On this page

• Text (1)

  Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

  • 

    Untitled Article

• Transcript

  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

    Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.

    Untitled Article

    pressed more plainly according to the idiom of his country , and is hy ho means difficult to be discerned in ! our times . Precisely in the same manner as when the disciples were exhorted to be perfect as their Father in heaven

    is perfect , they and the Eternal are described in equivalent and convertible terms ; our Lord and the God who sent him are certainly here so spoken of ; but no conclusion can be drawn in the one case which would not be equally just in the other , and the attempt to infer the identity of the knowledge spoken of in kind and extent , is altogether unreasonable and

    extravagant . It is perfectly true that the knowledge here spoken of is represented as not attainable by the ordinary means of human investigation : it k the subject of Revelation : but when Dr . S . says ,, that " it is here affirmed to > be a special communication of Divine influence" he affirms that for which he has no warrant in the fair interpretation of the passage . Jesus spoke of

    the actual state of things . Certain knowledge respecting the Messiah ' s office and the Father's plans , was not then possessed at all justly and correctly by those who made great pretensions to it . The Father had reserved to himself the exact knowledge of the nature of the Son ' s mission : the Son alone was admitted to the full understanding of the Father's designs , and this he was to communicate to whom he pleased , to his chosen followers ;

    but being communicated , and the communication recorded for the benefit of mankind at large ; , no farther revelation to individuals is to be expected , or is at all hinted at in our Lord's words . Again , in reference to our author ' s fourth position , it was the actual knowledge respecting the true character of the gospel dispensation , which had hitherto been kept secret , which our Lord undertook to reveal to such as he should choose for that

    purpose . Dr . S ., who had just before been contending for a perfect reciprocity and co-extension of the knowledge of God and Christ , now finds room" for differences in degree and extent , according to the different capacities of the instructed and instructor . Of course , the truths communicated would not be equally well apprehended by all , but the plain sense of the passage is , that it was the very knowledge , and the whole of it , respecting the true nature of the Messiah's office , and the Divine purposes in his

    mission for the salvation of men , which had not before been possessed , which Christ undertook now to communicate to his disciples , and which they afterwards gave proofs of their having received and fully understood . Lastly , if the clause respecting the Son , as the object of knowledge , were removed , and , of course , the passage were taken entirely out of its connexion , Dr . S . thinks it would be understood , ** that the Infinite Majesty and perfection of tne adorable Supreme , as * distinguished from the imaginary deities of the Heathen world , were revealed and demonstrated by the Christian religion alone ; " and ,, therefore , he argues , when the clause respecting the knowledge of the Son is inserted , the passage must be taken " as equally attributing to him the same Infinite Majesty and Perfection . "

    Untitled Article

    590 Dr . •/ . P . Smiths ' Scripture Testimony to the Messiah .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1831, page 590, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2601/page/14/