the world, or his office as Mediator between God and man, is thus
represented to us in the Scripture. He is the light of the world, John
i; viii, 12; the revealer of the will of God in the most eminent sense.
He is a propitiatory sacrifice, Rom. iii, 25; v, 11; 1 Cor. v, 7; Eph.
v, 2; 1 John ii, 2; Matt. xxvi, 28; John i, 29, 36; and, as because of
his peculiar offering, of a merit transcending all others, he is styled
our High Priest. He was also described beforehand in the Old Testament,
under the same character of a priest, and an expiatory victim, Isa.
liii; Dan. ix, 24; Psa. cx, 4. And whereas it is objected, that all this
is merely by way of allusion to the sacrifices of the Mosaic law, the
Apostle on the contrary affirms, that the law was a shadow of good
things to come, and not the very image of the things,” Heb. x, 1; and
that the priests that offer gifts according to the law, serve unto the
example and shadow of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God,
when he was about to make the tabernacle: for see, saith he, that thou
make all things according to the pattern showed to thee in the mount,”
Heb. viii, 4, 5; that is, the Levitical priesthood was a shadow of the
priesthood of Christ; in like manner as the tabernacle made by Moses was
according to that showed him in the mount. The priesthood of Christ, and
the tabernacle in the mount, were the originals; of the former of which,
the Levitical priesthood was a type; and of the latter, the tabernacle
made by Moses was a copy. The doctrine of this epistle, then, plainly
is, that the legal sacrifices were allusions to the great atonement to
be made by the blood of Christ; and not that it was an allusion to
those. Nor can any thing be more express or determinate than the
following passage: It is not possible that the blood of bulls and of
goats should take away sin. Wherefore when he [Christ] cometh into the
world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering,” that is, of bulls and of
goats, thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me. Lo, I come
to do thy will, O God! By which will we are sanctified, through the
offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all,” Heb. x, 4, 5, 7, 9,
10. And to add one passage more of the like kind: Christ was once
offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall
he appear the second time, without sin;” that is, without bearing sin,
as he did at his first coming, by being an offering for it; without
having our iniquities again laid upon him; without being any more a
sin-offering:--“And unto them that look for him shall he appear the
second time without sin unto salvation,” Heb. ix, 28. Nor do the
inspired writers at all confine themselves to this manner of speaking
concerning the satisfaction of Christ; but declare that there was an
efficacy in what he did and suffered for us, additional to and beyond
mere instruction and example. This they declare with great variety of
expression: that he suffered for sins, the just for the unjust,” 1 Peter
iii, 18; that he gave his life a ransom,” Matt. xx, 28; Mark x, 45; 1
Tim. ii, 6; that we are bought with a price,” 2 Pet. ii, 1; Rev. xiv, 4;
1 Cor. vi, 20; that he redeemed us with his blood,” redeemed us from the
curse of the law, being made a curse for us,” 1 Peter i, 19; Rev. v, 9;
Gal. iii, 13; that he is our advocate, intercessor, and propitiation,”
Heb. vii, 25; 1 John ii, 1, 2; that he was made perfect, through
sufferings; and being thus made perfect, he became the author of
salvation,” Heb. ii, 10; v, 9; that God was in Christ, reconciling the
world to himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them,” 2 Cor. v,
19; Rom. v, 10; Eph. ii, 16; and that through death he destroyed him
that had the power of death,” Heb. ii, 14. Christ, then, having thus
humbled himself, and become obedient to death, even the death of the
cross; God, also, hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is
above every name;” hath commanded us to pray in his name; constituted
him man’s advocate and intercessor; distributes his grace only through
him, and in honour of his death; hath given all things into his hands;
and hath committed all judgment unto him; that at the name of Jesus
every knee should bow,” and that all men should honour the Son even as
they honour the Father,” Phil. ii, 8–10; John iii, 35; v, 22, 23.
All the offices of Christ, therefore, arise out of his gracious
appointment, and voluntary undertaking, to be the Mediator between God
and man;” between God offended, and man offending; and therefore under
the penalty of God’s violated law, which denounces death against every
transgressor. He is the _Prophet_ who came to teach us the extent and
danger of our offences, and the means which God had appointed for their
remission. He is the great _High Priest_ of our profession,” who, having
offered himself without spot to God,” has entered the holiest to make
intercession for us, and to present our prayers and services to God,
securing to them acceptance by virtue of his own merits. He is _King_,
ruling over the whole earth, for the maintenance and establishment and
enlargement of his church, and for the punishment of those who reject
his authority; and he is the final _Judge_ of the quick and the dead, to
whom is given the power of distributing the rewards and penalties of
eternity. See ATONEMENT and JESUS CHRIST.
