Recognitions imputed to Clemens Romanus They seem to be falsly reckoned to St. Clemens but they are very antient published probably in the Beginning of the 2 d Century or the second Century being but little advanced when so many other spurious Pieces were set forth under the Names of Apostles or of Apostolical Men. The Recognitions are quoted divers times by Origen who began to flourish about the Year 210. But they are much antienter than Origen for in a Fragment of Bardesanes apud Euseb Praep. Evang. l. 6. c. 10. who flourished about the Year 170 there is a Passage taken word for word out of the 9 th Book of the Recognitions Whereas Dr. Cave conjectures that Bardesanes was the Author of the Recognitions his Guess is nothing probable nay a manifest Mistake because the Author of the Recognitions was an Ebionite but Bardesanes a Valentinian that is held the Pre-existence of our Saviour and that he was not as the Apostle speaks made of a Woman but brought his Flesh from Heaven It remains therefore that the Recognitions are antienter not only than Origen but than Bardesanes how much antienter we cannot determinately say but probably published when the 2 d Century was but little advanced when so many affected to countenance their own Productions with the authoritative Names of the Aposiles and Apostolical Men. But tho the Recogaitions are not the Work of Clemens Romanus yet they serve to let us know what Doctrines and Rites were current or in use in those times and to this purpose they are quoted by the severely Criticks of all Parties and Perswasions I shall not need to cite particular Passages out of these Books for 't is consessed by the Trinitarian Criticks and by Monsieur du Pin who hath written last on the Fathers that the Author of the Recognitions was a manifest Ebionite Eccl. Hist cent 1. p. 28. But hitherto of the Apostolick Fathers and the Writings and Remains of the Apostolick Succession I have proved I think that hitherto we have no certain or probable notice that there were yet any who publickly professed to hold the Pre-existence of our Saviour or that he was God in any Sense of that Word But on the contrary the Apostles Creed the true and by all confessed St. Clemens Romanus the Nazaren Minean or Ebionite that is the Jewish Churches the Alogians or Gentile Churches Hegesippus the Father of Ecclefiastical History the most antient Author of the Recognitions were all of them Unitarians that is held there is but one Divine Person and the Lord Christ was a Man only It should seem then that very thing hapned to the Christian Church which had formerly come to pass in the Church of the Jews For as the Author of the Book of Judges Judg. 2.7 says The People of Israel served the Lord all the Days of Joshua and of the Elders that outlived Joshua but when all that Generation was gathered to their Fathers there arose another after them which knew not the Lord so the Children of Israel did Evil in the sight of the Lord and served Baalim i. e. the Gods In like manner while the Apostles lived and those Elders who had conversed with the Apostles the Christian Church kept her self to the Acknowledgment and Worship of the one true God and preserved the true Doctrine and Faith concerning the Person of the Lord Christ that he was a holy Man the great Prophet and Messias promised in the Law and other Book of the Old Testament But 〈◊〉 the Aposiles themselves and the 〈◊〉 of the Apostolick Succussion were gathered to their Fathers then 〈◊〉 Corruptions to prevail apace 〈◊〉 they sancied a pre-existent 〈◊〉 of God God's Minister and Instrument in the creating of all things and but little less than his Father A Son said they who being tho but the instrumental yet the immediate Creator of all things is to be worshipped by us his Creatures A Son who tho with respect to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as they still spoke the true and very God the Father is but a Minister and Subject yet with respect to us his Creatures is a God A Son who must be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a God tho only the Father may be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the God that is God by way of Excellence and true Propriety In a word after the Apostles and Apostolical Elders or Pastors were composed to rest the next Generation like the Jewish Church did Evil in the Sight of the Lord and served Baalim that is the half-Gods of their own devising Nemo repente fit turpissimus therefore here they stop a considerable time namely from about the Year 140 and 150 to the Nicene Council or the Year 325. at what time as we shall see hereafter Superstition and Impiety made a sudden and wonderful Advance The first Defender and publick Patron of the Apostacy mentioned in the foregoing Paragraph was Justin Martyr about the Year 150. Our Opposers can quote no Father or genuine Monument older than Justin Martyr for the Pre-existence of our Saviour or that he ought to be called