Jewish law promulgated the great principles of moral duty in the
decalogue, with a solemnity suited to their high preëminence; that it
enjoined love to God with the most unceasing solicitude, and love to our
neighbour, as extensively and forcibly, as the peculiar design of the
Jewish economy, and the peculiar character of the Jewish people, would
permit; that it impressed the deepest conviction of God’s requiring, not
mere external observances, but heart-felt piety, well regulated desires,
and active benevolence; that it taught sacrifice could not obtain pardon
without repentance, or repentance without reformation and restitution;
that it described circumcision itself, and, by consequence, every other
legal rite, as designed to typify and inculcate internal holiness, which
alone could render men acceptable to God; that it represented the love
of God as designed to act as a practical principle, stimulating to the
constant and sincere cultivation of purity, mercy, and truth; and that
it enforced all these principles and precepts by sanctions the most
likely to operate powerfully on minds unaccustomed to abstract
speculations and remote views, even by temporal rewards and punishments;
the assurance of which was confirmed from the immediate experience of
similar rewards and punishments, dispensed to their enemies and to
themselves by that supernatural Power which had delivered the Hebrew
nation out of Egypt, conducted them through the wilderness, planted them
in the land of Canaan, regulated their government, distributed their
possessions, and to which alone they could look to obtain new blessings,
or secure those already enjoyed. From all this we derive another
presumptive argument for the divine authority of the Mosaic code; and it
may be contended, that a moral system thus perfect, promulgated at so
early a period, to such a people, and enforced by such sanctions as no
human power could undertake to execute, strongly bespeaks a divine
original.
2. The moral law is sometimes called the Mosaic law, because it was one
great branch of those injunctions which, under divine authority, Moses
enjoined upon the Israelites when they were gathered into a political
community under the theocracy. But it existed previously as the law of
all mankind; and it has been taken up into the Christian system, and
there more fully illustrated. As the obligation of the moral law upon
Christians has, however, been disputed by some perverters of the
Christian faith, or held by others on loose and fallacious grounds, this
subject ought to be clearly understood. It is, nevertheless, to be
noticed, that the morals of the New Testament are not proposed to us in
the form of a regular code. Even in the books of Moses, which have the
legislative form to a great extent, not all the principles and duties
which constituted the full character of godliness,” under that
dispensation, are made the subjects of formal injunction by particular
precepts. They are partly infolded in general principles, or often take
the form of injunction in an apparently incidental manner, or are
matters of obvious inference. A preceding code of traditionary moral law
is all along supposed in the writings of Moses and the prophets, as well
as a consuetudinary ritual and a doctrinal theology, both transmitted
from the patriarchs. This, too, is eminently the case with Christianity.
It supposes that all who believed in Christ admitted the divine
authority of the Old Testament; and it assumes the perpetual authority
of its morals, as well as the truth of its fundamental theology. The
constant allusions in the New Testament to the moral rules of the Jews
and patriarchs, either expressly as precepts, or as the data of
argument, sufficiently guard us against the notion, that what has not in
so many words been re-enacted] by Christ and his Apostles is of no
authority among Christians. In a great number of instances, however, the
form of injunction is directly preceptive, so as to have all the
explicitness and force of a regular code of law, and is, as much as a
regular code could be, a declaration of the sovereign will of Christ,
enforced by the sanctions of eternal life and death. This, however, is a
point on which a few confirmatory observations may be usefully adduced.
No part of the preceding dispensation, designated generally by the
appellation of the law,” is repealed in the New Testament, but what is
obviously ceremonial, typical, and incapable of coëxisting with
Christianity. Our Lord, in his discourse with the Samaritan woman,
declares, that the hour of the abolition of the temple worship was come;
the Apostle Paul, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, teaches us that the
Levitical services were but shadows, the substance and end of which is
Christ; and the ancient visible church, as constituted upon the ground
of natural descent from Abraham, was abolished by the establishment of a
spiritual body of believers to take its place. No precepts of a purely
political nature, that is, which respect the civil subjection of the
Jews to their theocracy, are, therefore, of any force to us as laws,
although they may have, in many cases, the greatest authority as
principles. No ceremonial precepts can be binding, since they were
restrained to a period terminating with the death and resurrection of
Christ; nor are even the patriarchal rites of circumcision and the
passover obligatory upon Christians, since we have sufficient evidence
that they were of an adumbrative character, and were laid aside by the
first inspired teachers of Christianity.
