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PREFACE
PREFACE
There would be no need for a preface to this second volume were it not that a very kindly and careful review of the first volume in The Guardian of May 24 last, requires a word of notice. The reviewer warns me off 'the dialogue system of exegesis.' Now no doubt this principle, like every other, may be abused. 'The Jewish objector' may, as the reviewer complains, be allowed to 'run riot.' Still I cannot doubt that the Jewish objector is a reality of an illuminative kind in the argument of such pa
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PREFACE
PREFACE
A good excuse is needed for adding to the large number of excellent commentaries on the Epistle to the Romans which already exist. But I think there is such an excuse. These commentaries are not of the sort which readers who are educated but not scholarly find it easy to master; so that in fact this epistle is at the present day very much misunderstood or ignored by such people. And again, partly owing to its interpretation at the period of the Reformation and by some Evangelicals of later date,
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DIVISION IV. CHAPTERS IX-XI.
DIVISION IV. CHAPTERS IX-XI.
St. Paul has concluded his great exposition of the meaning of 'the gospel': that in it is the disclosure of a divine righteousness into which all mankind—Jews and Gentiles on the same level of need and sin—are to be freely admitted by simply believing in Jesus. The believer in Jesus first welcomes the absolute and unmerited forgiveness of his sins, which his redeemer has won for him, and thus acquitted passes into the spiritual strength and joy and fellowship of the new life, the life of the red
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Introduction.
Introduction.
St. Paul's great Epistle to the Romans was written, as may be quite confidently asserted, from Corinth, during the second visit to Greece recorded in the Acts[ 1 ], i.e. in the beginning of the year commonly reckoned 58, but perhaps more correctly 56 A.D.—the year following the writing of the Epistles to the Corinthians. The reasons for this confident statement, and indeed for all that needs to be said about the circumstances under which St. Paul wrote and the conditions of Christianity at Rome,
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DIVISION IV. § 1. CHAPTER IX. 1-13.
DIVISION IV. § 1. CHAPTER IX. 1-13.
St. Paul has finished his glowing description of the position and prospects of the elect people of God. And then, by contrast, the misery of the outcast people once called elect—his own people—wrings his heart with pain. The very idea that in his new enthusiasm for the catholic church he can be supposed to be forgetting those who are of his own flesh and blood, stirs him to a profound protest. He solemnly asseverates that the pain which Israel's rejection causes him is acute and continuous. He h
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CHAPTER I. 1-7.
CHAPTER I. 1-7.
It was the custom in the days of the Romans to begin a letter with a brief indication from whom it came and to whom it was addressed, in the form of a complimentary salutation, thus—to take an example from the New Testament—'Claudius Lysias unto the most excellent governor Felix, greeting[ 1 ].' We are familiar in our day with the like forms for beginning and ending letters, serving the same purpose and generally no other. St. Paul then accepts the epistolary form of his day, but pours into it a
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DIVISION IV. § 2. CHAPTER IX. 14-29.
DIVISION IV. § 2. CHAPTER IX. 14-29.
But the obvious reply of the Jewish objector to St. Paul's assertion of the absolute and apparently arbitrary freedom of God's election is that it is unfair. It convicts God of unrighteousness. To this objection (ver. 14), which St. Paul deprecates with horror, he replies not by any large consideration of divine justice, but still by keeping the Jew to his own scriptures. The God revealed in scripture must be to the objector still the just God. He cannot call God unjust if His method as it now a
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CHAPTER I. 8-17.
CHAPTER I. 8-17.
The salutation is immediately followed by a passage in which St. Paul introduces himself specially to the Christians at Rome. He had a delicate task to perform. The Roman Christians had been gathered probably from many parts of the empire, because Rome was the centre of all the world's movements, and adherents of whatever was going on in the empire were sure by force of circumstances to find their way to Rome. Thus, though no apostle had yet preached at Rome, Christians had gathered there. Many
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DIVISION IV. § 3. CHAPTER IX. 30-X. 21.
DIVISION IV. § 3. CHAPTER IX. 30-X. 21.
