because Christ was to be in Heaven he assures them ver 19. 20. That whatever Publick Acts of Discipline they did when they were assembled and desired his Confirmation of them he would grant it to them yea when they met together in his Name and by his Authority committed to them did proceed to Censure Offenders he declares he was present there virtually and effectually ver 20. Now here seems to be no room for evasion yet those who love to find knots in the Bulrush do object to this plain Exposition First That this is meant of private Injuries when the Believers had no Judicatures to right them but Jewish or Heathen and though in that Case they were to use this Method yet now Christians have Magistrates and Laws of their own this order is void of it self To which Grotius replys That Christian Tribunals do not take away the power of judging from the Church because the Civil Laws do only punish the grosser Crimes and such as are most contrary to Civil Societies but there are many Offences against Charity Meekness and Patience not forbid by the Civil Laws but only by Christ's Laws by which the Church judgeth so that Constantine and his Successors did well to leave this power of Judging to the Church and to confirm it by their Laws as may be seen in the Acts of the Councils and in the Code (i) Grot. Com. in Luc. vi 22. To which I shall add That Christ here speaks not only of Injuries but of all kinds of Sins which are called Scandals or Offences because they may be an occasion of our Brethrens falling into Apostacy or evil Practises if these go unpunished and many Sins must be unpunished if none be taken notice of but those which the Civil Laws forbid (k) Rom. xiv 13. 1 Cor. viii 10. and therefore Scandals and Trespasses are used promiscuously (l) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Matth. xviii 7. but ver 21. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So also 1 Cor. viii 12. So that many evil things which are scandalous and offend weak Christians are still to be punished by the Church and since the ends of Church Censures are to bring the Offender to Repentance to clear the Church from the blot contracted by this Crime and to warn others not to follow so ill an Example and the nature of them is more gentle and more spiritual than the Civil Punishments doubtless they may well subsist together in the same Nation without subverting one another Secondly The Learned Mr. Selden seeks many Glosses for those words Tell the Church which he sometimes expounds of the Jewish Magistrates in the Synagogue and sometimes of the whole Assembly manifestly designing to take this Power out of the Bishops hands But for his first Notion how improbable is it that Christ should allow his Disciples who were not to sue for their very Cloaks Matth. v. 40. to go to their mortal Foes the unbelieving Jews to complain of Injuries and according to Mr. Selden's Notion of a Synagogue for a Court of Justice they were more like to be scourged or receive new Injuries than to get right there and Christ would rather have said Tell it to the Synagogue than tell the Church But an easie Prolepsis will solve this seeming difficulty for it was usual with our Lord whose words were to be writ for after times to allude to things not then instituted as he doth to Baptism John iii. 5. and to the Eucharist John vi 51. so we may reasonably believe he gave this Rule with respect to those Assemblies of Christians which he foresaw would soon after grow into a distinct Society and be ruled by his Apostles and their Successors to whom these Complaints were then to be made For I must venture to prefer S. Chrysostom's Exposition before that which Mr. Selden writ under a Rebellious Democracy and that holy Father tells us expresly that by the Church here is meant the Governours of the Church (l) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hom. 69. in Matth. Tom. II. p. 385. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Theoph. whom Theophilact agrees with And St. Augustine expresly affirms That it is the Governours of the Church which have received this power from Christ in this place of St. Matthew xviii 17 18. (m) Augustin de Civ Dei lib. 20. c. 9. p. 213. And common Speech confirms this explication of the Fathers for we say He complains to the City who complains to the Governours of it But our Saviour puts it past all dispute that he intended this Power only for his Apostles and their Successors because to them and no other he grants a Commission to remit and retain sins John xx 23. 