to teach by these sacrificial terms and allusions. They are, themselves, utterly silent as to this, and the varying theories of those who reject the doctrine of atonement, in fact, confess that their writings afford no solution of the difficulty. If, therefore, it is blasphemous to suppose, on the one hand, that inspired men should write on purpose to mislead; so, on the other, is it utterly inconceivable that, had they only been ordinary writers, they should construct a figurative language out of terms which had a definite and established sense, without giving any intimation at all that they employed them otherwise than in their received meaning, or telling us why they adopted them at all, and more especially when they knew that they must be interpreted, both by Jews and Greeks, in a sense which, if the Socinians are right, was in direct opposition to that which they intended to convey. This will, however, appear with additional evidence, when the typical, as well as the expiatory character of the legal sacrifices is considered. In strict argument, the latter does not depend upon the former, and if the oblations of the Mosaic institute had not been intentionally adumbrative of the one oblation of Christ, the argument, from their vicarious and expiatory character, would still have been valid. For if the legal sacrifices were offered in place of the offender, blood for blood, life for life, and if the death of Christ is represented to be, in as true a sense, a sacrifice and expiation, then is the doctrine of the New Testament writers, as to the expiatory character of the death of our Lord, explicitly established. That the Levitical sacrifices were also TYPES is another argument, and accumulates the already preponderating evidence A type, in the theological sense, is defined by systematic writers to be a sign or example, prepared and designed by GoD to prefigure some future thing. It is required that it should represent (though the degree of clearness may be very different in different instances) this future object, either by something which it has in common with it, or in being the symbol of some property which it possesses;-that it should be prepared and designed by God thus to represent its antitype, which circumstance distinguishes it from a simile, and from hieroglyphic:-that it should give place to the antitype so soon as the latter appears;-and that the efficacy of the antitype should exist in the type in appearance only, or in a lower degree.(1) These may be considered as the general properties of a type. coine;" Of this kind are the views given us, in the sacred Scriptures of the New Testament, of the Levitical dispensation, and of many events and examples of the Mosaic history. Thus St. Paul calls the meats and drinks, the holy days, new moons, and Sabbaths of the Jews, including in them the services performed in the celebration of these festivals "a shadow of things to the body" of which shadow, whose form the shadow generally and faintly exhibited, "is Christ." Again, when speaking of the things which happened to the Israelites, in the wilderness, he calls them "ensamples" (TUTO) types, "written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come." In Hebrews x. 1, the same apostle, when he discourses expressly on the "sacrifices" of the tabernacle, calls them"the shadow of good things to come," and places them in contrast with "the very image of the things," that is, the "good things" just before mentioned; and, in the preceding chapter, he tells us that the services performed in the tabernacle prefigured what was afterward to be transacted in the heavenly sanctuary, These instances are sufficient for the argument, and, in examining them, we may observe, that if the things here alluded to are not allowed to be types, then they are used as mere illustrative rhetorical illustrations, and in their original institution had no more reference to the facts and doctrines of the Christian system than the sacrificial services of Pagan temples, which might, in some particulars, upon this hypothesis, just as well have served the apostle's purpose. But if, upon examination, this notion of their being used merely as rhetorical illustrations be contradicted by the passages themselves, then the true typical character of these events and ceremonies may be considered as fairly established. With respect to the declaration of St. Paul, that the (1) Vide OUTRAM De Sacrificiis punishments inflicted upon the disobedient and unfaithful Israelites in the wilderness were " types written for our admonition," it is only to be explained by considering the history of that people as designedly and by appointment typical. These things happened for types; and that, by types, the apostle means much more than a general admonitory correspondence between disobedience and punishment, which many other circumstances might just as well have afforded, he adds, that "they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come," that is, for the admonition of Christians who had entered into the obligations of the new dispensation. For this purpose they were recorded; by this act of God they were made