What is to be our conclusion then? That Gentiles, men beyond the pale of God's covenant, who made no pretension of pursuing righteousness, all at once laid hold on righteousness and made it their own, simply by accepting in faith the divine offer which came their way; while Israel, the chosen people, devoted to pursuing a law of righteousness, never caught up with that of which it was in pursuit. The result seems strange enough. But the reason of it is apparent. Israel[ 1 ] had been put under a
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DIVISION I. (CHAPTERS I. 18-III. 20.)
DIVISION I. (CHAPTERS I. 18-III. 20.)
St. Paul has enunciated his great thesis. There has arrived into the world a new and divine force making for man's fullest salvation: the disclosure of a real fellowship in the moral being of God, which is open to all men, Jew and Gentile equally, on the simple terms of taking God at His word. This word of good tidings St. Paul is to expand and justify in his epistle; but first he must pause and explain its antecedents. Why was such a disclosure needed at this moment of the world's history? Why
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DIVISION IV. § 4. CHAPTER XI. 1-12.
DIVISION IV. § 4. CHAPTER XI. 1-12.
But if Israel has thus by her own fault fallen from her high estate, are we then to suppose that God has simply rejected His own chosen people? Such a thought cannot be entertained. How could it have been in the mind of such an Israelite as St. Paul, one who came of Abraham's genuine seed, and of the tribe which held so fast by Judah? No: the people on whom from eternity God's eye rested, to mark them out for Himself and for His purposes, assuredly cannot, as a people, have been cast away[ 1 ].
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DIVISION I. § I. (CHAPTER I. 18-32).
DIVISION I. § I. (CHAPTER I. 18-32).
Before we read this passage certain points should be plain to our minds. 1. By sin St. Paul means essentially wilfulness—wilful disobedience. There is such a thing as an inheritance of moral weakness or perversity which passes to men without their fault and without their knowledge. This, the real existence of which hardly any one can deny, is what is called original sin; and later on we shall find St. Paul speaking of it. But it is not what is most properly called sin. God is absolutely equitabl
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DIVISION I. § 2. CHAPTER II. 1-29.
DIVISION I. § 2. CHAPTER II. 1-29.
St. Paul in his judgement of the Gentile world is but repeating, with more of moral discernment, what he would have learned in his Jewish training. But the strict Jews who had taught St. Paul, though some among them must have been good men, ready to enter into the deeply penitential spirit of their psalmists and prophets, do not seem as a rule to have liked to think of their own people as liable to divine condemnation. They chose to suppose that the Gentile world alone was the area upon which di
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DIVISION IV. § 5[1]. CHAPTER XI. 13-36.
DIVISION IV. § 5[1]. CHAPTER XI. 13-36.
St. Paul would not have it supposed that, in his zeal for the recovery of Israel, he was proving faithless to his vocation as the apostle of the Gentiles. On the contrary, he explains (assuming the Roman Christians to be Gentiles in the mass) that he is, by this very zeal, fulfilling that vocation. The conversion of the Gentiles was meant to react as a stimulus on the Jews. When St. Paul magnifies his Gentile ministry, he does so always with the motive of stinging the jealousy of his own people,
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DIVISION I. § 3. CHAPTER III. 1-8.
DIVISION I. § 3. CHAPTER III. 1-8.
This passage is interesting as showing us, what is more often the case than appears on the surface, that St. Paul has in mind as he reasons the familiar objections of an opponent—his own objections, perhaps in part, before he was a Christian. St. Paul, that is to say, very frequently writes controversially, and argues ad hominem : and his own reasoning is only rightly understood when we have clearly in view what he is opposing. It of course very frequently happens in literature generally that a
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Retrospect over the argument
Retrospect over the argument
And now that we have given all the pains we can to entering into the spirit of these chapters, may we not say that they have become no longer repellent but deeply attractive? Where could we find a more liberating outlook over the wide purpose of God in redeeming the world? Sin is a stern fact, and demands stern dealing to overcome it by moral discipline. Men of all sorts must be brought to realize their need of God, utterly to expel the false dream of independence, and humbly to welcome the unme
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DIVISION I. § 4. CHAPTER III. 9-20.