a God in so much as the restrained inseriour Sense before said Dr. Bull indeed pretends to prove the contrary from the counterseit Barnabas the false Ignatius aliàs Pionius and the Impostor Hermas how injudiciously I think hath been competently shown in these present Papers but I will yet oppose to him one Authority which I doubt not will convince the indifferent unprejudiced Reader Eusebius that capital Antagonist of the Nazaren and Alogian Christians and who searched with the utmost Diligence into the remotest Antiquity for whatsoever might seem to make against them quotes H. E. l. 5. c. 28. a very antient Author whom in his foregoing Chapter he reckons among the Ecclesiastical Writers that deserve saith he to be esteemed for their laudable Zeal and Industry This laudable Man you must know wrote a Book against the Theodotians and Artemonites who were Branches of the Alogians what Eusebius there cites out of him is as follows The Unitarians pretend that the Apostles and all the Antients held the very Doctrine concerning the Person of our Saviour that is now maintained by the Unitarians and that it is but only since the Times of the Popes Victor and Zepherin that the Truth has been adulterated and discountenanced This would be credible if first the Unitarian Doctrine were not contrary to Holy Scripture and if divers before Victor and Zepherin had not contended for the Divinity of the Lord Christ namely Justin Martyr Miltiades Tatianus Clemens of Alexandria Ireneus Melito To whom we may add the antient Hymns or Psalms wrote from the beginning by the Brethren which speak of Christ as the WORD of God and attribute to him Divinity I will omit now that all these but only Justin were but Contemporaries to Victor and Zepherin or after them for it is home to my purpose that the first whom our Opposers of those early times could quote was
flagitious Men in the World I am of opinion we ought to answer that 't is not to be wondred at if a counterfeit Apostle belies the true ones This Crimination of the true Apostles is in the 5 th Chapter of the alledged Epistle The more learned and impartial Criticks freely observe concerning this Epistle that 't is full of strained and dull Allegories extravagant and incongruous Explications of Scripture and abundance of silly and notorious Fables concerning Animals And what all judicious Men think of the Epistle is that it is indeed very antient being quoted by Clemens Alexandrinus and Origen but that it was forged about the beginning of the 2 d Century or the 2 d Century being well advanced when also the Gospels of St. Thomas St. Peter St. Matthias the Acts of St. Andrew St. John and other Apostles were devised and published as Eusebiue witnesses H. E. l. 3. c. 25. But lest this Epistle should be thought to be of somewhat the more Credit because 't is barely quoted by Clemens and Origen the Reader may take notice that Clemens cites also other counterfeit Works of the Apostles as particularly the Revelation of St. Peter as has been noted by Eusebius H. E. l. 6. c. 14. And nothing is more common with Origen than to quote such supposititious Writings as for Instance the Book of Enoch the Revelation of St. Paul the Doctrine of St. Peter and many more concerning which Citations the Reader may see what Mr. du Pin has observed at large Cent. 3. p. 113. Dr. Bull 's next approved Father is the great either Prophet or Impostor Hermas in his Book called the Pastor or Shepherd We grant that St. Paul mentions one Hermas Rom. 16.14 and we doubt not that the Author of the Shepherd would be understood to be that Hormas for he makes himself contemporary with Clemens Romanus mentioned also by St. Paul Phil. 4.3 Vision 2 d. Chap. 4. The Shepherd of Hermas is distinguished into 3 Books whereof the first contains 4 Visions the second 12 Commands the third 10 Similitudes but both the Commands and Similitudes may be called Visions and Prophecies because they are Representations and Charges made to him by Angels The Scene of these Visions is Arcadia and that we may be assured that this Author would be taken for a Prophet and would have his Book pass for a Divine Revelation he introduces the Angel in his 2 d Vision Chap. 4. as commanding him that he should prepare 3 Copies of these Visions one for Clement then Bishop of Rome to be sent by him to all the Churches another for Grapte who should instruct out of it the Widows and their Children the third Hermas himself was to read to the Presbyters of the City of Rome This is the Book and Author in which Dr. Bull finds or thinks he finds some Passages in favour of our Saviour's Divinity as I said at first we must carefully examine what is the true Character of this Work and Writer By what has been said it is evident to every one that this pretended Hermas either was a Prophet or an Impostor there is no Middle between these two when the Person pretends to Visions to Conferences with Angels and such like extraordinary