of the Scribes So we often meet with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is out of the Law or Scripture to which is opposed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is out of the Rabbins That Christ abideth for ever How then came the Rabbins to determine his time and years some to the space of Forty years some to Seventy and others to three Generations q q q q q q Sanbedr fol. 99. 1. After the days of Messiah they expected that Eternity should follow VERS XXXIX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Therefore they could not believe c. THEY were not constrained in their infidelity because Isaiah had said Their heart is waxen gross c. But because those things were true which that Prophet had foretold concerning them Which Prophesie if I understand them aright they throw off from themselves and pervert the sense of it altogether r r r r r r Rosh hashanah fol. 17. 2. R. Johanan saith repentance is a great thing for it rescinds the decree of judgment determined against man as it is written The heart of this people is made fat their ears heavy and their eyes are closed lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but they shall be converted and healed For to that sense do they render these last words diametrically contrary to the mind of the Prophet They have a conceipt that Isaiah was cut in two either by the Saw or the Ax by Manasses the King principally for this very Vision and Prophesie s s s s s s Jevamoth fol. 49. ◠It is a Tradition Simeon Ben Azzai saith I found a Book at Jerusalem in which was written how Manasses slew Isaiah Rabba saith He condemned and put him to death upon this occasion He saith to him Thy Master Moses saith no man can see God and live But thou sayest I have seen the Lord sitting upon a Throne high and lifted up Thy Master Moses saith Who is like our God in all things that we call upon him for Deut. IV. 7. But thou saiest seek ye the Lord while he may be found Isai. LV. 6. Moses thy Master saith the number of thy days I will fulfil Exod. XIII 26. But thou saiest I will add unto thy days fifteen years Isai. XXXVIII 5. Isaiah answered and said I know he will not hearken to me in any thing I can say to him If I should say any thing to the reconciling of the Scriptures I know he will deal contemptuously in it He said therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I will shut my self up in this Cedar They brought the Cedar and sawed it asunder 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And when the Saw touched his mouth he gave up the Ghost This happened to him because he said I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips Manasses slew Isaiah and as it should seem the Gemarists do not dislike the fact because he had accused Israel of the uncleanness of their lips No touching upon Israel by any means VERS XLI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 When he saw his Glory ISAI VI 1. I saw the Lord sitting upon a Throne Where the Targum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I saw the Lords Glory c. So Exod. XXIV 10. They saw the God of Israel Targum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They saw the glory of the God of Israel and vers 11. and they saw God Targum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And they saw the glory of God So the Targumists elsewhere very often commended therefore by their followers for so rendring it because no man cold see God It might be therefore thought that our Evangelist speaks with the Targumist and the Nation when he saith that Isaiah saw his glory whereas the Prophet himself saith he saw the Lord. But there is a deeper meaning in it nor do I doubt but this glory of our Saviour which Isaiah saw was that kind of Glory by which he is described when he was to come to avenge himself and punish the Jewish Nation As when he is said to come in his Kingdom and in his Glory and in the Clouds c. viz. in his Vindictive Glory For observe 1. The Prophet saw the posts of the door shaken and removed as hastening to ruine 2. The Temple it self filled with smoke not with the cloud as formerly the token of the Divine Presence but with smoke The forerunner and prognostick of that fire that should burn and consume it 3. He saw the Seraphims Angels of fire because of the predetermined Burning 4. He heard the decree about blinding and hardening the people till the Cities be wasted and the Land desolate CHAP. XIII VERS I. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Now before the Feast of the Passover THE Vulgar Beza and the Interlinear read Now before the Feast-day of the Passover But by what authority they add day it concerns them to make out For I. In the common language of the Jews 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 do never signifie less than the whole Festivity and time of Passover Pentecost and of Tabernacles no part of that time being excepted nor does the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Feast occur any where throughout the whole Bible in another signification II. It is something harsh to exclude the Paschal Supper out of the title 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Feast of the Passover because the name of the whole Feast takes its original from it This they do who imagine this Supper mentioned in this place to have been the Paschal Supper and yet it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before the Feast of the Passover We have therefore shewn by many Arguments in our Notes upon Matth. XXVI 2 6. That the Supper here mentioned was with that at Bethany in the House of Simon the Leper two days before the Passover VERS II. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And Supper being ended I Acknowledge the Aorist and yet do not believe the Supper was now ended We have the very same word in the story of the same Supper Matth. XXVI 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And Jesus being in Bethany Which in St. Mark is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And being in Bethany Chap. XIV 3. So that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is no more than 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Being Supper Let us joyn the full story together whiles Jesus was at Supper in the House of Simon the Leper two days before the Passover a Woman comes and pours very precious Oyntment upon his head when some murmured at the profuseness of the expense he defends the Woman and the action by an Apology and having finished his Apology he rises immediately from the Table as it were in the very midst of Supper and girds himself to wash his Disciples feet so that while they are grumbling at the anointing of his head he does not disdain to wash their
be Converted the Spirit of Grace reveals these to him in feeling and experience And further Revelation as to the understanding of Scripture there is not the least ground-work in Scripture whereupon to expect it III. When God had committed the New Testament to writing he had revealed all that he would reveal to men on Earth of his will and way of Salvation The words in Joh. XVI 13. are appropriate to the Apostles None ever were or will be whom God led into all Truth save the Apostles He leads indeed every Saint he hath into all Truth needful for him but the Apostles into all Truth needful both for themselves and the whole Church Because God by them was to give the rule of Faith and Manners to all the Church Now when all the Truth that God would reveal was revealed and compact in the New Testament as all Light in the body of the Sun must we still look for further Revelation to explain this Revealing It was foretold that the Light that God would exhibit under the Gospel should be as the Light of the Sun sevenfold and must we look for another Sun of Revelation to give Light to this Sun The New Testament revealed the Old and must we look for Revelations to reveal the New And so we may look in infinitum IV. The main difficulty of the New Testament requires study to unfold it rather than Revelation The Old Testament needed further Revelation to unfold it and further was promised And accordingly the New Testament was a further Revelation that did unfold it For the great difficulty of the Old Testament was in the Sence the Language every Child could understand for it was their Mother-tongue But when they could understand what the words meant they could not understand what the Sence meant nor was it possible to find it out in abundance of places without further Revelation But the main difficulty of the New Testament is in the Languages unlock that clearly and the Sence ariseth easie The Old Testaments difficulty was in the Kernel the New in the Shell For besides that Greek the Original is not the Native Tongue now of any part of the World there is such intermixture of Septuagint Greek Hebrew Idioms Talmudichal Phrases and Allusions to the Jews Opinions and Customs that the greatest difficulty is to explain the Language that done the Sence is plain Now certainly it is more likely to obtain understanding of Languages by Study than to attain it by Revelation unless any one will yet expect that miraculous gift of Tongues which I suppose there is none will make himself so ridiculous as to say they expect But this only by the way In the Text as there are two Verses so are there two distinct things observable In the former a Festival mentioned in the latter Christs presence there intimated and either of them illustrated by three circumstances I. The Festival 1. By its Name It was the Feast of Dedication 2. By the Place It was at Jerusalem 3. By the Time It was Winter II. Christs presence there 1. By the place where he was In the Temple 2. The particular place in the Temple Solomons porch 3. His posture there He was walking He was at the Feast at Jerusalem though it were Winter and he walked in the Temple belike to get him heat because it was Winter The Feast of Dedication as the Authors before mentioned do inform us was instituted upon this occasion Antiochus Epiphanes one of the Kings of Syria one of the Horns of the fourth Monarchy Dan. VII 24. having the Nation of the Jews under his Power and Tyranny raised against them and their Religion a very sad Persecution He forbad them to Circumcise their Children he restrained the exercise of their Religion burnt the Books of the Law set up idolatry defiled the Temple set up an Idolatrous Altar upon the very Altar of the Lord in the Court of the Temple And all this for a Time two Times and half a Time as Daniel styles it Dan. VII 25. or three years and an half The Jews had never felt such misery of that nature before and Daniel in his twelfth Chapter foretelling of that a long time before it came saith That it should be such a time of trouble as had never been since they were a Nation At last Judas Maccabaeus prevails against his Power and Tyranny shakes off that Yoak restores the People and Religion destroies his Idolatry purges the Temple pulls down his Idol-Altar that he had erected there yea also the Altar of the Lord which it had stood upon and defiled reareth up a new Altar and on the 25th day of the month Cisleu which was the ninth month or their November dedicates the Altar and sets the Publick Service of the Temple afoot again And thereupon he and the generation ordained that day and seven days forward for the Feast of Dedication to be kept annually throughout all succeeding Generations as may be read at large in 1 Macc. IV. and in the Authors beside that I named I might Observe from hence How joyful a thing it is and how joyful and perpetual a Memorial it ought to carry when decayed Religion is restored to a Nation Oh! that England might see that day and come to such a Feast of Dedication But I desire to fix upon the latter Verse of the Text and to observe Christs presence at that Feast which is the more remarkable and strange because there were three things that might not only have warranted his absence thence but even perswaded and urged it according to the three circumstances we observed in the former verse the Feast it self the Time and the Place I. The Time It was Winter An ill time to travail and Jerusalem was a very long journey from Capernaum the place of Christs habitation And the Evangelist seems to have added this circumstance the rather that we might look upon his presence there as the more remarkable II. It is said that Christ was at this Feast at Jerusalem whereas he might have kept it in his own Town For although indeed the three Festivals that God had appointed by Moses Passover Pentecost and of Tabernacles required mens personal appearance at Jerusalem yet the two Feastâ— that were ordained afterwards Purim and Dedication as the Jews Records tell us might be kept at their own homes III. And that which was the main thing indeed this Feast was not ordained either by the immediate appointment of God as those three were to Moses nor was there then any Prophet in those times that by Divine Warrant could authorize its institution but it was only of a Civil and Ecclesiastical Sanction appointed by the Higher Powers in that Generation As our fift of November is indeed of Religious observation and yet but only of Humane Institution These reasons might have kept Christ from going up to Jerusalem at this Feast and yet you see that he is there From whence I Observe and on which I shall
what 358 Council of the Jews of what Authority in the time of Christ of its place of residence and what sort and number of Men it was compounded of p. 248 to 251. The Council of the Jews transgressed many of their own Canons in Judging Jesus Christ. p. 263. Council used for Sanhedrin 355 Courses of the Priests in the second Temple did something differ from those in the first p. 377. Course of Abiah what p. 377. How many Courses were there and what were their turns in which they did Circulate p. 377 378 379 380. Stationary Men among the Courses what 378 Court of the Gentiles among the Jewish Writers is ordinarlly called the Mountain of the House those that were unclean might enter into this p. 28 29. The Gates of it 29 Court of the Women its dimensions situation Gates and parts 29 30 Court of the Temple its parts its length and breadth 32 33 Courts of Judicature there were three in the Temple 395 Coins some of the Jews Coins of the smaller value mentioned 142 Creation God created all things in six days and why not in a moment p. 1322. The World was created in September p. 1322 c. A new Creation or Redemption was performed on the day Adam was created p. 1315. Creation and Resurrection of Christ whether the greater work 1330 Creature all Creatures or every Creature a speech common among the Jews by which is understood all Men or all Nations but especially the Gentiles 359 360 1149 Criminals capital Criminals if Israelites were not Judged by the Sanhedrin with the Reasons why p. 611 to 614. The Sanhedrin gave to Jewish criminals a full hearing even after sentence if they themselves or any other had any thing to say for them p. 675. They were buried in differing places from other Men and had the Stone Wood Sword or Rope wherewith they were executed buried with them 676 Cruelty of the Jews great most barbarously destroying two hundred and twenty thousand Greeks and Romans at one time feeding on their flesh eating their bowels besmearing themselves with their blood and covering themselves with their skins c. p. 686 c. They also in Egypt and Cyprus destroyed two hundred and forty thousand Men in a most barbarous manner p. 686 687. Cruelty or slaughter prodigious in the East Indies 1295 Cup that Cup which Christ used was mixed with water 777 Cup in the Sacrament is not only the sign of the Blood of Christ and a Seal as a Sacrament but the very Sanction of the New Testament 778 Curses in the Old Testament the Jews applied to the Gentiles not to themselves 535 Cursing and Blessing how practised among the Jews 136 Custom of the Jews in praying what p. 1139. They said not Amen in the Temple but in Houses and in Synagogues p. 1139. What they said by way of response in the Temple 1139 Cutheans were Israelites and very exact in the Jewish worship c. 52 53 Cuthites and their Kingdom what p. 496. Cuthites for the Samaritans and whence p. 503. How far their Victuals were lawful to the Jews p. 538. What dealings the Jews might have or not have with them these Cuthites here spoken of were Samaritans 539 Cutting off in Scripture doth not intend Excommunication but the Divine Vengeance 142 Cymbal and tinkling Cymbal were two Balls of brass struck one against another 782 D. DAlmanutha what and whence the Name Page 307 309 310 Damascus spoke to as the scene of Paul's conversion 682 Damned it is impossible Christ should suffer the torments of Hell or be in the case of the damned p. 1350. The Damned not tormented under Ground 1342 Dan why not named among the sealed of the twelve Tribes Rev. 7. 1067 Dancing one way of expressing joy 196 Daniel how he came to scape when Nebucadnezzer's Image was set up as say the Jews 657 Daphne and Riblah the same Josephus mentions another Daphne 62 to 64 David put for the Messias 691 Day of the Lord Christ's coming in Glory and in the Clouds signifie only Christ's taking vengeance on the Jewish Nation p. 244 624. The Son cometh was exprest to be the same 245 Day of Judgment and Day of Vengeance put for Christ's coming with Vengeance to judge the Jewish Nation there are six differing ways of expressing it 346 Days of the week how reckoned by the Jews by the name of first and second c. of the Sabbath p. 274. The third Day much taken notice of by the Rabbins 481 Days of the Messias and the World to come sometimes distinguished sometimes confounded 743 Daemons Angels and Spirits distinguished among the Jews 483 Deacons there were three Deacons or Almoners in the Jews Synagogues 132 134 662 Dead what mourning was used for the Dead also what feasting and company p. 173. The Dead live in another World p. 230 231. The Jews had an opinion that the Dead did discourse one among another and also with those that were alive p. 457. Mourning for the Dead the way and method of it The Jews used to comfort the Mourners both in the way and at home p. 581 582. The washing used after touching a dead Body what p. 790. Praying for the dead founded by the Rhemists on that Text 1 John 5. 16. refuted 1094 Deaf and Dumb unfit to sacrifice c. 210 384 Death looks awakening and terrible upon the most Moral and Learned Men p. 16. Four kinds of Death were delivered into the Hands of the Sanhedrin p. 683. They are continued say the Jewish Writers by a Divine Hand now the Sanhedrin is ceased p. 705. Death what it is p. 1353. Why do Men dye i. e. why are they not removed Soul and Body into the other World without any more ado p. 1354. The difficulty of the Soul and Bodies parting at death 1354 Death of sin God stints the time of Mens rising from it which slipped is not to be retrieved 1238 1239 Decapolis the Region of it not well placed 314 Deciarii were one sort of Publicans 466 Dedication the Feast of it why called by the name of Lights 576 577. The Feast of Dedication is mentioned but once in all the Scripture and that only by bare naming of it in John 10. 22. p. 1033. The Original institution of this Feast of Dedication collected out of the Talmud Maimonides Josephus and the first Book of Maccabes p. 1035. It was kept on the twenty fifth day of the Month Cisâ—en or November p. 1035. Dedication the strange custom of lighting up of Candles therein used 1039 Defendant and Plaintif chose their Judges c. among the Jews 755 Degree and Pomp of the World countervail nothing with God 1210 1211 1212 Demoniacks why so many in Christs time more than at other times Page 175 Denarius and Luz were of the same value amongst the Rabbins 343 c. Dens and Caves vastly large and very numerous in the Land of Israel many of these were digged out of Mountains and Rocks by the
permitting and practising to swear by the Temple ver 16. came into a common custom Juchas fol. 50. col 1. Baba ben Bota swear by the Temple and so did Rabban Simeon ben Gamaliel and this was a custom in Israel Their tithing mint annise and cummin ver 23. explained in the Talmudick treatises Demai whited Sepulchers ver 27. Shekalim per. 1. halac 1. In the month Adar they whited the Sepulchers And the reason is given by the Gemarists that people hereby might have the better discovery of them the better to avoid defilement by them which well observed sets on Christs invective against these wretches the more Gemar utriusq Talm. in loc Jerus in Maasar Sheni fol. 55. 3. Their decking of Sepulchers in honour of those that lay in them ver 29. handled in Jerus in Moed Katon fol. 80. col 3. 4. He concludeth his speech with the intimation of what shame and guilt lay upon them for the blood of the former Prophets slain by their Fathers filled up by their own wickedness in persecuting those that he did or should send to them He calleth them Serpents from Gen. 3. 15. and teacheth us to look upon them as the seed of the Serpent in an eminent degree if any degree of that nature may be called eminent He dooms all the Prophets blood to be required of that generation because they by their transcendent abuse of those whom God sent even of Messias himself did justifie and exceed all the evil their Fathers had done against the Prophets Yea all the blood shed before the blood of Zacharias and his though they held that to have been satisfied for by the destruction slaughter and captivity by the Babylonians Jerus in Taanith fol. 69. col 2. He changeth the name of his Father and so doth Targ. in Lament cap. 2. ver 20. And concludes with a sad denunciation of destruction and that they should no more see him till they should say blessed be he that cometh in the name of the Lord which very words he had uttered also a great while before this Luke 13. 34 35. and the multitude had said Blessed be he that cometh c. when he rode into Jerusalem upon an Ass. But the same words now uttered by him are of somewhat doubtful interpretation whether they mean their no more seeing of him till the night and time of the Passover for at the Paschal meal every company rehearsed this saying Blessed be he that cometh c. in their great Hallel as they called it or that they should no more see him at all because they had not learned to entertain him as coming from God See Joh. 5. 43. SECTION LXXVIII MARK Chap. XII Ver. 41 42 43 44. LUKE Chap. XXI Ver. 1 2 3 4. The poor Widows Mites THE Jews before their prayers in the Temple or their Synagogues used to give something by way of alms of offering that Charity and piety might go together Maym. in Mattanath Anijim per. 6. Now in the Court of the Women at the Temple as we have observed elsewhere in the discription of that place there were several chests which the Jews call Shoperoth into which the people put the money they offered some to buy one thing for the service of the Temple some another c. SECTION LXXIX MATTH Chap. XXIV all the Chapter MARK Chap. XIII all the Chapter LUKE Chap. XXI from Ver. 5. to the end of the Chapter And after these MATTH Chap. XXV all the Chapter CHRIST foretelleth the destruction of Jerusalem the signs and miseries preceeding and accompanying it THe Talmud tells us that there was a place upon mount Olivet just in the face of the Temple where the Priest slew and burnt the red Cow into the ashes of purification and as he sprinkled the blood he looked directly upon the Temple door Middoth per. 1. c. This was the last Sermon that Christ made upon mount Olivet and he makes it as he sits upon that mount just facing the Temple Matth. 24. 3. And that text that he had taken in tears but two or three days ago weeping over the City and foretelling the destruction of it Luke 19. 44. he now preacheth upon at large declaring the misery and foreshewing the forerunners of that destruction The aim of his speech or to what time and purpose it refers may be discerned by the question of the Disciples to which it is an answer When shall these things be viz. that one stone of the Temple shall not be left upon another Mark 13. 4. Luke 21. 7. and so it relates plainly to the destruction of the Temple and City But Matthew hath added And what shall be the sign of thy coming and of the end of the world from whence it is conceived by some that the speech doth aim at the end of the world and Christs last coming unto judgment It is true indeed that the close of his speech in Matth. 25. doth speak plainly of the last judgment and that many of those terrible things mentioned Matth. 24. may very well typifie the terrours of the last day but the prime and proper scope of the speech in that 24th Chapter is to set forth the destruction of Jerusalem and the rejection and misery of the Jewish nation as may be observed by these particulars 1. Because in Matth. 24. 15 16. He points directly to time and place when and where these things shall be viz. when the Temple shall be profaned then these things come c. 2. Especially consider ver 34. Verily I say unto you this generation shall not pass till all these things be fulfilled This generation not meaning Generatio Evangelica as some do harshly interpret it but as it means in Matth. 23. 36. Luke 11. 31 32. and abundance of other places in the New Testament the generation then in being 3. The destruction of Jerusalem is phrased in Scripture as the destruction of the whole world Jer. 4. 23. Isa. 65. 17. and Christ coming to her in judgment as his coming to the last judgment Matth. 17. 28. John 21. 22. Math. 19. 28. Rev. 1. 7 c. Therefore those dreadful things spoken of in ver 29 30 31. are but borrowed expressions to set forth the terrors of that judgment the more Ver. 29. The Sun shall be darkened c. shews the decay of all glory excellency and prosperity in that Nation and the coming in of all sadness misery and confusion as Isa. 13. 10. Joel 2. 10. Ver. 30. Then shall they see the sign of the Son of man c. Not any visible appearance of Christ or of the cross in the clouds as some have imagined but whereas the Jews would not own Christ before for the Son of man or for the Messias then by the vengance that he should execute upon them they and all the world should see an evident sign that he was so This therefore is called his coming and his coming in his kingdom Matth. 17. 28. because