'T is true the Apostles and Primitive Bishops were wont to exercise this Discipline in the Presence of the People and with their Approbation but the Authority was wholly in the Governour and the Judicial Act was solely his St. Peter and S. Paul did pass the Censure and the Bishops their Successors But they did this in and before the Assembly for greater Solemnity and because the People were to know and avoid these Offenders as also that the openness of the shame might make the Criminals sooner repent and be a more effectual warning to others not to follow so bad an Example But from this presence of the whole Assembly to infer their joyning in the Authoritative part is a very weak Consequence and confuted both by Scripture and Antiquity as we shall see in the sequel For this shall suffice here to prove that in this second place our Lord Jesus hath left Power with the Governours of his Church to receive Complaints concerning scandalous Offenders and to bind them with the Bond of Excommunication till they do repent and that he hath commanded the People to refuse all Communion with these in Sacred Civil Actions while they remain obstinate yea and declared that they who remain obdurate and impenitent under this Sentence shall not only be excluded from Communion with the Church on Earth but be bound in Heaven also and excluded from thence if they do not submit and repent Thirdly these two places being only promises of a future Priviledge we may read the fulfilling of them when Christ ordained the Apostles for Governours of his Church after his Resurrection for he sent them with Authority as his Father sent him John xx 21. and to give them inward ability to exercise this high and holy Office he gives them the Holy Ghost by the Ceremony of breathing on them ver 22. Finally to oblige all the Society to revere and obey them he grants them the power of binding and loosing without a Metaphor saying Whosesoever Sins ye remit they are remitted unto them and whosesoever sins ye retain they are retained ver 23. Which place evidently makes them Judges under Christ concerning such Offences as are committed by those in the Church so that if they should find any Man obstinate in his evil ways
direction and then they were admitted in again and restored to their former Priviledges see Levit. xiii xiv xv by the Priests consent and permission Now these persons who were thus legally unclean being unfit for that legal Worship were justly excluded from it and were to all intents and purposes in the state of Excommunicate persons during this their Separation as far as concerned the loss of their External Priviledges and if in a more Spiritual Religion the Spiritual Sword cut deeper when it is used on greater Offenders it is no wonder But still this treatment of the legally unclean by Divine Institution was a Type and Fore-runner of the Gospel Censures And these natural Diseases and External Pollutions were plain Emblems of those moral Impurities which were to exclude those who were Jesus his professed Disciples from the Assemblies which were to meet in his Name And the Type was so clear an indication of this that the learned Grotius thinks even the Jews could not but make the inference themselves viz. That if a leprous person was turned out of the Assembly lest he should infect others with his Disease so much at least ought to be inflicted on wicked and lewd Men whose Examples were contagious and their actions a reproach to the whole Society that their Crimes should be marked with a publick detestation (k) Grot. Comunent in Luc. vi 22. And on this account some think David did abstain from the Publick Worship for some time after he had committed his great Sin and therefore he prays in his Penitential Psalm li. vers 11. Cast me not away from thy presence c. Yet if any make it still matter of admiration How it comes to pass there are so few Instances in the Old Testament of any that were Excommunicated for real Sins and immoral or impious Actions There being but one clear Example of this kind viz. that of the Tribe of Benjamin which was publickly denounced accursed in a Religious Assembly Jud. xx 12. and all conversation with them renounced by a solemn Oath Chap. xxi 1. for abetting the lust and cruelty of the men of Gibeah I say if this be strange to any we can give some satisfactory Reasons Why the Instances were so few under the Ceremonial Law For first it must be noted that in those days Almighty God for the conviction of a stubborn and unbelieving Nation did very usually strike those who committed great and scandalous Offences either with sudden death as Corah and his Complices Numb xvi 32. the Bethshemites 1 Sam. vi 19. Uzzah 2 Sam. vi 7. and many others and so executed the highest and heaviest sort of Excommunication the Schammatha upon them to terrifie others from the like Crimes Or at least he did lay such loathsom Diseases upon the Offenders against his Laws as did even by the Rules of the Ceremonial Law sufficiently expose them to a necessary Exclusion out of the Congregation and cut them off from both civil and religious Conversation as may be particularly seen in the case of Leprosie with this Miriam was smitten for speaking evil of Moses the Ruler of the People and thereupon by the Priest she was declared unclean and by the express command of God excluded out of the Camp and so consequently from the Tabernacle and Publick Worship seven days which was so plain a