[13] See Rev. II. M'Neile's Lecture, The Proper Deity of our Lord the
only Ground of Consistency in the Work of Redemption, pp. 339, 340.
[14] "Either he" ("the Deity of the Unitarians") "must show no mercy,
in order to continue true; or he must show no truth, in order to
exercise mercy. If he overlook man's guilt, _admit him to the
enjoyment of his favor, and proceed_ by corrective discipline to
restore his character, he unsettles the foundations of all equitable
government, obliterates the everlasting distinctions between right and
wrong, spreads consternation in heaven, and proclaims impunity in
hell. Such a God would not be worth serving. _Such_ tenderness,
instead of inspiring filial affection, would lead only to reckless
contempt."--_Mr. M'Neile's Lecture_, p. 313.
Surely this is a description, not of the Unitarian, but of the
Lecturer's own creed. It certainly is no part of his opponents'
belief, that God first admits the guilty to his favor, and _then
"proceeds"_ "to restore his character." This arrangement, by which
pardon _precedes_ moral restoration, is that feature in the Orthodox
theory of the Divine dealings against which Unitarians protest, and
which Mr. M'Neile himself insists upon as essential throughout his
Lecture. "We think," he says, "that _before_ man can be introduced to
the only true process of improvement, he must _first_ have forgiveness
of his guilt." What is this "first" step, of pardon, but an
"overlooking of man's guilt"; and what is the second, of
"sanctification," but a "restoring of character"; whether we say by
"corrective discipline," or the "influence of the Holy Spirit,"
matters not. Is it said that the guilt is not overlooked, if Christ
endured its penalty? I ask, again, whether justice regards only the
_infliction_ of suffering, or its _quantity_, without caring about its
_direction_? Was it impossible for the stern righteousness of God
freely to forgive the penitent? And how was the injustice of
liberating the guilty mended by the torments of the innocent? Here is
the verdict against sin: "The soul that sinneth, it shall die." And
how is this verdict executed? The soul that had sinned does _not_ die;
and one "that knew no sin" dies instead. And this is called a divine
union of _truth_ and _mercy_; being the most precise negation of both,
of which any conception can be formed. First, to hang the destinies of
all mankind upon a solitary volition of their first parents, and then
let loose a diabolic power on that volition to break it down; to
vitiate the human constitution in punishment for the fall, and yet
continue to demand obedience to the original and perfect moral law; to
assert the absolute inflexibility of that holy law, yet all the while
have in view for the offenders a method of escape, which violates
every one of its provisions, and makes it all a solemn pretence; to
forgive that which is in itself unpardonable, on condition of the
suicide of a God, is to shock and confound all notions of rectitude,
without affording even the sublimity of a savage grandeur. This will
be called "blasphemy"; and it is so; but the blasphemy is not in the
_words_, but in the _thing_.
Unitarians are falsely accused of representing God as "overlooking
man's guilt." They hold, that _no guilt is overlooked till it is
eradicated from the soul_; and that pardon proceeds _pari passu_ with
sanctification.
[15] Mr. Buddicom has the following note, intimating his approbation
of this rendering: "Some of the best commentators have connected εν τω
αυτου αιματι, not with δια της πιστεως, but with ἱλαστηριον and,
accordingly, Bishop Bull renders the passage, 'Quem proposuit Deus
placamentum in sanguine suo per fidem.'"--_Lecture on Atonement_, p.
496.
[16] John i. 29. For an example of the use of the word "_world_" to
denote the Gentiles, see Rom. xi. 12-15; where St. Paul, speaking of
the rejection of the Messiah by the Jews, declares that it is only
temporary; and as it has given occasion for the adoption of the
Gentiles, so will this lead, by ultimate reaction, to the readmission
of Israel; a consummation in which the Gentiles should rejoice without
boasting or high-mindedness. "If," he says, "the fall of them (the
Israelites) be the riches of _the world_ (the Gentiles), and the
diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles, how much more their
fulness! For I speak to you Gentiles, inasmuch as I am the Apostle of
the Gentiles, I magnify my office; if, by any means, I may provoke to
emulation them which are my flesh (the Jews), and save some of them;
for if the casting away of them be the _reconciling of the world_,
what shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead?"
[17] Acts xx. 28. It is hardly necessary to say, that the reading of
our common version, "_church of God_," wants the support of the best
authorities; and that, with the general consent of the most competent
critics, Griesbach reads "_church of the Lord_."
[18] Gal. iii. 13. Even here the Apostle cannot refrain from adverting
to his _Gentile_ interpretation of the cross; for he adds,--"that the
blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles, through Jesus Christ."