With the moral precepts which abound in the Old Testament the case is
very different, as sufficiently appears from the different, and even
contrary, manner in which they are always spoken of by Christ and his
Apostles. When our Lord, in his sermon on the mount, says, Think not
that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets; I am not come to
destroy the law, but to fulfil;” that is, to confirm or establish it;
the entire scope of his discourse shows that he is speaking exclusively
of the moral precepts of the law,” eminently so called, and of the moral
injunctions of the prophets founded upon them, and to which he thus
gives an equal authority. And in so solemn a manner does he enforce
this, that he adds, doubtless as foreseeing that attempts would be made
by deceiving or deceived men professing his religion, to lessen the
authority of the moral law, Whosoever, therefore, shall break one of
these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the
least in the kingdom of heaven;” that is, as St. Chrysostom interprets,
He shall be the farthest from attaining heaven and happiness, which
imports that he shall not attain it at all.” In like manner St. Paul,
after having strenuously maintained the doctrine of justification by
faith alone, anticipates an objection by asking, Do we then make void
the law through faith?” and subjoins, God forbid: yea, we establish the
law;” meaning by the law,” as the context and his argument clearly show,
the moral and not the ceremonial law.
After such declarations, it is worse than trifling for any to contend
that, in order to establish the authority of the moral law of the Jews
over Christians, it ought to have been formally reënacted. To this we
may, however, farther reply, not only that many important moral
principles and rules found in the Old Testament were never formally
enacted among the Jews; were traditional from an earlier age; and
received at different times the more indirect authority of inspired
recognition; but, to put the matter in a stronger light, that all the
leading moral precepts of the Jewish Scriptures are, in point of fact,
proposed in the New Testament in a manner which has the full force of
formal reënactment, as the laws of the Christian church. This argument,
from the want of formal reënactment, will therefore have no weight. The
summary of the law and the prophets, which is to love God with all our
heart, and to serve him with all our strength, and to love our neighbour
as ourselves, is unquestionably enjoined, and even reënacted by the
Christian lawgiver. When our Lord is explicitly asked by one who came
unto him and said, Good Master, what good thing shall I do, that I may
have eternal life?” the answer given shows that the moral law contained
in the decalogue is so in force under the Christian dispensation, that
obedience to it is necessary to final salvation:--“If thou wilt enter
into life, keep the commandments.” And that nothing ceremonial is
intended by this term, is manifest from what follows: He saith unto him,
Which? Jesus said, Thou shalt do no murder. Thou shalt not commit
adultery. Thou shalt not steal,” &c. Matt. xix, 17–19. Here, also, we
have all the force of a formal reënactment of the decalogue, a part of
it being evidently put for the whole. Nor were it difficult to produce
passages from the discourses of Christ and the writings of the Apostles,
which enjoin all the precepts of this law taken separately, by their
authority, as indispensable parts of Christian duty, and that, too,
under their original sanctions of life and death; so that the two
circumstances which form the true character of a law in its highest
sense, divine authority and penal sanctions, are found as truly in the
New Testament as in the Old. It will not, for instance, be contended,
that the New Testament does not enjoin the acknowledgment and worship of
one God alone; nor that it does not prohibit idolatry; nor that it does
not level its maledictions against false and profane swearing; nor that
the Apostle Paul does not use the very words of the fifth commandment
preceptively, when he says, Honour thy father and mother, which is the
first commandment with promise,” Eph. vi, 2; nor that murder, adultery,
theft, false witness, and covetousness are not all prohibited under pain
of exclusion from the kingdom of God. Thus, then, we have the whole
decalogue brought into the Christian code of morals, by a distinct
injunction of its separate precepts, and by their recognition as of
permanent and unchangeable obligation; the fourth commandment,
respecting the Sabbath only, being so far excepted, that its injunction
is not so expressly marked. This, however, is no exception in fact; for
beside that its original place in the two tables sufficiently
distinguishes it from all positive, ceremonial, and typical precepts,
and gives it a moral character, in respect to its ends, which are,
first, mercy to servants and cattle, and, second, the worship of
almighty God, undisturbed by worldly interruptions and cares, it is
necessarily included in that law” which our Lord declares he came not to
destroy, or abrogate; in that law” which St. Paul declares to be
established by faith,” and among those commandments” which our Lord
declares must be kept,” if any one would enter into life.” To this,
also, the practice of the Apostles is to be added, who did not cease
themselves from keeping one day in seven holy, nor teach others so to
do; but gave to “the Lord’s day” that eminence and sanctity in the
Christian church which the seventh day had in the Jewish, by
consecrating it to holy uses; an alteration not affecting the precept at
all, except in an unessential circumstance, (if indeed in that,) and in
which we may suppose them to have acted under divine suggestion.