DIVISION I. § 4. CHAPTER III. 9-20.
At this point the direct argument with an opponent is dropped; and St. Paul restates what he has so far been occupied in proving. It is not that Jews are in a worse position than Gentiles. It is that all together are involved in the same moral failure. To deepen the impression that this is a true statement, St. Paul culls from various psalms and from Isaiah a series of passages describing a general state of depravity, moral blindness, apathy, failure, unprofitableness, falsity, hatred, and outra
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DIVISION V. CHAPTERS XII-XV. 13.
DIVISION V. CHAPTERS XII-XV. 13.
We must almost all of us, in climbing some high hill, have experienced the necessity for two distinct efforts, the second more or less unanticipated. We started to climb to the apparent summit, only to find, when we got there, that it was no real summit at all, but a prominent spur, and that a second climb was required of us before we were really at the top. An intellectual experience not unlike this is the lot of the student of the Epistle to the Romans. The apparent climax of the epistle is th
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DIVISION II. CHAPTERS III. 21-IV. 25.
DIVISION II. CHAPTERS III. 21-IV. 25.
Now we have been brought to recognize the true state of the case as between ourselves and God—the facts about ourselves as we are in God's sight. We were meant for fellowship in the divine glory. 'The glory of God,' says an old Father, 'is the living man: the life of man is the vision of God.' But, meant for fellowship in the divine glory, we have fallen short of it and have come to appreciate our failure. We have sinned, and that universally and wilfully. We are such that God cannot accept us a
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DIVISION V. § i. CHAPTER XII. 1-2.
DIVISION V. § i. CHAPTER XII. 1-2.
And first of all the general attitude of mind is defined, which it befits us to adopt towards God as He has now revealed Himself to us. It is the response of entire self-surrender—the response of sacrifice to sacrifice. St. Paul 'beseeches,' or rather 'encourages,' or 'summons' the Roman Christians, using for his motive power[ 1 ] all the rich store of divine compassions which he has just been occupied in disclosing or explaining to them, to make the only response really possible to such an exhi
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DIVISION II. § 2. CHAPTER IV.
DIVISION II. § 2. CHAPTER IV.
St. Paul has been repudiating the principle of justification by works of the law. To those with whom he had been brought up, this was in the highest degree to dishonour the Jewish law, and indeed the principle of divinely-given law at all. But in the last words of the previous chapter he refuses to admit this inference. 'God forbid that we should make law of none effect. Nay, we establish law.' This idea of the Gospel, rightly understood, establishing the law even while it superseded it, is with
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DIVISION V. § 2. CHAPTER XII. 3-21.
DIVISION V. § 2. CHAPTER XII. 3-21.
And when St. Paul, justifying himself here, as before and later on, by the special divine favour which has made him the apostle of the Gentiles[ 1 ], proceeds to develop his exhortation, it appears that with him, as with St. James[ 2 ], the form in which 'divine service' shows itself must be love of the brethren. To be called into the body of Christ—the society which is bound into one by His life and spirit—is to be called to social service, that is, to live a community life, and to cultivate th
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DIVISION III. CHAPTERS V-VIII.
DIVISION III. CHAPTERS V-VIII.
Peace is a fundamental spiritual need of the human soul. But the peace that is God's gift comes only through the breaking up of the peace of soul which comes from ignoring God. The Pharisee on the temple steps was at peace when he thanked God that he was not as other men are—at peace in his misplaced pride. The mass of men in heathen Corinth, where St. Paul was writing, were at peace in their sins. And St. Paul has set himself with all his might, as in his preaching generally, so in this particu
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DIVISION V. § 3. CHAPTER XIII. 1-7.
DIVISION V. § 3. CHAPTER XIII. 1-7.
It is possible that the thought of the innocent victim of injustice and wrong waiting upon the divine wrath, brings to St. Paul's mind the idea of the State which exists to represent divine justice in the world, and minister divine wrath on behalf of the innocent. But, whether this particular connexion of thought was really in St. Paul's mind or no, at any rate the previous section has made it plain that the 'love of the brethren' must extend itself to become a right relation to all men, whether
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DIVISION V. § 4. CHAPTER XIII. 8-10.