Declaration of God's Will as to the turning out open Offenders from the Congregation that we may justly believe Excommunication took its rise from this and the like instances (l) Num. xii 14. LXX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ad hoc exemplum instituti 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 à Synagogâ inter Christianos ab Ecclesiâ Grot. in loc And we may note That while Miriam stayed before the Tabernacle the Schecina removed to shew that if Offenders were not excluded his Presence should not stay with them ver 10. And further we may observe God did this as a mark of publick Disgrace to shame her into Repentance and warn others whence that phrase If her Father had spit in her face ver 14. Another Example of this kind and more plain we have in King Uzziah who would in the pride of his heart Officiate as a Priest But the High Priest and his Brethren interdicted him from coming into the Sanctuary as one that had Apostatized from God's Law (m) 2 Paral. xxvi 18. LXX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and he not valuing the Interdict was immediately smitten by the Lord with Leprosie and so forced to go hastily out of the Temple and he remained separated from all Civil Society and from the Publick Worship also until the day of his death (n) Ver. 21. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For the Text expresly mentions his dwelling in a several house and his being cut off from the House of the Lord which is a clear sign it was a divinely inflicted Excommunication and it was most fit to be only done by God's hand since it was executed on a King To this I might add the like Plague inflicted upon Gehazi for the Sin of Lying by Elisha who was God's special Messenger and therefore to be cast out of his Presence signifies an exclusion from the true Worship of God as well as from the Society of Men 2 Kings v. 27. and Chap. vii ver 3. The Jewish Doctors also affirm That David was smitten with Leprosie for his great Sin and that he was thereby uncapable of coming into the Congregation which occasioned that Prayer Cast me not away from thy presence and restore me to the joy of thy Salvation (o) Psal li. ver 11 12. Munster And thence he prays to be purged with hyssop (p) Ver. 7. see Levit. xiv 6. And that this is not a meer Rabbinical fancy may appear from those Complaints in the other Penitential Psalm where he says He was weak and desired God to heal him Psal vi 2. and speaks of God's hand lying heavy on him day and night till all his moisture was dried up Psal xxxii 4. Yea expresly Psal xxxviii he declares there was no soundness in his flesh ver 3. and that his wounds stank and were corrupt ver 5. so that his lovers and friends stood aloof from his sore and his kinsmen would not come near him ver 11. And that he was excluded from the Publick Worship also seems plain from Psal xlii ver 2 4. c. Again This may be further confirmed from that general Notion among the Jews That all Sickness and Diseases were laid on Men by God for some notorious Sin which is plain from the Disciples asking Who had sinned the blind Man or his Parents Jolin ix 2. and from our Saviour's reckoning it was all one for him to bid the Paralytick take up his Bed and walk and to say to him his Sins were forgiven him Matth. ix 4. because the Disease being inflicted for some Crime the remitting the Crime was also a removal of the Punishment and Jesus by
not to Peter only but to all the Apostles yea to all the Clergy and the whole Church (d) Haec autem ligandi solvendi potestas quamvis soli Petro data videatur à Domino tamen caeteris Apostolis datur necnon etiam in Episcopis Presbyteris toti Ecclesiae Raban Maurus And our Saviour himself to anticipate this unjust Claim doth afterwards twice grant the same Power to all the Apostles which here he seems only to give to S. Peter Matth. xviii 18. John xx 21 22. Yet this false Gloss of the Romanists with the wild and extravagant Inferences deduced from thence hath put some Learned Protestants into the other extream that is into denying there is any Power granted to the Apostles here more than the Power of a Doctor or Teacher and they will have the Key to be only the Key of Knowledge Luke xi 52. and out of the Talmud they go about to prove that binding and loosing signify nothing else but determining what things are lawful and these are said to be loosed and what things are unlawful which are said to be bound (e) Gamero in loc item Lightfoot horae Hebr in Matth. But we must not let the Sense of the Fathers and the Power of the Keys to be at once wrested out of our hands by this Novel fancy For first the place cannot bear this Sense since it is ridiculous to affirm that Christ gave his Apostles such a Power That whatever they declared or taught to be unlawful on Earth should be unlawful in Heaven and whatever they taught was lawful God would make that lawful this were to give them a power which God himself never did assume viz. to change the eternal