304 THE ARIAN INVITED TO ORTHODOX FAITH. ascribe to the human soul of Christ, supposing it actually exist: eut, and considered always in a present, real, and personal union with his divine nature. Now, as he supposes those texts must necessarily be explained concerning Christ as God-man, so I suppose a literal interpretation of scripture is to be preferred' before a figurative and proleptical sense, where it will consist with ail other points of reason and revelation ; and therefore.! am ready to persuade myself, that the supposition of thereal existence of the glorious human soul of Christ, as a super - angelic being, in actual union with the divine, eternal Logos, before the creation, as it happily corresponds with the ancient Jewish notions, snit will aflbrd a better solution to many scrip- tural difficulties, will raise a nobler idea of the person of our blessed Lord, and add a lustre to the whole scheme of the gos- pel, as depending on his person, characters and transactions. There is one objection will arisehere, viz. how can the hu. man soul of Christ be called an angel, since it is said in Heb: ii. 16. d-Ie took not on him the nature of angels, but the seed of itbraham. Answer I. The words in the original are, ayyfawv as mot04 Sav:1ay &c. 00 He does not lay hold on angels, but he lays hold on the seed of Abraham," that is, to bring them out of that bondage in which they were held in the foregoing verse.--; Then it follows, verse 17. Whereforeit behoved him in all things to be made like: his brethren, that is, It behoved him, who had a soul before, to take flesh and blood upon him now, since he came to lay holdon men, to rescue them from bondage. As the Greek words themselves do not signify taking the nature of angels, or of Abraham, so neither will the context allow that translation, as some learned men have supposed, particularly Camero. For it would be hardly consistent language to say, " He took not on hint the nature of angels, but took on him the nature of theseed of Abraham, forwhich reason it became him to be made like his brethren, that is, to take flesh and blood upon him." This would he proving " idem per idem." Whereas'the sense is very natural when-we read it thus, " He does not lay hold on angels to rescue them, but he lays hold on the seed of Abraham, for their rescue from bondage. Wherefore it became him in all things to be made like his brethren ;" that is, It became him, who before was -a: spirit, now to be made flesh, since he came to re- deem those.who are partakers of flesh. II. But suppose our English translation were exactly true, yet the human soul of Christ may be called an angel in its separate state, though it be really a human spirit, or of a species of spirits different from the angelic world ; for since the vulgar; hypothesis supposes, the divine nature of Christ to be, called an angel imam Old Testament, because of its appearances like,an
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=