[19] In three or four instances, it is true, a sin-offering is
demanded from the perpetrator of some act of _moral wrong_. But in all
these cases a suitable punishment was ordained also; a circumstance
inconsistent with the idea, that the expiation procured remission of
guilt. The _sacrifice_ appended to the _penal infliction_ indicates
the twofold character of the act,--at once a _ceremonial defilement_
and a _crime_; and requiring, to remedy the one, an atoning rite,--to
chastise the other, a judicial penalty. See an excellent tract by Rev.
Edward Higginson, of Hull, entitled, "The Sacrifice of Christ
scripturally and rationally interpreted," particularly pp. 30-34.
[20] Heb. vii. 27. Let the reader look carefully again into the verbal
and logical structure of this verse; and then ask himself whether it
is not as plain as words can make it, that Christ "once for all"
_offered up_ "_a sacrifice first for_ HIS OWN SINS, and _then for the
people's_." The argument surely is this: "He need not do the _daily_
thing, for he has done it _once for all_; the never-finished work of
other pontiffs, a single act of his achieved." The sentiment loses its
meaning, unless that which he did once is _the selfsame thing_ which
they did always: and what was that?--the offering by the high-priest
of a sacrifice first for his own sins, and then for the people's. With
what propriety, then, can Mr. Buddicom ask us this question: "Why is
he said to have excelled the Jewish high-priest in _not_ offering a
sacrifice for himself?" I submit, that no such thing is said; but
that, on the contrary, it is positively affirmed that Christ _did_
offer sacrifice for his own sins. So plain indeed is this, that
Trinitarian commentators are forced to slip in a restraining word and
an additional sentiment into the last clause of the verse. Thus
Pierce: "Who has no need, like the priests under the law, from time to
time to offer up sacrifice first for his own sins, and after that for
the people's. For this _latter_ he did once for all when he offered up
himself; _and as to the former, he had no occasion to do it at all_."
And no doubt the writer of the Epistle _ought_ to have said just this,
if he intended to draw the kind of contrast which orthodox theology
requires, between Jesus and the Hebrew priests. He limits the
opposition between them to _one_ particular;--the Son of Aaron made
offering _daily_,--the Son of God _once for all_. Divines must add
_another_ particular;--that the Jewish priest atoned for _two_ classes
of sins, his own and the people's,--Christ for the people's only.
Suppose for a moment that this was the author's design; that the word
"_this_," instead of having its proper grammatical antecedent, may be
restrained, as in the commentary cited above, to the sacrifice for
_the people's_ sins; then the word "daily" may be left out, without
disturbance to the other substantive particular of the contrast: the
verse will then stand thus: "Who needeth not, as those high-priests,
to offer up sacrifice for his own sins; _for_ he offered up sacrifice
for the people's sins, when he offered up himself." Here, all the
reasoning is obviously gone, and the sentence becomes a mere inanity:
to make sense, we want, instead of the latter clause, the sentiment of
Pierce,--_for_ "he had no occasion to do this at all." This, however,
is an invention of the expositor, more jealous for his author's
orthodoxy than for his composition. I think it necessary to add, that,
by leaving out the most emphatic word in this verse (the word _once_)
Mr. Buddicom has suppressed the author's antithesis, and favored the
suggestion of his own. I have no doubt that this was unconsciously
done; but it shows how system rubs off the angles of Scriptural
difficulties.--I subjoin a part of the note of John Crell on the
passage: "De pontifice Christo loquitur. Quid verô fecit semel
Christus? quid aliud, quam quod Pontifex antiquus statâ die
quotannis[21] faciebat? Principaliter autem hic non de oblatione pro
peccatis populi; sed de oblatione pro ipsius Pontificis peccatis agi,
ex superioribus, ipsoque rationum contextu manifestum est."
The sins which his sacrifice cancelled must have been of the same
order in the people and in himself; certainly therefore not moral in
their character, but ceremonial. His death was, for himself no less
than for his Hebrew disciples, a commutation for the Mosaic
ordinances. Had he not died, he must have continued under their power;
"were he on earth, he would not be a priest," or have "obtained that
more excellent ministry," by which he clears away, in the courts
above, all possibilities of ritual sin below, and himself emerges from
legal to spiritual relations.
[21] This is obviously the meaning of καθ ἡμεραν in this passage;
_from time to time_, and in the case alluded to, _yearly_; not, as in
the common version, _daily_.
[22] Mr. Buddicom's Lecture on the Atonement, p. 471.
[23] See Mr. M'Neile's Lecture, pp. 302, 311, 328, 340, 341.
[24] Mr. M'Neile's Lecture, p. 338.