name of the old Enemy Ezek. XXXVIII XXXIX I shewed that Gog was Antiochus that laid wast the Jews Religion and would force them to turn to the manners of the Heathen that forbad them Circumcision Law Religion forbad the daily Sacrifice and profaned the Altar with Swines flesh and sacrifices abominable and offered to Idols I cited that that speaks concerning him Chap. VII 25. He shall speak great words against the most High and shall wear out the Saints of the most High c. until a time and times and the dividing of time that is a year two years and half a year or three years and an half In the verse before the Text there is mention of the same matter and there are reckoned only a thousand two hundred and ninety days From the time that the daily sacrifice shall be taken away and the abomination that maketh desolate set up there shall be a thousand two hundred and ninety days For the Holy Ghost reckons by round sums near about three years and an half which he calls a time times and half a time and does not punctually fix upon the very exact sum And so in the Book of the Revelations where allusion is made to the same space of time viz. three years and an half it is sometimes expressed by a thousand two hundred and sixty days as Rev. XII 6. The woman fled into the wilderness where she had a place prepared of God that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days Sometimes by forty two months Chap. XIII 5. And there was given to the beast a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies and power was given him to continue forty and two months You have both in Chap. XI 2. They that tread the holy City under-foot forty and two months And vers 3. I will give power unto my two witnesses and they shall prophesie a thousand two hundred and threescore days Now let your thoughts conceive the case and state of the people and Temple in this time a thousand two hundred and ninety days three years and an half or there abouts no Law no Religion no Sacrifice but what is abominable the Temple filled with Idols the Heathen there sacrificing swines-flesh and other abominable things to their abominable gods Ah! Poor Jerusalem what case art thou in How is the gold become dim nay changed to dros What desolation of Religion is come upon thee and what bondage and thraldom under irreligion How it goes against their heart not to circumcise their children But they dare not do it How grievous to see the Books of the Law burnt and they upon pain of death dare not save them nor use them How bitter to see Altar Temple Holy of Holies all defiled with abomination and all Religion laid in the dust and they cannot help it dare not resist it What should these poor people do Wait Gods deliverance for Haec non durabunt in secula These things will not always last Stay but till one thousand three hundred thirty five days but forty five above the thousand two hundred and ninety of the Temples defilement in the verse before and there is deliverance And read two verses together From the time that the dayly sacrifice shall be taken away and the abomination that maketh desolate set up there shall be a thousand two hundred and ninety days Blessed is he that waiteth and cometh to the thousand three hundred and five and thirty days Add but forty five days further the sum to come up to a thousand three hundred thirty five days and there is some remarkable thing done as pleading the cause of the people and Religion that had been so abused which in all probability was the death of the Tyrant that had brought this misery upon them or at least some signal thing done by God for the relief of the people who had been so oppressed But I rather believe the former The story of whose actions and death you may read in the first Book of the Maccabees Chap. I. beginning The story of which book goes almost step by step with Josephus However his death was the Mercy or some other special providence the words afford plainly these two Truths I. That the time of the affliction of the people of God is determined with God II. That it is a blessed thing for the afflicted to wait his time and determination The former Observation lies in the latter clause the latter in the former The two things the latter an inference upon the former or the former a Doctrine the latter the Use and Application of it I shall handle in the same method and order The time of the affliction of the people of God is determined with God Therefore it will prove a blessed thing for the afflicted to wait his time and determination In prosecuting either I shall not so much prove as clear
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
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
understanding immortal substance that is not extinguished by sin nor cannot be by any thing And so when God forbids Murther he doth it with this argument That he that kills a Man destroys one that carries the image of God And yet then the likeness of God in Man Holiness and Righteousness was utterly gone but the image of God in these essential constitutives in soul were still remaining in him Upon that saying of God Whoso sheddeth Mans blood by Man shall his blood be shed for in the image of God made he Man if any Man question Is this meant of every Man in the world Can any doubt it Unless the Murther of some Men were allowed though of others forbidden Upon the very same argument we may urge the love of every man to every man because in the Image of God he created him And if thou canst find any man without the Image of God in his Soul then hate him and spare not But then it will further be Objected Then by this Argument I should love the Devil for he was created in the Image of Cod that is He is a spiritual intellectual immortal substance as well as any mans Soul I Answer He is so indeed but