types in the highest sense; and could not become types in the sense of mere figurative illustration, which would have been contingent upon this rhetorical use being made of them by some subsequent writer. This is farther confirmed also by the preceding verses, in which the apostle calls the manna "spiritual meat," which can only be understood of it as being a type of the bread which came down from heaven, even Christ, who, in allusion to the same fact, so designates himself. The "rock," too, is called the spiritual rock, and that rock, adds the apostle, "was Christ;" but in what conceivable meaning, except. as it was an appointed type of him? This is St. Paul's general description of the typical character of "the church in the wilderness." In the other passages quoted, he adduces, in particular, the Levitical services. He calls the ceremonial of the law "a shadow" (okia); in the Epistle to the Colossians, he opposes this shadow to "the body," in that to the Hebrews, to "the very image" by which he obviously means the reality of "the good things" adumbrated, or their essential form or substance. Now, whether we take the word σkia for the shadow of the body of man, or for a faint delineation, or sketch, to be succeeded by a finished picture, it is clear, that whatever the law was, it was by Divine appointment; and as there is a relation between the shadow and the body which prodnces it, and the sketch or outline and the finished picture, so if, by Divine appointment, the law was this shadow of good things to come, which is what the apostle asserts, then there was an intended relation of one to the other, quite independent of the figurative and rhetorical use which might be made of a mere accidental comparison. If the apostle speaks figuratively only, then the law is to be supposed to have no appointed relation to the Gospel, as a shadow or sketch of good things to come, and this relation is one of imagination only; if the relation was a designed and an appointed one, then the resolution of the apostle's words into figu rative allusion cannot be maintained. But, farther, the apostle grounds an argument upon these types; an argument, too, of the most serious kind; an argument for renouncing the law and embracing the Gospel, upon the penalty of eternal danger to the soul: no absurdity can, therefore, be greater than to suppose him to argue so weighty and important a question upon a relation of one thing to another existing only in the imagination, and not appointed by God; and if the relation was so appointed, it is of that instituted and adumbrative kind which constitutes a type in its special and theological sense. Of this appointment and designation of the tabernacle service to be a shadow of good things to come, the ninth chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews affords several direct and unequivocal declarations. So verses 7 and 8, "But into the second went the high priest alone, once every year, not without blood, which he offered for himself, and for the errors of the people; the HOLY GHOST SIGNIFYING this (showing, declaring by this type), that the way into the holiest of all was not VET made manifest." Here we have the declaration of a doctrine by type, which is surely very different to the figurative use of a fact employed to embellish and enforce an argument by a subsequent writer, and this is also referred to the design and intention of the "Holy Ghost" himself, at the time when the Levitical ritual was prescribed, and this typical declaration was to continue until the new dispensation should be introduced. In verse 9, the tabernacle itself is called a figure, or parable; "Which was a figure (ragaẞon) for the time then present." It was a parable by which the evangelical and spiritual doctrines were taught; it was an appointed parable, because limited to a certain time, "for the time then present," that is, until the bringing in of the things signified, to which it had this designed relation. Again, verse 23, "the things under the law" are called "patterns" (representations) of things in the heavens ;" and in verse 24, the holy places made with hands are denominated "the figures" (antitypes) "of the true." Were they then representations and antitypes only in St. Paul's imagination, or in reality and by appointment? Read his argument; "it was necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these." On the hypothesis that sacrificial terms and allusions are employed figuratively only by the apostle, what kind of argument, we may ask, is this? On what does the common necessity of purification, both of the earthly and the heavenly tabernacle, by sacrifices, though different in their degree of value and efficacy, rest? Could the apostle say that this was necessary to afford him a figurative embellishment in writing his epistle? The necessity is clearly grounded upon the relation instituted by the Author of the Levitical economy himself; the heavenly places were not to be entered by sinners, but through the blood of "better sacrifices;" and to teach this doctrine early to mankind, it was "necessary" to purify the earthly tabernacle, and thus give the