There is an essential connection between the mediation of our Lord and
the covenant of grace. (See _Covenant_.) He is therefore called the
Mediator of a better covenant,” and of a new covenant.” The word μεσίτης
literally means a person in the middle,” between two parties; and the
fitness of there being a Mediator of the covenant of grace arises from
this, that the nature of the covenant implies that the two parties were
at variance. Those who hold the Socinian principles understand a
mediator to mean nothing more than a messenger sent from God to give
assurance of forgiveness to his offending creatures. Those who hold the
doctrine of the atonement understand, that Jesus is called the Mediator
of the new covenant, because he reconciles the two parties, by having
appeased the wrath of God which man had deserved, and by subduing that
enmity to God by which their hearts were alienated from him. It is plain
that this is being a mediator in the strict and proper sense of the
word; and there seems to be no reason for resting in a meaning less
proper and emphatical. This sense of the term _mediator_ coincides with
the meaning of another phrase applied to him, Heb. vii, 22, where he is
called κρείττονος διαθήκης ἔγγυος. If he is a Mediator in the last
sense, then he is also ἔγγυος, the _sponsor_, the _surety_, of the
covenant. He undertook, on the part of the supreme Lawgiver, that the
sins of those who repent shall be forgiven; and he fulfilled this
undertaking by offering, in their stead, a satisfaction to divine
justice. He undertook, on their part, that they should keep the terms of
the covenant; and he fulfils this undertaking by the influence of his
Spirit upon their hearts.
If a mediator be essential to the covenant of grace, and if all who have
been saved from the time of the first transgression were saved by that
covenant, it follows that the Mediator of the new covenant acted in that
character before he was manifested in the flesh. Hence the importance of
that doctrine respecting the person of Christ; that all the
communications which the Almighty condescended to hold with the human
race were carried on from the beginning by this person; that it is he
who spake to the patriarchs, who gave the law by Moses, and who is
called in the Old Testament, the angel of the covenant.” These views
open to us the full importance of a doctrine which manifestly unites in
one faith all who obtain deliverance from that condition; for, according
to this doctrine, not only did the virtue of the blood which he shed as
a priest extend to the ages past before his manifestation, but all the
intimations of the new covenant established in his blood were given by
him as the great Prophet, and the blessings of the covenant were applied
in every age by the Spirit, which he, as the King of his people, sends
forth. The Socinians, who consider Jesus as a mere man, having no
existence till he was born of Mary, necessarily reject the doctrine now
stated: and the church of Rome, although they admit the divinity of our
Saviour, yet, by the system which they hold with regard to the mediation
of Christ, agree with the Socinians in throwing out of the dispensations
of the grace of God that beautiful and complete unity which arises from
their having been conducted by one person. The church of Rome considers
Christ as Mediator only in respect of his human nature. As that nature
did not exist till he was born of Mary, they do not think it possible
that he could exercise the office of Mediator under the Old Testament;
and as they admit that a mediator is essential to the covenant of grace,
they believe that those who lived under the Old Testament, not enjoying
the benefit of his mediation, did not obtain complete remission of sins.
They suppose, therefore, that persons in former times who believed in a
Saviour that was to come, and who obtained justification with God by
this faith, were detained after death in a place of the infernal
regions, which received the name of _limbus patrum_; a kind of prison
where they did not endure punishment, but remained without partaking of
the joys of heaven, in earnest expectation of the coming of Christ, who,
after suffering on the cross, descended to hell that he might set them
free. This fanciful system has no other foundation than the slender
support which it appears to receive from some obscure passages of
Scripture that admit of another interpretation. But if Christ acted as
the Mediator of the covenant of grace from the time of the first
transgression, this system becomes wholly unnecessary; and we may
believe, according to the general strain of Scripture, and what we
account the analogy of faith, that all who died in faith,” since the
world began, entered immediately after death into that heavenly country
which they desired.”
