LECTURES

ON

THE DIATESSARON.

PART I.

THE Diatessaron opens with Luke's Introduction, from which it appears, that several accounts of our Lord's discourses and actions were in circulation before he undertook to write and from the terms in which he mentions them, as having been delivered to the authors immediately, by the eye witnesses and ministers of the word, we may conclude that they were substantially true, though not so accurate as his means of information enabled him to draw up. From this, as well as from his dedication of his Gospel to a person of high rank, we learn, that contrary to the gratuitous assertion of modern infidels, the miracles of Christ, and the prevalence of his religion, must have excited a great sensation, and that there was a desire for more perfect knowledge of so extraordinary a person.

The epithet gatioros, most excellent, applied to Theophilus, does not refer to his moral character, but his rank; for it is given to the governors Felix and Festus, and answers to Excellency, Grace, Highness, and similar honorary appellations of modern times. Luke's and Paul's use of it shew that Christians who refuse to conform to such customs, are over scrupulous.

2. The other evangelists lead us to infer the divinity of Christ, but John begins with an express avowal of this fundamental truth. His introduction consists of two parts; in the first, (1-5.) the essential and also the mediatorial glory of Christ is asserted; in the second, (6-18.) its sufficient manifestation; so that it might appear, that those who rejected him were without excuse, while those who received him were adopted into the family of God. This assertion, that Jesus is the Son of God and the Christ, is then con

firmed by the narrative, and the whole is concluded with the declaration that this was the object of the Evangelist. (xx. 31.)

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With a few weighty words St. John condemns the heresies of his own and future times. "In the beginning was the Word," he does not say like the author of Genesis," in the beginning God made the Word," consequently he is not created; and there never was, as the Arians assert, a time when he was not. "The Word was (wgos) with God," not (E) in God; marking thereby the difference of persons, which the Sabellians confound. "And the Word was God, which contradicts the Socinian, or any other scheme of the Son's inferiority to the Father. He then describes the Word as the Creator of all things without exception, and as the author both of life and of light or reason. But this light shone in darkness, and not only the heathen did not open their eyes to its beams, but when he came incarnate to his own peculiar country, his own people (do) rejected him. Notwithstanding, his advent was not without effect, there was a seed to serve him;"-and to as many as received him, he gave the privilege of becoming sons of God;and consequently, heirs of God, and joint heirs with him. And he shews the value of this adoption, by observing, that it could not be claimed as a right springing from natural descent from Abraham, or by appealing to the blood of circumcision, or of sacrifices, or to be obtained by any efforts of themselves, or others, but that it was derived from no source but the will of God. He shews also that those who rejected the Word were inexcusable, for he had the testimony of the Baptist; and his disciples, who preached him to the world, had beheld his glory visibly at his baptism, transfiguration, and ascension, as well as in his miracles, (ii. 11.) and had additional evidence in the supernatural gifts which they had themselves received. In order to procure for believers this adoption, the Word was made flesh, and dwelt, or rather pitched his tent, (sonnywos) among men, alluding to the tabernacle under the Jewish polity, in which the Deity was visibly present.

John then intimates the inferiority of Moses, through whom the law was made known, to the incarnate Word, who not merely discovered, but was the author of the truth or sub

* Attachment to their great legislator, and the notion that the ceremonial law delivered by him was of perpetual obligation, were the stumbling blocks of the Jews. The Epistle to the Hebrews, therefore, undertakes to shew, that Jesus is the mediator of a better covenant, established upon better promises; and that he is by nature as well as by office superior not only to Moses and Aaron, but to the angels. Moses was faithful as a servant in God's house, but Christ as a son over his own house. (chap. iii.)

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stance of the types and rites of the ceremonial law, and of grace or favour put in opposition to the demands of the moral law. And we all, he adds, that is all Christians, have received out of his overflowing fulness, whatever gifts or graces we possess, and grace upon grace; that is, grace in the greatest abundance, or grace for grace, meaning the greater grace of the Gospel, instead of the lesser one of the law. He tells us that he has explained to us (nynouto, see Eph. iii.) the secrets that were hid in God, that is his character and designs, to which he alone is competent, "for no one hath seen the Father but the Son," who is ever in his bosom, or in the most intimate familiarity with him. (xiii. 23.)

Logos, which we translate word, a common term in Greek, is used by St. John in this chapter in a peculiar sense. Still, as he does not define it, we may presume that it was intelligible to those for whom he wrote; and indeed we find it used in the same sense, by his countryman and contemporary Philo. Both are supposed to have adopted the term from Plato, but this is not probable, especially in the case of St. John; and Bishop Pearson shews, in his Exposition of the Creed, that the doctrine was the then current interpretation of the Hebrew Scriptures, which occasionally use the expression; as, "By the Word of the Lord (Toy To Kuglov) were the heavens made." Ps. xxxiii. 6. The Chaldee paraphrase, which was read in the synagogue, taught them that God and the Word of God were the same, which explains why John delivered so great a mystery in so few sentences, as he spoke to those who understood him. The existence, nature, and operations of the Logos, were allowed, its union with the man Jesus was the only point to be established.

We have no term in English, that can express the whole meaning of Logos, which signifies both reason as existing in

* An instructive view of Philo's doctrine may be seen in Smith's Scripture Testimony, vol. i. ch. viii. 4. He observes, that the Logos is sometimes represented by him, as being to the supreme intellect, what speech is to the human, and as the idea existing in the Creator's mind previous to the formation of his work. But that in other passages he speaks of it as a person, as the instrument of the Deity, in the creation and government of the world, as the medium of divine communication, the messenger of the Father, the high priest and mediator for the honour of God, and the benefit of man. Some of the appellations he bestows upon the Logos, we recognize as scriptural titles of the Son of God, as açxn, beginning, or rather beginner; uxwv, image of the invisible God; xaganτng, or express image of the divine substance; and avatoλn, branch, or rising light. Philo maintains that it was not the supreme Being who cannot be seen, that appeared unto the patriarchs, but his image, the Logos, as men who cannot look at the sun itself behold its reflected brightness.