this did first declare his power glory and victory on that nation that had despised him Ver. 31. He shall send his Angels with a great sound of a Trumpet c. that is his Ministers with the Trumpet of the Gospel to fetch in his elect from among the Gentiles when the Jews were now destroyed and cast off And the false Christs and false Prophets that should arise ver 5. 24. arose in that Nation in those last days of it as is abundantly evident both in the New Testament and in Josephus And those wars and rumors of wars and Nation rising against Nation c. ver 6 7. were accomplished not only in the horrid civil wars among the Jews but also in the great concussions in Roman Empire in the wars betwixt Otho and Vitellius and betwixt Vitellius and Vespasian of which the Roman Historians especially Tacitus is very large the like to which there had not been before even to the sacking of Rome it self and the burning of the Capitol SECTION LXXX MATTH Chap. XXVI from the beginning to Ver. 14. MARK Chap. XIV from the beginning to Ver. 10. LUKE Chap. XXII Ver. 1 2. And after these portions read JOHN Chap. XIII from the beginning to Ver. 27. CHRISTS head anointed at a supper at Bethany two nights before the Passover At the same supper he washeth his Disciples feet giveth Judas the sop and the Devil entreth into him THe proof of the proper order here will require some dispute not so much in regard of any obscurity or difficulty of the order it self but in regard of needless and groundless difficulties that are put upon it There are two strange opinions we meet with here The one is that holdeth that this supper mentioned by Matthew and Mark was the same supper which is mentioned in John 12. which was six days before the Passover And the other is that holdeth that this supper in John 13. was the Supper on the Passover night so that for the shewing and asserting of the order as we have laid it these three things are to be done First It is to be proved that the supper in John 12. and the supper in Matth. 26. and Mark 14. were not one and the same supper but two suppers at some daies distance Secondly That the supper in John 13. was not on the Passover night but before the Passover night And thirdly That the supper in John 13. was the same supper with that in Matth. 26. 6. and Mark 14. 3. two daies before the Passover First That the supper in John 12. and the supper in Matth. 26. and Mark 14. were two different suppers to which something hath been said before appears by these observations 1. The supper in John 12. was in the house of Lazarus unless we will unwarrantably strain the construction of the story but the supper in Matth. 26. and Mark 14. was in the house of Simon the Leper 2. At the supper in John 12. Christs feet were anointed but his head was anointed at the supper in Matth. 26 and Mark 14. 3. The supper in John 12. was six days before the Passover but the supper in Matth. 26. and Mark 14. was but two days before For observe Mark 14. 1. After two days was the feast of the Passover and then ver 3. And Jesus being at Bethany c. Here they that hold the opinion that we are confuting will not acknowledg the order of the Evangelists direct but say there is a dislocation so that though two days be mentioned before yet the story following was six days before the Passover But the method of Matthew and Mark hath been so direct hither through the story of Christs actions since his last coming to Jerusalem that no reason possible can be given why they should invert the order here They had punctually mentioned his actions five four three days before the Passover and now they come to speak of two days before and under that account bring in this supper and what sense or reason can there be to surmise that it was six days before They had shewed you Christ five days before the Passover at Bethany John 12. 1 12. Mark 11. 1 11. And four days before the Passover at Bethany Mark 11. 12 15 19 20. And three days before the Passover at Bethany Mark 11. 20 27. and 13. 3. And then they come and speak of two days before the Passover and they speak also of Christs being at Bethany and yet would the opinion under confutation apply the reckoning of the two days only to point at the high-Priests assembling and Christs being at Bethany to be jumped backward over all the story before even to beyond Matth. 21. Mark 11. An opinion that by its improbability is confutation enough to it self A second thing to be cleared is that the supper in John 13. was not on the Passover night but before which may be evidenced by these arguments instead of more 1. Because John saith expresly ver 1. that it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before the festival of the Passover for so the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 constantly signifies not the meal of the Paschal as some would construe it here but the whole festival 2. The Disciples when Jesus said to Judas What thou doest do quickly though he spake about buying something against the feast ver 29. by which it appears that the feast was not yet come Thirdly Luke sheweth that the entring of Satan into Judas which was at the supper John 13. was before the Passover day came for observe his order Luke 22. 3. Then entred Satan into Judas and he went and communed with the chief Priests c. and then ver 7. Then came the day of unleavened bread Upon all which considerations it is apparent that this supper in John 13. at which Satan entred into Judas whereupon he went and compacted for his Masters betraying was not on the Passover night but some space before the Passover day came There is indeed a passage in John 13. 38. which may seem to bring that supper to the Passover night which is when Christ saith at the supper to Peter The Cock shall not crow till thou hast denied me thrice which seemeth to carry it as if this supper were on that very night when Peter denied him For answer to which let it be observed 1. That Peter denied Christ but once before the Cock crew Mark 14. 68 69 70. and it will teach us to expound the words of Christ John 13. 38. and Matth. 26. 24. not as meaning that he should deny him three times over before any Cock crew but that he should deny him thrice in the time of Cocks crowing which time was a fourth part of the night Mark 13. 34. And that it meaneth in such a sense is yet more apparent by Mark 14. 30. where he utters it The Cock shall not crow twice 2. Let it be observed that in John 13. 38. it is only said The Cock shall not crow
at the mountain where he had appointed them The two times that he had appeared to them before this this Evangelist giveth account of before namely one time when Thomas was not present and another time when he was After dinner he putteth Peter to a threefold confession answerable to his threefold denial and foretelleth his Martyrdom but telleth that John should live till he should come meaning in that sense as his coming and coming in glory is oft used in the Gospel namely his coming to take vengeance of the unbelieving Jewish Nation Peter should be Martyred by them but John should live to see them receive their deserts SECTION XCII MATTH Chap. XXVIII from Ver. 16. to the end MARK Chap. XVI Ver. 15 16 17 18. LUKE Chap. XXIV Ver. 49. A sixth appearing at the mountain in Galilee to all the eleven and 500 more HIs appointing them into Galilee to such a mount it is like to that mount near Capernaum where he had chosen the Apostles and made his Sermon Matth. 5. was not barely to appear to the eleven for that had he done before and that could he have done at Jerusalem but it was an intended meeting not only with the eleven but with the whole multitude of his Galilean and other Disciples and therefore he published this appointment so oft before and after his Resurrection and we cannot so properly understand his being seen of above five hundred brethren at once of which the Apostle speaketh 1 Cor. 15. 6. of any other time and place as of this He had appointed the place and the concourse argueth that he had appointed the time too or at least this concourse waited at the place till his time should come And here may we conceive that he kept the Lords day or the first day of the week for the Christian Sabbath with this multitude of his Disciples revealing himself clearly to them and preaching to them of the things that concerned the Kingdom of God Particularly he gives command and commission to go and Disciple all Nations For whereas hitherto he had confined them to preach only to Israel now must they preach to every creature Mark 16. 15. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 See Colos. 1. 23. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the Jews ordinary language that is to all men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Solomon in his Proverbs makes known Theory and Practice to the creatures Kafvenaki in Prov. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He causeth the Holy Ghost to dwell upon the Creatures Midr. Til. in Psal. 135. Nimrod made Idols 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and caused the creatures to erre Tanch fol. 8. 4. The Lord requires that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the creatures should pray before him Id. fol. 16. 4. In which and an hundred other instances that might be given the word Creatures signifieth only Men and their charge and commission to preach the Gospel to every creature means to all men the Gentiles as well as the Jews Warrant then and charge is given for the fetching of them in the great Mystery Ephes. 3. 4 6. who had lain subject to vanity of Idolatry and under the bondage of all manner of corruption ever since their casting off at Babel 2203 years ago They had been taught of the devil his oracles and delusions c. but now they must all be taught of God Isa. 54. 13. by the preaching of the Gospel They had in some few numbers in this space been taught by Israel to know the Lord and proselyted into their Religion but now such proselyting should not need for all must come to the knowledge of God Heb. 8. 11. the Gospel carrying the knowledge of him and it being carried through all Nations Those of them that had come into the Church of Israel and the true Religion had been inducted and sealed into it by being baptized Talm. in Jebam per. 4. c. And so that proselyte Sacrament as I may so call it must be carried and continued among all Nations as a badge of homage and subjection to Christ to whom all power is given in Heaven and earth and of the profession of the true God The Father Son and Holy Ghost against all false Gods and false worship Infants born of Christian Parents are to bear this badge though when they undertake it they understand not what they do because none in Christian Families should continue without the note of homage to Christs soveraignty and this distinctive mark against Hethenism that worshippeth false Gods as no male among Israel after eight daies old must be without the badge of Circumcision Discipling was not of persons already taught but to that end that they should be taught and if the Disciples understood this word in Christs command after any other sense it was different from the sense of the word which the Nation had ever used and only used For in their Schools a person was made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Scholar or Disciple when he gave in himself to such a Master to be taught and trained up by him and in the Discipling of Proselytes to the Jews Religion it was of the very like tenour That sense therefore that many put upon these words viz. that none are to be baptized but those that are throughly taught is such a one as the Apostles and all the Jewish Nation had never known or heard of before That wretched and horrid opinion that denieth the Godhead of Christ and the Godhead of the Holy Ghost little observeth or at least will not see why the administration of Baptism among the Gentiles must be in the Name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost whereas among the Jews it was only in the Name of Jesus Act. 2. 38. namely for this reason that as by that among the Jews Jesus was to be professed for the true Messias against all other so by this among the Gentiles who had worshipped false Gods The Father Son and holy Ghost should be professed the only true God And it would be but a wild as well as an irreligious Paraphrase that that opinion would make of this passage Go preach the Gospel to every Creature and Baptize them in the Name of the Son a Creature and the holy Ghost a Creature He promiseth the miraculous gifts of the holy Ghost to them that should believe not to all but to some for the confirmation of the Doctrine and chargeth the Disciples to return to Jerusalem and there to stay till he should pour down the holy Ghost upon them to inable them for this Ministry among all Nations to which he had designed them Mark and Luke do briefly add the story of his ascension because they will dispatch his whole story but that is related more amply Act. 1. A seventh appearing To Iames. After the appearing to above five hundred Brethren at once which we suppose and not without ground to have been that last mentioned the Apostle relateth that he was seen of James 1 Cor. 15. 7. and then of all
by the plague the vengeance upon the fornicators with Baal Peor REVEL CHAP. IV V. NOW cometh a second vision That before was of things then being see Chap. 1. 19. but this and forward of things to come Chap. 4. 1. A door open in Heaven and the voice of a trumpet talking with John out of it The scene of Johns visions said to be in Heaven is according to the scheme of the Temple and the Divine glory there And hence you have mention of the Altar Candlesticks Sea of Glass the brazen laver made of the Womens looking Glasses the Ark of the Covenant and the like And as at the opening of the Temple doors a Trumpet sounded so is the allusion here The door in Heaven opened and a Trumpet calls John to come in and see what there And immediately he was in the Spirit ver 2. Why Was he not in the Spirit before Chap. 1. 10. and was he not in the Spirit in seeing the door in Heaven opened c. But we may observe a double degree in rapture as inspired men may be considered under a double notion viz. Those that were inspired with Prophesie or to be Prophets and to preach and those that were inspired to be Penmen of Divine Writ which was higher John hath both inspirations or revelations to both ends both in the Vision before and this then he was in the Spirit and saw the vision and was in the Spirit and inspired to pen what he saw and what to be sent to the Churches And in the first verse of this Chapter he is in the Spirit or hath a revelation and in ver 2. he is in the Spirit he is inspired so as to take impression and remembrance of these things to write them also He seeth Christ inthroned in the middle of his Church in the same Prophetick and visionary Embleme that Ezekiel had seen Ezek. 1. 10. and this is a commentary and fulfilling of that scene that Daniel speaketh of Dan. 7. 9 10 22. In Ezekiel the Lord when Jerusalem was now to be destroyed and the glory of the Lord that used to be there and the people were to flit into another Land appeareth so inthroned as sitting in Judgment and flitting away by degrees to another place as compare Ezek. 1. 10. well together So Christ here when the destruction of Jerusalem was now near at hand and his glory and presence to remove from that Nation now given up to unbelief and obduration to reside among the Gentiles he is seated upon his throne as Judge and King with glorious attendance to judge that Nation for their sins and unbelief and stating the affairs of his Church whither his glory was now removing The scheme is platformed according to the model of Israels Camp 1. The Tabernacle was in the middle there so is the throne here 2. There the four squadrons of the Camp of Levi next the Tabernacle so here the four living creatures 3. Then the whole Camp of Israel so here twenty four Elders Representatives of the whole Church built from twelve Tribes and twelve Apostles In the hand of him that sate on the Throne was a Book sealed which no creature could open This justly calls us back to Dan. 12. ver 4. Where words are shut up and a Book sealed unto the time of the end and now that that is near drawing on the Book is here opened REVEL CHAP. VI. THE opening of the six Seals in this Chapter speaks the ruine and rejection of the Jewish Nation and the desolation of their City which is now very near at hand The first Seal opened ver 2. shews Christ setting forth in Battel array and avengement against them as Psal. 45. 4 5. And this the New Testament speaketh very much and very highly of one while calling it his coming in clouds another while his coming in his Kingdom and sometime his coming in Power and great Glory and the like Because his plagueing and destroying of the Nation that crucisied him that so much opposed and wrought mischief against the Gospel was the first evidence that he gave in sight of all the world of his being Christ for till then he and his Gospel had been in humility as I may say as to the eyes of men he persecuted whilest he was on Earth and they persecuted after him and no course taken with them that so used both but now he awakes shews himself and makes himself known by the Judgement that he executeth The three next Seals opening shew the means by which he did destroy namely those three sad plagues that had been threatned so oft and so sore by the Prophets Sword Famine and Pestilence For The second Seal opened sends out one upon a red Horse to take Peace from the Earth and that men should destroy one another he carried a great Sword ver 4. The third Seals opening speaks of Famine when Corn for scarcity should be weighed like spicery in a pair of ballances ver 5 6. The fourth Seal sends out one on a pale Horse whose name was Death the Chaldee very often expresseth the Plague or Pestilence by that word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so it is to be taken Revel 2. 22. and Hell or Hades comes after him ver 8. The opening of the fifth Seal reveals a main cause of the vengeance namely the blood of the Saints which had been shed crying and which was to be required of that generation Matth. 23. 35 36. These souls are said to cry from under the Altar either in allusion to the blood of creatures sacrificed poured at the foot of the Altar or according to the Jews tenet That all just souls departed are under the Throne of Glory Answer to their cry is given that the number of their Brethren that were to be slain was not yet fulfilled and they must rest till that should be and then avengement in their behalf should come This speaks sutable to that which we observed lately that now times were begun of bitter persecution an hour of temptation Rev. 2. 10. 3. 10. the Jews and Devil raging till the Lord should something cool that fury by the ruine of that people The opening of the sixth Seal ver 12 13. shews the destruction it self in those borrowed terms that the Scripture useth to express it by namely as if it were the destruction of the whole world as Matth. 24. 29 30. The Sun darkned the Stars falling the Heaven departing and the Earth dissolved and that conclusion ver 16. They shall say to the rocks fall on us c. doth not only warrant but even inforce us to understand and construe these things in the sense that we do for Christ applies these very words to the very same thing Luke 23. 30. And here is another and to me a very satisfactory reason why to place the shewing of these visions to John and his writing of this Book before the desolation of Jerusalem REVEL CHAP. VII IN the end of the
down of Idolatry and Heathenism in the Earth till the World was become Christian and then the Papacy arising doth Heathenize it again The destruction of which is set down vers 9. by fire from Heaven in allusion to Sodom or 2 King 1. 10 12. and it is set close to the end of the World the Devil and the Beast Rome imperial and the false Prophet Rome Papal are cast into fire and brimstone vers 10. where John speaks so as to shew his method which we have spoken of The Devil was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where the Beast and the false Prophet are He had given the story of the beast and false Prophet the Devils agents and what became of them Chap. 19. vers 20. And now the story of the Devil himself for it was not possible to handle these two stories but apart and now he brings the confusion of all the three together and the confusion of all with them that bare their mark and whose names were not written in the Book of life REVEL CHAP. XXI THE Jerusalem from above described The phrase is used by Paul Gal. 4. 26. and it is used often by the Jews Zohar fol. 120. col 478. Rabbi Aba saith Luz is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Jerusalem which is above which the holy blessed God gives for a possession where blessings are given by his hand in a pure Land but to an impure Land no blessings to be at all Compare Revel 21. 27 22. 15. Midras Till in Psal. 122. Jerusalem is built as a City that is compact together R. Jochanan saith The holy blessed God said I will not go into Jerusalem that is above until I have gone into Jerusalem that is below c. Ezekiels Jerusalem as we observed was of a double signification namely as promising the rebuilding of the City after the Captivity and foretelling of the spiritual Jerusalem the Church under the Gospel and that most especially At that John taketh at here and that is the Jerusalem that he describeth And from Isa. 65. 17 18. joyneth the creating new Heavens and a new Earth and so stateth the time of building this new Jerusalem namely at the coming in of the Gospel when all things are made new 2 Cor. 5. 17. A new People new Ordinances new Oeconomy and the old World of Israel dissolved Though the description of this new City be placed last in the Book yet the building of it was contemporary with the first things mentioned in it about the calling of the Gentiles When God pitched his Tabernacle amongst theâ—â— as he had done in the midst of Israel Levit. 26. 11 12. That Tabernacle is pitched in the fourth and fifth Chapters of this Book And now all tears wiped away and no more sorrow death nor pain vers 4. which if taken litterally could refer to nothing but the happy estate in Heaven of which the glory of this Jerusalem may indeed be a figure but here as the other things are it is to be taken mystically or spiritually to mean the taking away the curse of the Law and the sting of death and sin c. No condemnation to be to those that are in Christ Jesus The passages in describing the City are all in the Prophets phrase Ezekiel and Isaiah as compare these The Bride the Lambs wife vers 9. Sing O barren Heathen that didst not bear c. Thy Maker is thine Husband thy Redeemer c. Isa. 54. 1 5. Vers. 10. He carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain Compare Ezek. 40. 2. That great City holy Jerusalem c. This refers to great dimensions of Ezekiels Jerusalem as also to the squareness the three gates of a side c. The glory of it described from thence and from Isa. 58. 8. 60. 2 3. 54. 11 12 c. The wall of it twelve thousand furlongs square or fifteen hundred miles upon every quarter East West North and South three thousand miles about and fifteen hundred miles high Wall of salvation Isa 26. 1. 60. 14. The foundations of the walls garnished with twelve precious stones see Isa. 54. 11. as the stones in the Ephod or holy Breastplate three upon every side as these were three and three in a row The first foundation stone here is the Jaspar the stone of Benjamin for Pauls sake the great agent about this building of the Church of the Gentiles The Jerus Talmud in Peah fol. 15. col 3. saith expresly that the Jaspar was Benjamins stone for it saith Benjamins Jaspar was once lost out of the Ephod and they said Who is there that hath another as good as it Some said Damah the son of Nethina hath one c. And I saw no Temple therein c. vers 22. here this Jerusalem differs from Ezekiels that had a Temple this none and it is observable there that the platform of the Temple is much of the measures and fashion that the second Temple was of but the City of a compass larger then all the Land which helpeth to clear what was said before of the double significancy of those things they promised them an earthly Temple which was built by Zerobabel but foretold a heavenly Jerusalem which is described here REVEL CHAP. XXII FROM Ezekiel Chap. 47. and from several passages of Scripture besides John doth still magnifie the glory happiness and holiness of the new Jerusalem Lively waters of clear Doctrine teaching Christ and life by him flowing through it continually Ezek. 7. 1 9. Cant. 4. 15. The Tree of Life lost to Adam and Paradise shut up against him to keep him from it here restored Then a curse here There shall be curse no more vers 3. See Zech. 14. 11. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Anathema non erit amplius c. He concludeth These sayings are faithful and true so he had said before at the marriage of the Lamb Chap. 19. 9. and again at his beginning of the story of the new Jerusalem Chap. 21. 5. referring to the several Prophesies that had been of these things and now all those sayings and Prophesies were come home in truth and faithfulness He is commanded not to seal his Book as Daniel was Dan. 12. 4. because the time of these things was instantly beginning and Christs coming to reveal his glory in avengement upon the Jewish Nation and casting them off and to take in the Gentiles in their stead was now at the door within three and an half or thereabout to come if we have conjectured the writing of this Book to its proper year There are two years more of Nero and one of confusion in the Roman Empire in the Wars of Otho Vitellius and Vespasian and the next year after Jerusalem falls And thus if this Book of the Revelation were written last of the Books of the New Testament as by the consent of all it was then may we say Now was the whole will of God revealed and committed to writing and from
