282 THE ARIAN INVITED TO ORTHODOX FAITH. Most writers fix their eyes and thoughts so entirely upon the divine dignity of the person of Christ ; and out of a holy fear of sinking his character below godhead, have explained many of these diminishing expressions, as mere economical ac- counts of his subl'imest nature, and attributed even these lessenr Mgcharacters to Christ considered as God, by the help of tropes and figures, by catechreses, and economicalinterpretation. On the other hand, there have been some, who out of a sacred vene- ration for the supreme majesty of God the Father, and in order to secure the unity of the godhead, have sunk all the sublimer and divine characters given to Christ, or the Logos, in his pre- existent state, and'reduced them to some diminished and figura- tive sense, in order to reconcile them to the inferior characters of Christ ; and thereby they have not suffered the person of Christ, in any sense, to arise to the true dignityof godhead. This has been a matter of dreadful contest in the churches of old, and has been again revived in the present age. The scriptures have been consulted through and through, by each party ; and yet there are some difficulties still attending the sa- cred subject, and the parties are not reconciled.- I grant that scripture is the best interpreter of itself, and by comparing one part of the word of God with another, we are led into the mean- ing of many a difficult text, and find out many an important truth : And, in my esteem, the foregoing difficulties are resolved by the scripture itself. But when persons have employed their labour in this manner, and there still remains a darkness in their .opinion, upon the language of scripture, they may, perhaps de- rive some degrees of light, by consulting the authors that wrote on the same subject, and lived nearest to that agewhen the scrip- tures were written. And since the christian religion is built upon the same gene- ral foundations with the Jewish ; and the New Testament is a divine comment upon the Old, perhaps we may borrow some advantages for the interpretation of dark passages in the gospel from the modes of speech, and the common sentiments of the Jews in that age; as well as from the primitive fathers of the christian church, who lived nearest to the apostolic times. It may be also observed, that the sacred writers of the New Testa- ment, were Jews themselves ; and though they were converted to the faith of Christ, yet it is, very evident, that they used seve- ral peculiar words and phrases, according to the sense and mean- ing of their countrymen, and brought several of the idioms of the Hebrew language into their Greek writings : This is agreed among all the learned. Upon these accounts the ancient Jews, as well as the first christians, may give us their assistance toward the better understanding of these terms and expressions, " The Word of God," the °" Son of God," &e. and add some light to that doctrine which we derive from scripture.
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