Although the members of the church of Rome adopt the language of
Scripture, in which Jesus is styled the Mediator of the new covenant,
they differ from all Protestants in acknowledging other mediators; and
the use which they make of the doctrine that Christ is Mediator only in
his human nature is to justify their admitting those who had no other
nature to share that office with him. Saints, martyrs, and especially
the Virgin Mary, are called _mediatores secundarii_, because it is
conceived that they hold this character under Christ, and that, by
virtue of his mediation, the superfluity of their merits may be applied
to procure acceptance with God for our imperfect services. Under this
character, supplications and solemn addresses are presented to them; and
the _mediatores secundarii_ receive in the church of Rome, not only the
honour due to eminent virtue, but a worship and homage which that church
wishes to vindicate from the charge of idolatry, by calling it the same
kind of inferior and secondary worship which is offered to the man
Christ Jesus, who in his human nature acted as Mediator. In opposition
to all this, we hold that Jesus Christ was qualified to act as Mediator
by the union between his divine and his human nature; that his divine
nature gave an infinite value to all that he did, rendering it effectual
for the purpose of reconciling us to God, while the condescension by
which he approached to man, in taking part of flesh and blood, fulfilled
the gracious intention for which a Mediator was appointed; that the
introducing any other mediator is unnecessary, derives no warrant from
Scripture, and is derogatory to the honour of him who is there called
the one Mediator between God and men;” and that as the union of the
divine to the human nature is the foundation of that worship which in
Scripture is often paid to the Mediator of the new covenant, this
worship does not afford the smallest countenance to the idolatry and
will worship of those who ascribe divine honours to any mortal.
MEGIDDO, a city of the tribe of Manasseh, famous for the battle fought
there between Pharaoh-Necho and King Josiah, in which the latter was
defeated and mortally wounded, Josh. xvii, 11; Judges i, 27; 2 Kings
xxiii, 29.
MELCHIZEDEK. When Abram returned from the slaughter of the Assyrians, in
his way to Hebron, he was met at Shaveh, or King’s Dale, afterward the
valley of Jehoshaphat, between Jerusalem and Mount Olivet, by
Melchizedek, king of Salem, the most ancient quarter of Jerusalem, a
priest of the most high God, who gave him bread and wine, and blessed
him in the name of the most high God, Creator of heaven and earth;” to
whom Abram in return piously gave tithes, or the tenth part of all the
spoils as an offering to God, Heb. vii, 2. This Canaanitish prince was
early considered as a type of Christ in the Jewish church: Thou art a
priest for ever, after the order of Melchizedek,” Psalm cx, 4. He
resembled Christ in the following particulars: 1. In his name,
_Melchizedek_, King of Righteousness;” 2. In his city, _Salem_, Peace;”
3. In his offices of king and priest of the most high God; and 4. In the
omission of the names of his parents and genealogy, the time of his
birth and length of his life, exhibiting an indefinite reign and
priesthood, according to the Apostle’s exposition, Heb. vii, 5. The
import of this is, that he came not to his office by right of
primogeniture, (which implies a genealogy,) or by the way of succession,
but was raised up and immediately called of God to it. In that respect
Christ is said to be a priest after his order.” Then, again, that he had
no successor, nor could have; for there was no law to constitute an
order of succession, so that he was a priest only upon an extraordinary
call. In this respect our Lord’s priesthood answers to his, because it
is wholly in himself, who has no successor. An infinite number of absurd
opinions have been at different times held respecting this mystic
personage, as that he was Shem, or Ham; or, among those who think he was
more than human, that he was the Holy Ghost, or the Son of God himself;
absurdities which are too obsolete to need refutation.
MELITA, now called Malta, an island in the African or Mediterranean Sea,
between Africa and Sicily, twenty miles in length and twelve in breadth,
formerly reckoned a part of Africa, but now belonging to Europe. St.