things That the pretended Hermas was not a Prophet is certain to me by these Arguments 1. He owns in the third Command that he was a most egregious and common Liar he saith expresly that he scarce ever spake a true Word in his whole Life but always lived in Dissimulation and that to all Men. He weeps hereupon and doubts whether he can be saved but his Angel assures him that if for the time to come he will leave off his Lying he may attain to Blessedness He that was so addicted to lying 't is no wonder that he has counterfeited also Visions and Colloquies with Angels or that to gain Credit to his Chimeras and Follies he father'd them on Hermas an Apostolical Man and Friend of St. Paul as others before him had laid their spurious Off-springs to the Apostles themselves But 2. Some of his Celestial Visions contain manifest Falshoods particularly he maketh his Angel to tell him that the whole World is made up of twelve Nations Simil. 9. Chap. 17. Being a Person altogether ignorant of secular Learning as appears in all his three Books 't was almost impossible but that in his feigned Conferences with Angels he should sometimes make them to speak divers things both false and absurd 3. To add no more on this Trifler he has been judged to be no Prophet by the whole Catholick Church in that his Book is not reckoned among the Canonical Books of Scripture were it a real Revelation from God by the Ministry of Angels as the Author pretends and so esteemed by the Catholick Church it must have been put among the Canonical Books It is true when it first appeared it imposed on some Churches by the Boldness of its Pretence and therefore was read in those Churches as other genuine Parts of Scripture were but even then very many of the more Judicious rejected it and as the Church began to fill with learned and able Persons it was not only every where laid aside but censured as both false and foolish Of so many of the Antients as condemned it we need only take notice of Eusebius who speaking of the Books used by Christians whether privately or in publick says Some Books are received by common Consent of all others are of questioned and doubtful Authority and finally others are supposititious and counterfeit of which last kind saith he are the Acts of Paul the Revelation of Peter the Shepherd of Hermas and the pretended Epistle of Barnabas Euseb H. E. l. 3. c. 25. Dr. Bull 's third Author is Ignatius but neither is this Writer a whit better or honester than the pretended Barnabas or the counterfeit Hermas I do not mean to deny that we have still the Epistles that are quoted by the Antients Origen and Eusebius under the Name of Ignatius but this I affirm that they were forged under Ignatius his Name about the time that so many other Impostures were published under the Names of Aposiles and of Apostolical Men of which the Learned know there were almost an infinite Number Let us see first what the Criticks of the contrary Perswasion have to alledg for the Epistles of Ignatius we may hear Mr. Du Pin for them all because he has written last and more largely than any other He observes that St. Polycarp being thereto desired by the Philippians sent them the Epistles of Ignatius to which he also prefixed an Epistle of his own directed to the same Philippians Well we acknowledg that Polycarp writing to the Philippians tells them towards the Close of his Epistle that he had sent them according to their Desire the Epistles of Ignatius that had by any means come to his Knowledg or Hand He adds that in these Epistles Ignatius treats of Faith and Patience
careful to learn it exactly To this purpose they cite among divers others the Testimony of St. Jerom Epist ad Pam. In the Creed says St. Jerom there which is not written with Ink and Paper but on the fleshly Tables of the Heart 3 It is not true what Vossius adds that the Apostles do not seem to allude or refer to this Creed in any of their Epistles St. Paul says Rom. 6.17 Ye have obeyed from the Heart the Form of sound Doctrine which was delivered to you The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Exemplar or Form of Doctrine here cannot be better interpreted than of the common Creed It seems also to be meant Rom. 12.6 Let him that prophesieth or preacheth preach 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the Analogy or the Rule of Faith The Scriptures of the New Testament not being yet written the Christian's Rule of Faith could be no other but the Creed which accordingly by the most antient Fathers is expresly called Regula fidei the Rule of Faith 1 Tim. 6.20 O Timothy keep 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Depositum or the thing committed to thy Trust and turn not aside The Depositum or Trust from which Timothy might not turn aside is generally and very reasonably understood by Interpreters to be the true Doctrine or Faith of the Gospel but if so 't is very probable that the Apostle intended more particularly the