people access to it only by the blood of the inferior sacrifices, that both they and the tabernacle might be the types of evangelical and heavenly things, and that they might be taught the only means of obtaining access to the tabernacle in heaven. There was, therefore, in setting up these "patterns," an intentioned adumbration of these future things, and hence the word used is vrodεtypa, the import of which is shown in chap. viii. 5, where it is associated with the term, the shadow of heavenly things,-" who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things," or "these" priests "perform the service with a representation and shadow of the heavenly things." The sacrificial ceremonies, then, of the Levitical institute are clearly established to be typical, and have all the characters which constitute a type in the received theological sense. They are represented by St. Paul, in the passages which have been under consideration, as adumbrative; as designed and appointed to be so by God as having respect to things future, to Christ and to his sacerdotal ministry; as being inferior in efficacy to the antitypes which correspond to them, the "better sacrifices" of which he speaks; and they were all displaced by the antitype, the Levitical ceremony being repealed by the death and ascension of our Lord. of the world ;" and that "whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life; for my flesh is meat INDEED, and my blood is drink INDEED;" that is, it is in truth and reality what the flesh and blood of the Jewish victims were in type. The instances of this use of sacrificial terms are, indeed, almost innumerable, and enough, I trust, has been said to show that they could not be employed in a merely figurative sense; nevertheless there are two or three passages in which they occur as the basis of an argument which depends upon taking them in the received sense, with a brief consideration of which we may conclude this part of the subject. When St. Paul, in writing to the Corinthians, says, "for he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin," or "him who knew no sir, he hath made to be sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him;" he concludes a discourse upon our reconciliation to Gon, and lays this down as the general principle upon which that reconciliation of which he has been speaking is to be explained and enforced. Here, then, the question is, in what sense Christ was MADE SIN for us. Not, certainly, as to the guilt of it; for it is expressly said, that "he knew no sin ;" but as to the expiation of it, by his personal sufferings, by which he delivers the guilty from punishment. For the phrase is manifestly taken from the sin-offerings of the Old Testament, which are there sometimes called "sins," as being offerings for sin, and because the animals sacrificed represented the sinners_themselves. Thus, Lev. iv. 21, the heifer to be offed is called, in our translation, more agreeable to our idiom, "a sin-offering for the congregation;" but in the LXX. it is denominated "THE SIN of the congregation." So, also, in verse 29, as to the red heifer which was to be offered for the sin of private persons, the person offending was "to lay his hand upon the head of the sinoffering," as we rightly interpret it; but in the LXX. upon the head of his SIN," agreeably to the Hebrew word, which signifies indifferently either sin or the offering for it. Thus, again, in Lev. vi. 25, "This is the law of the sin-offering," in the Greek, "This is the law of sin," which also has, "they shall slay the SINS before the Lord," for the sin-offerings. The Greek of the apostle Paul is thus easily explained by that of the LXX., and affords a natural exposition of the passage-"Him who knew no sin, God hath made sin for us," as the sin-offerings of the law were made sins for offenders, the death of innocent creatures exempting from death those who were really criminal.(2) This allusion to the Levitical sin-offerings is also established by the connexion of Christ's sin-offering with our reconciliation. Such was the effect of the sinofferings among the Jews, and such, St. Paul tells us, is the effect of Christ being made a sin-offering for us; a sufficient proof that he does not use the term figuratively, nor speak of the indirect but of the direct effect of the death of Christ in reconciling us to Gop. 66 Since, then, both the expiatory and typical characters of the Jewish sacrifices were so clearly held by the writers of the New Testament, there can be no rational doubt as to the sense in which they apply sacrificial terms and allusions, to describe the nature and effect of the death of Christ. As the offering of the animal sacrifice took away sin, that is, obtained remis- Again, in Ephes. v. 2, "Christ loved us, and gave sion for offences against the law, we can be at no loss himself for us, an offering and sacrifice to God, for a to know what the Baptist means, when, pointing to sweet-smelling savour." Here, also, he uses the very Christ, he exclaims, "Behold the Lamb of God, which terms applied to the Jewish sacrifices. How, then, taketh away the sin of the world." As