Hillel Out of which as they relate there came thousands of Scholars but fourscore especially of most renown Hillel the old they are the words of the Talmud had fourscore Scholars Thirty of them were fit in whom the divine Majesty should rest as it did on Moses Thirty of them were worthy for whom the Sun should stand still as it did for Joshua and twenty were of a middle rank between The greatest of them all was Jonathan ben Uzziel that Paraphrased the Prophets in the Chaldee Tongue and the lowest of them was Johannan the son of Zaccai Such a Father had this our Simeon and so renowned but himself infinitely more renowned in the thing that is now in hand and in his having the Saviour of the world in his arms and heart Now this is the Genealogy of this man as it is Recorded by the Jews themselves Hillel begat Simeon who was first titled Rabban Rabban Simeon begat Rabban Gamaliel the Tutor of Paul Rabban Gamaliel begat Rabban Simeon the second Rabban Simeon the second begat Rabban Gamaliel the second Rabban Gamaliel begat Rabban Simeon the third Rabban Simeon the third begat Rabbi Juda the holy Rabbi Juda begat Rabban Gamaliel the third These six Rabbans were of the line of Hillel besides whom there was a seventh that bare the same title of another stock Rabban Johanan ben Zaccai But it may be justly questioned if Simeon were the man we suppose namely the Son of Hillel and the Father of Gamaliel and if he were so holy and devout a man and confessed Christ as this Evangelist relateth of him how came it to pass that his Son Gamaliel was so far contrary as appeareth by the education of Paul in Pharisaical righteousness and persecution of the Truth Answ. First It is no strange thing for holy Fathers to have wicked Children witness Eli David Josaphat and common experience Secondly It was thirty years from Simeons acknowledging of Christ to Gamaliels education of Paul or little less and so much time might wear out the notice of his Fathers action if he had taken any notice of it especially his Father dying shortly after he had made so glorious a confession §. Waiting for the consolation of Israel It is an Article of the Jewish Creed To believe the coming of the Messias and to wait and wait for his coming although he defer it which foolishly they do even to this day after sixteen hundred years expired since he came But Simeons expectation is neither so vain nor so uncertain For besides the general expectation of the whole Nation that the Messias should appear about that time Luke 19. 11. he had it by a special and assured revelation ver 26. The coming of Christ is called The consolation of Israel from Isa. 49. 13. 52. 9. 66. 13. Jer. 31. 13. Zech. 1. 17. and such like places which the Jews do not only apply to the coming of the Messias but also in their Talmud questioning what his name should be when as he came some conclude it to be Menahem The Comforter from Lam. 1. 16. In Sanhedr Ver. 26. That he should not see * * * * * * As Psal. 89. 48 and to see corruption Psal. 16. 10. death before he had seen the Lords Christ. This was the time when the Nation expected that Messias should appear Luke 19. 11. and began to look for redemption near at hand Luke 2. 38. The Angel Gabriel to Daniel and he to the people had so determinately pointed out the time Dan. 9. 26 27. that not only Jews of all Nations are gathered to Jerusalem against the expiring of that Prophesie Act. 2. but also all the East was possessed with an opinion of a Prince to rise about these times of supereminent honour glory and dominion Baron in Appar c. Sueton. Virgil c. Simeon having learned the time with the rest of the studious of the Nation out of the Scripture hath the certainty of it sealed up to him by the spirit of Prophesie which assured him that the time of so great expectation was so near at hand that he though he were old yet should not die till he had seen what he desired And thus Prophesie that was departed from Israel so long ago is returning and dawning to it again to be as the morning Star to tell that the Sun of righteousness would rise ere long Ver. 35. Yea a sword shall pierce through thine own soul also These words seem to be of the same tenor and intent with those of our Saviour to Peter Joh. 21. 18. and to tell Mary of her suffering martyrdom for Christ and the Gospel as those do of his For Simeon having in the preceding verse related how Christ both in his person and in the Gospel should be as a sign to be spoken against persecuted and opposed yea saith he and thou his Mother also for his and the Gospels sake shalt drink of the same cup and partake of the same lot for the sword of persecution shall go through thy life also for so the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth often signifie §. That the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed This clause is linked to the latter end of the verse preceding and reacheth beyond the Parenthesis that lieth before it and in conjuncture with the clause before that it maketh this sense that Christs being set up for a sign to be spoken against or persecution for the Gospels sake should detect many mens tempers and affections which were not descried nor revealed before and discover what malignity or sincerity to him and to his cause is in their hearts as Matth. 13. 21. and as it is at this day Vers. 36. The daughter of Phanuel of the Tribe of Aser Hannah a Widdow indeed as 1 Tim. 5. 3 5. that is not by divorce but by the death of her husband and now of above an hundred years of age is chosen also and actuated by the Holy Ghost to give testimony of Christ as Simeon had done that out of the mouth of two such witnesses of either sex one the thing might be established and the party witnessed unto might be the more taken notice of Her Father Phanuel is named as either being a noted and well known man in those times or for the significancy of his name made good in her in that she now beholdeth the Lord face to face as Gen. 32. 30 31. And thus the New Testament doth by this Prophetess as the Old Testament doth by divers of the Prophets in naming her and her Father with her as Isa. 1. 1. Jer. 1. 1. Joel 1. 1. c. Phanuel her Father was a Galilean for in Galilee lay the Tribe of Aser and from thence cometh a Prophetess now to declare and publish the great Prophet that must once appear thence to the wonder of the Nation Ver. 37. Which departed not from the Temple Her constant continuance there might be either because she was a poor Widow and so
Heaven fol. 66. So that in these mens Dictionary The phrase of The Kingdom of Heaven did signifie mainly the height zeal and strictness of their devotions joined with punctual Ceremoniousness and Phylactery rites Zohar shall be our Lexicon for conclusion What is the yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven saith he But as they put a yoke upon an Ox at first to produce by him benefit to the world and if he take not the yoke upon him he is unserviceable so also it behoveth a man to take upon him the yoke at first and afterward to serve with it in every thing that is needful and if he take not the yoke upon him he cannot be serviceable As it is said Serve the Lord in fear what meaneth in fear Why what is written The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom And this is the Kingdom of Heaven Zohar in Levit. fol. 53. But in the language of the Jews in the Gospel and in some of their writers elsewhere also The Kingdom of Heaven signifieth the days of the Messias and the glorious times and their Religion and condition that they expected would be then When he should restore the Kingdom of the house of David to its old glory and build the Temple and bring home all the dispersed of Israel and Israel should be at rest from the Kingdom of wickedness to study the Law and the Commandments without disquieture Maym. in Melachim per. 11. and in Teshubah per. 9. See these places and passages expounding plainly the phrase of the days of Messias both in the construction of the Jews and also of Christ and the Gospel it self John Baptist preached saying The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand Matth. 3. 2. So did Christ Matth. 4. 17. and so he bad his Disciples to do Matth. 10. 17. by which was meant no other thing but the time was near when the Son of man should be revealed for so our Saviour himself doth interpret it Matth. 16. 23. Luke 16. 16. The Law and the Prophets were till John but from that time forward the Kingdom of God was preached which John himself expounded thus That Christ should be manifest to Israel therefore came I baptizing with water Joh. 1. 31. Luke 17. 20 21. The Pharisees asked him when the Kingdom of God should come And Jesus answered the Kingdom of God is among you Which in the next verse after is uttered by The days of the Son of man Luke 9. 27. There be some standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the Kingdom of God which Matthew utters till they see the Son of man come in his Kingdom Mark 16. 28. Matth. 21. 31. Publicans and Harlots go into the Kingdom of God before you and the next verse gives this reason because they believed not John from whom the Kingdom of God began to be preached and by whom the Messiah was pointed out Matth. 21. 43. The Kingdom of God shall be taken from you And the reason is given in the verse before because they refused the corner stone when he was among them to which the gloss is agreeable that R. Solomon maketh on Jer. 13. 17. My soul shall weep in secret for your pride that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because of the glory of the Kingdom of Heaven which shall be given to Idols or to the Idolatrous Heathen And of the days and revealing of the Messias which the Nation so much looked after are those passages to be understood Luke 23. 52. Joseph of Arimathea waited for the Kingdom of God and Luke 19. 11. They thought that the Kingdom of God should shortly appear Sutable to which the Chaldee Paraphrast interprets those words Say to the Cities of Judah Behold your God Esay 40. 9. Say to the Cities of Judah The Kingdom of your God is revealed and Esay 53. 11. They shall see the Kingdom of their Messias Now although our Saviour and the Evangelists and Apostles did use the Phrase The Kingdom of God or of Heaven for the days and affairs under the Messias as well as the Jews yet in the exposition of the things of those days they do as far differ as may be For 1. The Jews looked upon the appearance and days of the Messias as things of incomparable earthly pomp royalty and gorgeousness therefore they called it the Kingdom because they expected the restoring of the earthly glory of Davids throne Act. 1. 6. Luke 24. 21. Mark 20. 20. and The Kingdom of Heavon because they imagined they should be acquitted from under the power of an earthly Kingdom For their wise men held that there should be no difference betwixt this world and the days of Messias but only the oppression of the Kingdoms Talm. in Sanhed per. 10. Maym. in Teshubah per. 9. But Christ professeth that his coming is not with observation Luke 17. 20. that his Kingdom is not of this world Joh. 18. 36. That the Kingdom of Heaven is of the poor Luke 6. 20. and to be received as by little children Mark 10. 15. c. 2. They fancied a change in matters of Religion in the time of the Messiah but all for the greater and higher pomp of Ceremonies and formal worship that the solemn Festivals Sacrifices Sprinklings observations of carnal rites should be in a higher force and esteem than ever yet that their study and practise of the Law according to such a carnal manner should be incomparable both for zeal and diligence And that there should be a punctual exactness in all formalities about meats and drinks converse and worship But the Gospel tells that no coming into the Kingdom of Heaven unless their righteousness exceed this Pharisaical righteousness Matth. 5. 20. That the worship of God was to be in the spirit Joh. 4. 23 24. And that the Kingdom of God is not meat and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost Rom. 14. 17. 3. They conceited that the happiness of the days of the Messias shall be appropriated only to them of that Nation and that the Heathens should have no share nor interest in that felicity But the Gospel tells that there should come from East and West and North and South and sit down in the Kingdom of God Luke 13. 29. And that that Kingdom should be taken from them who took themselves only to be the children of the Kingdom and should be given to another Nation Mark 21. 43. 8. 11 12. The meaning therefore of this expression The Kingdom of God or Heaven which is so exceeding frequent in the New Testament in the Gospel acceptation is to this extent 1. It signifieth the revealing or appearing of Christ as is apparent by the places cited before not so much his first appearing in humane flesh or when he was born as his revealing coming and appearing in the demonstration of his power and of his being the Son of God And in reference to this matter the Kingdom of Heaven or of God is dated by
from death to life in a spiritual sense which argues that he intends the same sense here 3. In that he ascribeth reviving to his Voice here as he did there to his Word 4. Because he distinguisheth upon hearing his voice The dead shall hear it and as many as hear it shall live which is applicable a great deal more fairly to the bare and to the effectual hearing of the Gospel than to dead in corporal sense And 5. lastly Because there are so great things spoken of the calling of the Gentiles in the Scripture and of Christs work about that matter and their Heathenish condition so expresly called death and their imbracing the Gospel a resurrection that when Christ is speaking of his actings in the New Testament and useth such words as these before us we may not unproperly apply them in that sense It would have prevented many controversies and not a few errors if the Phrases the last days and the day of the Lord and the end and new Heavens and new Earth and the dead raised c. had been cautelously understood and as the Scripture means them in several places But as for the raising of the dead in the verse in hand it needeth not very much curiosity to fix it to either of those as a determinate sense since taken either way that hath been mentioned it carries a fair construction most agreeable to the truth and not very disagreeable to the scope and context Vers. 26. For as the Father hath life in himself so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself It is needless to dispute here how far the second person in the Trinity may be said to have or not to have his being of himself for the words do not consider him simply as the second person but as the Messias God and Man as is the tenour of speech all along And in this acceptation we may give the words this construction 1. That they are a Paraphrase upon the name Jehovah which betokeneth Gods eternal being in himself and his giving of being to the Creature and that they mean that as the Father is Jehovah so also hath he given to the Son the Messias that name above all names as Philip. 2. 9. to be owned and worshipped for Jehovah having life in himself as being the eternal and living God and having the disposal of life in his power as being the God of all living 2. That as the Father is the eternal and immortal God so also is the Messias and though he stand there before the Sanhedrin in humane appearance yet should he never see corruption as Psalm 16. 10. but declare himself mightily to be the Son of God and to have life in himself by his raising himself from the dead Rom. 1. 4. Being the first and last He that liveth though he died and is alive for evermore Amen and hath the Keys of Hell and death at his disposal Rev. 1. 17 18. 3. As the words before may be applied to Christs raising from the dead those that were either bodily or spiritually deceased so these are a reason and proof of that assertion because as the Father hath the absolute disposal of life in his own power so hath he given to the Messias the same disposal Vers. 27. And hath given him authority to execute Iudgment also because he is the Son of Man By this passage it is apparent in what sense our Saviour useth the term The Son and The Son of God all along this discourse namely for the Son of God as he was also the Son of Man or the Messias There hath been some scruple made as was mentioned before upon the reason given of Christs authority of Judging namely because he was the Son of Man which will be removed by rightly stating the sense of the Son of Man which we may take up in these three particulars 1. The Phrase the Son of Man may be taken to signifie simply A Man and then the words are to be understood in this sense He hath given him authority of judging because he is a man and then is the reason current and apparent under this construction First Because the Son of God humbled himself and became man for the redemption of man therefore the Lord hath given him authority to be judge of man as Phil. 2. 8 9. And secondly He hath given the Messias authority of judging because he is man that man might be judged by one in his own nature as Act. 17. 31. He hath appointed a day in which he will judge the World in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained whereof he hath given assurance unto all men in that he hath raised him from the dead 2. The title The Son of Man which our Saviour so oft applieth to himself in the Gospel doth not speak him barely A Man but it owns him as that singular and peculiar seed of the woman or Son of Man that was promised to Adam to be a repairer of ruined mankind and the destroyer of the works of Satan as the term hath been cleared before And in this construction the reason of Christs authority of judging because he was the Son of Man is yet cleared further namely because he was the Son of that promise the Heir of the world and Redeemer of mankind and Destroyer of Devils therefore the Lord did give authority to him to be Lord of the World and Judge of Men and Devils to destroy the Serpent and his seed that were his enemies and to perfect and save the holy seed that should believe in him and obey him and to do and order all things here in this world that were in tendency either to the one or the other end 3. The Messias is thus charactered in Dan. 7. 13 14. Behold one like the Son of man came with the clouds of Heaven and came to the antient of days and they brought him near before him And there was given him dominion and glory and a Kingdom that all people nations and languages should serve him Upon which words R. Saadias glosseth thus This is Messias our righteousness But is it not written concerning the Messias lowly and riding upon an Ass Because he shall come in humility and not in pomp riding upon Horses And with the Clouds of Heavens meaneth the Angels the Host of Heaven this is the abundance of greatness which the Creator shall give unto the Messias c. Our Saviour in the words that we are upon seemeth to point at those words of Daniel and whereas it was confessed by the Nation that the Son of Man there spoken of to whom all Dominion was given was the Messias he doth here plainly aver that it was himself and that all Authority and Judicature was given him because he was the Son of Man Observe how purposely he changeth expressions In ver 25. He speaketh of raising the dead by the voice of the Son of God and here of executing judgment because he is the Son
already out of the words of the verse it self to prove that the verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is to be rendred in the Indicative sense Ye search rather than Search ye these considerations may also be added for the confirmation of that construction 1. That Christ is speaking to the Doctors of the Sanhedrin the most acute diligent and curious searchers of the Scripture of all the Nation Men that made that their glory and imployment and howsoever it was their arrogancy that they thought their skill in Scripture more than indeed it was yet was their diligence and scrutinousness in it real and constant even to admiration It was exceedingly in fashion among the Nation to be great Scripture-men but especially the great Masters of the Sanhedrin were reputed as the very Foundations of the Law and pillars of instruction as Maymony stiles them in the treatise Mamrim cap. 1. And therefore it cannot be so proper to think that Christ in this clause sets them to the study of the Scripture upon which they spent all their wits and time already as confessing their studiousness in Scripture yet sheweth them how unprofitably they did it and to little purpose 2. They did exceeding copiously and accurately observe and take up the Prophesies in Scripture that were of the Messias and though they missed in expounding some particulars concerning him yet did they well enough know that the Scriptures did testifie of him abundantly 3. The word that is used 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which betokeneth a narrow search seemeth to be intended purposely to answer the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which they themselves ascribe to themselves in their unfolding of the Scriptures 4. It was their conceit that the skill and knowledge in Scripture was now in its floure and prime amongst them having been restored by Hillel who died about the twelfth year of our Saviours age even as Ezra had restored the Law when it was forgotten Juchasin fol. 55. And let us take a scantling of the rest of the Doctors now present by this testimony which is given of two of them namely of Rabban Gamaliel the old and Rabban Jochanan ben Zaccai who were both of the Sanhedrin at this time From the time that Rabban Jochanan ben Zaccai died the beauty of wisdom failed and from the time that Rabban Gamaliel the old died the glory of the Law failed c. Sotah per. 9. So that these things considered and the verse next following looked into the speech of our Saviour in these words appeareth not to be intended so much to urge them to whom he speaketh to the study of the Scripture as to speak to them in such a reproof as this for studying the Scripture they knew not how Ye search the Scriptures and they are the very things that testifie of me and Yet ye will not come unto me c. which is much to the same tenour and effect that those words are to Nicodemus Chap. 3. 10. Art thou a Master in Israel and yet knowest not these things Now in that he saith In them ye think to have eternal life he denieth not that eternal life is to be had in the Scriptures nor doth he that thinketh to have eternal life in them think amiss but yet he taxeth the Jews grounds and principles upon which they went about this matter They thought that the very study and knowledge of the things in the Scripture was available to Salvation by the very work wrought And as they thought that the people that did not know the Law were cursed Joh. 7. 48. so they reputed that they that were skilful in the Law had blessedness enough by that very thing though they went no further It were easie to shew how they placed the fruit and efficacy of all duty in opere operato even as the Romanists do about their devotions How the repeating of their Phylacteries saying over their prayers resorting to their Synagogues c. were reputed by them as enough done if they did but do the outward formal work And as concerning the bare study and knowledge of Scripture and the bare historical belief of them how far they rested in that we need go no further than to Rom. 2. 17 18 19 20. c. Jam. 2. 19. c. otherwise it might be shewed out of their own Authors copiously what was their opinion in this point In what he addeth They are they that testifie of me the Emphasis may not be passed unobserved He saith not only they testifie of me but they are they that do it as intimating that the Scriptures are the great singular and intended witnesses of Christ the fullest and the highest testimony of him as 2 Pet. 1. 19. And ye study and search them curiously saith our Saviour and they are they that do abundantly and were given purposely to testifie of me and yet ye will not come to me Ye think of having eternal life in the Scriptures now this life is only to be had by coming to me and not by the bare searching of them and yet ye will not come to me And thus doth Christ read unto us 1. The dignity of the Scriptures as his choicest witness 2. The end of them himself 3. Their work to bring men to him 4. And 4. the fruit of all Eternal Life Vers. 41. I receive not honour from men He had said that he received not testimony from men before verse 34. and now he speaketh of another matter He had copiously asserted himself for the Messias in the former part of his speech and had shewed what Divine testimony he had that asserted the same in the latter part and now he cometh to shew the end and manner of his actings and demeanor namely not to receive honour from men or that he might be glorified with any worldly glory but that he might seek the glory of God and the glory which is of God only as the 43 44 verses help to explain his speech here In verse 43. he saith he came not in his own Name but in his Fathers and that doth teach us to construe the words that we are upon That therefore he sought not to magnifie his own Name with any humane or mundane honour but that he sought Gods glory And in verse 44. he opposeth seeking honour from men and the glory which is from God as things contrary and inconsistent and therefore when he saith here I receive not honour from men he disclaimeth all humane glory and ambition though he had spoken of his equal power and dignity with the Father before and of the high testimony that was of him And he may be conceived to speak this the rather 1. Because of the conceptions that the Nation had of the Messias coming in an earthly pomp and glory And 2. because of his words that he had spoken immediately before And ye will not come to me c. which he would clear from any carnal or ambitious sense which might be put upon them