DIVISION V. § 4. CHAPTER XIII. 8-10.
Christians are willingly to pay tribute and tax as a debt, a thing due in God's sight to His ministers. But this obligation is a specimen of innumerable obligations which we owe to our 'neighbours'—debts only limited by human need. And the Christian is to take a wide view of his obligations, and to let there be no legitimate claim upon him unfulfilled, no debt unpaid, except the one which a man ought always to be paying and still to be owing, for it is infinite—the debt of love. Here, in loving
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DIVISION III. § 2. CHAPTER V. 12-21.
DIVISION III. § 2. CHAPTER V. 12-21.
St. Paul had spoken, at the end of the passage we have just been reading, of our being 'saved by (or 'in') Christ's life.' And this brings him to what is truly the central point of his theology—the life in Christ by the Spirit: the thought that the glorified Man, with all the power of the divine life at work in Him, though He is hidden from sight, is still perpetuating His life by His Spirit in that society which He has established to be His body. It stands to reason that if real fellowship in t
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DIVISION III. § 3. CHAPTER VI. 1-14.
DIVISION III. § 3. CHAPTER VI. 1-14.
It has now been made apparent that belief in Christ introduces a man into a new sphere of 'life in Christ' or 'state of grace'—a state, that is, in which the divine grace or goodwill is the atmosphere and motive force. And just as with his natural life he inherited all the taint and curse attaching to sin in the unredeemed manhood, so now in his new state he receives from Christ all the bountiful outpouring, not of acquittal only, but of divine life. What he is called to witness is the triumph o
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DIVISION V. § 5. CHAPTER XIII. 11-14.
DIVISION V. § 5. CHAPTER XIII. 11-14.
And the motive for paying our debts, in this wide sense, is that we must 'agree with our adversary quickly, while we are with him in the way,' for the day of account is at hand. This worldly world lies asleep to the spiritual realities, but its short night—the time of darkness—is nearly over. The great deliverance is nearer to us than when we first became Christians. The day of the Lord is almost dawning. Let us see to it then that all that is only fit for the darkness is stripped off us: that w
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DIVISION III. § 4. CHAPTER VI. 15-23.
DIVISION III. § 4. CHAPTER VI. 15-23.
The reiterated mention of the deliverance of the Christian from the yoke of the law—'Ye are not under law, but under grace'—brings up the excuse for licentious living in a new form:—'This very abolition of the strict power of the law in favour of a system of which the ruling principle is God's goodness, at least makes one willing to contemplate any particular act of sin[ 1 ], with a good hope of escaping punishment.' St. Paul meets the suggestion with a 'God forbid,' and then gives a deep reason
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DIVISION V. § 6. CHAPTER XIV. 1-23.
DIVISION V. § 6. CHAPTER XIV. 1-23.
St. Paul's practical exhortations show no definite scheme, but flow out of one another in a natural sequence. He began with the fundamental moral disposition required by life in the Christian community (xii). He proceeded to the relation between the Christian community and the government of the world outside (xiii. 1-7). This led him to lay brief and vigorous emphasis upon the universal range of Christian obligation (8-10), and the motive which is to make Christians zealous in rising to its fulf
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DIVISION III. § 5. CHAPTER VII. 1-6.
DIVISION III. § 5. CHAPTER VII. 1-6.
St. Paul is full of two thoughts. The first is that of life out of death, living by dying. He had lived an old life in which 'those multitudinous motions of appetite and self-will which reason and conscience disapproved, reason and conscience could yet not govern, and had to yield to them. This, as we shall see, is what drove Paul almost to despair[ 1 ].' He had passed to a new life in which he found in actual, blessed experience that he could do the thing that he would. He could do all things—t
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DIVISION V. § 7. CHAPTER XV. 1-13.
DIVISION V. § 7. CHAPTER XV. 1-13.