Rule of Faith the Creed composed by all the Apostles 2 Tim. 1.13 Hold fast the Form of sound Words which thou didst hear of me Heb. 5.12 Whereas ye ought for the time to have been Teachers ye have need that one teach you again the first Principles of the Doctrines not the Oracles of God Heb. 6.1 Leaving the Principles of the Doctrine of Christ let us go on to Perfection Here the Form of sound Words and the first Principles and again the Principles of the Doctrine of Christ are Expressions so most properly applicable to the Creed that it was too much Boldness or Inadvertence in Vossius to affirm directly that there is no Allusion to the Creed in all the Apostolick Writings one may say they not only allude but even point to it And what does St. Jude so likely mean in these Words Jude 3. Earnestly contend for the Faith once delivered to the Saints for there are certain Men crope in denying the only God and our Lord Jesus Christ It is highly credible that by the Faith delivered to the Saints he means the Creed that was given out by the Apostles to all their Churches And does he not refer to the two first Articles of it in these Words for certain Men are crope in who deny the only or one God and the Lord Jesus Christ 2. Vossius his next Argument is yet more weak nay perfectly ridiculous If this Creed saith he had been made and so thought to be by the Apostles the Church would never have presumed to add any thing to it and much less to take ought from it I know not what he means by taking ought from it it doth not appear that any thing has been taken from it it is still the same for all that I know or have ever read as at first But they would not have added by this he means the Creeds of Nice of Constantinople and Chalcedon by making of which Creeds 't is manifest that divers things were added to the first Creed namely the Creed of the Apostles I answer 1 The Fathers in these Councils excused themselves by pretending their Creeds were only Explications of the antient Faith or Creed They professed to keep close to the Old Faith without adding any thing to it because they added not any new Articles but only more largely and fully explained the old ones In short they came off from this Exception of Vossius as they thought by calling their Additions by the Name of Explications and Declarations not of Additions But 2 If they had directly said that they thought fit to inlarge the Creed made by the Apostles by some other Doctrines taken from the New Testament I do not think that this is the worst thing of the kind that Mother Church ever did 'T is known to all the World that she has added to and taken away from the Sacraments and the Scriptures therefore 't is no such great wonder if also she turned her own Doctrines into Creeds and mingled her Articles with the Articles of the Apostles From the Sacrament of the Supper she hath taken away the Cup and in the same Sacrament has changed unleavened Bread into leavened The Sacrament of Baptism she hath wholly changed turning it into the mimical Rite of sprinkling and also added the Cross to that false Baptism which she administers As for the Scriptures all learned Criticks even of the Trinitarian Perswasion agree that abundance of Words and some whole Texts have been added 'T is uncontestable that they have added there are three that bear Record in Heaven the Father the WORD and the Holy Ghost and these three are one It was expresly denied at the first Council of Nice it self that the Apostle Paul said Great is the Mystery of Godliness GOD was manifested in the Flesh but which which Mystery was manifested by Flesh namely by the Lord Christ and the Apostles And to omit many other certain and yielded Depravations of Scripture both by adding and omitting there are shrewd Presumptions that to the Institution of Baptism by our Saviour in the Gospel of St. Matthew these Words have been added In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost It appears in the Acts and Epistles of the Apostles that the Apostles never baptized in that Form of Words but only in the Name of the Lord Jesus But we need no more but the Testimony of one of their own Historians St. Epiphanius concerning the Fidelity of the Church as the prevailing Party always calls it self in preserving pure and intire the Oracles of God Epiphanius owns in direct terms that the Orthodox put out of their Bibles some Passages of Scripture which they liked not and the Bibles of his time that had not been so used this good Father roundly calls them the Bibles that have not been rectified Ancor n. 31. 3. Vossius saith farther that none of the Ecclesiastical Historians tho they have set down the Creeds made in Councils have recorded the Creed of the Apostles thus Socrates and others register not only the Creeds made in legitimate Councils but even those by the Arian Councils but they have not a Word of the Apostles Creed To this I say 1. Socrates and the Historians that follow him begin their Histories at soonest no higher than the Conversion of Great Constantine to the Christian Faith Therefore 't is no wonder that tho they record the Creeds in order as they were composed by the Councils that assembled under Great Constantine and his Successors yet they say nothing of the Apostles Creed which belonged