Thus, then, we have the obligation of the whole decalogue as fully
established in the New Testament as in the Old, as if it had been
formally reënacted; and that no formal reënactment of it took place, is
itself a presumptive proof that it was never regarded by the lawgiver as
temporary, which the formality of republication might have supposed. It
is important to remark, however, that, although the moral laws of the
Mosaic dispensation pass into the Christian code, they stand there in
other and higher circumstances; so that the New Testament is a more
perfect dispensation of the knowledge of the moral will of God than the
Old. In particular, (1.) They are more expressly extended to the heart,
as by our Lord, in his sermon on the mount; who teaches us that the
thought and inward purpose of any offence is a violation of the law
prohibiting its external and visible commission. (2.) The principles on
which they are founded are carried out in the New Testament into a
greater variety of duties, which, by embracing more perfectly the social
and civil relations of life, are of a more universal character. (3.)
There is a much more enlarged injunction of positive and particular
virtues, especially those which constitute the Christian temper. (4.) By
all overt acts being inseparably connected with corresponding principles
in the heart, in order to constitute acceptable obedience, which
principles suppose the regeneration of the soul by the Holy Ghost. This
moral renovation is, therefore, held out as necessary to our salvation,
and promised as a part of the grace of our redemption by Christ. (5.) By
being connected with promises of divine assistance, which is peculiar to
a law connected with evangelical provisions. (6.) By their having a
living illustration in the perfect and practical example of Christ. (7.)
By the higher sanctions derived from the clearer revelation of a future
state, and the more explicit promises of eternal life, and threatenings
of eternal punishment. It follows from this, that we have in the Gospel
the most complete and perfect revelation of moral law ever given to men;
and a more exact manifestation of the brightness, perfection, and glory
of that law, under which angels and our progenitors in paradise were
placed, and which it is at once the delight and the interest of the most
perfect and happy beings to obey.
LAZARUS, brother to Martha and Mary. He dwelt at Bethany with his
sisters, near Jerusalem; and the Lord Jesus did him the honour sometimes
of lodging at his house when he visited the city. See the account of his
resurrection related at large in John xi, 5, &c.
LEAD, עפרת, Exod. xv, 10; Num. xxxi, 22; Job xix, 24; Jer. vi, 29; Ezek.
xxii, 18; xxvii, 12; Zech. v, 7, 8; a mineral of a bluish white colour.
It is the softest next to gold, but has no great tenacity, and is not in
the least sonorous. It is mentioned with five other species of metal,
Num. xxxi, 22; and there is no doubt but that this is the meaning of the
word; so the Septuagint render it throughout, μόλιϐδος or μόλιϐος.
LEAVEN. The Hebrews were forbidden by the law to eat leavened bread, or
a food with leaven in it, during the seven days of the passover, Exod.
xii, 15–19; Lev. ii, 11. They were very careful in purifying their
houses from all leaven before this feast began. God forbad either leaven
or honey to be offered to him in his temple; that is, in cakes or in any
baked meats. But on other occasions they might offer leavened bread or
honey. St. Paul, 1 Cor. v, 7, 8, expresses his desire that the faithful
should celebrate the Christian passover with unleavened bread; which,
figuratively, signifies sincerity and truth. In this he teaches us two
things; first, that the law which obliged the Jews to a literal
observance of the passover is no longer in force; and, secondly, that by
unleavened bread, truth and purity of heart were denoted. The same
Apostle alludes to the ceremony used at the passover, when he says, A
little leaven leaveneth the whole lump;” that is, a small portion of
leaven, in a quantity of bread or paste, corrupts the whole, and renders
it unclean. Our Saviour, in the Gospel, Matthew xvi, 11, warns his
Apostles to beware of the leaven of the Herodians and Pharisees; meaning
their doctrines.