It was essential, as has been said, that men whose prejudices and instincts were different should live in the same church and eat at the same love feast. This would require a large-hearted and unselfish self-control. Formerly, as in Syria and Palestine, it was the Jews who occupied the position of vantage in the Christian communities, and were not disposed to tolerate the ways of the Gentiles. Now the tables are turned, and the Gentiles are in the majority. The danger is now that those whose ins
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DIVISION III. § 6. CHAPTER VII. 7-25.
DIVISION III. § 6. CHAPTER VII. 7-25.
The somewhat confused passage just dealt with, in which several moral ideas and metaphors are struggling for the mastery, is followed by a famous passage of luminous power in which St. Paul expounds, with a profound insight into human nature, the function and failure of law. The close alliance into which St. Paul constantly puts 'the law' with the reign of sin, an alliance hardly suggested by any other New Testament teacher, suggests inevitably the idea that St. Paul, like the later Gnostics, re
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DIVISION VI. CHAPTERS XV. 14-XVI. 27.
DIVISION VI. CHAPTERS XV. 14-XVI. 27.
The long letter is almost ended. St. Paul has developed the meaning of the revelation of the divine righteousness. He has vindicated the ways of God to the Jews. He has drawn out sufficiently the moral conclusions from God's mercy to mankind. Now he has only to secure again his good terms with the Roman Christians—which he does with the same tact and the same anxiety as at the beginning[ 1 ],—to explain his movements, to send his greetings to individuals, and to bid farewell. [ 1 ] Vol. i. p. 53
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DIVISION VI. § 1. CHAPTER XV. 14-33.
DIVISION VI. § 1. CHAPTER XV. 14-33.
St. Paul is very anxious not to be understood as if, while giving the Christians at Rome these exhortations which we have just been reading, he stood in any doubt himself of their goodness of heart and full grasp of Christian principles, or of their fitness to admonish one another. He has only been bold to put them in mind of what they already knew, because of the priestly commission on behalf of his Lord towards all the Gentiles, which the divine grace has bestowed upon him as apostle of the Ge
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DIVISION III. § 7. CHAPTER VIII. 1-11.
DIVISION III. § 7. CHAPTER VIII. 1-11.
If we were to represent the Epistle to the Romans as a bas relief , there would be two passages which would have to stand in the highest relief—the end of the third chapter, in which St. Paul speaks of that free justification which is given to all men on the equal basis of faith in Christ the propitiation for their sins; and this eighth chapter, in which he speaks of the triumph which belongs to the life of the justified, lived in the power of Christ's Spirit. The note of this chapter is struck
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DIVISION III. § 8. CHAPTER VIII. 12-17.
DIVISION III. § 8. CHAPTER VIII. 12-17.
We are now in the Spirit. The divine Spirit dwells within us, and restores our nature to its proper balance by giving us control over our lower nature. The moral meaning and obligations of such a condition are plain, and St. Paul proceeds to enforce them. When our impulses and appetites solicit us to let them have their own way, we must give them to understand that they are making a claim which we cannot recognize and which, if we did, would lead us the way of death. On the contrary, it is these
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DIVISION VI. § 2. CHAPTER XVI. 1-2.
DIVISION VI. § 2. CHAPTER XVI. 1-2.
One strong link among Christians of different towns, constraining them to remember that their brotherhood did not depend on physical nearness or personal acquaintance, lay in the 'letters of commendation' from one local church to another, which the Christian traveller carried with him. And here we have an example of such a letter given by St. Paul to the Corinthian deaconess, Phoebe, who was probably the bearer of his letter to the Roman Christians. I commend unto you Phoebe our sister, who is a
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DIVISION VI. § 3. CHAPTER XVI. 3-16.
DIVISION VI. § 3. CHAPTER XVI. 3-16.
Then St. Paul, according to his custom, winds up his epistle with personal greetings. In this case they are sent to the individual Christians, among those who from various parts of the empire had collected at Rome, whose names his memory—so retentive of personal relationships—enabled him to recall. Salute Prisca and Aquila my fellow-workers in Christ Jesus, who for my life laid down their own necks; unto whom not only I give thanks, but also all the churches of the Gentiles: and salute the churc
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DIVISION III. § 9. CHAPTER VIII. 18-30.
DIVISION III. § 9. CHAPTER VIII. 18-30.