never produce any thing of the Cabala that but looks this way And see here what Origen who flourished about the Year 270 fays of the Jews I have disputed often says this most Learned Father with the Jewish Rabbins that were of most Esteem but I could never meet with any of them who approve this Doctrine that the WORD is the Son of God Contr. Celsum l. 2. p. 79. Again l. 4. p. 162. he is more express in the case Celsus is ignorant that the Jews do not believe that the Messias or Christ whom they still expect as to come is not God nor the Son of God But Dr. Bull himself tho here to serve the present turn he contends that the Jewish Cabala speaks of the WORD as a Person and the Son of God elsewhere Judic Eccl. p. 170. owns and proves that the Jews do not expect any Messias or Christ promised to them by their Prophets but who shall be a mere Man And he cites Tripho the Jew saying We Jews expect a Christ who is a Man born of Men. But if this was the Opinion of the Jews concerning Christ that he shall be a Man only why does Mr. Bull pretend in this Place that the Cabala or Traditional Doctrine of the Jews which by them is supposed to be of Divine Revelation teaches the contrary namely that the Christ is to be a Divine Person the eternal Son of God and himself also God He will never reconcile these Contradictions to himself But let us now examine of what Authority his Quotations out of some Jewish Books are His first Citation is out of the Apocryphal Book of Wisdom Wisd 18.15,16 Thy Almighty WORD leap'd down from Heaven out of his Royal Throne as a fierce Man of War into a Land destined to Destruction He brought thine unfeigned Commandment as a sharp Sword and standing up filled all things with Death he touched the Heaven tho he stood upon the Earth In sober Sadness this was a terrible WORD his Feet stood on plain Ground and yet his Head touched not the Clouds or the Aether but Heaven it self and with his Death-dealing Fauchion he even depopulated the whole Country in a few Minutes 'T is sufficient however I suppose to sober People if we say hereupon that this same was only a Chimerical not a real Almanzor and that there is no Body but Dr. Bull that will ever be afraid of his Puissance But Dr. Bull objects that however this Passage serves to show that the Author of the Book of Wisdom who was a Jew believed the WORD Right but then he should have observed too that the Book as we now have it must be as much reckoned to the Translator who was a Christian as to the first Writer of it who it may be was a Jew Let us hear Grotius in his Preface to his Annotations on this Book The Book of Wisdom was written by a Jew who lived after the times of Ezra but some Christian or other who was a Greek hapning on it he hath given it us in the Greek Tongue but with divers Additions to it taken from the Christian Religion Of this kind no Man will doubt it is this Description of the WORD which is wholly Christian as Christianity began to be taught about the middle of the second Age the Jews as we have heard from Origen never believed such a kind of WORD namely that is a Person the Son of God or God His next Allegation is from the Paraphrases of Onkelos and Jonathan Jews that translated the Old Testament into Syro-Chaldaick after a Paraphrastical way But I cannot perceive that any of his Citations out of these Paraphrases speak of the WORD in the Platonick Sense namely as a Person or as a God but only in the Jewish and Socinian Sense namely as the Energy and Power of God or God's powerful effectual Mandate As to his last Quotation from a Paraphrase of Jonathan on the Psalms which has some Appearance of being to the purpose for which Mr. Bull alledged it whereas Jonathan seems to read the Lord said to his WORD Sit on my right Hand Jonathan's Words may better be rendred thus the Lord said by his WORD i. e. his Mandate or Decree Sit on my right Hand But Philo speaks home he expresly calls the WORD the Son of God his first-begotten Son to whose Care saith he farther as to the Vicarius and Deputy of God the whole Creation is committed and by whom it was originally made But I shall never believe that a Jew by Religion wrote those things concerning the WORD that we see in Philo's Works Eusebius suspects Photius directly affirms that Philo was a Christian This last adds that by occasion of some Displeasure taken Philo departed from the Christian Religion I believe with Eusebius and Photius that Philo was a Christian but I make no question that Eusebius is mistaken in thinking that this is the Philo who was sent on an Ambassage to the Emperor C. Caligula but a Philo of the second Age toward