LEBANON, or LIBANUS, signifying _white_, from its snows,--the most
elevated mountain or mountain chain in Syria, celebrated in all ages for
its cedars; which, as is well known, furnished the wood for Solomon’s
temple. This mountain is the centre, or nucleus, of all the mountain
ridges which, from the north, the south, and the east, converge toward
this point; but it overtops them all. This configuration of the
mountains, and the superiority of Lebanon, are particularly striking to
the traveller approaching both from the Mediterranean on the west, and
the desert on the east. On either side, he first discovers, at a great
distance, a clouded ridge, stretching from north to south, as far as the
eye can see; the central summits of which are capped with clouds, or
tipped with snow. This is Lebanon, which is often referred to in Holy
Writ for its streams, its timber, and its wines; and at the present day
the seat of the only portion of freedom of which Syria can boast.
The altitude of Lebanon is so considerable, that it appears from the
reports of travellers to have snow on its highest eminences all the year
round. Volney says, that it thus remains toward the north-east, where it
is sheltered from the sea winds and the rays of the sun. Maundrell found
that part of the mountain which he crossed, and which in all probability
was by no means the highest, covered with deep snow in the month of May.
Dr. E. D. Clarke, in the month of July, saw some of the eastern summits
of Lebanon, or Anti-Libanus, near Damascus, covered with snow, not lying
in patches, as is common in the summer season with mountains which
border on the line of perpetual congelation, but do not quite reach it,
but with that perfect white, smooth, and velvetlike appearance, which
snow only exhibits when it is very deep,--a striking spectacle in such a
climate, where the beholder, seeking protection from a burning sun,
almost considers the firmament to be on fire. At the time this
observation was made, the thermometer, in an elevated situation near the
sea of Tiberias, stood at 102½° in the shade. Sir Frederic Henniker
passed over snow in July; and Ali Bey describes the same eastern ridge
as covered with snow in September. Of the noble cedars which once
adorned the upper parts of this mountain but few now remain, and those
much decayed. Burckhardt, who crossed Mount Libanus in 1810, counted
about thirty-six large ones, fifty of middle size, and about three
hundred smaller and young ones: but more might exist in other parts of
the mountain. The wine, especially that made about the convent of
Canobin, still preserves its ancient celebrity; and is reported by
travellers, more particularly by Rauwolff, Le Bruyn, and De la Roque, to
be of the most exquisite kind for flavour and fragrance. The rains which
fall in the lower regions of Lebanon, and the melting of the snow in the
upper ones, furnish an abundance of perennial streams, which are alluded
to by Solomon, Cant. iv, 15. On the declivities of the mountain grew the
vines which furnished the rich and fragrant wine which Hosea celebrated,
xiv, 7, and which may still be obtained by proper culture.
The cedar of Lebanon has, in all ages, been reckoned as an object of
unrivalled grandeur and beauty in the vegetable kingdom. It is,
accordingly, one of the natural images which frequently occur in the
poetical style of the Hebrew prophets; and is appropriated to denote
kings, princes, and potentates of the highest rank. Thus, the Prophet
Isaiah, whose writings abound with metaphors and allegories of this
kind, in denouncing the judgments of God upon the proud and arrogant,
declares that the day of the Lord of Hosts shall be upon all the cedars
of Lebanon that are high and lifted up, and upon all the oaks of
Bashan,” Isaiah ii, 13. The king of Israel used the same figure in his
reply to the challenge of the king of Judah: The thistle that was in
Lebanon sent to the cedar that was in Lebanon, saying, Give thy daughter
to my son to wife: and there passed by a wild beast that was in Lebanon,
and trod down the thistle,” 2 Kings xiv, 9. The spiritual prosperity of
the righteous man is compared by the Psalmist to the same noble plant:
The righteous shall flourish as the palm tree; he shall grow as the
cedar in Lebanon.” To break the cedars, and shake the enormous mass on
which they grow, are the figures that David selects to express the awful
majesty and power of Jehovah: The voice of the Lord is powerful; the
voice of the Lord is full of majesty. The voice of the Lord breaketh the
cedars: yea, the Lord breaketh the cedars of Lebanon. He maketh them
also to skip like a calf; Lebanon and Sirion like a young unicorn,”
Psalm xxix, 4–6. This description of the divine majesty and power
possesses a character of awful sublimity.