quarter let us take our prospect outward as we have done from the two sides we have been upon before As you stood on the middle of this wall Millo lay before you and there might you see besides the Kings stables and other buildings the Pool of Siloam and the Kings Gardens On the left hand was the descent of Acra and the buildings of Jerusalem upon it on the right hand the rising of Sion and the stairs that went up into the City and by which the King came down to Shallecheth and so into the Temple And as you rose higher was the place of the Sepulchers of Davids family and another Pool Neh. III. 15 16. CHAP. VI. The North-Gate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tedi or Tadde ON the North-side to which we are now come there was but one gate as there was but one on the East quarter which was situate just in the middle of the wall between the East and West end of it but how to give it its right-name there is some dispute a a a Misnajoth in Octavo in Midd. Some write it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Teri with r which signifieth moistness or purulency because that they of the Priests whose seed went from them by night went through this gate to bath themselves from that uncleanness But the reading of old hath been C. â—emper ibid. pag. 13. so resolved 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with d Tedi b b b Talm. Bab. Aruch or as some vowel it c c c Bâ—xâ— Talm. â—â—x Tadde that Pisk Tosaphoth ad Middoth goeth about to give its Etymology He mentions a double notation namely that either it betokens 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 obscurity and shamefac'dness because of its rare use and passage and because the Priests that had suffered Gonorrhaea by night went out through it to the Bath with some shame and dejectedness Or that the word refers to Actors or Poets and he produceth a sentence in which by its conjunction with another word it seems so to signifie for other sense I know not to put upon it The sentence is this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tragedians and Poets used it before the chief of the Captivity But what sense he would make of this Etymology I do not understand But be the notation of the word what it will the Talmud setteth two distinguishing marks upon the Gate it self for which it was singular from all the rest of the gates that we have mentioned d d d Talm. in Mid. per. 2. The first is that it had not so fair a rising Gate-house and chambers above it as the rest had but only stones laid flat over it and the battlement of the wall running upon it and no more And the other is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 e e e Ibid. pet 1. That it was not a common and ordinary passage in and out as the other Gates were but only a passage upon occasion the uselessness whereof we shall have occasion to look at again ere it be long The Mount Moriah did afford some space of ground upon this side without the Wall and compass of the Holy ground which it did upon none of the sides beside for here was built the large and goodly Tower of Antonia which we shall survey by and by whereas on every one of the other sides the incompassing Wall that closed in the Holy ground did stand near upon the very pitch and precipice of the hill So that looking about you as you stood out at this Gate this Tower Antonia stood on your left hand and spoyled your prosect on that side and you could see nothing that way but it Before you was Mount Sion and the goodly buildings of the Kings Palace and other houses upon the bending toward the East angle was the place called Ophel or Ophla the habitation of the Nethenims Neh. III. 26. and when Ophla was turned East then was there the horse-gate and water-gate before the Temple Thus lay the Mountain of the Lords House incompassed with the City round about and enclosed with a fair and high Wall which separated it from the common ground On the one side of it lay Sion the seat of the King on the other side Jerusalem the habitation of the people and the Temple and its service in the middle between even as the Ministery is in mediation betwixt God and his people That Wall that encompassed it had eight gates of goodly structure and beauteous fabrick all of one fashion save only that the North and East gates were not topped the one in height and the other in fashion as the other were At all these gates were Porters by day and at five of them were guards by night as we shall observe hereafter the access to them on the East and West was by a great ascent but facilitated by steps or causeys for the peoples ease and for the coming up of the Beasts that were to be sacrificed of which there were some that came up dayly On the South side the ascent was not so very great yet it had its rising in the like manner of access as had the other On the North what coming up there was it was more for the accommodation of the residents in the Tower Antonia than for the entrance into the Temple the North gate Tedi being of so little use as hath been spoken At any of the Gates as you passed through the entrance if self through which you went was ten cubits wide twenty cubits high and twelve cubits over six of which cubits were without the Holy ground and six within and as you entred in at the East gate had you seen the ground before any buildings were set in it or any thing done to it but only the building of this Wall you might have seen the hill rising from the East to the West in such an ascent that the Western part of it was very many cubits higher than where you stood as we shall have occasion to observe as we pass along This bank was once well stored with bushes and brambles Gen. XXII 13. and afterward with worse briers and thorns the Jebusites who had it in possession till David purchased it for divine use and structure that we are looking after Here was then a poor threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite but afterward the habitation of the God of Jacob A place and fabrick as sumptuous and eminent as it was possible for man and art and cost to make it the glory of the Nation where it was and the wonder of all the Nations round about it but in fine as great a wonder and monument of desolation and ruine as ever it had been of beauty and gloriousness Before we step further toward the survey of it as it stood in glory we must keep yet a while along this Wall about which we have been so long and observe some buildings and beauties that joyned and belonged to iâ— besides the Gates that we have surveyed in it alread
story was a cubit wider than the middle and the middle a cubit wider than the lowest and yet the outmost wall of them was even and straight and jutted not over at one story or other any whit at all But the reason of this different breadth of the Stories was this the wall of the Temple for five cubits from the ground upward was thicker by a cubit than it was from thence above At the height therefore of those five cubits there was a bench of the wall of a cubit breadth left outerly round about the House on which they laid one end of the beams and timber which was the roof of the lowest rooms or the floor of the second Story And then again for five cubits above that the wall was thicker by a cubit than it was above and at the height of those five cubits there was such another bench left again and on that they laid the beams for the roof of the second story which was the floor of the third And so likewise for five cubits above that the wall was yet thicker by a cubit than it was above and there the like bench was left again and there were laid the beams of the roof of the third Story and of the whole building And this is the meaning of that verse 1 King VI. 6. The neathermost Chamber was five cubits broad the middlemost six cubits broad and the third was seven cubits broad for he made abating to the House on the outside round about that the beams should not have hold of the very walls of the House And thus did these Chambers take up half the height of the House being as the lower Leads of our Churches to the higher the use of the Chambers we shall observe hereafter Now above these Chambers in the wall of the Temple and in the outer wall of these Chambers themselves there were Windows to let in light which the Text saith were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 open and shut or broad and narrow which f f f Chald. par in 1 Kings VI. 4. the Chaldee Paraphrast and g g g Vid. Nobil in LXX in loc Theodoret have well interpreted wide within and narrow without namely narrow without to receive the light and wide within to disperse and dilate it Though there h h h Vid. R. Sol. Kimch in loc be some Jews that construe it the clean contrary way viz. broad without and narrow within different from all other Windows 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for God say they had no need of such light The people that returned out of Captivity were i i i Joh. II. 20. forty and six years in building their Temple before they could compleat it and bring it to perfection and yet when all was done it proved so far inferiour in beauty and stateliness to that of Solomons as that to those that had seen both k k k Hag. II. 3. it was as nothing the dimensions made not the difference for it was two ways as large again as his even as his was every way as large again as Moses Tabernacle but this wanted that sumptuousness and bravery of building that his had And it wanted those five things which were the glory and excellency of the former namely l l l R. Sol. in Hag. I. 18. The Ark Urim and Thummim Fire from Heaven The Cloud of glory upon the Mercy seat and The Spirit of Prophesie The m m m Ezr. III. 10. weeping therefore of those persons that had seen the former House at the laying of the foundation of this was not as if they saw any lessening of the House in comparison of the former in compass and measure for the foundations promised a larger but it was upon remembring the glory of the former both in its magnificence and in these five excellencies and to think of the burning of that and it was also in comparing their present servile and poor condition with the liberty state and gallantry of the Nation when the other stood Their measures were prescribed by Cyrus not because he would curb the building but inlarge it for whereas Solomons Temple was but thirty cubits broad Chambers and all he gave liberty of sixty cubits bredth and whereas Solomons was but thirty cubts high all the body of the House he doubled the measure to sixty And therefore those words of Josephus are cautelously to be understood when he saith That n n n Ioseph Antiq. lib. 8. c. 2. they brought up the roof of Solomons Fabrick of white stone the height sixty cubits the length as much and the breadth twenty In which account of the height of it he differs both from Scripture and from all other of his own Nation and by what measures or counters he reckons it is hard to understand And so it is also to construe that which follows 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which I English thus And by this there was another piece raised of equal measures so that the whole height of the Temple was an hundred and twenty cubits By which piece I conceive he means the Porch and his own words clear it but how to apprehend that it was of equal measure with what he had spoken of before I acknowledge I do not understand And whereas he saith That the whole height of the Temple was an hundred and twenty cubits his own context shews that he cannot mean that it was so high throughout but it is to be construed of the Porch of which he is speaking namely that the Temple in some part of it rose to an hundred and twenty cubits high And so are those words of Herod to be understood in the Oration that he made to the people when he tells them of his resolution to build the Temple o o o Id. ib. lib. 15 cap. 14. Our Fathers saith he built the Temple to the great God after their coming up again from Babylon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But it wanted as to the greatness of it sixty cubits in height for so much did the former Temple which Solomon had built exceed it Which is not to be understood of the whole house but of the Porch only for the Children of the Captivity either built no Porch at all and then their Temple was a perfect Cube length and height and breadth exactly equal or if they did yet did not the height of it exceed the rest of the house as Solomons did but only equal it the whole being sixty cubits high all alike according to the dimensions that Cyrus had prescribed Now in his Patent for the building of the Temple there are these words which are of no small difficulty to be understood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ezr. VI. 4. Josephus renders this passage thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p p p Ioseph Antiq. lib. 11. c. 1. 4. Three houses of hewen stone and one house of wood within By the three houses seeming to mean the three parts of the Temple
denomination from the last Letter of Arphaxad's Name 13 Chaldean and curious Arts what 820 Chambers The Chambers in Solomon's Temple their height breadth and evenness of them without notwithstanding they were not of the same dimensions within p. 1065. * overlaid with Gold 2 Chron. 3. 9. over the Holy Place what or whether any such thing p. 1085 1086. * The Treasury Chambers what 1097. * Changers of Mony or Mony Changers what 213 550 Chapiters belonging to the Pillars what 1074. * Chargers what and of what use in the Temple 2048. * Charming was much used among the Jews 371 Chazan that is Episcopus or Overseer 375 Chel what and how put for the Temple 1089 Cherubiâ—s what number of what resemblance and where placed 1086 * Chests in the Treasury where placed and for what use p. 1095 1096. * The Chest set in the Gate of the House of the Lord what 2022 * Chief Priests put for the Sanhedrim many of them being Priests p. 282. They were the Heads of the Families of the Priests or the chief of the 24 Courses c. p. 438 439 Children How an Holy Seed p. 203. The Infants of Believers were brought to Christ to be received as Disciples which he did declaring them to be such and blessed them 248 Children came under the Title of Believers when all things were in common or else they must have farnished p. 277. When a Master of a Family was baptised his Children though never so young were baptised with him as had been the Custom among the Jews and was in the times of the Apostles unaltered p. 277. What Children are to be taught by their Fathers p. 295. They were sometimes named by the Mother as soon as born sometimes by the Standers-by but the Fathers at the Circumcision had the casting voice Whether the Name should be so or no. 421 Children for Scholars or Disciples 759 Children begot by or on Angels or Devils a nonsensical story 995 Chochebas and Barchochebas the same with Ben Coziba coyned Mony with his own Stump tortured the Christians to make them deny Christ was at the head of a most desperate Rebellion p. 366 367. He reigned two years and an half 366 367 Christ how Abraham saw his day p. 13. How Isaac typified him p. 13 14. He gave the Ten Commandments p. 28. He appeared weaponed and was Lord General in the Wars of Canaan p. 40. When he ceased to be Israels Captain and Conductor p. 45. Glorious things are spoken of him p. 102. His Divinity shewed and his fitness to be Incarnate p. 201 202. He was born in Tizri about the Feast of the Tabernacles that is about the close of September at which time 30 years after he was baptised p. 204 210 c. We have no History of him for nine or ten years p. 206. When he was twelve years of Age and all the time of his Ministry he disputed with and proved his Doctrine against the most learned Sanhedrim p. 207. He came in a double seasonableness When Learning was at the highest And Traditions had made the Word of God of none effect p. 207 440. His Life from Twelve to Twenty nine is passed over by all the Evangelists in silence they having a special eye at his Ministry only so has the Angel Gabriel Dan. 9 24 25 c. p. 208. Those years in which we hear nothing of him he spent at Nazareth in his Fathers Trade of Carpentry which made the Jews stumble at him looking for a pompous Messiah p. 208. He appeared not till fully looked for what were the things did intimate his coming p. 209. The time when he was born and when he died were both eminent p. 210 211. He was circumcised into the Jewish Church and baptised into the Church of the Gospel p. 211. He was unknown to John the Baptist and those whom John had baptised into faith in Christ until Christ himself came to be baptised of John p. 212. He was admitted at Nazareth as a Member of the Synagogue to be a Maphteir or Publick Reader of the second Lesson in the Prophets for that day p. 215. His reading and interpreting the Original Hebrew shewed him to have a Prophetical Spirit he not being educated in that Language 215. At his second Passover he declares his Authority and Power before the Sanhedrim that being a time of Wonders p. 221. He was a great Priest and a great Prophet when and how p. 239. He did not so fully and openly reveal himself to be the Messias till he sent forth the Seventy Disciples p. 242. He could not be apprehended without his own leave p. 263. The Jews transgressed two of their own Canons in arraigning and judging Christ on an Holiday and by Night p. 263. He was had before the Sanhedrim in Caiphas his house p. 263. The Wine offered him at his Crucifixion was to intoxicate him p. 268. How bewailed when he went to Execution p. 268. The manner even of his friends burying him shewed the small expectation they had of his Resurrection p. 269. His Disciples and Mary Magdalen notwithstanding their saving faith in him neither of them believed his Death nor his Resurrection p. 270. His coming in Clouds in his Kingdom and in power and great glory all signify his Plaguing the Nation that crucified him p. 342 343. His birth was called The fulness of time p. 383. He was born in the year of the World 3928. about the close of September p. 390. He was not born at the later end of December but September a Month famous indeed p. 427. Why he would be baptized that needed no cleansing being purity it self eight Reasons p. 472. Why John refused to admit him to baptism p. 472. His Ministry was just Three years and an half p. 476. Why he was tempted p. 499. What were his Temptations and where and how tempted p. 503 to 511. In his Temptations his being hurryed about by the Devil does afford some material and profitable Considerations p. 506. He is shewed to be the Son of God p. 504. That he was the Messias he easily convinced the Mind by telling of secret things p. 535. He was the seed of the Woman illustrated from Lukes Genealogy and Christs calling himself the Son of Man p. 471 491 537. His Union of two Natures in one Person is plainly shewn with what refers thereunto p. 577 578. How he could be said to be in Heaven whilst speaking with Nichodemus on earth p. 578. The several Properties of the two Natures in Christ are sometimes indifferently applied to the whole Person p. 578. Believing in Christ for salvation excellently illustrated by being healed by looking on the Brazen Serpent p. 579. He is said to do what his Servants do p. 581. His anointing was his setting apart for Mediator and Minister of the Gospel c. also his apparent Installments into that Office by the Spirit p. 616 617. His Ministry had six parts in it p. 617 to 619. Why it was
〈◊〉 The Emperour commanded them to dig up the whole City and the Temple And a little after 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Thus those that digged it up laid all level that it should never be inhabited to be a witness to such as should come thither VERS III. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And what shall be the sign of thy coming and of the end of the World WHAT the Apostles intended by these words is more clearly conceived by considering the opinion of that people concerning the times of the Messias We will pick out this in a few words from Bab. Sanhedr d d d d d d Fol. 92. The Tradition of the School of Elias The righteous whom the Holy Blessed God will raise up from the dead shall not return again to their dust as it is said Whosoever shall be left in Sion and remain in Jerusalem shall be called holy every one being written in the book of life As the Holy God liveth for ever so they also shall live for ever But if it be objected what shall the righteous do in those years in which the Holy God will renew his world as it is said The Lord only shall be exalted in that day The answer is That God will give them wings like an Eagle and they shall swim or float upon the face of the waters Where the Gloss saith thus The righteous whom the Lord shall raise from the dead in the days of the Messiah when they are restored to life shall not again return to their dust neither in the daies of the Messiah nor in the following age but their flesh shall remain upon them till they return and live 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To eternity And in those years when God shall renew his world or age 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This world shall be wasted for a thousand years where then shall those righteous men be in those years when they shall not be buried in the earth To this you may also lay that very common phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The worlds to come whereby is signified the days of the Messiah of which we spoke a little at the thirty second verse of the twelfth Chapter e e e e e e Gloss in Bab. 〈…〉 fol. 9. 2. If he shall obtain the favour to see the world to come that is the exaltation of Israel namely in the days of the Messiah f f f f f f â—anâ—â—um fol. 〈…〉 The Holy blessed God saith to Israel In this world you are afraid of trasgressions but in the world to come when there shall be no evil affection you shall be concerned only for the good which is laid up for you as it is said After this the children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God and David their King c. g g g g g g Hos. III 5. which clearly relate to the times of the Messiah Again h h h h h h Tanchum fol. 77. 3. Saith the Holy Blessed God to Israel In this world because my messengers sent to spy out the land were flesh and blood I decreed that they should not enter into the land but in the world to come I suddenly send to you my messenger and he shall prepare the way before my face i i i i i i Mal. III. â— See here the Doctrine of the Jews concerning the coming of the Messiah 1. That at that time there shall be a Resurrection of the just 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Messias shall raise up those that sleep in the dust k k k k k k Midr. Tillin fol. 42. 1. 2. Then shall follow the desolation of this World 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This World shall be wasted a thousand years Not that they imagined that a Chaos or confusion of all things should last the thousand years but that this World should end and a new one be introduced in that thousand years 3. After which 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eternity should succeed From hence we easily understand the meaning of this question of the Disciples 1. They know and own the present Messiah and yet they ask what shall be the signs of his coming 2. But they do not ask the signs of his coming as we believe of it at the last day to judge both the quick and the dead But 3. When he will come in the evidence and demonstration of the Messiah raising up the dead and ending this World and introducing a new as they had been taught in their Schools concerning his coming VERS VII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nation shall rise against Nation BEsides the seditions of the Jews made horridly bloody with their mutual slaughter and other storms of War in the Roman Empire from strangers the commotions of Otho and Vitellius are particularly memorable and those of Vitellius and Vespasian whereby not only the whole Empire was shaken and Totius orbis mutatione fortuna Imperii translit they are the words of Tacitus the fortune of the Empire changed with the change of the whole World but in Rome it self being made the scene of battel and the prey of the Soldiers and the Capitol it self being reduced to ashes Such throws the Empire suffered now bringing forth Vespasian to the Throne the scourge and vengeance of God upon the Jews VERS IX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Then they shall deliver you up to be afflicted TO this relate those words of Peter l l l l l l 1 Pet. IV. 17. The time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God that is the time foretold by our Saviour is now at hand in which we are to be delivered up to persecution c. These words denote that persecution which the Jews now near their ruine stirred up almost every where against the professors of the Gospel They had indeed oppressed them hitherto on all sides as far as they could with slanders rapines whippings stripes c. which these and such like places testifie 1 Thes. II. 14 15. Heb. X. 33 c. But there was something that put a rub in their way that as yet they could not proceed to the utmost cuelty m m m m m m 2 Thes. II. 6. And now ye know what withholdeth which I suppose is to be understood of Claudius enraged at and curbing in the Jews n n n n n n Act. XVIII 2 Who being taken out of the way and Nero after his first five years suffering all things to be turned topside turvy the Jews now breathing their last and Satan therefore breathing his last effects in them because their time was short they broke out into slaughter beyond measure and into a most bloody persecution which I wonder is not set in the front of the ten persecutions by Ecclesiastical writers This is called by Peter who himself also at last suffered in it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 o o o o o o 1 Pet.