the expiring of it or of the 2 d Age just expiring For he describes the Therapeutae that is the Christians both in their Discipline their Studies and their manner of interpreting Holy Scripture not as they lived or were in the Apostolick Times but in the Close of the second and Beginning of the third Age. Lastly as to the obscure Rabbi cited by Masius and the unknown Book Tankumam enough has been said to evince that if they speak of the WORD as the Son of God they may be written perhaps in Rabbinical Hebrew and by Jews by Nation but such Jews as were come over to the Christian Religion there being nothing more certain than that the Jews never owned a Son of God in any other Sense but of Adoption Sanctification Exaltation and such like nor do I think that Dr. Bull himself will again insist on Jewish Authorities whether they be these or any other He should make himself ridiculous to all learned Men by persevering in such a notorious Mistake as this that the Jews either now or in any time past believed the WORD as a Person or that God begat a Son who was pre-existent to the World and was together with God the Creator of it 't is for this very Doctrine that the Jews have pretended ever since the Council of Nice and at this day do pretend that Christianity is a Revolt to Heathenism and Paganism There remains now but one thing more in Dr. Bull 's Defence of the Nicene Faith that I intend to consider in this first Part of my Answer to him his Explication of the Trinity or how three Divine Persons and Spirits each of which has all Divine Perfections and is singly and by himself God nay perfect God are for all that but one God On the Explication of the Trinity according to the Fathers and Dr. Bull. THAT three Divine Spirits and Persons each of which has all possible real Perfections and therefore is singly
Nature and Quality of the Action that is imputed to the Person who bears the Names Jehovah and God evinces that the Person spoken of is Jehovah and God only by Representation But let us now weigh Dr. Bull 's Answers He saith first the Divine WORD who is true God might be called an Angel when he appeared to Moses in the Bush Because God appeared in such manner as Angels are wont to appear But we cannot grant that if God appears in suchmanner as Angels are wont to appear God may therefore be called an Angel tho Dr. Bull desires us that of all Love we would grant it for he only says it and offers no manner of Proof of so absurd and in very deed impossible a Supposition And we give this incontestable Reason why the Person who appeared in the Bush to Moses and is called sometimes Angel sometimes God was only an Angel who was called God on the Account that he represented God because if he were God and therefore spoke these Words I am the God of thy Fathers in his own Name not in the Name of another or as representing another He should have been called God only and not Angel which is to say Messenger Nor do I know why Dr. Bull pretends here God is called an Angel in this Place Because he appeared in such manner as Angels are wont to appear there was no Cause at all why he should say so at least there is nothing in the Text or Context to countenance his so saying But our Argument is extremely probable while we say if it was indeed not an Angel but God himself that spake these Words I am the God of thy Fathers he could be only called God and he was not at all an Angel that is a Messenger Briefly 't is say I a Chimera founded on nothing what Dr. Bull here says that the true God is called an Angel in this Context because he appeared in such manner as Angels are wont to appear for the manner of appearing here was wholly unusual there never was any such Appearance whether by God or Angel either before or since But we argue solidly and concludingly when we alledg if it be not an Angel that speaks here in the Name and Person of God but God himself and in his own Name 't is against all Propriety and Grammar that he is called both by Moses and St. Stephen the Angel or Messenger of the Lord. But Dr. Bull has a 2 d Evasion Several Fathers said an Angel indeed appeared in the Bush but God was in the Angel and it was not the Angel that spoke but God in the Angel This is a Whimsy tho he should quote an hundred Fathers for it For if God himself was in the Fire and the Voice was from God not from the Angel what need was there that an Angel should be there at all Lastly he says 't is an impious Opinion that Angels ever as it were acted the Person and Part of God by assuming the incommunicable Name Jehovah and the Authority and Attributes of God No Ambassador he saith ever took on him the Name and Stile of his Prince but the Ambassador says only thus saith my Master He is a bold Man to charge even Angels themselves and so many Writers of holy Scripture as ridiculous and impious for giving the Name God to those that represent God Has not our Saviour himself told us that they also are called Gods to