there was a could a Jew, or even a Gentile, understand him? transfer of suffering and death, from th offender to Would an inspired man use sacrificial language withthe legally clean and sound victim, so Christ died, "the out a sacrificial sense, and merely amuse his readers just for the unjust;" as the animal sacrifice was ex-with the sound of words without meaning, or employ piating, so Christ is our acuos, propitiation, or expia- them without notice being given, in a meaning which tion; as by the Levitical oblations men were reconciled the readers were not accustomed to affix to them? to Gon, so "we, when enemies, were reconciled to The argument forbids this, as well as the reason and God by the death of his Son;" as, under the law, honesty of the case. His object was to impress the "without shedding of blood there was no remission," Ephesians with the deepest sense of the love of Christ; so, as to Christ, we are "justified by his blood," and and he says, "Christ LOVED US; and gave up himself have "redemption through his blood, the remission of for us ;" and then explains the mode in which he thus sins;" as by the blood of the appointed sacrifices the gave himself up for us, that is, in our room and stead, holy places made with hands were made accessible to an OFFERING and SACRIFICE to God, for a sweetthe Jewish worshippers, that blood being carried into smelling savour;" by which his readers could only unthem, and sprinkled by the high priest, so "Christ en-derstand, that Christ gave himself up a sacrifice for tered once, with his own blood into the holy place, hav- them, as other sacrifices had been given up for them, ing obtained eternal redemption for us," and has thus"in the way of expiation, to obtain for them the mercy opened for us a "new and living way" into the celes- and favour of GOD." The cavil of Crellius and his tial sanctuary; as the blood of the Mosaic oblations followers on this passage is easily answered. He was the blood of the Old Testament, so he himself says, that the phrase "a sweet-smelling savour," is says, "this is my blood of the New Testament, shed scarcely ever used of sin-offerings or expiatory sacrifor the remission of sins;" as it was a part of the sa- fices; but of burnt-offerings, and peace-offerings, by crificial solemnity, in some instances, to feast upon the which expiation was not made. But here are two misvictim, so, with direct reference to this, our Lord also declares that he would give his own "flesh for the life 66 (2) Vide CHAPMAN'S Eusebius, chap. iv. takes. The first lies in assuming that burnt-offerings were not expiatory, whereas they are said "to make atonement," and were so considered by the Jews, though sometimes also they were eucharistic. The second mistake is, that the phrase, "a sweet-smelling savour," is by some peculiar fitness applied to one class of offerings alone. It is a gross conception, that it relates principally to the odour of sacrifices burned with fire; whereas it signifies the acceptableness of sacrifices to God; and is so explained in Phil. iv. 18, where the apostle calls the bounty of the Philippians, "an odour of sweet smell," and adds, exegetically, "a sacrifice acceptable and well pleasing to GOD". The phrase is, probably, taken from the incensing which accompanied the sacrificial services. To these instances must be added the whole argument of St. Paul, in the Epistle to the Hebrews. To what purpose does he prove that Christ had a superior priesthood to Aaron, if Christ were only metaphorically a priest? what end is answered by proving that his offering of himself had greater efficacy than the oblations of the tabernacle, in taking away sin, if sin was not taken away in the same sense, that is, by expiation? Why does he lay so mighty a stress upon the death of our Lord, as being "a better sacrifice," if, according to the received sense, it was no sacrifice at all? His argument, it is manifest, would go for nothing, and be no better than an unworthy trifling with his readers, and especially with the Hebrews to whom he writes the epistle, beneath not only an inspired but an ordinary writer. Fully to unfold the argument, we might travel through the greater part of the epistle; but one or two passages may suffice. In chap. vii. 27, speaking of Christ as our high priest, he says, "Who needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for his own sins, and then for the people's, for this (latter) he did once, when he offered up himself." The circumstance of his offering sacrifice not daily, but "once for all," marks the superior value and efficacy of his sacrifice; his offering up this sacrifice of himself" for the sins of the people, as the Jewish high priest offered his animal sacrifices for the sins of the people, marks the similarity of the act; in both cases atonement was made, but with different degrees of efficacy; but unless atonement for sin was in reality made by his thus offering up "himself," the virtue and efficacy of Christ's saerifice would be inferior to that of the Aaronical priesthood, contrary to the declared design and argument of the epistle. Let us, also, refer to chap. ix. 13, 