these two things make now the vast difference First He is in a sinful estate utterly irrecoverable And so we cannot say of any soul in the world The Apostle saith of the Angels that fell That God cast them down into Hell upon their Fall 2 Pet. II. They are damned already irrecoverably but you cannot say of any soul in the World absolutely that it cannot be saved Whether all Souls in the World be salvabiles in a savable condition we shall not dispute nor whence their salvability comes if it be so But certainly you and I nor no Man in the world can say of any Man that he cannot be saved True we may truly and justly say that if he continue and dye in such and such sins and wicked courses he cannot be saved But of his soul considered in its bare essence we cannot say so Nay we must pray for his Salvation This then is that that beautifies a Soul and makes it lovely and upon which we are to love every Man because he hath a soul capable of enjoying God and Salvation Shall I hate any Mans soul It may be united to God Hate any Mans body It may be a Temple of the Holy Ghost any Mans Person He may be an Inheritor of Eternal Glory Scorn not poor Joseph for all his rags and imprisonment he may come to sit upon a Throne Despise not poor Lazarus for all his Sores and Tatters he may be carried by Angels into Abraham ' s bosom Secondly Christ dyed for Souls he dyed not for Devils And this is no small demonstration of the Excellency and preciousness of a Soul viz. That the Son of God himself would dye for it It is therefore the Apostles Argument once and again Offend not him for whom Christ dyed Destroy not him for whom Christ dyed Rom. XIV 1 Cor. VIII Darest thou hate him for whom Christ dyed Darest thou wrong him for whom the Son of God would shed his blood A SERMON PREACHED upon GENESIS III. 20. And Adam called his Wives name Eve because she was the Mother of all living ADAMS story is all wonder Dust so raised to become so brave a Creature that Bravery so soon lost so soon repaired and so hughly repaired to a better condition That he is sensible of in the Text therefore he calls his Wives name Eve because Mother to all living He had named her quoad sexum as to her sex Chap. II. 23. Now he gives her another name of distinction Then she was called Woman because she was taken out of Man Now Eve because all living were to come out of her Adam shewed Wisdom in naming the Beasts here he shews that and more viz. Faith and sense of his better Estate She was rather the Mother of Death having done that that brought death into the world but he sensible of a better life to come in by her calls her Eve Life as the word signifies Lay this to that in Joh. I. 4. In him was life speaking of Christ and the life was the light of men Eve was the Mother of all living viz. of Christ and all that live by him So that hence I make this Observation That Adam and Eve believed and obtained life For the proof of this let us view their story I. God saith I will put enmity between thee and the Woman and between thy seed and her seed it shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel vers 15. Satan had accompanied with them till this Promise came He keeps to them to chear them he perswaded them to hide themselves from the presence of the Lord. But now she sets him at defyance She sees her error The Serpent saith she deceived me grows at enmity with him having now a surer comfort promised to rely upon II. God clothed them with skins vers 21. Which is an evidence that they sacrificed For they had no need of slaying Beasts for any other purpose Flesh they might not eat They were slain for sacrifice and their skins served for clothing Thus Body and Soul were provided for And in these Sacrifices they looked after Christ and saw him in figure The first death in the world was Christs dying in figure Noah knew clean and unclean Beasts and sacrificed This undoubtedly he had learned from the beginning III. Observe that Luk. I. 70. As he spake by the mouth of his holy Prophets which have been since the world began Hinting that from the very beginning of the world there were Prophets of the Messias Thus Adam was a Prophet of Christ and prophesied of him in the name of Eve signifying life And Eve prophesied of him in the name of Cain Gen. IV. 1. She conceived and bare Cain and said I have gotten a man from the Lord Or I have begotten a man the Lord as the words may be rendred And in the name Seth Gen. IV. 25. She bare a Son and called his name Seth For God saith she hath appointed me another seed IV. The promise of the Messiah was not given to a Castaway It was given to Abraham and David and others that were righteous men V. Religion began to be planted by Adam Cain and Abel brought Sacrifice to God Which shews that Religion had been planted before VI. Christ prevailed against the Serpent from the beginning and had a seed The Church began with Adam Else what confusion would there have been in the world VII The Sabbath was given from the beginning and Adam kept it VIII All Gods dealings with him were to forward Faith in him Such were his Cursing the ground his expelling him out of Eden his enjoyning him Sacrifice and the Sabbath IX Adam is ranked with holy ones Gen. V. These things laid together may be sufficient to prove that Adam and Eve believed