Prophets The Book of Josua Judges Samuel Kings Jeremiah Ezekiel Esay and the twelve And a little after But since Isaiah was before both Jeremiah and Ezekiel he ought to have been set before them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But since the Book of Kings ends with destruction 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and all Jeremy is about destruction and since Ezekiel begins with destruction and ends with comfort and all Isaiah is about comfort 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They joyned destruction with destruction and comfort with comfort that is they placed those Books together which treat of destruction and those together which treat of comfort You have this Tradition quoted by David Kimchius in his Preface to Jeremy Whence it is very plain that Jeremy of old had the first place among the Prophets and hereby he comes to be mentioned above all the rest Mat. XVI 14. because he stood first in the volume of the Prophets therefore he is first named When therefore Matthew produceth a Text of Zacharias under the name of Jeremy he only cites the words of the Volume of the Prophets under his name who stood first in the Volume of the Prophets Of which sort is that also of our Saviour Luk. XXIV 44. All things must be fulfilled which are written of me in the Law and the Prophets and the Psalms In the Psalms that is in the Book of Hagiographa in which the Psalms were placed first VERS XVI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Barabbas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Bar Abba a very usual name in the Talmudists R. Samuel Barabba and R. Nathan Barabba z z z z z z Hieros Moed Katon fol. 82. 1. Abba bar Abba 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a a a a a a Bab. Berac fol. 18. 2. In the Jerusalem Dialect it is very often uttered 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Bar Ba. Simeon Bar Ba b b b b b b Taanith fol. 66. 1. R. Chaijah bar Ba c c c c c c Chagigah fol. 76. 6. c. This brings to my mind what Josephus d d d d d d De Bell. Lib. 5. Cap. 18. relates to have been done in the besieging of the City 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 When huge stones were thrown against the City by the Roman stings some persons sitting in the Towers gave the citizens warning by a sign to take heed crying out in the vulgar dialect The Son cometh that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Son of man indeed then came in the glory of his justice and his vengeance as he had often foretold to destroy that most wicked and profligate Nation VERS XIX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Have thou nothing to do with that just man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 e e e e e e Bab. Taanith fol. 25. 2. When King Sapores went about to afflict Rabbah his mother sent to him saying 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Have thou nothing to do with that Jew c. VERS XXVI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 When he had scourged Iesus he delivered him to be crucified SUCH was the custom of the Romans towards those that were to be crucified f f f f f f Joseph de Bell. Lib. 2. Cap. 25. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whom after he had beaten with whips he crucified And a little after 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To be whipped before the judgment-seat and to be nailed to the Cross. VERS XXIX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Reed in his right hand SEE those fictions in Tanchum g g g g g g Fol. 59. 4. concerning an Angel that appear'd in the shape of Solomon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In whose hand there was a reed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And whom they struck with a reed VERS XXXI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Led him away to crucifie him THESE things are delivered in Sanhedrim h h h h h h Cap. 6. Hal. 4. of one that is guilty of stoning If there be no defence found for him they lead him out to be stoned and a cryer went before saying aloud thus N. the Son of N. comes out to be stoned because he hath done so and so The Witnesses against him are N. and N. whosoever can bring any thing in his defence let him come forth and produce it On which thus the Gemara of Babylon The Tradition is that on the evening of the Passover Jesus was hanged and that a Cryer went before him for forty days making this Proclamation This man comes forth to be stoned because he dealt in sorceries and perswaded and seduced Israel whosoever knows of any defence for him let him come forth and produce it But no defence could be found therefore they hanged him on the evening of the Passover Ulla saith His case seem'd not to admit of any defence since he was a seducer and of such God hath said Thou shalt not spare him neither shalt thou conceal him Deut. XIII They led him that was to be stoned out of the City Act. VII 58. so also him that was to be crucified i i i i i i Gloss. in Bab. Sanhed fol. 42. 2. The place of stoning was without the three Camps for at Jerusalem there were three Camps namely Gods the Levites and the Peoples as it was in the encamping in the Wilderness And in every city also where there was a Council namely of twenty three the place of stoning was without the City For all cities that have walls bear a resemblance to the Camp of Israel Because Jesus was judged at a Heathen Tribunal therefore a death is inflicted on him not usual with the Jewish Council namely Crucifixion In several things the circumstances and actions belonging to his death differed from the custom of the Jews in putting persons to death 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They never judg two on the same day k k k k k k Sanhedr cap. 6. hal 4. But here besides Christ are two thieves judged 2. They never carried one that was to be hanged to hanging till near Sun-set l l l l l l Ibid. in Gemara 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They stay till near Sun-set and then they pass sentence and execute him And the reason is given by the Glosser They do not perfect his judgment nor hang him in the morning lest they should neglect his burial and happen to forget themselves and the Malefactor should hang till after Sun-set but neer Sun-setting so that they may bury him out of hand But Christ was sentenced to death before noon and at noon was nailed to the Cross. For 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They first put the condemned person to death and then hanged him upon a tree But the custom of the Roman Empire is first to hang them and then to put them to death ll ll ll ll ll ll Ibid. 4. They did not openly lament for those that were led forth to be put to death but
casting out Devils I. WIthout doubt he truly did this work whosoever he were He cast out Devils truly and really and that by the divine power otherwise Christ had not said those things which he did Forbid him not there is no man that doth a miracle in my name who can speak evil of me c. II. Whence then could any one that followed not Christ cast out Devils Or whence could any one that cast out Devils not follow Christ I answer We suppose I. That this man cast not out Devils in the name of Jesus but in the name of Christ or Messias and that it was not out of contempt that he followed not Jesus but out of ignorance namely because he knew not yet that Jesus was the Messias II. We therefore conjecture that he had been heretofore some Disciple of John who had received his Baptism in the name of the Messias now speedily to come which all the Disciples of John had but he knew not as yet that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messias which John himself knew not until it was revealed to him from Heaven III. It is probable therefore that God granted the gifts of miracles to some lately baptized by John to do them in the name of the Messias and that to lay a plainer way for the receiving of the Messias when he should manifest himself under the name of Jesus of Nazareth See Vers. 41. In my name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Because ye belong to Christ and Chap. XIII 6. Many shall come in my name not in the name of Jesus but in the name of the Messias for those false Prophets assumed to themselves the name of the Messias to bring to naught the name of Jesus That Joh. XVI 24. Hitherto ye have asked nothing in my name differs not much from this sense The Apostles poured out their prayers and all the holy men theirs in the name of the Messias but ye have as yet asked nothing in my name Jesus c. VERS XLIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cut it off a a a a a a Bab. Scabb fol. 108. 2. RAbh Mona in the name of R. Judah saith A Drop of cold water in the morning applyed to the eye and the washing of the hands and feet in the Evening 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is good beyond all the Collyrium eye salve in the whole world For he said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The hand applyed to the eye in the morning before washing let it be cut off The hand applyed to the nostril let it be cut off the hand put to the ear let it cut off c. VERS XLIX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For every one shall be salted with fire THE great Scaliger is well chastized and not without cause by b b b b b b In Spicileg Scholae sacrific Problem 3. John Clopenberg because he changed the reading here into 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Every sacrifice shall be salted See what he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All is not to be understood of every man but of every one of them Whose worm dyeth not c. The sense of the place is to be fetched from those words and the sense of those words from Esai LXVI ult And they shall go forth and look upon the carcasses of the men that have transgressed against me for their Worm shall not dye neither shall their fire be quenched and they shall be an abhorring to all flesh Upon which place thus the Jews write They shall go forth and look c. Is not the finger of a man if it be put into the fire immediately burnt But God gives power or being to wicked men to receive torments Kimchi upon the place thus They shall see the carcasses of them full of worms and fire burning in them and yet the worms dye not The words therefore of our Saviour respect this Their worm dyeth not and the fire is not quenched for every one of them shall be seasoned with fire it self so as to become unconsumeable and shall endure for ever to be tormented as salt preserves from corruption That very learned man mentioned before called the common reading very improper For what is it saith he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To season with fire Let me retort And what is it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To fire with salt And yet that sense occurs very frequently in the Talmudists For in them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is to burn which signifies properly indeed and very frequently it is To corrupt any thing with too much salting so that it cannot be eaten To be fired with salt So in this place To be salted with fire that it cannot be corrupted or consumed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And every sacrifice shall be salted with salt Here the discourse is of salting which was done at the Altar See Levit. II. 13. c c c c c c Menacoth fol. 21. 2. In the ascent of the Altar they salted the parts of the sacrifice and on the top of the Altar they salt the handful of meal of frankincense of incense and the mincha of the Priests and the mincha of the anoynted Priest and the mincha of the drink offerings and the sacrifice of birds Yea 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 d d d d d d Fol. 20. ◠The very wood is a Corban of the Mincha and is to be salted But in the former clause the allusion was not to the fire of the Altar but to the fire in the valley of Hinnom where dead carcasses bones and other filthy things were consumed Carcasses crawl with worms and insteed of Salt which secures against worms they shall be cast into the fire and shall be seasoned with flames and yet the worms shall not dey But he that is a true sacrifice to God shall be seasoned with the salt of Grace to the incorruption of Glory Our Saviour speaks in this place with Esaiah Chap. LXVI 20. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They shall bring their brethren out of all the Nations for a gift to the Lord as the children of Israel offer their sacrifices to me with Psalms in the house of the Lord. And Vers. 24. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. And they shall go forth and look upon the limbs of the men that transgressed against me For their worm shall not dy and their fire shall not be quenched c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Every sacrifice saith our Saviour concerning holy men seasoned with Grace So the Prophet They shall bring your Brethren for a gift to the Lord as the children of Israel do the sacrifices 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall be seasoned with fire saith our Saviour of wicked men in the same sense Esaiah They shall be in unquencheable fire and yet their worm shall not dye Their fire and their worm Whose Concerning the former t is somewhat obscure in our Saviours words and so indeed that it is without all obscurity that he refers his words
vengeance upon the Jews the enemies of this Gospel But in the Jewish Schools this was their conceit of him that when he came he should cut off all those Nations that obeyed not his i. e. the Jewish Law redeeming Israel from the Gentile yoke establishing a Kingdom and Age amongst them that should be crowned with all kind of delights whatever In this they were miserably deceived that they thought the Gentiles were first to be destroyed by him and then that he himself would reign amongst the Israelites Which in truth fell out just contrary he was first to overthrow Israel and then to reign amongst the Gentiles It is easie to conceive in what sense the Pharisees propounded that question when the Kingdom of God should come that is when all those glorious things should be accomplished which they expected from the Messias and consequently we may as well conceive from the contexture of his discourse in what sense our Saviour made his reply You enquire when the Messias will come His coming will be as in the days of Noah and as in the days of Lot For as when Noah entred the Ark the world perisht by a deluge and as when Lot went out of Sodom those five Cities were overthrown so shall it be in the day when the Son of Man shall be revealed So that it is evident he speaks of the Kingdom of God in that sense as it signifies that dreadful revenge he would e're long take of that provoking Nation and City of the Jews The Kingdom of God will come when Jerusalem shall be made like Sodom vers 29. when it shall be made a Carkass v. 37. It is plain to every eye that the cutting off of that place and Nation is emphatically called his Kingdom and his coming in glory Nor indeed without reason For before he wasted the City and subverted that Nation he had subdued all Nations under the Empire and obedience of the Gospel according to what he foretold i i i i i i Matt. XXIV 14. That the Gospel of the Kingdom should be preached in all the world and then should the end of Jerusalem come And when he had obtained his dominion amongst the Gentiles what then remained toward the consummation of his Kingdom and Victories but to cut off his Enemies the Jews who would not that he should rule over them Of this Kingdom of God he speaks in this place not answering according to that vain apprehension the Pharisee had when he propounded the question but according to the thing its self and the truth of it There are two things he saith of this Kingdom 1. That it comes not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not with observation Not but that it might be seen and conspicuous but that they would not see and observe it Which security and supineness of theirs he both foretells and taxeth in other places once and again 2. He further tells them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this Kingdom of God is within you you are the scene of these triumphs And whereas your expectancies are of that kind that you say behold here a token of the Messias in the subduing of such a Nation and behold there in the sudbuing of another they will be all in vain for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it is within you Within and upon your own Nation that these things must be done I would lay the emphasis in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 you when commonly it is laid in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 within Besides those things which follow vers 22. do very much confirm it that Christ speaks of the Kingdom of God in that sense wherein we have supposed it they are spoken to his Disciples that the days will come wherein they shall desire to see one of the days of the Son of Man but shall not see it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The days of the Son of Man in the Jewish stile are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the days of the Messias days wherein they promise themselves nothing but pleasing prosperous and gay enjoyments and questionless the Pharisees put this question under this notion only But our Saviour so applies the terms of the question to the truth and to his own purpose that they signifie little else but vengeance and wrath and affliction And it was so far from it that the Jews should see their expected pleasures that the Disciples themselves should see nothing but affliction though under another notion CHAP. XVIII VERS I. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And not to faint THE discourse is continued still and this Parable hath its connection with the Chap. XVII concerning Christ's coming to avenge himself upon Jerusalem Which if we keep our eye upon it may help us to an easier understanding of some more obscure passages that occurr in the application of this Parable And to this doth the expression 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not to faint seem to have relation viz. that they might not suffer their hopes and courage to languish and droop upon the prospect of some afflictions they were likely to grapple with but that they would give themselves to continual prayer VERS II. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. There was a certain judge c. IF the scene of this Parabolical History must be supposed to have been amongst the Jews then there would some questions arise upon it 1. Whether this Judge were any way distinguisht from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Elder or Presbyter For the Doctors are forced to such a distinction from those words in Deut. XXI 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Elders and Judges a a a a a a Hieros Sotah fol. 23. 2. If 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Judge be the same with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Elder which the Babylonian Sotah b b b b b b Fol. 44. 2. approve of then might it be enquired whether it was lawful for one Elder to sit in judgment which the Sanhedrin deny c c c c c c Cap. 1. But I let these things pass The Parable propounded is of that rank or order that commonly amongst them the Jews had the title 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and usually ended in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is when it is argued from the less to the greater If that judge the wickedest of men being overcome by the endless importunity of the Widow judged her cause will not a just merciful and good God appear for his own much more who continually solicite him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Who feared not God c. How widely distant is this wretch from the character of a just Judge d d d d d d Maimon Sanhedr cap. 1. Although in the Triumviral Court all things are not expected there which are requisite in the Sanhedrin yet is it necessary that in every one of that Court there should be this seven fold qualification Prudence gentleness piety hatred of Mammon love of truth that
of the place is that Christ shining forth in the light of the Gospel is a light that lightens all the world the light of the Law shone only upon the Jews but this light spreads wider even over the face of the whole earth VERS XII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He gave them power 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He empower'd them So Eccl. V. 19. VI. 2. He gave them the priviledg the liberty the dignity of being call'd and becoming the Sons of God Israel was once the Son and the first-born Exod. IV. 22. but now the adoption of Sons to God was open and free to all Nations whatever VERS XIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which were born not of blood IT may be a question here whether the Evangelist in this place opposeth regeneration to natural generation or only to those ways by which the Jews fancy'd men were made the Sons of God Expositors treat largely of the former let us a little consider the latter I. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not of bloods Observe the Plural number k k k k k k Shemoth rabba Sect. 19. Our Rabbins say that all Israel had thrown off Circumcision in Egypt but at length they were circumcised 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the blood of the Passover was mingled with the blood of the circumcised and God accepted every one of them and kissed them l l l l l l Gloss. in Vajicra rab fol. 191. I said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 while thou wert in thy bloods live i. e. In the twofold blood that of the Passover and that of the Circumcision The Israelites were brought into Covenant by three things by Circumcision by Washing and by offering of Sacrifices In the same manner an heathen if he would be admitted into Covenant he must of necessity be circumcised baptised and offer sacrifice m m m m m m Maimon Issure◠biah cap. 13. We see how 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of bloods of the Passover and Circumcision they say the Israelites were recover'd from their degeneracy and how 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the bloods of Circumcision and Sacrifices with the addition only of washing they suppos'd the Gentiles might become the Sons of God being by their Proselytism made Israelites and the children of the Covenant for they knew of no other adoption or Sonship II. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the will of the flesh In the same sense wherein the Patriarchs and other Jews were ambitious by many wives to multiply children to themselves as being of the seed of Israel and children of the Covenant III. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the will of man in that sense wherein they coveted so many proselytes to admit them into the Religion of the Jews and so into Covenant and Sonship with God These were the ways by which the Jews thought any became the Sons of God that is by being made Israelites But it is far otherwise in the adoption and Sonship that accrues to us by the Gospel VERS XIV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The glory as of the only begotten THIS 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in this place imports the same thing as worthy We saw his glory as what was worthy or became the only begotten Son of God He did not glister in any worldly pomp or grandeur according to what the Jewish Nation fondly dream'd their Messiah would do but he was deckt with the glory of holiness grace truth and the power of miracles VERS XVI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And grace for grace HE appear'd amongst us full of grace and truth and all we who convers'd with him and saw his glory of his fulness did receive grace and truth Nay further we receiv'd grace toward the propagation of grace i. e. the grace of Apostleship that we might dispense and propagate the grace of the Gospel toward others that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 denotes the end or design of a thing very frequently there are hardly any but must needs know VERS XXI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Art thou that Prophet THAT is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Luk. IX 8 19. One of the old Prophets that was risen again I. The Masters of Traditions were wont to say that the spirit of Prophesie departed from Israel after the death of Zachary and Malachy So that we do not find they expected any Prophet till the days of the Messiah nor indeed that any in that interim of time did pretend to that character II. They believ'd that at the coming of the Messiah the Prophets were to rise again a a a a a a Sanhedr fol. 91. 2. They watchmen shall lift up the voice with the voice together shall they sing Isa. LII 8. R. Chaia bar Abba and R. Johanan say All the Prophets shall put forth a song with one voice b b b b b b Ibid. fol. 92. 2. All the just whom God shall raise from the dead shall not return again into the dust Gloss. Those whom he shall raise in the days of the Messiah To this Resurrection of the Saints they apply that of Micah V. 5. c c c c c c Succah fol. 51. 2. We shall raise against him seven shepherds David in the middle Adam Seth Methusalem on his right hand Abraham Jacob and Moses on his left And eight principal men but who are these Jess Saul Samuel Amos Zephany Zedechiah or rather Hezekiah as Kimch in loc Messiah and Elijah But indeed saith R. Solomon I do not well know whence they had these things Nor indeed do I. The Greek Interpreters instead of eight principal men have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 eight bitings of men a very forreign sense They mistook in reading the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for which they read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hence by how much nearer still the Kingdom of Heaven or the expected time of Messiah's coming drew on by so much the more did they dream of the Resurrection of the Prophets And when any person of more remarkable gravity piety and holiness appear'd amongst them they were ready to conceive of him as a Prophet raised from the dead Mat. XVI 14. That therefore is the meaning of this question 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Art thou one of the Prophets rais'd from the dead VERS XXV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Why then baptisest thou THE Jews likewise expected that the world should be renew'd at the coming of the Messiah d d d d d d Sanhedr fol. 52. 2. In those years wherein God will renew his world Aruch quoting these words adds In those thousand years So also the Gloss upon the place Amongst other things they expected the purifying of the unclean R. Solom upon Ezek. XXXVI 26. I will expiate you and remove your uncleanness by the sprinkling of the water of purification Kimchi upon Zach. IX 6. The Rabbins of Blessed memory have a Tradition that Elias will purifie the bastards and restore them to the Congregation You have the
return into the body But when it sees that the form or aspect of the face is changed then it hovers no more but leaves the body to its self d They do not certifie of the dead that this is the very man and not another but within c Jevamoth fol. 120. 1. Maimo◠in Gerushin cap. 13. the three days after his decease For after three days his countenance is changed VERS XLIV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. With Grave-cloths c. THE Evangelist seems so particular in mentioning the Grave-cloths wherewith Lazarus was bound hand and foot as also the Napkin that had covered his face on purpose to hint us a second miracle in this great miracle The dead man came forth though bound hand and foot with his Grave-cloths and blinded with the Napkin VERS XLVIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And the Romans shall come I Could easily believe that the Fathers of the Sanhedrin had either a knowledge or at least some suspition that Jesus was the true Messiah I. This seems plainly intimated by the words of the Vine-dressers in the Parable Mark XII 7. This is the heir come let us kill him They knew well enough he was the Heir and it was come to this in the struggle betwixt them either he will inherit with his doctrine or we will with ours come therefore let us kill him and the inheritance shall be ours II. They could not but know that Daniel's weeks were now fully accomplished and that the time of the Messiah's appearing was now come This that * * * * * * Act. II. conflux of Jews from all Nations into Jerusalem doth testifie being led by Daniel's Prophecy and the agreeableness of the time to fix their residence there in expectation of the Messiah now ready to be revealed Compare also Luke XIX 2. III. When therefore they saw Jesus working miracles so very stupendous and so worthy the character of the Messiah and that in the very time wherein the manifestation of the Messiah had been foretold they could not but have a strong suspition that this was HE. But then it is a wonderful thing that they should endeavour his death and destruction What destroy the Messiah the expectation and desire of that Nation Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum Such mischiefs could religious zeal perswade But it was a most irreligious Religion made up of Traditions and humane inventions a strange kind of bewitchery rather than Religion that they should chose rather that the Messiah should be cut off than that Religion be changed They had been taught or rather seduced by their Traditions to believe 1. That the Kingdom of the Messiah should be administred in all imaginable pomp and worldly glory 2. That their Judaism or the Religion properly so called should be wonderfully promoted by him confirmed and made very glorious 3. The whole Nation should be redeemed from the Heathen Yoke But when he who by the force of his miracles asserted himself so far to be the Messiah that they could not but inwardly acknowledge it appeared notwithstanding so poor and contemptible that nothing could be less expected or hoped for of such an one than a deliverance from their present mean and slavish state and so distant he seemed from it that he advised to pay tribute to Cesar taught things contrary to what the Scribes and Pharisees had principled them in shaked and seemed to abrogate the Religion it self and they had no prospect at all of better things from him Let Jesus perish though he were the true Messiah for any thing that they cared rather than Judaism and their Religion should be abolished Obj. But it is said that what they did was through ignorance Luke XXIII 34. Acts III. 17. and XIII 27. 1 Cor. II. 8. Ans. True indeed through ignorance of the person they did not know and believe the Messiah to be God as well as Man they apprehended him mere Man Though they suspected that Jesus might be the Messiah yet did they not suspect that this Jesus was the true God Let it then be taken for granted that the Fathers of the Sanhedrin under some strong conviction that this was the true Messiah might express themselves in this manner all men will believe on him and the Romans will come c. and so what Caiphas said It is expedient that one man should dye c. But where does the consequence lye in all this All men will believe on him Ergo the Romans will come c. I. It is not altogether wide of the mark what is commonly returned upon this question The Romans will come against our Nation taking us for Rebels to the Emperor in that without his consent our people have entertained this Jesus for the King Messiah II. Nor is it impertinent to this purpose what was the antient observation of the Jews from that of the Prophet Isaiah Chap. X. 34. and XI 1. Lebanon shall fall by a mighty one and there shall come forth a rod out of the stemm of Jesse viz. That the coming of the Messiah and the destruction of the Temple should be upon the heels one of another e e e e e e Hieros Beracoth fol. 5. 1. The story is of an Arabian telling a certain Jew while he was at Plow that the Temple was destroyed and the Messiah was born which I have already told at large upon Matth. II. 1. But the conclusion of it is R. Bon saith what need we learn from an Arabian is it not plainly enough written Lebanon shall fall by a mighty one And what follows immediately there shall come forth a rod out of the stemm of Jesse If therefore the Sanhedrin suspected Jesus to be the Messiah they might by the same reason from thence also gather that the destruction of the City and Nation was not far off especially when they see the people falling off from Judaism to the Religion of Jesus III. The Fathers of the Sanhedrin judge that the Nation would contract hereby an unspeakable deal of guilt such as would subject them to all those curses mentioned Deuter. XXVIII particularly that their turning off from Judaism would issue in the final overthrow of the whole Nation and if their Religion should be deserted neither the City nor the Commonwealth could possibly survive it long So rooted was the love and value they had for their wretched Traditions Let us therefore frame their words into this Paraphrase It does seem that this man can be no other than the true Messiah the strange wonders he doth speak no less What must we do in this case On the one hand it were a base and unworthy part of us to kill the Messiah but then on the other hand it is infinitely hazardous for us to admit him For all men will believe on him and then our Religion is at an end and when that is once gone what can we look for less than that our whole Nation should perish under the Arms
and fury of the Romans I beg your pardon for that saith Caiphas you know nothing neither consider for be he the Messiah or be he not it is expedient nay it is necessary he should dye rather than the whole Nation should perish c. VERS LI. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He Prophesied IS Caiphas among the Prophets There had not been a Prophet among the Chief Priests the Priests the People for these four hundred years and more and does Caiphas now begin to Prophesie It is a very foreign fetch that some would make when they would ascribe this gift to the office he then bore as if by being made High-Priest he became a Prophet The opinion is not worth confuting The Evangelist himself renders the reason when he tells us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Being the High-Priest that same year Which words direct the Reader 's eye rather to the year than to the High-Priest I. That was the year of pouring out the Spirit of Prophesie and Revelations beyond whatever the world had yet seen or would see again And why may not some drops of this great effusion light upon a wicked man as sometimes the Childrens crums fall from the table to the Dog under it that a witness might be given to the great work of Redemption from the mouth of our Redeemer's greatest enemy There lies the emphasis of the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that same year for Caiphas had been High-Priest some years before and did continue so for some years after II. To say the truth by all just calculation the office of the High-Priest ceased this very year and the High-Priest Prophesies while his office expires What difference was there as to the execution of the Priestly Office between the High-Priest and the rest of the Priesthood none certainly only in these two things 1. Asking counsel by Urim and Thummim 2. In performing the service upon the day of Expiation As to the former that had been useless many ages before because the Spirit of Prophesie had so perfectly departed from them So that there remained now no other distinction only that on the day of expiation the High-Priest was to perform the Service which an ordinary Priest was not warranted to do The principal ceremony of that day was that he should enter into the Holy of Holies with blood When therefore our great High-Priest should enter with his own blood into the Holiest of all what could there be left for this High-Priest to do When at the death of our great High-Priest the Veil that hung between the Holy and the Holy of Holies was rent in twain from the top to the bottom Math. XXVII 51. there was clear demonstration that all those Rites and Services were abolished and that the Office of the High-Priest which was distinguished from the other Priests only by those usages was now determined and brought to its full period The Pontificate therefore drawing its last breath prophesies concerning the Redemption of mankind by the great High-Priest and Bishop of Souls that he should dye for the people c. That of the Apostle Acts XXIII 5. I wist not that it was the High-Priest may perhaps have some such meaning as this in it I knew not that there was any High-Priest at all because the Office had become needless for some time For grant indeed that St. Paul did not know the face of Ananias nor that Ananias was the High-Priest yet he must needs know him to have been a Magistrate because he had his seat amongst the Fathers of the Sanhedrin now those words which he quoted out of the Law Thou shalt not speak evil of the Ruler of thy People forbad all indecent speeches toward any Magistrate as well as the High-Priest The Apostle therefore knowing Ananias well enough both who he was and that he sate there under a falsely assumed title of the High-Priest does on purpose call him whited wall because he only bore the colour of the High-Priesthood whenas the thing and office it self was now abolished Caiaphas in this passage before us speaketh partly as Caiaphas and partly as a Prophet As Caiaphas he does by an impious and precipitate boldness contrive and promote the death of Christ and what he uttered as a Prophet the Evangelist tells us he did it not of himself he spoke what himself understood not the depth of The greatest work of the Messiah according to the expectation of the Jews was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the reduction or gathering together the Captivities The High-Priest despairs that ever Jesus should he live could do this For all that he either did or taught seem'd to have a contrary tendency viz. to seduce the people from their Religion rather than recover them from their servile state of bondage So that he apprehended this one only remedy left that care might be taken so as by the death of this man the hazard of that Nations ruin might blow over If he be the Messiah which I almost think even Caiaphas himself did not much question since he can have no hope of redeeming the Nation let him die for it himself that it perish not upon his account Thus miserably are the great Masters of Wisdom deceiv'd in almost all their surmizes they expect the gathering together of the Children of God in one by the life of the Messiah which was to be accomplisht by his death They believe their Traditional Religion was the establishment of that Nation whereas it became its overthrow They think to secure themselves by the death of Christ when by that very death of his their expected security was chiefly shaken O blind and stupid madness VERS LV. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To purifie themselves R. f f f f f f Rosh hashanah fol. 16. 2. Isaac saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Every man is bound to purifie himself for the Feast Now there were several measures of time for purifying He that was unclean by the touch of a dead body he requir'd a whole weeks time that he might be sprinkled with the water of Purification mixt with the ashes of the red heifer burnt the third and the seventh day which ceremony we may see and laugh at in Parah cap. 3. Other purifyings were speedilier perform'd amongst others shaving themselves and washing their garments were accounted necessary and within the Laws of purifying g g g g g g Moed-katon fol. 13. 1. These shave themselves within the Feast he who cometh from an heathen Country or from captivity or from prison Also he who hath been excommunicated but now absolv'd by the wise men These same also wash their garments within the Feast It is suppos'd that these were detain'd by some necessity of affairs that they could not wash and be shav'd before the Feast for these things were of right to be perform'd before lest any should by any means approach polluted unto the celebration of this Feast but if by some necessity they were hinder'd from doing it before
that number of twelve But omitting this there were more also present when he said these words who had followed him in the regeneration and if all they and all the Saints that should be in the whole world were to be concluded within that priviledge of sitting with Christ upon the Bench why is the number restrained only to Twelve You Twelve that is All Saints shall judge the twelve Tribes of Israel that is the whole world is so thorny a Gloss that my fingers can by no means touch it III. We gave the sense of the words in their place Namely by Christ sitting in the Throne of his glory is not to be understood his Tribunal in the last judgment but when he should come in the glory of his vengeance against the Jewish nation then not the Persons but the Doctrine of the twelve Apostles should judge and condemn that most wicked Nation And as to the opinion it self concerning the Saints sitting with Christ. I. Nothing is plainer in the Scripture than that all shall stand before the judgment seat of Christ 2 Cor. V. 10. as well the Sheep as the Goats Mat. XXV 32. c. Mention indeed is made of reigning with Christ but no where of judging with Christ in the day of judgment II. How little or nothing doth that sound The Saints shall approve the judgment of Christ Are thrones for this to be set up that those that sit upon them should approve the judgment The very Devils and damned themselves shall not otherwise chuse but acknowledge his justice III. And what I pray is this manner of arguing Saints in the last day shall approve the judgment and sentence of Christ Therefore ye are able to judge concerning those things which pertains to this life We therefore make no doubt that the sense of these words Know ye not that the Saints shall judge the World most plainly is this Know ye not that Christians shall be Magistrates and Judges in the World Which most clearly appears by these observations I. The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Saints in the verse before denotes all Christians as opposed to Infidels not professing Christianity But that all these shall judge the world with Christ the espousers of that opinion will not acknowledg and then let a reason be given why the word in this verse is to be taken in a different and stricter sense than the same word is in the verse aforegoing II. The Apostle speaks as of a thing known and confessed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Know ye not But whence was this known or to be known that Christians should be Magistrates and judges of the world Most easily and most plainly out of Dan. Chap. VII 18 27. Where when the four Heathen Monarchies which had so long ruled the world under their Tyranny fell at length the Rule and Dominion and Empire under the whole Heaven was to be translated to the people of the Saints of the most In what sense and in what latitude the word Saints is to be taken one may learn from a very plain Antithesis in that Chapter The Rule and the Dominion and Empire under the whole Heaven was before belonging to Heathens but under the reign of Christ it was the Saints that is the Christians III. This sense agrees very well with the Apostles argument Think it not unlawful to decide among themselves such differences as arise among your selves and by flying to Heathen Tribunals do not bring a reproach upon the Gospel for consider what is foretold by Daniel which ye know well enough namely that the Saints that is the Christians shall hereafter possess the Dominion and Government of the whole world as now a long while the Heathens have possessed and do possess it If they shall one day be endued with a right of governing certainly you your selves may determine of contentions now IV. That which is said by the Apocaliptic Chap. XX. 4. agrees with the sense of this place That when Christ had bound Satan that he should no more deceive the Gentiles as he had done before by Idols Oracles c. Thrones are set up and Judgment is given unto them who set upon them that is a Power and Authority of judging and ruling and exercising magistracy VERS III. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Know ye not that we shall judge Angels HE saith not as he did before The Saints shall judge Angels but We shall judge them By Angels all confess Devils to be understood But certainly all Saints according to the latitude of that word in the verse foregoing that is that profess Christianity shall not judge Devils Nor is this judging of Angels to be understood in the last day But the Apostle speaks of the Ministers of the Gospel himself and others who by the preaching of the Gospel and the name of Christ should spoyl the Devils of their Oracles and Idols should deprive them of their Worships should drive them out of their seats and strip them of their Dominion Thus would God subdue the whole world under Christian Power that Christian Magistrates should judge men and Ministers of the Gospel Devils and do not you now judge among your selves of some trivial differences VERS IV. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Iudgments of things pertaining to this life HOW judgments among the Jews were distinguished into 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pecuniary judgments and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Capital judgments every one knows Whether 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Judgments of things pertaining to this life and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pecuniary judgments are the same we do not dispute certainly under Pecuniary judgments as they are opposed to Capital judgments are comprised all judgments below Capital Hence is that which we observe elswhere Capital judgments were taken away from Israel forty years before the destruction of the Temple e e e e e e Hieros Sanhedr fol. 24. 2. And Pecuniary judgments were taken away from Israel in the days of Simeon ben Jochai f f f f f f Ibid. col 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Who are least esteemed in the Church I. To interpret this word here for those that are most vile or most contemptible which some versions do is certainly somewhat hard and improper What Needy persons and such as seek their living by almes or hard labour to make them Judges Whence should such have skill to judge or be at leasure for it How apt might they be to consult rather their own gain than just judgment And who would not despise such Judges The word therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 least esteemed is not to be reserred to the lowest of the common people but to the lowest of the order of Judges II. That Order had these degrees in the Jewish Benches according to the custom and disposition of which it is very likely the Apostel speaks 1. There was the Great Sanhedrin consisting of LXXI Elders 2. There was the Sanhedrin of Three and Twenty in Cities of more note 3.
