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make man in our image." Gen. xi. 7, "Let us go down and confound their language."

Answer. This is nothing more than the author's dramatic way of writing. We are not to suppose that God actually said to the waters," Bring forth abundantly," or to the birds and fishes, " Be fruitful and multiply." Perhaps the expression "Let there be" may denote energy; -and "Let us make" may denote forethought; and upon this occasion such language might be employed by the writer to intimate that man is the noblest work of God, the most distinguished production of divine power and wisdom in this world. Dr. Geddes says that the Jews understood these words to have been addressed to the surrounding angels: but there is no need to have recourse to this supposition.

In Eccles. xii. 1, The Received Text reads "Remember thy Creators:" and from this plural form a plurality of persons has been inferred. But Dr. Kennicott has shown that the best manuscripts have the singular number.

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III. It is alleged that the word angel' is often used in connexion with the subordinate, but not with the Supreme Jehovah.

It is urged that Exod. xxiii. 20-23, Jehovah having promised to send an angel to keep the Israelite nation in the way, and to bring them to the promised land, adds, "Beware of him, and obey his voice, for MY NAME IS IN HIM." Here it is said that the name of Jehovah is expressly given to the conducting angel.

An angel is pro

But this remark is very erroneous. perly nothing more than a messenger, and the angel here alluded to was probably Joshua, who acted in the name, that is, by the authority, of God.

Exod. xxxiii. 3. Jehovah says to Moses, "I will send an angel before thee, and I will drive out the Canaanite,

&c.

&c. for I will not go up in the midst of thee, lest I consume thee by the way."-But, whatever be the meaning of this threatening, which cannot be understood in a literal sense, as though God were afraid of trusting himself with so rebellious a people, lest his indignation should unawares gain the ascendancy over his wisdom, at the intercession of Moses it was revoked. Ver. 14, " My presence shall go with thee," &c.

To assert that the angel of Jehovah is a phrase only used of the subordinate Jehovah, is assuming the very point in dispute. Any sensible symbol of the divine presence is called an angel, and this symbol is called indifferently the "angel of Jehovah," or, " Jehovah himself." See Sect. VI. p. 123.-Gen. xvi. 7, "The angel of Jehovah found her :" but ver. 13, it appears that this angel was Jehovah himself. This fact is still more evident from Exod. iii. 2-15, "The angel of Jehovah appeared to him in a flame of fire in the midst of a bush :-and when Jehovah saw -God.called to him out of the midst of the bush :-1 am the God of thy Fathers, the God of Abraham, &c.—Moses said, They will say to me, What is his name?-And God said to Moses, I Am that I Am. Thus shall ye say; Jehovah, the God of your Fathers, hath sent me : this is my name for ever."

What room is there here for the supposition of a Jehovah subordinate to the Supreme? The person who speaks is God himself: and it is plain that the words 'Jehovah,' 'I Am,' ' God,'' God of your Fathers,'' God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,' are all names for one and the same divine person: also, that the phrase angel of Jehovah' means either the visible symbol of the divine presence, or Jehovah himself. Gen. xvii. 1; xxxi. 11, 12; xxxii. 24; and Exod. xii. 21, which have been appealed to in support of the strange doctrine of two Jehovahs, admit of a similar explanation.

IV. The

IV. The Chaldee paraphrasts of the Old Testament, Onkelos and Jonathan, are said to acknowledge a distinction between the two Jehovahs, by giving the title Mimra,' i. e. Word, to the Jehovah-angel 4.

Gen. xxviii. 20, “ Jacob vowed, If God will be with me, then shall Jehovah be my God." Onkelos renders it, If the Word of the Lord be with me, then shall the Word of the Lord be my God.-Deut. iv. 24, "Jehovah, thy God, is a consuming fire." Onkelos: Jehovah, thy God, his Word is, &c.

Gen. i. 27," Jehovah created man," &c, Jonathan renders it, The Word of Jehovah created man.-Chap. iii. 9, "God called to Adam." In the Targum: The Word of God called, &c.-Chap. xviii. 1, "Jehovah, God, appeared to Abram." In the Targum; The Word of Jehovah appeared, &c. See Gen. iii. 22; xix. 24.