Paul suffered shipwreck upon the coast of Malta, Acts xviii, 1–3. In the
opinion of Dr. Hales, the island where this happened was not Malta, but
Meleda. His words are: “That this island was Meleda, near the Illyrian
coast, not Malta, on the southern coast of Sicily, may appear from the
following considerations: 1. It lies confessedly in the Adriatic Sea,
but Malta a considerable distance from it. 2. It lies nearer the mouth
of the Adriatic than any other island of that sea; and would of course,
be more likely to receive the wreck of any vessel driven by tempests
toward that quarter. And it lies north-west by north of the south-west
promontory of Crete; and came nearly in the direction of a storm from
the south-east quarter. 3. An obscure island called Melite, whose
inhabitants were ‘barbarous,’ was not applicable to the celebrity of
Malta at that time, which Cicero represents as abounding in curiosities
and riches, and possessing a remarkable manufacture of the finest linen;
and Diodorus Siculus more fully: ‘Malta is furnished with many and very
good harbours, and the inhabitants are very rich; for it is full of all
sorts of artificers, among whom there are excellent weavers of fine
linen. Their houses are very stately and beautiful, adorned with
graceful eaves, and pargetted with white plaster. The inhabitants are a
colony of Phenicians, who, trading as merchants, as far as the western
ocean, resorted to this place on account of its commodious ports and
convenient situation for maritime commerce; and by the advantage of this
place, the inhabitants frequently became famous both for their wealth
and their merchandise.’ 4. The circumstance of the viper, or venomous
snake, which fastened on St. Paul’s hand, agrees with the damp and woody
island of Meleda, affording shelter and proper nourishment for such, but
not with the dry and rocky island of Malta, in which there are no
serpents now, and none in the time of Pliny. 5. The disease with which
the father of Publius was affected, dysentery combined with fever,
probably intermittent, might well suit a country woody and damp, and
probably, for want of draining, exposed to the putrid effluvia of
confined moisture; but was not likely to affect a dry, rocky, and
remarkably healthy island like Malta.”
MELON, אבטחים, Numbers xi, 5, a luscious fruit so well known that a
description of it would be superfluous. It grows to great perfection,
and is highly esteemed in Egypt, especially by the lower class of
people, during the hot months. The juice is peculiarly cooling and
agreeable in that sultry climate, where it is justly pronounced one of
the most delicious refreshments that nature, amidst her constant
attention to the wants of man, affords in the season of violent heat.
There are varieties of this fruit; but that more particularly referred
to in the text must be the water melon. It is cultivated, says
Hasselquist, on the banks of the Nile, in the rich clayey earth, which
subsides during the inundation. This serves the Egyptians for meat,
drink, and physic. It is eaten in abundance during the season, even by
the richer sort of people; but the common people, on whom Providence has
bestowed nothing but poverty and patience, scarcely eat any thing but
these, and account this the best time of the year, as they are obliged
to put up with worse fare at other seasons. This fruit sometimes serves
them for drink, the juice refreshing these poor creatures, and they have
less occasion for water than if they were to live on more substantial
food in this burning climate. This well explains the regret expressed by
the Israelites for the loss of this fruit, whose pleasant liquor had so
often quenched their thirst, and relieved their weariness in their
servitude, and which would have been exceedingly grateful in a dry
scorching desert.
MEMPHIS. See NOPH.
MENNONITES, a society of Baptists in Holland, so called from Menno Simon
of Friesland, who lived in the sixteenth century. He was originally a
Romish priest, but joined a party of the Anabaptists, and, becoming
their leader, cured them of many extravagancies, and reduced the system
to consistency and moderation. The Mennonites maintain that practical
piety is the essence of religion, and that the surest mark of the true
church is the sanctity of its members. They plead for universal
toleration in religion, and debar none from their societies who lead
pious lives, and own the Scriptures for the word of God. They teach that
infants are not the proper subjects of baptism; that ministers of the
Gospel ought to receive no salary. They also object to the terms
_person_ and _trinity_, as not consistent with the simplicity of the
Scriptures. They are, like the Society of Friends, utterly averse to
oaths and war, and to capital punishments, as contrary to the spirit of
the Christian dispensation. In their private meetings every one has the
liberty to speak, to expound the Scriptures, and to pray. They assemble,
or used to do so, twice every year from all parts of Holland, at
Rynsbourg, a village two leagues from Leyden, at which time they receive
the communion, sitting at a table in the manner of the Independents; but
in their form of discipline they are said more to resemble the
Presbyterians. The ancient Mennonites professed a contempt of erudition
and science, and excluded all from their communion who deviated in the
least from the most rigorous rules of simplicity and gravity: but this
primitive austerity is greatly diminished in their most considerable
societies. Those who adhere to their ancient discipline are called
Flemings or Flandrians. The whole sect were formerly called
Waterlandians, from the district in which they lived. The Mennonites in
Pennsylvania do not baptize by immersion, though they administer the
ordinance to none but adult persons. Their common method is this: The
person to be baptized kneels, the minister holds his hands over him,
into which the deacon pours water, so that it runs on the head of the
baptized; after which follow imposition of hands and prayer.