whom the Word of God comes that is the Magistracy as all confess And for the Name Jehovah which Dr. Bull calls the Incommunicable Name I ask how comes Jehovah to be a greater Name or more incommunicable than God And why has he said nothing to so many Instances as the Socinians and his own viri quidam doctissimi give of Persons and even of Places on which the Name Jehovah is bestowed in the Historical Books of Scripture What he says of Ambassadors serves only to show that he has forgot some part of his Academical Learning and is but little acquainted with the World There is no Freshman in Oxford or Cambridg but will inform him out of the Roman Antiquities that Publick Messengers were wont to assurne the Name and whole Stile of the Persons whom they represented The Fecialis or Herald at Arms denounced War in these Terms I the King and People of Rome denounce and proclaim Hostility and War against the King and People of N. At this present time in the Christian Countries Ambassadors in some Cases take on them the Name and Stile of their Prince as in all Espousals and some other Cases but they always retain the Majesty and Dignity of the Prince or State from whom they come they always speak with the Hat on and their Persons are sacrosanct that is they cannot be arrested confined or punished they can only be required to depart out of the Kingdom This whole Defence therefore of Dr. Bull is either groundless or directly false For if it had been God who spoke to Moses out of the Bush he being present and speaking in his own Name these Words I am the God of thy Fathers he could not have at all been called an Angel that is Messenger And if God himself as Mr. Bull pretends was in the Fire there was no Occasion that an Angel also should be there And 't is utterly false that publick Messengers do not assume the Name or the Stile or Dignity of the Sovereigns that send them and whom they represent I shall therefore thank Dr. Bull for giving up his Cause to the Socinians For if it was the WORD or Son as he says that appeared in the Bush to Moses it follows that the WORD is not God but the Angel or Messenger of God for he can never elude our Argument that if the Person that spoke these Words I am the God of thy Fathers had been God himself speaking in his own Person and there present he could not have been called a Messenger of the Lord either by Moses or St. Stephen Dr. Bull must of necessity grant either that the WORD did not appear in the Bush which is to yield that his Fathers mistook in the chief Ground on which they built our Saviour's Pre-existence or that the WORD is but a Messenger not God which is to yield his Cause 2. It is argued again against Dr. Bull 's Fathers by the viri quidam doctissimi that indeed it is said at Exod. 20.1 God spake all these Words namely the ten Commandments but other Texts inform us that God is said to have spoke the Commandments and given the Law because it and they were given and spoke by an Angel attended or accompanied by other Angels in the Person and Name of God or as representing God Acts 7.53 They received the Law by the Disposition of Angels Gal. 3.19 It was ordained by Angels in the Hand of a Mediator i. e. it was commanded or spoken by Angels yet not immediately to the People but by
them also tempted and were destroyed of Serpents The Israelites then were destroyed of Serpents for their tempting that is provoking the Lord Christ with their Sins while in the Appearance of an Angel he led them thorow the Wilderness To this Text Grotius answers that without doubt Let us not tempt Christ is a false Reading and that we ought to read with the Alexandrian Copy Let us not tempt God as some of them tempted and were destroyed of Serpents Dr. Bull replies the Authority of the Alexandrian Copy cannot be opposed to the Syriac Latin and Arabick Versions to St. Ambrose St. Chrysostom and Theophylact. Yes the Alexandrian Copy is much antienter than any of those Versions or Fathers the Latin which is the first was made by St. Jerom above 100 Years after the Alexandrian Copy But why has Dr. Bull suppressed it that one of his own Historians St. Epiphanius has expresly informed us who was the particular Man that corrupted this Text the Heretick Marcion instead of let us not tempt the Lord that is to say God published in his Copies let us not tempt Christ Epiphan l. 1. T. 1. p. 358. Edit Petav. This Corruption is very antient for Marcion one of the first that defended our Saviour's Pre-existence and to support that Doctrine corrupted this Text flourished about the Year 150. But after the Nicene Council 't is no wonder that many Trinitarians followed in this Text the Copies of Marcion as being then near 200 Years old and it was after the Nicene Council that all the Versions and Fathers to whom Dr. Bull appeals concerning this Text appeared But to confirm farther the Pre-existence of the WORD or Son of God Dr. Bull dares pretend that 't is a part of the Jewish