St. Paul has touched upon the familiar topic of Christian suffering, and he ends his great argument with a splendid encouragement to believers to suffer gladly, and that for a manifold reason. First (18-25), that the suffering is altogether inconsiderable by comparison with the glory to which it leads, and is in itself only a part of the universal travail-pang through which created nature as a whole is to produce a glorious new earth to be the habitation of righteousness. Secondly (26-30), that
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DIVISION III. § 10. CHAPTER VIII. 31-39.
DIVISION III. § 10. CHAPTER VIII. 31-39.
St. Paul has brought his great argument to an end. And before he passes to its manifold application in the later parts of his epistle, he applies it in words which spring glowing from a heart on fire with the gospel he loves, to reassure disheartened and nervous Christians. It was a natural feature of the apostolic age that the disciples should lose their first courage and become afraid, when the hard experience they were to expect became plain to them. The Epistle to the Hebrews is written full
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DIVISION VI. § 4. CHAPTER XVI. 17-20.
DIVISION VI. § 4. CHAPTER XVI. 17-20.
Something occurred before the letter to the Romans was concluded and dispatched to make St. Paul insert a final warning against false teachers, who were causing divisions and perverting the gospel as all Christians had at first received it, in the interests of their personal aggrandizement. St. Paul makes a brief but vigorous appeal to the Romans to be true to their first obedience, and maintain their reputation unsullied. Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which are causing the divisions an
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RIGHT REV. CHARLES GORE, D.D.,
RIGHT REV. CHARLES GORE, D.D.,
THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. THE EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. Vol. I. cap. i-viii. Vol. II. cap. ix-xvi, with Appendices....
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DIVISION VI. § 5. CHAPTER XVI. 21-23.
DIVISION VI. § 5. CHAPTER XVI. 21-23.
Timothy my fellow-worker saluteth you; and Lucius and Jason and Sosipater, my kinsmen. I Tertius, who write the epistle, salute you in the Lord. Gaius my host, and of the whole church, saluteth you. Erastus the treasurer of the city saluteth you, and Quartus the brother. Most of these persons are very probably otherwise known to us. Leaving aside the well-known Timothy, we find a Lucius of Cyrene among the prophets in Acts xiii. 1[ 1 ]; a Jason at Thessalonica, as St. Paul's host, in Acts xvii.
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DIVISION VI. § 6. CHAPTER XVI. 25-27.
DIVISION VI. § 6. CHAPTER XVI. 25-27.
Now to him that is able to stablish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which hath been kept in silence through times eternal, but now is manifested, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the eternal God, is made known unto all the nations unto obedience of faith; to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, to whom[ 1 ] be the glory for ever. Amen. There is no idea in this doxology with which th
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RIGHT REV. CHARLES GORE, D.D.
RIGHT REV. CHARLES GORE, D.D.
THE MISSION OF THE CHURCH. Four Lectures delivered in the Cathedral Church of St. Asaph. CONTENTS:—I. The Mission of the Church.—II. Unity within the Church of England.—III. The Relation of the Church to Independent and Hostile Opinion.—IV. The Mission of the Church in Society.—Appended Notes. 'It is a twofold work—to sanctify what can be hallowed, to pass judgement on that which must be condemned. From this point of view the interest of Mr. Gore's new book is great.'— Church Quarterly . THE BAM
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NOTE A. See vol. i. p. 59.
NOTE A. See vol. i. p. 59.
The history of the original Hebrew and Greek words for believing or faith, is very interesting. The Hebrew verb ('aman') means 'to prop' or 'support'[ 1 ]. Now (1) a form of this verb means 'to be supported,' hence 'to be firm,' hence ' to be trustworthy '; (2) another form of the verb means 'to support oneself on,' and hence ' to trust ,' ' to believe .' From (1) comes the Hebrew substantive ('emunah') meaning 'faithfulness,' 'trustworthiness,' which is used, as elsewhere, so also in Habakkuk i
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NOTE B. See vol. i. p. 103.
NOTE B. See vol. i. p. 103.