Divine worship is conducted among the Mennonites much as among the
churches of the reformed, or among the Dissenters in England, only with
this peculiarity, that collections are made every Sabbath day, sometimes
in the middle of the sermon, in two bags, one for the poor, and the
other for the expenses of public worship. They have a Mennonite college
at Amsterdam, and the ministers are chosen in some places by the
congregation, and in others by the elders only. As they reject infant
baptism, they refuse to commune at the Lord’s table with any who
administer the ordinance to children, unless resprinkled. They train up
catechumens under their ministers, and, about the age of sixteen,
baptize them, taking from the candidate, before the minister and elders,
an account of his repentance and faith. In some parts of North Holland,
young people are baptized on the day of their marriage. They baptize by
pouring or sprinkling thrice.
With respect to their confession of faith, as it is stated by one of
their ministers, Mr. Gan, of Ryswick, they believe that in the fall man
lost his innocence, and that all his posterity are born with a natural
propensity to evil, and with fleshly inclinations, and are exposed to
sickness and death. The posterity of Adam derive no moral guilt from his
fall: sin is personal, and the desert of punishment cannot be inherited.
The incarnate Son of God is set forth to us as inferior to the Father,
not only in his state of humiliation, but in that of his exaltation, and
as subject to the Father: he is nevertheless an object of religious
trust and confidence in like manner as the Father. With respect to the
number of Mennonites in Holland, they are calculated at only thirty
thousand, including children, and form about a hundred and thirty
churches. In the United States of America, it appears, there are more
than two hundred Mennonite churches, some of which contain as many as
three hundred members in each. They are mostly the descendants of the
Mennonites who emigrated in great numbers from Paltz.
MERCY SEAT, ἱλαϛήριον, _propitiatory_. This word is properly an
adjective, agreeing with ἐπίθεμα, _a lid_, understood, which is
expressed by the LXX, Exod. xxv, 17. In that version, ἱλαϛήριον
generally answers to the Hebrew כפרת, from the verb כפר, _to cover_,
_expiate_, and was the _lid_ or _covering_ of the ark of the covenant,
made of pure gold, on and before which the high priest was to sprinkle
the blood of the expiatory sacrifices on the great day of atonement, and
where God promised to meet his people, Exod. xxv, 17, 22; xxix, 42; xxx,
36; Lev. xvi, 2, 14. St. Paul, by applying this name to Christ, Rom.
iii, 25, assures us that he is the true mercy seat, the reality of what
the כפרת represented to the ancient believers; by him our sins are
covered or expiated, and through him God communes with us in mercy. The
mercy seat also represents our approach to God through Christ; we come
to the throne of grace;” which is only a variation of the term mercy
seat.”
MEROM, WATERS OF, or _lacus Samechonitis_: the most northern and the
smallest of the three lakes which are supplied by the waters of the
Jordan. Indeed the numerous branches of this river, descending from the
mountains, unite in this small piece of water; out of which issues the
single stream which may be considered as the Jordan Proper. It is at
present called the lake of Houle; and is situated in a hollow or valley,
about twelve miles wide, called the Ard Houle, formed by the Djebel
Heish on the west, and Djebel Safat on the east, the two branches into
which the mountains of Hasbeya, or Djebel Esheikh, the ancient Hermon,
divides itself about fifteen miles to the north.
MEROZ, a place in the neighbourhood of the brook Kishon, whose
inhabitants, refusing to come to the assistance of their brethren, when
they fought with Sisera, were put under an anathema, Judges v, 23.
MESHECH, COUNTRY OF. Meshech was the sixth son of Japheth, and is
generally mentioned in conjunction with his brother Tubal; and both were
first seated in the northeastern angle of Asia Minor, from the shores of
the Euxine, along to the south of Caucasus; where were the Montes
Moschisi, and where, in after times, were the Iberi, Tibareni, and
Moschi; near to whom also, or mingled with them, were the Chalybes, who,
it is probable, derived their Grecian appellation from the general
occupation of the families of Tubal and Meshech, as workers in brass and
iron, as the inhabitants of the same countries have been in all ages,
for the supply of Tyre, Persia, Greece, and Armenia. There appears also
to have been in the same neighbourhood, namely, in Armenia, a river and
country termed Rosh: for so, Bochart says, the river Araxes is called by
the Arabs; and that there was a people in the adjoining country called
Rhossi. That passage in Ezekiel, xxxviii, also, which in our Bibles is
rendered the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal,” is, in the Septuagint,
the prince of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal.” These Rossi and Moschi, who
were neighbours in Asia, dispersed their colonies jointly over the vast
empire of Russia; and preserve their names still in those of Russians
and Muscovites.