The stupendous size, the extensive range, and great elevation of
Libanus; its towering summits capped with perpetual snow, or crowned
with fragrant cedars; its olive plantations; its vineyards, producing
the most delicious wines; its clear fountains, and cold-flowing brooks;
its fertile vales, and odoriferous shrubberies,--combine to form in
Scripture language, the glory of Lebanon.” But that glory, liable to
change, has, by the unanimous consent of modern travellers, suffered a
sensible decline. The extensive forests of cedar, which adorned and
perfumed the summits and declivities of those mountains, have almost
disappeared. Only a small number of these trees of God, planted by his
almighty hand,” which, according to the usual import of the phrase,
signally displayed the divine power, wisdom, and goodness, now remain.
Their countless number in the days of Solomon, and their prodigious
bulk, must be recollected, in order to feel the force of that sublime
declaration of the prophet: Lebanon is not sufficient to burn, nor the
beasts thereof sufficient for a burnt-offering,” Isaiah xl, 16. Though
the trembling sinner were to make choice of Lebanon for the altar; were
to cut down all its forests to form the pile; though the fragrance of
this fuel, with all its odoriferous gums, were the incense; the wine of
Lebanon pressed from all its vineyards, the libation; and all its
beasts, the propitiatory sacrifice; all would prove insufficient to make
atonement for the sins of men; would be regarded as nothing in the eyes
of the supreme Judge for the expiation of even one transgression. The
just and holy law of God requires a nobler altar, a costlier sacrifice,
and a sweeter perfume,--the obedience and death of a divine Person to
atone for our sins, and the incense of his continual intercession to
secure our acceptance with the Father of mercies, and admission into the
mansions of eternal rest. The conversion of the Gentile nations from the
worship of idols and the bondage of corruption, to the service and
enjoyment of the true God, is foretold in these beautiful and striking
terms: The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them: and
the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose. It shall blossom
abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing; the glory of Lebanon
shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon: they shall
see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God,” Isaiah xxxv,
4.
LEEK, חציר, in Numbers xi, 5, translated leek;” in 1 Kings xviii, 5; 2
Kings xix, 26; Job xl, 15; Psalm xxxvii, 2; xc, 5; ciii, 15; civ, 14;
cxxix, 6; cxlvii, 8; Isaiah xxxv, 7; xxxvii, 27; xl, 6, it is rendered
grass;” in Job viii, 12, herb;” in Prov. xxvii, 25; Isaiah xv, 6, hay;”
and in Isaiah xxxiv, 13, a court.” It is much of the same nature with
the onion. The kind called _karrat_ by the Arabians, the _allium porrum_
of Linnæus, Hasselquist says, must certainly have been one of those
desired by the children of Israel, as it has been cultivated and
esteemed from the earliest times to the present in Egypt. The
inhabitants are very fond of eating it raw, as sauce for their roasted
meat; and the poor people eat it raw with their bread, especially for
breakfast. There is reason, however, to doubt whether this plant is
intended in Num. xi, 5, and so differently rendered every where else: it
should rather intend such vegetables as grow promiscuously with grass.
Ludolphus supposes that it may mean lettuce and sallads in general; and
Maillet observes, that the succory and endive are eaten with great
relish by the people in Egypt: some or all of these may be meant.
LEGION. The Roman legions were composed each of ten cohorts; a cohort,
of fifty maniples; a maniple, of fifteen men; consequently, a full
legion contained six thousand soldiers. Jesus cured one who called
himself legion,” as if possessed by a legion of devils, Mark v, 9. He
also said to Peter, who drew his sword to defend him in the olive
garden: Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, who shall
presently give me more than twelve legions of angels?” Matt. xxvi, 53.
LEMUEL. See AGUR.