unless they be writ in Hebrew II. It is disputed b b b b b b Schabb. fol. 115. 1. Whether it be lawful to snatch the holy Books out of the fire on the Sabbath day when that cannot be done without some labour And it is concluded without all scruple that if they are wrote in Hebrew they ought to be snatched out but if in an other Language or in other Characters then it is doubted Yea R. Jose saith They are not to be snatched out III. It is disputed further 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if the holy Books so written shall come to your hands whether you may destroy them with your own hand either by cutting or tearing them or throwing them into the fire and it is concluded indeed in the negative which yet is to the same effect as though it were determined in the Affirmative Let them be laid up say they in some foul place where they may be consumed by themselves And it is related of Rabban â—â—â—aliel first that when 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Book of Job made into a Targum was brought to him he commanded that it should be buried under a heap of stones Which example also a certain Rabbin afterward urgeth to his great grand-son Gamaliel that he also should bury under ground the Book of Job Targumized which he had in his hand to be consumed The Book of Job Targumized was that Book translated into the Chaldee Language the Mother Tongue of the Nation the Tongue into which the Law and the Prophets were rendred in the Synagogues and yet by no means did they tolerate the Version of that Book which indeed was not read in the Synagogues though rendred in that Language much less would they tolerate the Version of the Law and the Prophets into a more remote and more Heathen Language These things well considered one may with good reason suspect that the Jews thought not so honourably of any Version as to cast away the Hebrew Bible and to espouse that in the room of it And what they might or did think concerning the Greek Version of the LXX as it is called let us as much as we can briefly search CHAP. VII A Comparison of the History of the LXX as it is in Iosephus and as it is in the Talmudists THE story as it is in Josephus and Aristeas hath no need to be repeated being so well known to all From which how vastly different is it from the story as it is related in the Talmudists Which we transcribe verbatim from Massecheth Sopherim a a a a a a Cap. 1. thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 There is a story of five Elders who transcribed the Law for Ptolomy the King in Greek And that day was bitter to Israel as the day wherein the golden Calf was made Because the Law could not be turned according to all things requisite to it And again there is a story of King Ptolomy that he assembled seventy two Elders together and disposed them into seventy two Cells But he revealed not to them why he had assembled them But coming in to every one of them said to them write me out the Law of Moses your Master God put council into each of their hearts that their minds agreed in one And they wrote out for him the Law by it self But they changed thirteen places in it The Babylonian Talmud f relates the story in the like manner this only excepted â— In Megill that there is no mention of the five Elders as also that this clause is wanting They wrote out the Law for him by it self I. Josephus speaks glorious things of letters sent from the King to the High Priest sending for Interpreters of Presents sent to Eleazar and other things consecrated to the Temple of many Talents spent by Ptolomy for the redemption of the Jews of honourable rewards conferred upon the Interpreters all which according to the account of Josephus and Aristeas amounted to such a sum that one might with reason believe the whole Alexandrian Library was not worth so much yea a whole years tax of Egypt would scarcely have been of that value But of all this there is deep silence in the Talmudists and yet usually they want not either for Will or Elocution when something is to be declared for the glory of their own nation They are not silent of the gifts of Monobazus and Helena Nicanor Ben Kattin c. of the gifts of Princes either given or lent to their Rabbins but of these vast expences of Ptolomy there is not one Syllable II. In Josephus the Interpreters are sent for by letters and that under that notion that they should interpret But in the Talmudists they are convened being altogether ignorant what they must do III. In Josephus they turn the Law at least into Greek in the Talmudists it is obscure whether they translated any thing at all Of the five Elders indeed it is said in terms that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they transcribed in Greek that is they turned as the word which followeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to interpret sufficiently explains But of the Seventy there is no such thing but only this That they transcribed the Law by its self and changed thirteen places in it There is a passage indeed where the Babylonian Talmudists are brought in with their relation whereby one might think that they intimated that the Seventy translated into Greek Our c c c c c c Megil f. 9. 1. Masters say they permitted not that the holy Books should be transcribed but into Greek And it is a Tradition R. Judah saith when they permitted to transcribe in Greek they permitted it of the Book of the Law only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And that because of that which happened to King Ptolomy Or let it be as it is rendred by some Whence the work was begun with Ptolomy the King But if any should say that they transcribed indeed in Greek that is the Hebrew Text in Greek letters and translated not you would scarcely refute him out of the Talmudists especially when elsewhere they distinguish between writing out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in any Language d d d d d d Scabb fol. 115. 1. that is in the Characters of any Language and writing out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by a Version into any Language and when there was a publication and edition of a double Hebrew Text in Origens Hexapla and Octapla e e e e e e â—piphan haeres 63. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In Hebrew and Greek Characters he seems not to have been without his Copy in which the Hebrew Text it self was written out in Greek Letters What at length does that mean They writ out the Law by it self Certainly either this They transcribed the Law only and not the other Books or rather they transcribed the Hebrew Law it self in Hebrew and turned it not They wrote out say they the
not but see but those Books would at last though they were never so unwilling come forth in the Vulgar Language nor could they hinder but they would every where happen into the hands of the Heathen therefore that it would be far better that a Version should come forth by their care and authority which might be according to their pleasures than that some should come forth in one place and some in another which perhaps might turn to the disgrace of the Holy Text or to the danger and reproach of the Nation or might too much lay open the Holy Mysteries among the Heathen By these Authors and by these reasons I confess ingenuously it is my opinion that that Version was made which goes about under the name of the Seventy Nor are there some things wanting in the Version it self which hint some such counsil in the publishing of it For IV. Even a blear Eye may see clearly enough that it was hammered out and dressed with more caution than conscience more craft than sincerity 1. That as much as might be the Holy Books might remain free from any reproach or cavilling of the Heathen 2. That they might soften some things which might be injurious to the Jewish Nation either as to their peace or reputation or which might create offence to the Gentiles 3. That the mysteries and the bare truth of the Holy Books might be revealed as little as possibly could be to the Heathen All which might be demonstrated by such numberless examples as to leave no occasion to doubt of that matter behind it By these and the like cautions and subtilties was that Version made where in the Translators had less care that the Interpretation should come out sincere and true but provision was chiefly made that any thing should be thrust upon the Gentiles so it were without danger and that the Glory and safety of the Jewish Nation might be maintained And may it be allowed me to speak out what I think Among the various Copies and Editions of this Version which go about I do not esteem that Copy for the most genuine which comes nearest to the Hebrew Text but that which comes nearest to the mind of the Translators in such like cautions It is said as we saw before that when the five Elders had turned the Law That day was bitter to Israel as the day wherein the Golden Calf was made And why Because the Law could not be turned according to all things convenient to it Did their grief arise hence because it was not turned nor could not be clearly exactly and evidently enough that the Heathen might see the full and open light of it Who will believe that this ever was the Jews desire or wish But their trouble proceeded rather from hence that those five had not Translated it cunningly warily and craftily enough as the Gentiles were to be dealt withal Of this matter there was care enough taken in this Version the Authors setting all their strength and wits on work that according to their own pleasures it might come forth such as they would have it and might serve their purpose both as to themselves and as to the Gentiles This they established and strengthned by their own authority not as a pure Version and such as was to be recommended to their Countrymen but as fit enough to stop the mouths and satisfie the curiosity of the Heathen and lest any among them might attempt another in which those cautions and provisions might not be sufficiently observed This they laid up in their Sanhedrins and Synagogues that it might be ready and shewn to the Heathen as a Symbol and token of the Jewish Law Faith and Religion if at any time the matter and necessity called for some such thing We grant therefore to Justin Martyr that that Version was in the Synagogues and hands of the Jews but one would not conclude from that that it was read in the Synagogue instead of the Hebrew Text. And we will yield also to Tertullian that that Version was read at Rome in his age in the Synagogues of the Jews but being compelled so to do by that suspicion whereof we spake namely that it might be known to all what the Law and Religion of the Jews was whether it consisted with the Roman Government Our Question is whether the Hellenists chose to themselves the reading of the Greek Version and neglected the Hebrew Text and seeing for the most part they lived by their own Laws and Ordinances you will hardly any where shew me especially in the times of the Apostles concerning which we speak or in the times before them that they were compelled to reject the one and to read the other And as to that which is objected concerning Philo and Josephus t is no wonder if they writing for the Heathen followed that Version which was designedly made for the Heathen But that is of the greatest weight of all which is objected concerning the Evangelists and Apostles who embraced that Version in their quotations out of the Old Testament To which the Answer is very easie Namely Those Holy Writers had to do with two sorts of men Jews and Gentiles the Volume of the New Testament was in the hands of both A Gentile desires to examine the quotations which are brought out of the Old Testament But not understanding the Hebrew whether should he go but to the Greek Version which he understands So that it was not only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 out of condescension that those Holy Writers followed the Greek Version but out of pure necessity for otherwise it was impossible that their allegations out of the Law and the Prophets could be examined by the Gentiles And if a Jew having the New Testament in his hand should complain and quarrel that in their quotations they departed from the Hebrew Text they had an answer ready viz. This very Version which is cited is that very same which ye have writ published and propounded to the World as the Symbol and token of your Law and Religion and as your own very Bible If we would designedly attempt a full disquisition concerning that Version we might it may be more at large demonstrate all these things which have been spoken by various instances reasons and methods But let this suffice at present This discourse was raised by occasion of the mention of the unknown Tongue Chap. XIV which we suppose was Hebrew formerly used in the Hellenistical Synagogue of the Corinthians and which they would retain being now converted to the Gospel too much wresting to Judaism the gift of Tongues in the same manner as they did the other privileges and ordinances of the Gospel and using an unknown Language so much the rather because the gift of Tongues was granted from Heaven using it to an end plainly contrary to the gift it self unhappily perverting it and not requiring not admitting now an Interpreter which before was done by them as if they thought God had
at Jerusalem sat near the Altar of burnt offerings half the room where they sat being in that holy Court where the Altar stood And they thought they were bound to sit so near the Altar as long as they might and they thought they were bound while they sat there to execute impartial justice because of the nearness of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Divine presence which they accounted was always upon the Altar A very needful useful and proper conception and remembrance for every Court of Judicature to take up to think how near the Divine presence is unto them to overlook them how God is close by them near unto them nay as David tells us sitting among them seeing and observing their doing and demeanour in that great employment Therefore being to speak to such a Court if I should be so bold a◠to take on me to direct the way to the impartial administration of justice I could find no more proper way of direction in that case than to mind you of the noble copy you have before you viz. the great Judge Or if I should set my self to exhort to the execution of it I could use no more enforcing and perswasive arguments or exhortations than to mind you how near this great Judge is unto you Behold the Judge standeth before the door But do we behold him Could we see him with these bodily eyes as we see that honourable Person I should need to say no more Such a sight would be Text and Sermon enough and enough again for us But is there no other eye to see him that is invisible It is a true Christians motto I have set the Lord always before me and he sees him though he sees him not and with God in his eye he frameth all his demeanor and carriage and lives and walks and does and suffers and dies as seeing him that is invisible as it is said of Moses Heb. XI 27. But to see him as the great Judge is as I may say a second contemplation of God and as needful as the first The first I call that when the Soul contemplates God as the chiefest choicest only and most desirable Good and so all its affections desires and longings are laid out upon him striving for the enjoyment of him But withal the good soul contemplates God so as to make him his fear and his dread as well as his portion and delight he owns him infinitely just as well as he owns him infinitely good and as he looks upon him as his God so he looks upon him as his Judge Job IX 15. Whom though I were right yet would I not answer but I would make supplication to my Judge Such a Contemplation of God may the very present occasion call upon us to take up For can so great and remarkable an occasion pass us without some spiritual reflection and heavenly meditation Occasional meditation is a second sacred concoction as I may call it that when the body or sence hath or hath had the use of an earthly occurrence turns it to the good and nourishment of the soul. And shall such an occasion as this you are now entring on pass without some such beneficial spiritual improvement For what kind of heart does he carry that can see the day of an Assise and never think of the great day of judgment that can see a Judge a tribunal arraignings sentencings and never remember that We must all stand before the tribunal seat of Christ nor remember with himself For all these things God will bring thee to judgment Therefore Sursum Corda let us lift up our hearts and let their thoughts carry us beyond sight and sence and pick up the hony of some spiritual meditation from so noble a flower And the Text in some particulars directs us how to do it viz. that as we see the Judge already come and ready to enter upon the work of the Assise so to remember the great Assise is coming the great Judge is coming For he cometh for he cometh to judge the Earth Nay behold he standeth behold he standeth before the door But there may be some question what is our Apostles immediate and most intent and direct sence in these words For there are several expressions of the like nature in Scripture which seem to intend more especially the nearness of the destruction of Jerusalem and the Jewish Nation For as Christs pouring down his vengeance in the destruction of that City and people is called his coming in his glory and his coming in judgment and as the destruction of that City and Nation is charactered in Scripture as the destruction of the whole World so there are several passages that speak of the nearness of that destruction that are suited according to such characters Such is that in 1 Cor. X. 11. Upon us the ends of the world are come 1 Pet. IV. 7. The end of all things is at hand Heb. X. 37. Yet a little while and he that shall come will come and will not tarry And to the very same tendency may this be in the words of the Text Behold the Judge standeth before the door As also that in the Verse before The coming of the Lord draweth nigh There is very much mention in Scripture of the last days and both of exceeding much good and exceeding much evil that should accrew in them Our present dealing is about the latter By the last days are meant the last days of Jerusalem and of that Nation And there is foretold of them that in the last days there should be perillous times 2 Tim. III. 1. That in the last days there should come mockers 2 Pet. III. 3. That in the last times there should come many Antichrists which was an evidence that those were the last times 1 Joh. II. 18. Under those sad times did the poor professors of the Gospel live till God gave them some recovery and refreshment by the ruine of the City and Nation They were times of mockings and scourgings and imprisonments and of most bitter persecution of the Church both by the Jews that never believed and by Apostates that had believed but were revolted from the Gospel and become enemies to it A sad hour of temptation Rev. III. 10. Judgment began at the house of God 1 Pet. IV. 17. A fiery tryal at the thirteenth verse of the same Chapter Therefore the Apostles to bear up the hearts of the poor persecuted and afflicted Saints of God mind them concerning Christs coming in vengeance against that City and people to make an end of the persecution by making an end of the persecutors Instances might be given of this numerously if I would insist upon it Such an one I suppose is that in the verse before Be patient Brethren till the coming of the Lord Be patient for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh And that in the verse of the Text Grudge not Brethren one against another lest you be condemned with them that grudge at you
have the first fruits of the Spirit even we grone within our selves waiting c. They may be interpreted to a facil sense but construe them in connexion and conformity to the sense of the verses before as the first clause of this verse And not only they but we our selves c. does argue they must be and there will appear aliquid difficultatis propter vicinam difficultatem some difficulty in them because of a difficulty near them We may take Joh. III. 1 2 3. for an instance There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus a Ruler of the Jews The same came to Jesus by night and said unto him Rabbi we know that thou art a Teacher come from God for no man can do these miracles that thou dost except God be with him These words make a difficulty in the next verse which is how our Saviours reply there should correspond with Nicodemus his words Jesus answered and said unto him Verily Verily I say unto thee Except a man be born again he cannot see the Kingdom of God Which words are easie in themselves but the difficulty is to find out the relation they bear to the former There must be something understood to make Christs words an answer to Nicodemus his Peter saith 2 Pet. III. 16. that in S. Pauls Epistles there are some things hard to be understood This â—is probable is one of those hard places But Expositors aut inveniunt aut faciunt either invent the difficulties or make them before they were so and indeed most when they have expounded these words leave them more obscure than they found them The main difficulty is what sense to put on the word Creature vers 19. For the earnest expectation of the Creature waiteth for the manifestation of the Sons of God And I find especially three 1. Sedulius applies it to good Angels they grone for mans conversion But how are they subject to vanity vers 20. He hath an Interpretation for that which is not worth the trouble of your patience to hear 2. Primasius out of Austin understands it of Man only considered sinful Signaculo imaginis Dei amisso remansit tantum creatura Man having lost the mark of the Image of God there remained nothing but the creature And Creature ipsa est quae nondum vocatur filiorum forma perfecta sed tantum creatura The creature is that which hath not yet obtained the name of Sons but creature only But how this is applicable to the whole passage without much harshness I leave to your own thoughts to consider 3. A third and which is most entertained is that by Creatura is meant Ipsissima mundi machina coelesti elementari regione constans the very fabrick of the world consisting both of the heavenly and elementary region all subject to change and vanity and corruption because of sin Et convexo nutans pondere ready to sink with its weight labouring to be got into a better condition Accordingly Beza renders it Mundus hic creatus this created World and comments largely to this purpose and brings 2 Pet. III. 10 12. that speaks of the dissolution of the World to this purpose Out of which two places so taken what collections are made I need not tell you viz. That after the Resurrection Mundi Machina the Fabrick of the World shall not be dissolved but there shall be a Bodily creature still but purified and in an uncorrupt condition But quorsum haec cui â—ini Why is all this and to what end But I shall not now dispute this only I would recommend to you to consider whether taking up this sense the Apostles argumentation be proper If I be not deceived there are two phrases in the verses as keys hanging at their own girdle that do clearly unlock them into a sense far different from these but yet a sense plain and probable enough The first I shall take up is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the whole creation in the vers before we find the word in two places more The former is in Mark XVI 15. Go ye into all the World and preach the Gospel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to every creature There it means all Nations For Matthew so renders it in the parallel place Matth. XXVIII 19. Go ye therefore and teach all Nations The second place is I. Col. 23. The Gospel c. which was preached to every creature There it means the same and is as it were but an eccho to that in Mark. There was the Command here the performance The Apostle here speaks Attic Language but Jerusalem sense Greek but in a Jewish Idiom For the expression does but render a phrase most usual among the Jews viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All creatures which they use for all men or Nations as I might shew you by multitudes of Examples Now since in the two places mentioned it means all the Nations or Gentiles he offers violence to Scripture and frames a construction on his own head and not on his own heart that shall not construe it so here And for ought I see one might translate it omnis mundus Ethnicus all the Heathen World with as good warrant as Beza doth Totus hic mundus creatus all this created World A second key that I shall take up and use for the explaining this place is the Phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vanity vers 20. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the creature was made subject to vanity It is well translated Vanity but the word is ill construed It is generally taken for a vanishing fading condition whereas it signifies Vanity of mind This Apostle is a good Lexicon for this Rom. I. 21. Because when they knew God they glorified him not as God neither were thankful but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 became vain in their imaginations Eph. IV. 17. That ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk in the vanity of their mind 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lay these two places to the Text and see how they speak the same thing And now to take up the whole 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Paraphrase vers 18. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us For the very Gentiles look after this glory to be revealed vers 19. For the earnest expectation of the creature of all Nations or the Heathen waiteth for the manifestation of the Sons of God God had spoke much of his sons among the Gentiles and now the Gentiles did wait for the manifestation of these Sons of God vers 20. For the creature was made subject to vanity the Nations or Gentiles were subject to vanity of mind not willingly but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope vers 21. Because the creature the heathen World it self also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God vers 22. For we know that the whole