14, "For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh," so as to fit the offender for joining in the service of the tabernacle, "how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your consciences from dead works, to serve the living GOD." The comparison here lies in this, that the Levitical sacrifices expiated legal punishments; but did not in themselves acquit the people absolutely in respect to God, as the Governor and Judge of mankind; but that the blood of Christ extends its virtue to the conscience, and eases it of all guilty terror of the wrath to come on account of "dead works," or works which deserve death under the universal moral law. The ground of this comparison, however, lies in the real eflicacy of each of these expiations. Each "purifies," each delivers from guilt, but the latter only as "pertaining to the conscience," and the mode in each case is by expiation. But to interpret the purging of the conscience, as the Socinians, of mere dissuasion from dead works to come, or as descriptive of the power of Christ to acquit men, upon their repentance, declaratively destroys all just similitude between the blood of Christ and that of the animal sacrifices, and the argument amounts to nothing. We conclude with a passage to which we have before adverted, which institutes a comparison between the Levitical purification of the holy places made with hands, and the purification of the heavenly places by the blood of Christ. "And almost all things are by the law purged with blood, and without shedding of blood is no remission. It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are figures of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us." To enter into the meaning of this passage, we are to consider that God dwelt personally among the Israelites; that the sanctuary and tabernacle are represented as polluted by their sins, and even corporal impurities, the penalty of which was death, unless atoned for, or expiated according to law, and that all unclean persons were debarred access to the tabernacle and the service of God, until expiation was made, and purification thereby effected. It was under these views that the sin-offerings were made on the day of expiation, to which the apostle alludes in the above passage. Then the high-priest entered into the holy of holies, with the blood of sacrifices, to make atonement both for himself and the whole people. He first offered for himself and for his house a bullock, and sprinkled the blood of it upon and before the mercy-seat within the veil. Afterward he killed a goat for a sin-offering for the people, and sprinkled the blood in like manner. This was called atoning for, or hallowing and reconciling the holy place, and the tabernacle of the con. gregation, "because of the uncleanness of the children of Israel, and because of their transgressions in all their sins." The effect of all this was the remission of sins, which is represented by the scape-goat, who carried away the sins which had been confessed over him, with imposition of hands; and the purification of the priests and people, so that their holy places were made accessible to them, and they were allowed, without fear of the death which had been threatened, to "draw near" to God. We have already shown that here the holy places made with hands, and the "true holy places," of which they were the figures, were purified and opened, each in the same way, by the sprinkling of the blood of the victims-the patterns or emblems of things in the heavens, by the blood of animals, the heavenly places themselves by "better sacrifices," and that the argument of the apostle forbids us to suppose that he is speaking figuratively. Let us, then, merely mark the correspondence of the type and antitype in this case, as exhibited by the apostle. He compares the legal sacrifices and that of Christ in a similar purification of the respective Ayia or sanctuaries to which each had relation. The Jewish sanctuary on earth was purified, that is, opened and made accessible by the one; the celestial sanctuary, the true and everlasting seat of God's presence, by the other. Accordingly, in other passages, he pursues the parallel still farther, representing Christ as procuring for men, by his death, a happy admission into heaven, as the sin-offerings of the law obtained for the Jews a safe entrance into the tabernacle on earth. "Having, therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us through the veil, that is to say, his flesh; and having a high priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart, in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water." Thus, also, he tells us that "we are sanctified by the offering of the body of Christ Jesus," and that as the bodies of those animals whose blood was carried into the holy of holies by the high priest, to make an atonement for sin, were burnt "without the camp," so also Jesus suffered without the gate, "that he might sanctify the people with his own blood." The notion that sacrificial terms are applied to the death of Christ by rhetorical figure is, then, sufficiently refuted by the foregoing considerations. But it has been argued, that as there is, in many respects, a want of literal conformity between the death of Christ and the sacrifices of the law, a considerable license of figurative interpretation must be allowed. Great confusion of ideas, on this subject, has resulted from not observing a very obvious distinction which exists between figurative and analogical language. It by no means follows, that when language cannot be interpreted literally it must be taken figuratively, or by way of rhetorical allusion. This distinction is well made by a late writer.