Of EleClion. .Awl then ~ fecondly, more particularly, for the further enquiring into what~~ t h1s holmefs IS, you may, 1, Obfervc, the Apo!lle varying the phrufe wl,eo Chap 4 he c, mes tofpeak of the <:h1ldrcn, fromwhat he had ufed when he fpJke of~ t he U nbehevrng Parent lumfell: He 1s fa1d but to beJant1tfied in his Wile, but the children are fa id w be holy: T he former notes out a paflive kind of fubferving to theholy ufe of another, or to a holy md; but this !utter notes out a~ holtnf{s in themftlves; that but an i•flrmnrntol holinefs, this a perfimal: He is fanctined bur as an inflrumenr is !0 an hol)' end, yea even to this very end to help w bring forth huly Childrm; but they are limply and abfolurely rerm: ed holy' : He cannot be f1id robe perfonally .holy, for he is fuppofrd ro be an V 11bfliever, in the fl1le the Apofile fpe>ks of him; and lo to lay he were holy, were a con!radiCtion, yet is he_fancrJfied as the Crearures are, to an holy md. Bur the Children here are fatd to be holy as perfonally and in rhemfelves not in the Parent only; although by means of their believing Mother as a Be: liever; evenas they are Men of rhemfelves,rhou~h by means of their Parents; and tlus he dtd on purpofe to lhew that tnetrs ts a lurther hulint{s than the Fathers: His ufe is hoi)', but their s1au is holy. In the fecond place, Let us obftrve the exprellions themfelves, whereby he fets out the holmefs ot their !\ate; and likewife his doubling of exprellions ro fer this forth. He contents not himfelt to have f•td pofitively, they are holy ; but he ufeth a N egative exprellion alfo, Not u~tclean; which he doth, '• T n fettle and fix their Faith the more fully in it; that his meaning was real and full, and exprefs; and that it w_as a true holmeis which he meant, and therefore dGubled hts exprellion of tt, And 2. thereby to exprefs it with a different< from the Children of others thar are both Unbelievers: And thus to magnifie the privilcdge of a Believer the more, and to put •n Emphafis upon it, he think' it not fuf!icit:nt tingly to fay, that they are hot;·, bur adds, not un• clem1, namely, as others Children are, and to do it rhus with d,fference from otners, fers it forth the more. And l· (Which is t hat mol\ of all I would have you to obferve) !:le choof– erh to exprefs the holinefs of their !lare,thus with difference, in the f•me terms that the Old Te!\ament ufeth of the Chtldren of the Jews, in dtflercnce from the Heathen. Yea, and whereas in propriety nf Speech , according to the .Greelc, [""~t<] pure, or cleun, anfwcrs to(<J~I7•] tmclea11,and (o in a right way of oppofition to rmc!Mn, he lhould rather have fard [but 11ow thty art pt~re or u1ldefiled]wc fee that he varies it, and _go« out of the road (as it were) of the Greek rd ome and Analogy, and fays, l Buuww thry are holy] oo pur– pofe becaufe &')'i• and .ld~r1• nre ufed by the Septuagint, for things or perfons that were l·oly, and ttttcleml among the Jew>: And the Apoflle here on purpofe uft th thefe verv fame exprellions of d1ffcrence of their Children from others, by which the Jews exprelfed the d1fference between their Children and the Children of the N ations; and all to fllew, that our priviledge for our ChiI· dren holds, and continues now as then ; yea, that theirs was but the Type of what is real now. The old Law in a typical feofe called things that were un· holy, uuc!ean; and perfons prohibited to come into the Temple, and to par– rake of holy rhi, g<, were called tt11clea11. But the Seed of the Jews then ad– mitted into the Church, were called the Holy Seed, and that in di(!inCtion from t he Gentiles: yea, the Children of Jews, when one Parent was a Jew, t he other a Hea<hen, ( which is the very cafe here) were.counted unclean, Ezra 9· 2, lt is faid, the holy Sudmi11gledthem(flvn with theptoplt oftht Laud: which wor~s are fpoken not of the mingling of Jews and Heathens in marriage. fo much as of the ill fruit, and confequeot of their Marriages with them (of which the Prophet had fpoke in the fore-going Sentence) namely, that the Chddren begot by, or upon the people of rh~.Land by the Jews in thnfe Marrraa"s were mingled and accounted as the Cmldren begot by or up– on Jews onl v": For ( fays he) they have taken of their d,1ughtrrs to them– fdv'", fo th.1t the hot;· Sttd mingled them{dve.r, t!ic. he fpeaks it therefore ·as the ill effect thereof, rh1t the Children begotten of fuch Marriages w<re by reafon thereof promifcuoully mingled with, and accounted of as purely Jew– i!h Children were without any di(lmction, which that Law utterly forb~d. And the
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=