Apostles and Disciples and should pick out a man that we all know was no Apostle that no one knows whether he were a Disciple or no. But II. It is agreeable to all reason to conceive that as the man to whom God vouchsafed the revelation and discovery of the times and occurrences that were to intervene betwixt his own times and the fall of Jerusalem was Daniel a man greatly beloved so that the John to whom Christ would vouchsafe the revelation and discovery of the times and occurrences that were to intervene betwixt the Fall of Jerusalem and the end of the World was John the Disciple greatly beloved III. Of that Disciple Christ had intimated that he would that he should tarry till â—e came Joh. XXI 22. that is till he should come in vengeance against the Jewish Nation and their City to destroy them for that his coming both in that place and in divers other places in the New Testament doth mean in that sense it were very easie to make evident should we take that subject to insist upon Now as our Saviour vouchsafed to preserve him alive to see the Fall and destruction of that City so also did he vouchsafe to him the sight of a new Jerusalem instead of the old when that was ruined laid in ashes and come to nothing He saw it in Vision we see it in the Text and upon that let us six our Eyes and Discourse for we need not speak more of him that saw it In the verse before he sees a new Heaven and a new Earth and in this verse a new Jerusalem I. Something parallel to which is that in Esa. LXV 17. Behold I create new Heavens and a new Earth And in the verse next following Behold I create Jerusalem a rejoycing The expressions intimate the great change of affairs that should be in the World under the Gospel from what had been before A new Heaven or a change of Church and Religion from a Jewish to a Gentile Church and from Mosaick to Evangelical Religion A new Earth or a change in the World as to the management or rule of it from Heathenism to Christianity and from the rule of the four Heathen Monarchies Dan. VII to the Saints or Christians to iudge the World 1 Cor. VI. 2. or being Rulers or Magistrates in it And the new Jerusalem is the emblem and Epitome of all these things under this change as the old Jerusalem had been before the change came There is none but knoweth that Jerusalem in Scripture language is very commonly taken for the whole Church then being as well as it is taken particularly and literally for the City it self then standing That City was the Church in little because there were eminently in it all those things that do make and constitute a true Church viz. the administration of the Word and divine Ordinances the Assemblies of the Saints the Worship of the true God by his own appointment and the presence of God himself in the midst of all And can any doubt but that the new Jerusalem meaneth in the like sense and upon the like reason The Church of God under the Gospel this inriched with all those excellencis and privileges that that was yea and much more There was the Doctrine of Salvation but wrapped up in Types and Figures and dark Prophesies but here unfolded to the view of every Eye and Moses vail taken off his face There Ordinances of divine Worship but mingled with multitudes of carnal rites here pure adoration in Spirit and Truth There an assembly only of one People and Nation here a general assembly compacted of all Nations There God present in a cloud upon the Ark here God present in the communication of his Spirit Therefore it is the less wonder that it is called the holy City because of these things II. which is the second circumstance considerable in the words I saw the new Jerusalem The holy City It is observable that the second old Jerusalem for so let me call the Jerusalem that was built and inhabited after the return out of Captivity was called the holy City when goodness and holiness were clean banished out of the City and become a stranger there When the Temple had lost its choisest ornaments and endowments that contributed so much to the holiness of the place and City The Ark the cloud of Glory upon it the Oracle by Urim and Thummim the fire from Heaven upon the Altar these were all gone and Prophesie was utterly ceased from the City and Nation yet even then it is called the holy City in this her nakedness Nay when the Temple was become a Den of Thieves and Jerusalem no better if not worse when she had persecuted the Prophets and stoned those that were sent unto her when she had turned all Religion upside down and out of doors and worshiped God only according to inventions of men yet even then and when she is in that case she is termed the holy City Matth. IV. 5. Then the Devil taketh him up into the Holy City and setteth him on a pinacle of the Temple Nay when that holy Evangelist had given the story of her crucifying the Holy of Holies the Lord of life and glory even then he calls her the holy City Chap. XXVII 53. The bodies of many Saints which slept arose and came out of their graves after his Resurrection and went into the holy City and appeared to many Call me not Naomi but call me Marah might she very well have said then and so might others say of her for it might seem very incongruous to call the holy City when she was a City so very unholy She was indeed simply and absolutely in her self most unholy and yet comparatively The holy City because there was not a place under Heaven besides which God had chosen to place his Name there and there he had and that was it that gave her that name and title And while she kept the peculiarity of the thing she kept the name but at last forfeited both and then God finds out another City where to place his Name A new Jerusalem A holy City a holier City her younger sister fairer than she Holy under the same notion with the other because God hath placed his Name only III. there Holier than she because he hath placed it there in a more heavenly and spiritual manner than in her as was touched before And Holier still because she shall never lose her holiness as the other did as we shall touch hereafter And she cannot but be holy as I said before when she comes down from Heaven and is sent thence by God And this is the third thing remarkable in the Text I saw the new Jerusalem coming down from Heaven The Apostle S. Paul calls her Jerusalem which is above Gal. IV. 26. Our Apostle sees her coming down from above and the Prophet Ezekiel in his fortieth Chapter and forward seeth her pitched here below when she is
but he tries whether the door will be opened to give him entertainment And in this regard it is no wonder if men be said to resist and quench the Spirit because he comes only to try whether they will imbrace or resist quench or cherish This work of his differs from the effectual working of grace when he comes resolvedly to overcome and overpower A SERMON PREACHED upon ROMANS IX 3. For I could wish that I my self were accursed from Christ for my Brethren my Kinsmen according to the flesh A Dreadful passage at the first reading and which may make us even to tremble a man to wish himself to be accursed from Christ accursed from Christ The very words may make us to quake to think of such a thing And can we believe that a Paul should make such a wish that he might be accursed of Christ who knew so well what it was to be blessed of him Can he make such a wish Or rather can any one but such an one as he make such a wish upon such a ground upon such a condition upon such a warrant The Apostle is here beginning his Discourse concerning the casting off of the Jewish Nation and seed of Israel as at the nineteenth verse of the Chapter foregoing he is beginning his Discourse about the Calling of the Gentiles Them there he stiles by the title of the whole Creation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an expression usual among the Jews to signifie in that construction These here he calls his Brethren and Kinsmen for so nature had made them he and they coming of the same stock and original He speaks there of some mourning out of desire that the Calling of the Gentiles should be accomplished Here he speaks of himself mourning out of grief for the casting off of his own Nation There the whole Creation of the Gentiles themselves groaning to be delivered from the bondage of their sinful corruption Here himself grieving for the not delivering of his own people from theirs at ver 2. he hath grief and great grief and sorrow and continual sorrow for them and could wish himself to be accursed from Christ on condition it might be better with them And one would think he had very small cause to be thus affected towards them if it be well considered how they had continually demeaned themselves toward him They had continually bred him trouble always persecuted him five times beaten him constantly sought his life and contrived his death And yet the good man grieves for them that grieved not for themselves and that always were grieving him and could wish himself to be accursed for them that could wish him cursed to the pit of Hell A strange wish and a strange charity that he himself might be accursed that they might not be so that he might be separated from Christ that so they might be united to him A passage so strange that it hath but one parallel viz. that of Moses Exod. XXXII 32. where he prays God to blot him out of his Book when God was now ready to cut off the seed of Israel A passage so strange that it seems directly to cross the whole course of his profession and practise He professeth Phil. III. 8. That all things in the world were but loss for the excellency of the knowledg of Christ Jesus And yet here he can upon some condition be content to lose him He practiseth 1 Cor. IX ult to bring his body into subjection lest when he had preached to others he himself might be a cast-away And yet he could wish upon some condition to prove a cast-away So strange a passage that some Expositors cannot endure to look upon it in its full proportion but take as it were a diminishing glass to look upon it withal and they make those words of the Apostle to speak less a great deal than ever they meant They will have his meaning to be but this For my Brethrens sake the seed of Israel I could be content to be separate from Christ for a while and to continue upon earth from that glory that is prepared for me in Heaven that I might labour for their salvation Do you think that being Anathema or accursed from Christ means no more than this Others conceive that the Apostle only useth an high expression whereby to signifie how intirely he desireth the good of his own Nation As if he had needed so full and feeling an asseveration as I speak the truth in Christ Jesus my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost ver 1. to intimate that he so intirely desired their salvation But to omit more by this strong asseveration it is plain that he thinks as he speaks and speaks as he thinks For it was so strange a wish that he himself sees reason to use many asseverations to shew that he speaks in good earnest otherwise he would hardly be believed As First His double asseveration affirmatively and negatively ver 1. I speak the truth I lye not Secondly He lays his Conscience for earnest that he did not lye but spoke truth My Conscience bearing me witness Thirdly He doth as it were call Christ and the Holy Ghost to witness I speak the truth in Christ my conscience bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost And so under the attestation of three witnesses his Conscience Christ and the Holy Ghost he would have what he says to be confirmed for a truth and that he may be believed Well we believe that he speaks from his very heart and as he thinks that he wishes himself accursed from Christ for his Brethren his Kinsmen according to the flesh Doth he piously in so wishing or prudently St. Austin once wished that he might have heard him Preach but what would he have thought think you at such a wish as this Doth he not curse himself when he wisheth to be accursed And doth he not undervalue Christ when he could wish to be separate from Christ That passage My conscience bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost doth plainly evidence that what he doth is neither rashly done nor impiously nor imprudently but from a good conscience good affection and not without the Warrant of the Holy Spirit Indeed at ver 38. of the Chapter next going before He is perswaded that neither life nor death nor principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor any creature is able to separate him from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus And yet at this place he could wish that he were separate from Christ on the condition he proposeth Not that either he undervalueth his uniting to Christ or that he thought he should be separated from him or that he simply desired it but comparatively he could wish it on condition the seed of Israel his Brethren and Kinsmen might be united to him He could wish to be damned on condition they might be saved Which may seem a dreadful wish but so much doth he value the salvation of so
hard thing to make a fair probability of the truth of it So that as he was rapt into Heaven to attain to his revelations so he is wrapt as it were into an altitude and sublimity of these two things above other men when he prefers Gods glory in saving his Nation before his own salvation and the Souls of his Nation before his own Soul And this abounding superabounding Zeal and Charity is that that moves him to make such a Wish and his Conscience and the Holy Ghost warrant it I speak the truth in Christ I lye not My Conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost that I could wish my self accursed c. But to return then to the former Question Must an ordinary Christian write after this copy and come up to such a pitch of Charity and Zeal I might answer the occasion is extraordinary the person extraordinary the measure of Charity and Zeal extraordinary And therefore it cannot serve for an ordinary Rule Again I might briefly answer as we sometimes answer Children For pardon me if I take up that homely and familiar comparison It is ordinary with Children when they have meat in their hand to be greedy and think they have not enough but they cry for more But we commonly still them with bidding them first eat up that they have and then they shall have more God hath put thy task into thy hand Christian viz. Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self Ply take out digest that task and then it may be seasonable to ask What must I do more Here the love of the Apostle to others is more than to himself God requires of thee to love thy Neighbour as thy self Go and do that and never trouble thy self to question what thou hast more to do toward thy Neighbour till thou hast done that Keep but pace with the Apostle as he paceth like a Christian this is the task God requires of us He requires not that we keep pace with him as he paceth like an Apostle We poor Children cannot expect to keep even pace with so great a Father of the Church as this Apostle was It is our work to follow his steps though Non passibus oequis though not with even pace yet as well as we can But to consider of this case more particularly and distinctly Concerning our Duty or what we are to do we are to consider What is possible what is lawful and what is required For that may be lawful which is not possible and that may be lawful which is not required For example it were very lawful for a man to be as wise as Solomon if he could attain to it but that is impossible So it is very lawful for a man to speak with the tongue of Men and of Angels if he could do it but it is not possible to be done So on the other hand It is very lawful for a man to spend all his life in study and reading of Books but this is not required of all because they have other just and lawful callings to follow So it is very lawful for a Man as Timothy to drink nothing but water but it is not required since God hath afforded other wholesome Drinks and every creature of God is good being received with thanksgiving So as to our Duty or what we are to do we are to determine what is lawful by what is required I speak of our Christian Duty for as to our Christian Liberty that is not to be determined by what is required but by what is warranted Now as to the thing before us I. It is impossible we should reach to that height of Grace that this great Apostle attained to We cannot look that our poor spark of Grace if it be any should shine so bright as this glorious star of the first magnitude nor that we poor worms creeping altogether upon the Earth should soar to that pitch that he did that was rapt into the third Heaven And therefore not being in the same capacity with him in Grace we cannot think we are in the capacity of making the same wish with him which came merely from the abounding Grace of Zeal and Charity that was in him II. Then which we must especially look after is it required from us that we should wish such a wish to our selves to be accursed from Christ for any mans salvation Is it either our Christian Duty and we bound to do it or is it with in our Christian Liberty and we licenced to it I check my self for that I go about to discuss such a case as this when there is a great deal more need to bewail the sad want of common Duty that the Apostle passed through to come to that pitch he did Which when any man hath passed through then if he have warrant as the Apostle had let him wish as he did The pitch that he came to was to love his Neighbour above himself when he could wish so much evil to himself for their good But the way that he went up thither was by loving his Neighbour as himself And this is the way that we are to set into and to keep in and to write after him in this though we cannot nor are required to do in the other There are then three steps or degrees of the Apostles Charity First He hated no man in the world Secondly He loved his Neighbour as himself Thirdly He loved him above himself Now it is without all doubt in the two former of these we are all absolutely bound to follow him I. to hate no man in the world to be enemy to none That Gloss that the Jews made upon the Command Matth. V. 43. Thou shalt love thy Neighbour and hate thine Enemy was a Gloss from Hell and not from Heaven from Satan and not from God And how our Saviour confutes it and how he teaches what a Christian is to do in that case you may see there Love your Enemies bless them that curse you do good to them that hate you As he of old said He knew not what to morrow meant because he looked upon every present day as his last So a true Christian knows not what enmity or hatred to any Man means because he looks upon every Man as his Brother And it was a most noble commendation that one gives of another Our Friend Sturmius hated no Man but only Vice Wickedness Heresie and the Devil A true Christian hates no Man upon his own quarrel David professeth to God Do not I hate them that hate thee Yes I hate them with a perfect hatred But it was upon no quarel of his own but because they hated God Nor was it their Persons he hated but their Qualities So this Apostle would have those that loved not the Lord Jesus to be accursed 1 Cor. XVI 22. It was not because they loved not him or he them but because they loved not Christ. There is nothing in the world more common than the hate of
he shewed what was meant by that Levit. XVIII 5. viz. That by keeping the Commandments not only life here but Eternal life hereafter is obtained And so it is further cleared by his words in Luk. X. 28. This do and thou shalt life So that this here was not barely a temporal promise but had wrapped up in it a further promise of Life Eternal And so had the other temporal promises that were given them And so some of the Jews interpret that Levit. XXVI 11 12. And I will set my Tabernacle amongst you and my Soul shall not abhor you And I will walk among you and will be your God and ye shall be my people not only of God being among his people here but of his being in the midst of them and they about him in Heaven And so you find the word Heaven in Scripture sometimes to signifie the Church here as well as it signifies the state and place of glory hereafter Now if you ask why God since he meant spiritual things and eternal under these temporal promises did not speak out but used such promises as might prove occasions of missing of those promises through misimprovement And so we find that this very thing proved the ruine of the Jewish Nation they being moved hereby to look at temporal things and to neglect eternal They looked and still look for a temporal Kingdom of Christ pompous and resplendent with worldly Iustre And this stands as it were a Wood or a Fog betwixt them and the discerning of his spiritual Kingdom that they cannot will not see it This makes them look for their Canaan again and to be planted and â—ettled there anew With which opinion too many Christians do concurr and look for some such glorious thing among the Jews even this year sixty six Why I say did not God speak out spiritual and eternal things but only obscurely hinted them in such temporal promises as these I Answer Because God would use the most feeling perswasions to them Men are not so sensible of things spiritual as they be of bodily have not the feeling of things that concern Life Eternal as they have of this Life To have said Honour thy Father and Mother that thou mayst inherit eternal life had been a fair argument but it is not so feeling to flesh and blood No Man but is very desirous of long life here and it is but one of a City and two of a Tribe that more desires Life Eternal The Gadarens are more sensible of their Swine than Christ and not one in many but a promise of earthly prosperity or bodily welfare comes nearer his heart than a promise of everlasting and heavenly glory health of body than of soul showers of rain than of grace bags of mony than all the treasures of Christ. Therefore God gave such promises as might be most feeling and perswasive those that were most like to take As the Apostle I being crafty caught you with guile as the Jews describe it As one that gives his Child Nuts and Plums to bring him on to learn so God gave to them those things that he was sure would most please them The Church of the Jews was a Child under age Gal. IV. 1 2 3. and God deals with them as with Children giving Ordinances and promises according to its childhood feeds them with milk and not with strong meat because they were not so able to bear it It is commonly said they were not able to bear spiritual dispensations in their abstract simplicity and therefore God gave them such carnal Ordinances according as they were able to bear them It is true they were carnal enough about the worship of God but was it not because they had such carnal Ordinances from the first The use of these made them dote on them Are there not thousands among Christians as carnal about Gods service as they That dote as much upon Ceremony and outward formality in Gods worship as ever they did And that because they have been brought up in such Ceremonious way or cannot come up to worship in spirit And might not the Jews have been as capable of the same spiritual manner of Religion as the Gentiles were if God had set it up among them when he first took them for the Church Wherein then did the Childhood of the Church consist First That it was yet but small of stature in comparison of that full body and growth the Church of God was to come to See that Eph. IV. 12 13. For the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministry for the edifying of the body of Christ Till we all come in the unity of the Faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ. What is the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ It is the mystical body of Christ in its full proportion viz. Jew and Gentile joyned together How small a Babe was the Church of the Jews in comparison with what the Church was when the Gentiles of all Nations were become the Church Secondly That Church was a Child in knowledge in comparison of the Church under the Gospel Hence that promise Esai LXV 20. There shall be no more thence an Infant of days The Gospel should bring in such light and means of knowledge that none should be a Child or infant in knowledge if they had a mind to learn 'T is true they were so childish because God afforded no clearer means of knowledge And it is as true that in some sort it was needful the means of knowledge should be but as it was viz. that God by those means might make way to the knowledge and embracing of spiritual things under the Gospel when it came Consider their carnal ordinances and temporal promises God in the Gospel was to bring in a spiritual Worship and Religion A better way to make way for the embracing of that could not be used than by shewing before the unprofitableness the uneffectualness of their carnal worship This the Apostle speaks to at large in the Epistle to the Hebrews Chap. IX 9. That gifts and offerings could not make him that did the service perfect That sprinkling the blood of Goats and Bulls could not purge the Conscience The experience of this was the way to make men harken after the Sacrifice of Christ that would do the work that blood of Christ that could purge to the utmost And the like might be instanced in other parts of that carnal service So God gave them especially promises of temporal things that he might teach them that they should not be losers by his service Their service was chargeable in gifts and offerings and in going up to Jerusalem c. Therefore it was needful that God should ply them with promises of temporal good that they should lose nothing by his service if they were faithful to it Observe that Exod. XXXIV 23. Thrice in the
K its situation 497 Canaan what p. 202. It was only a part of Canaan p. 328. The earthly Canaan is not to be sought after 1224 Candle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Candle used for a Person famous for life or knowledge 550 Capernaum its situation a City in a pleasant place p. 72. Where p. 308. There were two Places of that Name 496 497 Caphar Chittim the same with Ziddim 71 Caphar Hananiah was the middle of Galilee 58 Caphar Karnaim was of Heathen Jurisdiction 317 Caphar Tebi what Village and whence the Name 18 Caphar Tsemach something observed about its Name 316 Cappadocia rendred by the Vulgar Palusium was Sin of old but in the Talmudists Cappadocia c. 290 291 Captains of the Temple what 471 Carmel a mountainous Country 59 Casiotis and Casius the Mount where situate c. 291 Castara what place and by whom inhabited 515 Castor and Pollux what how pictured and how fatal their Feast to the Lacedemonians 705 706 Caves and Dens vastly large and very numerous in the Land of Israel many of these were digged out of Mountains and Rocks by the Gygantick Canaanites for the use of war 88 89 Causes capital the Sanhedrim lost the power of Judging in Capital Causes by their own neglect being so remiss to the Israelites with the reason of it 611 to 614 Cesarea how named by Arabians and Jews how far from Jerusalem Herod built it after it was destroyed the Schools and Doctors of the Jews flourished there 54 55 Cesaria Phillippi where situated 63 317 Chabul what 311 Chagigah the Festival this was the second part of the Passover being kept with joy mirth and sacrifices p. 356 c. Paschal Chagigah what part of the Passover When the time of bringing it 610 611 618 Chains for the hands used among the Jews 683 Chalamish what place and by whom inhabited 515 Chaldee Language from their return out of Babilon was the Jews Mother Tongue 545 Chaldee Paraphrast addeth to the Hebrew Text. 707 Chaluch was a woolen shirt next the skin worn by the Jews 457 Chamber of the Counsellors and chief Men what 358 Chambers and Gates lying on the South side of the Court of Israel what 31 32 Chammath this is Ammaus of Josephus so near Tiberias as to be computed almost one City computed by some to be the warm Bathes of Tiberias 68 69 308 Chaphar Acon what 60 Chaphenatha where and what 516 Charity towards our neighbour is the top of Religion and a most undoubted sign of love to God p. 219. Saint Paul had three steps or degrees in his Charity 1300 Charms Mutterings Exorcisms c. were several sorts of Enchantments practised by Jews 243 Chel was the second Inclosure about the Temple 29 30 Chephar what place and by whom inhabited 515 Cheth and He Aleph and Ain the Mystical Jewish Doctors did not distinguish them 79 Chethib and Keri are the differing Readings of the Hebrew Text. 139 140 Chezib it and Achzib changed into Ecdippa the name of a place 61 Chief Men and Counsellors their Chambers what 358 Chijun or Remphan or Rephan what c. 673 Child a Child with two Bodies from the Navel upward which acted as two Children c. born at Emmaus 373 Children were born and brought up in some Courts near the Temple under ground to be made fitter to sprinkle the Purifying water p. 34. Little Children admitted Disciples by Christ. p. 219. Among the Jews when Children were grown to twelve years of age they were put close upon business both Secular and Divine p. 394. Children born crooked maimed or defective according to some sin of the Parents was the Opinion of the Jews p. 568. Children in the womb supposed by the Jews to be in a capacity to commit some sin p. 569 570. Holy Children a term for such as are born of Christian Parents p. 759 760. Why Children were and are to be baptized p. 1125 1127 1128 Why there is no particular Precept in Scripture for their Baptism p. 1128 1133. Children of the Jewish Proselytes were Baptized in the Jewish Baptism and why p. 1128 1132 1133. Why Children suffer for their Parents sin the Justice thereof p. 1316 1317. Good Children being part of their Parents are punished for their Parents sins 1318 1319 Children of the Bride-chamber what their priviledge and business 172 Chipper what place and by whom inhabited 515 Chorazin where seated 83 84 Christ is added to Jesus in numberless places in the New Testament to shew that Christ was the true Saviour and that Jesus was the true Messias p. 96. Jesus Christ is called the Son of David in a Communion term in the New Testament the Talmudick Writings also use the same term for the true Messias p. 96 97. Christ was born in the thirty first year of Augustus Caesar. p. 104 105. In the thirty fifth year of the Reign of Herod p. 106. In the Month of Tisri answering our September at the Feast of Tabernacles p. 107. This Month Tisri was ennobled before Christs time by many excellent things done in it p. 107. He fulfilled the typical Equity of the three great Feasts Passover Pentecost and Tabernacles p. 107. The Jewish Writers seem to intimate the time of Christs birth p. 107 108. There was a general expectation of him when he came p. 108. Manaben i. e. the Comforter is taken for Christ. p. 108. He conversed upon Earth two and thirty years and an half p. 128 Many Miracles were done by him p 174. Ben Satda a blasphemous name given by the Jewish Writers to Jesus Christ whom they make a Magician c. p. 189. Signs of Christs coming what from the Doctrin of the Jews p. 240 241. His coming in Glory and in the Clouds signifie only his taking vengeance on the Jewish Nation p. 244 1074. His death and the manner of it in several things differed from the Jewish custom in putting Persons to death p. 266. Christ had Perfections and Excellencies which flowed from the Hypostatical union of the two Natures and such also as flowed from the Donation and anointing of the Holy Ghost both mentioned p. 351 352. Christ or Messiah and the Son of God are convertible Terms against the Jews p. 548 549. Christ in his Agony and Passion exercised obedience and holiness not the Divine Power to bear up under the utmost that an enraged Devil could do p. 591. Whether God was then angry with him is questioned p. 591. Christs dew is his quickening Power p. 691. His Resurrection shews him to be the Messiah p. 691. His entrance into his publick Ministry and the time of his death and the several Actions which he did about the time of each c. p. 1033. He held communion with the National Church of the Jews in the publick Exercise of their Religion proved by manifold instances p. 1036 1037 1038 1039 1040 1041. He was a Member of the Church of the Jews proved and under the obligation of the Law p. 1037.