and unalterable Rules of Good and Evil And besides in the parallel place where these words are repeated by Christ Matth. xviii 18. they are applyed to Offenders refusing to Repent upon the Churches admonition which obstinate sinners are to be avoided as Heathens and Publicans by private Christians and if they value not this as being an Act only of their Equals Christ supposes his Apostles will then bind them by Excommunication and to shew the weight of that Censure he saith Whatsoever they bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven ver 18. which being spoken of the validity of the Punishment inflicted on evil Men can never be drawn to signifie only Teaching yea after our Lords Resurrection he who is the best expounder of his own meaning declares that binding and loosing signifies remitting or retaining of sins John xx 21. and turns the Whatsoever ye shall bind c. into Whosesoever sins ye remit c. Again since the Misna which is the oldest part of the Talmud was written 150 years after the destruction of Jerusalem which is later than any Canonical part of the New Testament (e) Sixt. Senens Biblioth lib. 2. pag. 148. those Learned Men above mentioned ought not to expound the more ancient Phrases of the Gospel by these Talmudical expressions yet even in the Talmud Binding and Loosing is often used for Excommunicating and Absolving (f) R. Samuel status cornu ligat et flatus cornu solvit Talm. Bab. Moed Katon c. 3. fol. 16. Os quod solvit est os quod ligat Tract Demai cap. 6. §. 11. which is the more obvious and natural Sense of the Words and because the doing things forbidden by the Rabbins caused Men to be Excommunicated or bound by this Censure Therefore by a Trope the things themselves were said to be bound So that we may conclude That our Saviour doth actually here give Authority to his Apostles and to their lawful Successors to shut Men who are scandalously wicked out of his Church and to let them in again upon their Repentance declaring their Sentence shall be ratified in Heaven And thus the Ancients generally expound this place and from thence they frequently speak of the Power of the Keys given by Christ to the Church in order to the Excommunicating and Absolving of Sinners Of which because there are innumerable Instances one or two shall suffice (g) Ecclesia quae fundatur in Christo claves ab eo regni coelorum accepit in Petro i. e. potestatem ligandi solvendique peccata Aug. Tract 124 in Johan Cum excommunicat Ecclesia ligatur in Coelo excommunicatus Aug. in Psal 108. Vid. Ambros de poenit l. 1. c. 6. that so Reason and Authority both may shew our Exposition of this Place is true and certain which will be further confirmed by considering the second place where this Power is mentioned viz. Matth. xviii 18. Verily I say unto you whatsoever ye shall bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven and whatsoever ye shall loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven the very same words with those spoken to Peter Chap. xvi 19. But if we look back to the occasion of them here it will appear they can be meant of nothing but of Ecclesiastical Discipline For in this xviiith Chapter Our Lord first labours to prevent the doing Injuries and Offences to the meanest of his Disciples ver 1. to ver 14. But secondly in case Injuries be done or any Scandal or Offence given Christ teaches the offended Person what method to take viz. First privately to admonish the Offender ver 15. If that prevail not the grieved party must rebuke him before witness ver 16. And if this also prove unsuccessful and the Offender remain obstinate then he must complain to the Church which is supposed to rebuke and if need be to Censure the stubborn Criminal and if he do not hear the Church that is submit to its Sentence and make reparation then Private Christians are to renounce all Communion and Commerce with that Man and carry themselves toward him as the Jews did to a Heathen or Publican with whom they would not discourse nor eat Matth. ix 11. Galat. ii 12. nor yet suffer them to come into that Court of the Temple where they were wont to pray Acts xxi 28. for on the Gate was written Let no Stranger go into the Holy Place (h) Joseph Bell. Jud. lib. 6. cap. 14. That is they must no longer count this Man a Member of the Christian Church nor call him a Brother but esteem him as a Pagan and one who never yet was admitted or a Publican who for living in open Sins was cast out and with such a Man the rest of the sound Christians were not to have any Commerce in Civil or Religious Matters But if all this will neither shame nor terrifie the wicked Wretch so as to bring him to Repentance because he may think this Sentence inflicted by the Church is but an Human Act and pronounced only by Mortal Men Our Lord declares That this Sentence is of Divine Authority and though it be pronounced only by Men yet it shall be confirmed in Heaven For saith he Verily I say unto you whatsoever ye shall bind c. ver 18. And