be under the torments of Hell And the Captain of our Salvation to be under the condition of the damned Let it not be told in Gath publish it not in the Streets of Ascalon Let not the Jews hear it nor the Turks understand such a thing lest they blaspheme our Lord of life more than they do The colour which is put upon this opinion by them that hold it is because Christ upon the Cross bare the sins of men and therefore that he was to bear the wrath torments and damnation that man had deserved And for this they produce those places Esa. LIII 6. The Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all 1 Pet. II. 24. Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree And they would have Christ to mean no less when he cried out Eli Eli Lamasabachtani my God my God why hast thou forsaken me For the stating of this matter I lay down these two things I. That it was impossible Christ should suffer the wrath of God the torments of Hell and be in the case of the damned for any cause of his own II. That he did not could not suffer these though he bare the sins of all his people I shall speak to both these under these five observations I. In all the passages of Christ at his suffering you cannot find that he looks upon God as an angry God Begin at his prayer at his last supper Joh. XVII Can you find there even the least hint that he doubted of Gods favour to him It is the rule of the Apostle 1 Tim. II. 8. That we lift up holy hands without wrath and doubting Can we think that Christ ever prayed with doubting Especially look into that Prayer and there is not the least tincture of it vers 1. Father glorifie thy Son Did his heart then any whit suspect that God was angry at him Vers. 2. Thou hast given him power over all flesh that he should give eternal life Are these the words of one that suspected he could come under the heaviest wrath of God Vers. 4. I have glorified thee on Earth I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do Are these the words of one that thought he could ever be repayed for so doing with wrath and vengeance and the torments of Hell Vers. 5. And now O Father glorifie me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the World was Vers. 13. And now Father I come unto thee Vers. 21. Thou Father art in me and I in thee Vers. 24. Father I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am that they may behold my glory Had Christ when he spake these things any suspicion or thought that he could possibly come under the heavy wrath of God It is said Chap. XVIII 1. He went beyond Kidron There he is in his agony then he prays Let this cup pass from me Why What did he see in the Cup Bitterness enough but not one drop of the dregs of Gods wrath Guess his case by the case of sinful men A Stephen a Cranmer a Ridley a Martyr is brought to the Stake He hath a Cup put into his hand and that very bitter but doth he see any of Gods wrath in it Martyrs could not have gone so joyfully to death had they seen God angry in that bitter dispensation Christ could not have gone so readily to his sufferings had he thought he had gone to encounter Gods indignation Look at his words on the Cross Hodie mecum in Paradiso To day shalt thou be with me in Paradise Were these the words of one under the torments of Hell to assure the thief of Heaven Pater in manus tuas Father into thy hands I commend my Spirit Did he apprehend God angry as at the Damned when he spake these words Nay those words Eli Eli Lamasabachtani speak not that he felt the wrath of God but a bitter providence that God had left him to such wrackings and tortures and to such wicked hands So that look at Christs passages at and near his Passion and you find not one word or action that doth bewray that Christ felt himself any whit at all under Gods fury Nay look through the Scripture whatsoever is spoken of Christ it sets him far from being to be thought liable to the wrath of God Was Christ a child of wrath as well as others Scripture tells you no. Esa. XLII 1. Behold my servant whom I uphold mine elect in whom my Soul delighteth I have put my Spirit upon him How far is that from such language as this Behold Christ under my wrath behold him under the torments of Hell And so that passage Matth. III. ult Lo a Voice from Heaven saying This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased And at his Transfiguration In whom I am well pleased And does he ever come to be angry at him as at the Damned and to lay his fury on him as on the tormented in Hell It troubles me to think any Christian should hold such an opinion concerning our Saviour and indeed where there is little need to imagine such a thing Could not Christ have wrought Redemption without enduring such heavy wrath then it were not so improper to conceive so But II. Christ in the work of Redemption had not to deal with the wrath of God but the justice of God not with his wrath to bear it but with his justice to satisfie it There is a great deal of difference may be made twixt wrath and justice and twixt satisfying one and the other A Judge condemning a Malefactor weeps and grieves Is there any wrath No but only justice The Malefactor satisfies the justice of the Law no wrath stirring Consider what was the debt men ought to God What owest thou to my Master It will be said Damnation and suffering eternal torments True these were due to them but the debt was of another nature viz. Obedience Damnation was the penalty upon forfeiture of Bonds but the Debt was Obedience that which man ought to God before he became sinful which he owes to God as he is God and which the Law challengeth and which the Gospel does also Does man owe Damnation to God as he is God as he is Creator as he is Lawgiver Or as man is man No God rather owes and will pay Damnation to man for being sinful Therefore that which Christ was properly to pay for his people was that which was properly their debt which they could not pay viz. Obedience And that the Scripture harps upon Rom. V. 19. As by one mans disobedience many were made sinners so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous Phil. II. 8. He became obedient unto Death Now what was Christ obedient to To say To the wrath of God were hardly sense but To the will of God which would prove and try him and could do it thorowly without wrath It was