to have been among the Jews illustrated by examples p. 806 807. They translated the Old Testament so as to favour the Manners Traditions Ordinances and State of the Jewish Nation p. 806 807. It s not an accurate pure Version even the Jews being Judges p. 807 808. Objections answered p. 808 809. Whence not the Greek Version but the Hebrew Text was read in the Synagogues of the Helenists p. 808. By what Authors and Councils it might probably be that the Greek Version came forth which obtains under the Name of the Seventy performed with more craft than Conscience why therefore did the Apostles and Evangelists use it 809 to 811 Sheaf first Fruit Sheaf where and how reaped p. 38 52. When to be offered p. 184. The manner of reaping it 618 619 Sheep Gate or Probatica was not near the Temple contrary to the Jewish opinion 507 Shekel of what parts and value it was p. 343 1204. The reason of the Gift of half a Shekel as used in the Temple p. 1204 1205. Why the half Shekel was to be paid at the age of twenty years and not before 1206 Shepherd Christ a great Shepherd described 573 574 Shezor a Town in upper Galilee Page 77 Shibin not far from Zippor 76 Shoos and Sandals not the same against Beza and Erasmus 178 Shops or Tabernae where things were sold for the Temple where situate 512 Shosbenuth or Shosbenim what 527 Sichem why called Sycbar 506 Signs are for a fit generation p. 191. Meer Signs or Miracles were never wrought by our Saviour p. 1104 Signs of the Heaven and Air and of the coming of the Messiah what p. 203. Signs of Christs coming what from the Doctrine of the Jews 240 241 Siloam a sweet and large Fountain where situate and which way it empâ—led it self p. 25 26 508 509. Silâ—am taken for part of Jerusalem 441 Simon Magus who he gave out himself to be and what the Samaritans accounted him 676 677 Sin is not to be remitted after death p. 190. How a Man may know whether it be pardoned to him p. 1071 1072. Deadly Sin what it is p. 1093 1094 c. Sin is the more desperately deadly by how much it is the more desperately wilful p. 1098. Sin of the Devil what it was p. 1098. Sin against the Holy Ghost why more grievous than that against the Son p. 1130. Believers punished for Sin against the opinion of the Antinominians p. 1226. God stints the time of Mens rising from the Death of Sin which slipped is not to be retrieved p. 1238 1239. Sin unto death and Sin against the Holy Ghost how distinguished p. 1253. Sin of the Devils wretched being beyond pardon p. 1305. God's letting Men go on uninterrupted in their Sin is the greatest punishment they can have here p. 1310 1311. What to think of Saints dying with some Sin unrepented of 1343 1344 Sindon was a Cloak made with Linnin and hung with Fringes 354 355 Singing of Psalms was one part of Prophesie p. 785. See Psalms Singular and Disciple what They are Terms sometimes confounded and sometimes distinguished 433 Sinners there is nothing more desirable to God Christ and Angels than the repentance of a Sinner p. 1269. What it is that moves God Christ and Angels to desire this 1270 Sins of wicked Men are set down in Scripture that we may avoid them 1306 Sion was the upper City on the North part of Jerusalem p. 22 23 24. After the return from Babilon it was constantly called the upper Town 23 Sippor or Zippor a City encompassed with a Land flowing with Milk and Hony noted for warlike affairs an University many Synagogues and many famous Doctors 74 75 Sirbon a Lake like that of Sodon 9 Sitting after the days of Rabban Gamaliel was the posture of Learning 396 Sitting at Table what the manner among the Jews 595 596 Slaughter or Cruelty prodigious in the East Indies 1295 Sleep put for Death used hundreds of times among the Talmudists 174 Smelling judging by Smelling supposed by the Jews to be one qualification of the Messiah for want of which Ben-Cozibah was destroyed by the Jews 543 Socoh in Jos. 25. 35. what 51 Socinianism and Quakarism are great Heresies 1280 1281 Solomons Porch what and where 511 512 1034 Son what the Son is bound to do for the Father 200 Son of Abraham by Faith and Nature what 467 Son of David a common term in the New Testament and Talmudick Writings for the true Messias 96 97 Son of God the Messiah acknowledged to be the Son of God by the Jews though not by Nature but by Adoptlon p. 269 270. He is put for the Messias frequently p. 351. Son of God and Messiah or Christ are convertible terms against the Jews Page 385 548 549 Son the word Son is to be added to every Race in Christ's Genealogy 400 Son of Man why this term is attributed to Christ. p. 204. The Son coming in Glory and in the Clouds signifie only Christs taking vengeance on the Jewish Nation 265 Sons of the envious Woman what 52 Sonship or Adoption as referring to God how understood by the Jews 521 533 Sorceresses Women of Israel were generally Sorceresses 244 Sorrows of the Messiah what 351 Soul the Soul is imprisoned and restrained in its actings whilst it is in the Body p. 1092. How the Soul contemplates God p. 1116. Soul put for Life and Person p. 1204 1205. Soul of Man not the Body bears the Image and Resemblance of God and how p. 1284 1285. Whether the Souls of Men are alike p. 1285. The Soul of Lazarus was in Heaven those four days he was dead p. 1352. Where was the Soul of Christ when separate from the body p. 1344. His Soul was like the Souls of other Men in its infusion existence and acting in the Body 1352 Souls of the Jews disposed of by the Jewish Schools under a threefold phrase or state p. 455. The Transmigration or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as also the Pre-existence of Souls what p. 569. How to judge of the true quality and worth of Souls p. 1212 1213. Spectra or Apparitions of the Souls of Men believed by the Jews p. 483 1283. Souls of other Men should be dear to us as well as our own p. 1297 1298 1299. Souls of Men in a better state than Devils and whether all Souls be in a savable condition p. 1302. The Pre-existence of Souls some hold it p. 1352. Whether all Souls are equal p. 1353. What doth a Soul instantly after it hath left the Body p. 1354. The Soul doth neither sleep nor dye when out of the Body p. 1355. Souls in the other World are fixed in their place and condition 1355 South Country used for Judea 13 Spain and France what places the Jews understood for them 368 Speaking among the Jews used to be with all possible shortness especially where the thing was plain p. 668. Speaking with Tongues what is meant by it 1157 Spectra or the Apparitions
inheritance of Jacob is promised to those that sanctifie the Sabbath because he sanctified the Sabbath himself Yea and more backwards yet even to the beginning of the world q q q q q q Targ. Id Cant. â— The first Psalm in the world was when Adams sin was forgiven and when the Sabbath entred he opened his mouth and uttered the Psalm of the Sabbath So also the Targum upon the title of Psalm XCII The Psalm or Song which Adam composed concerning the Sabbath day Upon which Psalm among other things thus Midras Tillin What did God create the first day Heaven and Earth What the second The Firmament c. What the seventh The Sabbath And since God had not created the Sabbath for servile works for which he had created the other days of the week therefore it is not said of that as of the other days And the evening was and the morning was the seventh day And a little after Adam was created on the Eve of the Sabbath the Sabbath entred when he had now sinned and was his Advocate with God c. r r r r r r â—ab Sanhedr fol. 38. 1. Adam was created on the Sabbath Eve that he might immediately be put under the Command c. III. Since therefore the Sabbath was so instituted after the fall and that by a Law and Condition which had a regard to Christ now promised and to the fall of man the Sabbath could not but come under the power and dominion of the son of Man that is of the promised seed to be ordered and disposed by him as he thought good and as he should make provision for his own honour and the benefit of Man VERS X. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath days THESE are not so much the words of Enquirers as Denyers For these were their dicisions in that Case s s s s s s Maimon in Schabb. c. XXI Let not those that are in health use physic on the Sabbath day Let not him that labours under a pain in his loyns anoynt the place affected with oyl and vineger but with oyl he may so it be not oyl of Roses c. He that hath the tooth ach let him not swallow vineger to spit it out again but he may swallow it so he swallow it down He that hath a soar throat let him not gargle it with oyl but he may swallow down the oyl whence if he receive a cure it is well Let no man chew Mastich or rub his teeth with spice for a cure but if he do this to make his mouth sweet it is allowed They do not put wine into a sore eye They do not apply fomentations or oyls to the place affected c. All which things however they were not applicable to the cure wrought by Christ with a word only yet they afforded them an occasion of cavilling who indeed were sworn together thus to quarrel him that Canon affording them a further pretence t t t t t t Talm. Schabb. cap. XIX This certainly obtains that what soever was possible to be done on the Sabbath Eve driveth not away the Sabbath To which sense he speaks Luke XIII 14. u u u u u u â—n Hieros Avodah Zaraâ— fol. 40. 4. Let the Reader see if he be at leisure what diseases they judge dangerous and what physic is to be used on the Sabbath VERS XI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. If a sheep fall into a ditch on the Sabbath days c. IT was a Canon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 x x x x x x Hieros Jom Tobâ— fol. 62. 1. We must take a tender care of the goods of an Israelite Hence y y y y y y Maimon in Schabb. â— 25. If a beast fall into a ditch or into a pool of waters let the owner bring him food in that place if he can but if he can not let him bring clothes and litter and bear up the beast whence if he can come up let him come up c. If a beast or his foal fall into a ditch on a holy day z z z z z z Hieros in the place above â—â— R. Lazar saith Let him lift up the formes to kill him and let him kill him but let him give fodder to the other lest he die in that place R. Joshuah saith Let him lift up the former with the intention of killing him although he kill him not let him lift up the other also although it be not in his mind to kill him VERS XVI 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That they should not make him known BUT this not that he refused to heal the sick nor only to shun popular applause but because he would keep himself hid from those who would not acknowledge him This prohibition tends the same way as his preaching by Parables did Mat. XIII 13. I speak to them by parables because seeing they see not He would not be known by them who would not know him VERS XX. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A bruised reed shall he not break THESE words are to be applied as appears by those that went before to our Saviours silent transaction of his own affairs without hunting after applause the noise of boasting or the loud reports of fame He shall not make so great a noise as is made from the breaking of a reed now already bruised and half broken or from the hissing of smoking flax only when water is thrown upon it How far different is the Messias thus described from the Messias of the expectation of the Jews And yet it appears sufficiently that Esaiah from whom these words are taken spake of the Messias and the Jews confess it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Till he send forth judgment unto victory The Hebrew and LXX in Esaiah read it thus He shall bring forth judgment unto truth The words in both places mean thus much That Christ should make no sound in the world or noise of pomp or applause or state but should manage his affairs in humility silence poverty and patience both while he himself was on earth and by his Apostles after his Ascension labouring under contempt poverty and persecution but at last he should bring forth judgment to victory that is that he should break forth and shew himself a judg avenger and conqueror against that most wicked Nation of the Jews from whom both he and his suffered such things and then also he sent forth judgment unto truth and asserted himself the true Messias and the Son of God before the eyes of all and confirmed the truth of the Gospel by avenging his cause upon his enemies in a manner so conspicuous and so dreadful And hence it is that that sending forth and execution of judgment against that Nation is almost always called in the New Testament his coming in Glory When Christ and his Kingdom had so long lain hid under the vail of humility and
the cloud of persecution at last he brake forth a revenger and cut off that persecuting Nation and shewed himself a conqueror before the eyes of all both Jews and Gentiles Let it be observed in the Text before us how after the mention of that judgment and victory against the Jews presently follows And in his Name shall the Gentiles trust VERS XXIV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 By Beelzebub the Prince of the Devils FOR the searching out the sense of this horrid blasphemy these things are worthy observing I. Among the Jews it was held in a manner for a matter of Religion to reproach Idols and to give them odious names a a a a a a Hieros Avodah Zâ—raâ— fol. 43. 3. R. Akibah saith Idolatry pollutes as a menstruous woman pollutes as it is said Thou shalt cast away the Idol as something that is menstruous and thou shalt say to it Get thee hence â—sai XXX 22. R. Lazar saith Thou shalt say to it Get thee hence That which they call the face of b b b b b b See Strabo â—iâ— â—â— pag â—pâ—â— mâ— â—â—4 God let them call the face of a dog That which they call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the fountain of a â—up let them call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the fountain of Toâ—l or of Flailes that which they call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fortune let them call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a stink c. That Town which sometimes was called Bethel was afterwards called Bethaven See also the Tract c c c c c c Fol. 11. 4. Schabbath where these same words are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 d d d d d d â—â—◠〈◊〉 fol â—â—â— All jeering is forbidden except the jeering of Idolatry This also is repeated in the Tract e e e e e e â—ol 25. 2. Megillah Where this is added It is lawful for a Jew to say to a Câ—â—hite 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Take you Idol and put it under your buttocks II. Among the ignominious names bestowed upon Idols the general and common one was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Zebul dung or a dunghil f f f f f f Hieros Bâ—â—aâ—â—â—â— fol. 12 â— Even to them who have stretched out their hands 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in a dunghill that is in an Idol-Temple or in Idolatry there is hope Thou â—anst not bring them into the Church because they have stretched forth their hands 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In a dunghill But yet you cannot reject them because they have repented And a little after 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that sees them dunging that is sacrificing to an Idol let him say Cursed be he that sacrifices to a strange God Let them therefore who dare form this word in Matthew into Beelzebuâ— I â—m so far from doubting that the Pharisees pronounced the word Beelzebul and that Matthew so wrote it that I doubt not but the sense fails if it be writ otherwise III. Very many names of evil spirits or devils occur in the Talmudists which it is needless here to mention Among all the devils they esteemed that devil the worst the foulest and as it were the Prince of the rest who ruled over the Idols and by whom Oracles and Miracles were given forth among the Heathens and Idolaters And they were of this opinion for this reason because they held Idolatry above all other things chiefly wicked and abominable and to be the Prince and head of evil This Demon they called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Baal-zebul not so much by a proper name as by one more general and common as much as to say the Lord of Idolatry the worst devil and the worst thing and they called him the Prince of devils because Idolatry is the Prince or chief of wickedness g g g g g g Hieros Peaâ—â— fol. 21. 2. We meet with a story where mention is made of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Prince of spirits Whether it be in this sense let the Reader consult and judg Also in the h h h h h h Ex â—â—â—â—oth Aruch we meet with these words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Demon Asmodeus the Prince of spirits IV. The Talmudists being taught by these their Fathers do give out horribly blaspheming That Jesus of Nazareth our Lord was a Magician a broacher of strange and wicked worship and one that did Miracles by the power of the Devil to beget his worship the greater belief and honour i i i i i i Bâ—b Sâ—hab fol. 104. â— Ben 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Satda brought Magick out of Egypt by cuttings which he had made in his flesh By 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ben Satda they understand Jesus of Nazareth as we have said before whom they dishonour by that name that they might by one word and in one breath reproach him and his Mother together For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Satda or Sâ—ada sounds as much as an Adulterous wife which the Gemara shews after a few lines 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 She went aside from her husband k k k k k k Saâ—hedr fol. 107. 2. They seign that Jesus travelled with Joshua ben Perachiah into Egypt when the said Joshua fled from the anger and sword of Janneus the King which we have mentioned at the second Chapter and that he brought thence Magical witchâ—rafts with him but under the cutting of his flesh that he might not be taken by the Egyptian Magicians who strictly examined all that went out of that land that none should transport their Magiâ—k Art into another land And in that place they add these horrid words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Jesus practised Magick and deceived and drove Israel to Idolatry Those whelps bark as they were taught by these dogs To this therefore does this blasphemy of the Pharisees come as if they should say He casts out Devils indeed but he doth this by the help of the Devil the Lord of Idols that dwells in him by him that is the worst of all Devils who favours him and helps him because it is his ambition to drive the people from the worship of the true God to strange worship VERS XXV 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But Iesus knowing their thoughts BEhold O Pharisee a sign of the true Messias for a sign you would have He smells out a wicked man l l l l l l Bab. Sanheâ—r fol. 93. â— It is written of Messias The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and shall make him smell in the fear of the Lord. Rabba said He shall smell and judg as it is said He shall not judg by the sight of his eyes c. Ben Cozba reigned two years and a half and said to the Rabbins I am the Messias They said to him It is written of Messias that he shall smell and judg The Gloss is He shall smell of the Man and shall judg and know whether he be