Cabbala or traditional Knowledg which that Nation derived from Moses he from God Hereupon he cites some Words of the Apocryphal Wisdom of Solomon which according to him is a very autient Book also some Expressions of Philo Judaeus supposed to be a Jew by Religion as well as by Nation He appeals also to the Chaldee Paraphrases or Translations of the Old Testament by Onkelos and Jonathan as if these spake of the WORD as a Person and the great Messenger of God under the Old Testament And finally he says Masius on Joshua has quoted a certain Rabbi and an old Jewish Book called Tanchumam which speak of the WORD much after the manner as doth the Author of the Wisdom of Solomon He saith first that the Pre-existence of the WORD as a Divine Almighty Person and as the Son of God is a part of the Jewish Cabbala or traditional Knowledg Then to prove this he cites Passages out of Philo the Wisdom of Solomon the Paraphrases of Onkelos and Jonathan a certain Rabbi and the Book Tanthumam He thinks it should seem that these Jewish Writers had their Notion of the WORD from the Jewish Cabbala I cannot but wonder I coufess that a Protestant Divine should believe the Jewish Cabbala or think that the Jews had a traditional Knowledg or Institution concerning God and Religion distinct from the Books of Moses and the Prophets I had thought that all Protestants nay all Christians were agreed that the Cabbala is the Invention of the Pharisees and Masters of the Pharisaical Sect not a Trudition from Moses If the Cabala had come from Moses or had it been acknowledged by the Prophets and antient Jewish Church as of Divine Revelation and Institution it would have been often mentioned appealed and alluded to in the Books of the Old Testament and there is no question that Ezra when he made the Collection of Canonical Books and Monuments immediately after the Return from the Babylonish Captivity would have had an especial Care of the Divine Cabala or Traditional Knowledg He would have committed it to Writing lest it should be lost or corrupted He would have added it to the Canon of Scripture when he collected all other Pieces that had been written by the Prophets or other holy Men He that has left to us the Proverbs of Solomon his Book of Love nay the Story of Ruth would not have neglected the Divine Cabala But I shall put this Dilemma to Dr. Bull let him take it by which Horn he likes best Either the Cabala of the Jews is of humane Invention or of divine Appointment and Revelation If the former why has he quoted in so great a Question as this now before us a spurious Work an Imposture an impious Pharisaical Addition to the Holy Scripture will such fraudulent Arts as these help or credit his Cause If the other if the Cabala is a Tradition of Divine Revelation and Institution 't is of equal Authority with the Writings of Moses and the Prophets and Dr. Bull ought to bind it up with the other two Parts of Holy Scripture namely the Old and New Testaments Dr. Bull may do as he pleases but the Socinians acquiesce in that Judgment which our Saviour himself has made of the Cabala at Mat. 15.6,9 where he calls this Traditional Law the Commandments of Men a mere humane Pharisaical Figment he adds there that by this Tradition of theirs they contradicted and made void the true and genuine Commandments of God It is in vain therefore that Mr. Bull tells us of a Cabala of the Jews of which he precariously and without having read it or so much as knowing what it is supposes that it not only speaks of the WORD but speaks of it as a Person and the Son of God and afterwards falls to citing some Jewish Authors who from this Cabala as he again untruly supposes discourse of the WORDâ—… a pre-existent Person the Son of 〈◊〉 by Generation and God's Messenger 〈◊〉 Minister during the times of the Old Testament I say this Pretence of Dr. Bull is vain because supposing the Cabala did speak of the WORD as a Person and the Son of God pre-existent to the Creation it self and supposing again that the Jewish Authors whom he cites had taken their Doctrine from the Cabala yet what will all this avail when the Cabala it self is so certainly not a Tradition from Moses or God but a mad Collection of Follies and Chimeras the sickly Dreams of the Fanatical Pharisees The Jewish Cabala is so far from owning a Trinity that this very Doctrine of Apostate Christians is the chief Offence that the Jews take at the Christian Religion it is the great thing that their learned Men in all Books and Conferences object to us that we have departed from the first Commandment and have advanced a second and a third God Farther they as little believe the WORD when taken in the Platonick Sense namely for a Person or that God has a Son who was his Minister in the Creation of all things and his Messenger or Angel to the Patriarchs In short neither now nor formerly have the Jews believed that the WORD is the Son of God but only his Power Energy and Virtue Dr. Bull will