There is no word for conscience in the Old Testament. 'The conception,' says Delitzsch ( Bibl. Psychology , Clark's trans., p. 160), 'is not yet impressed upon it.' And he accounts for this by quoting, 'The positive law took away its significance from the natural moral consciousness.' The Jews, that is—like other nations at certain stages of their history—lived so constantly under the detailed guidance of a law believed to be divine, that there was not much room for reflection as to the right an
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NOTE C. See vol. i. p. 129.
NOTE C. See vol. i. p. 129.
There is no doubt that there has been within the last forty years a great, and in large measure legitimate, reaction from the old—mediaeval and Calvinist—teaching about hell. But one who reads the early chapters of the Epistle to the Romans, or the Gospels, or other parts of the New Testament, in view of this reaction, will probably feel an uncomfortable sense that it has gone too far. It is worth while then to try and discriminate. To put the matter in as brief a summary as befits a note, I sho
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NOTE D. See vol. i. pp. 143 ff.
NOTE D. See vol. i. pp. 143 ff.
I have endeavoured above to sketch the positive conception of the Atonement, as St. Paul seems to put it before us. Christ inaugurates the church of the new covenant, the new life of union with God. He lays its basis in a great act of reparation to the righteousness of God, which 'the old Adam' had continually outraged. This act of reparation lies in a moral sacrifice of obedience, carried to the extreme point by the shedding of His blood. This is the great propitiation in virtue of which God is
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NOTE E. See vol. i. p. 196.
NOTE E. See vol. i. p. 196.
There is a wide-spread and popular notion that a marked contradiction exists between the biological theory of evolution and the Christian doctrine of the Fall, which may be stated and examined under several heads:— I.—'According to the theory of evolution man began his career at the bottom, emerging from purely animal life, and slowly struggled upwards to his present level of attainment. According to the Christian doctrine, on the contrary, he was created perfect, and then subsequently fell into
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NOTE F. See vol. i. p. 215.
NOTE F. See vol. i. p. 215.
The following passage in the Didache, c. 7, is of the plainest importance for the history of this matter: 'If thou have not living [i.e. running] water, baptize into other water; and if thou canst not in cold, then in warm. And if thou have not either [in sufficient amount for baptism, i.e. immersion in the water] pour forth water thrice upon the head into the name of Father and Son and Holy Ghost.' Cf. Dr. Taylor, Teaching of the Twelve Apostles (Cambridge, 1886), p. 52: 'The primitive mode of
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NOTE G. See vol. ii. p. 136.
NOTE G. See vol. ii. p. 136.
O holy and almighty God, Father of mercies, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of Thy love and eternal mercies, I adore and praise and glorify Thy infinite and unspeakable love and wisdom; who hast sent Thy Son from the bosom of felicities to take upon Him our nature and our misery and our guilt, and hast made the Son of God to become the Son of Man, that we might become the sons of God and partakers of the divine nature; since Thou hast so exalted human nature be pleased also to sanctify
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NOTE H. See vol. ii. p. 147.
NOTE H. See vol. ii. p. 147.
The expression 'In necessariis unitas, in non necessariis libertas, in omnibus caritas' is cited by Richard Baxter in the dedication of On the True and Only Way of Concord of all Christian Churches , 1679, thus, 'I once more quote you the pacificator's old and despised words.' But the pacificator appears to be no one older than a Protestant who wrote (1620 to 1640), under the name of Rupertus Meldenius, a Paraenesis votiva pro pace ecclesiae ad theologos Augustanae Confessionis . In the Paraenes
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NOTE I. See vol. ii. p. 179.
NOTE I. See vol. ii. p. 179.
The following passages are full of interest:— De Civ. D. x. 6: 'So that the whole redeemed city, that is the congregation and society of the saints, is offered as a universal sacrifice to God by the High Priest, who offered nothing less than Himself in suffering for us, so that we might become the body of so glorious a head, according to that 'form of a servant' which He had taken. For it was this (our human nature) that He offered, in this that He was offered, because it is in respect of this t
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REV. CHARLES GORE.
REV. CHARLES GORE.
THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. THE EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. In Two Vols. THE EPISTLES OF ST. JOHN....
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