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Answer. This argument is evidently founded upon a palpable mistake. In the Chaldee idiom the term Mimra, • Word,' is substituted for the reciprocal pronoun self; so that the Word of Jehovah' means nothing more than 'Jehovah himself.' Thus Numb. xv. 32, "A certain man said in his word," i. e. within himself, “I will go forth and gather sticks." 2 Sam. iii. 15, 16, "Phaltiel put a sword between his word," i. e. himself," and Michal, the daughter of Saul." Eccl. i. 12, "Solomon said in his word,” i. e. in himself, "Vanity of vanities is this whole world 5."

Secondly:

The Chaldee versions of the Old Testament are called Targums, a word which in that language signifies a translation. Of these Targums, the two principal are those of Onkelos, which is a close and faithful translation of the Pentateuch, written, as Dr. Prideaux thinks, near the time of Christ, and that of Jonathan, which is a paraphrastic version of the Prophets of considerably later date. Another Targum on the Law, is ascribed by the Jews to the same Jonathan, who was contemporary with Gamaliel; but by internal evidence it appears to have been written some centuries afterwards, and is a work of little repute. Prideaux, Conn. vol. ii. p. 531.

* Mr. Lowman, in his Three Tracts, at the end of a chapter upon

Secondly: It is maintained that the Jehovah angel

animated the body of Christ.

It would be sufficient to reply, that no such being exists as the Jehovah-angel: but as the Arian hypothesis maintains that the great Angel, who was the medium of divine dispensations to the Je vs, is the spirit which became incarnate in Christ, it will be proper to state a few of the principal arguments.

The following texts, among others, have been alleged from the Old Testament: Isa. lxiii. 8, 9, " He was their Saviour: the angel of his presence saved them: in his love and pity he redeemed them." But this alludes to the temporal deliverances of the Jews.-Hos. i. 7, “I will have mercy upon the house of Judah, and will save them by Jehovah their God," i. e. I myself will deliver them.--Ezek. xxxiv. 23, "I will set up one shepherd over them, even David." Compare Zech. xiii. 7, "Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against the man who is my fellow, saith Jehovah," or, as Archbishop Newcome renders it, "against my friend, and against the man who is near to me."-Hos. iii. 5, "The children of Israel shall return, and seek Jehovah their God, and David their king." Compare Micah iv. 7, "Jehovah shall reign over them for ever." Hence it is concluded that David, i. e. Christ, the descendant of David, is Jehovah.

Such arguments admit of no reply. One can only wonder that learned men can impose upon themselves by such slender and miserable sophisms.

this argument, observes justly, that "if the person appearing in the Shechinah was indeed only an angel personating the Most High, it should seem that the whole worship of the Jewish church for two thousand years together, was offered to an object beside and against the intention of every worshipper, beside and against the chief fundamental doctrine and rule of worship in their revelation, and against the chief principles of all religion, according to the light of nature."

The

The arguments from the New Testament are more plausible. Most of them have been stated and examined elsewhere. I shall subjoin a few which do not so properly fall under any other head.

It is alleged that the glory of Christ in the New Testament is represented in terms similar to those which express the glory of the Shechinah, or symbol of the divine presence, which rested upon the mercy-seat. 1 Thess. i. 7, "The Lord will be revealed in flaming fire."-Rev. xxi. 23, "The glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb was the light thereof." Compare Deut. iv. 24; ix. 3.-But no conclusion can be drawn from the obscure and figurative language of prophecy.

Malachi iii. 1. "Jehovah, whom ye seek, shall come suddenly to his temple." The prophecy, it is said, was fulfilled when Jesus visited the temple.-But this argument assumes the fact to be proved. Jesus visited the temple as the messenger of Jehovah, not as the imaginary Jehovah-angel.

Our Lord, weeping over Jerusalem, exclaims, Luke xiii. 34, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered thy children together, and ye would not!" This is explained of the superintendance of the Jehovah-angel. But it may be better understood of our Lord's frequent and earnest exhortations to repentance. Or perhaps, like other prophets, Jesus may here mean to speak in the name of God. So Matt. xxiii. 24, " Behold, I send unto you prophets and wise men."-Deut. xxxi. 23, Moses says to Joshua, "Be of good courage, thou shalt bring the children of Israel into the land that I sware unto them, and I will be with thee."

The feebleness and inconclusiveness of such arguments as these need not to be insisted upon. Other texts, which are produced to prove that the Jehovah-angel animated the

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