(3) "Figurative language," he observes, "does not arise from the real nature of the thing to which it is transferred, but only from the imagination of him who transfers it. So, a man of courage is figuratively (3) VEYSIES'S Bampton Lectures. As to the objection, that the Jewish sacrifices had no reference to the expiation of moral transgressions, we observe, called a lion, not because the real nature of a lion be- legal sacrifices had any efficacy, per se; but, in another longs to him, but because one quality which charac-and a higher view, the sacrifice of Christ was the only terizes this animal belongs to him in an eminent de- true sacrifice, and the Levitical ones were but the apgree, and the imagination conceives of them as par-pointed types of that. If, therefore, in this argument, takers of a common nature, and applies to them one we may refer to the Mosaic sacrifices, to fix the sense common name. But there is a species of language, in which the New Testament uses the sacrificial terms usually called analogical, which, though not strictly in which it speaks of the death of Christ, against au proper, is far from being merely figurative, the terms objector; yet, in fact, the sacrifices of the law are to being transferred from one thing to another, not be-be interpreted by the sacrifice of Christ, and not the cause the things are similar, but because they are in latter by them. They are rather analogical with it, similar relations. The term thus transferred is as than it with them. There was a previous ordination truly significant of the real nature of the thing, in the of pardon through the appointed sacrifice of the Lamb relation in which it stands, as it could be, were it the of God, "slain from the foundation of the world," to primitive and proper word. Thus the term foot pro- which they all, in different degrees, referred, and perly signifies the lower extremity of an animal, or of which they were but the visible and sensible monithat on which it stands; but, because the lower extre-tors" for the time present." mity or base of a mountain is to the mountain what the foot is to the animal, it is therefore called the same name, and the term thus applied is significant of something real, something which, if not a foot in strict 1. That a distinction is to be made between sacrifice propriety of speech, is, nevertheless, truly so, con- as a part of the theo-political law of the Jews, and sasidered with respect to the circumstance upon which crifice as a consuetudinary rite, practised by their the analogy is founded. But this mode of expression fathers, and by them also previous to the giving of the is more common with respect to our mental and intel-law from Mount Sinai, and taken up into the Mosaic lectual faculties and operations, which we are wont to institute. This was continued partly on its original denominate by words borrowed from similar functions ground, and partly, and with additions, as a branch of of the bodily organs and corresponding attributes of the polity under which the Jews were placed. With material things. Thus to see, is properly to acquire this rite they were familiar before the law, and even impressions of sensible objects by the organs of sight; before the exodus from Egypt. "Let us go," says but to the mind is also attributed an eye, with which Moses to Pharaoh," we pray thee, three days' journey we are, analogically, said to see objects intellectual. into the desert, and sacrifice to the Lord our God, lest In like manner, great and little, equal and unequal, he fall upon us with pestilence or with the sword." smooth and rough, sweet and sour, are properly attri- Here sacrifice is spoken of, and that with reference to butes of material substances; but they are analogically expiation, or the averting of the Divine displeasure. ascribed to such as are immaterial; for without intend-There is in this, too, an acknowledgment of offences, ing a figure, we speak of a great mind and a little as the reason of sacrificing; but these offences could mind; and the natural temper of one man is said to be not be against the forms and ceremonies of an institute equal, smooth, and sweet, while that of another is which did not then exist, and must, therefore, have called unequal, rough, and sour. And if we thus ex- been moral offences. We may add to this, that in the press such intellectual things as fall more immediately books of Leviticus and Exodus, Moses speaks of sacriunder our observation, we cannot wonder that things fices as a previous practice, and, in some cases, so far spiritual and divine, which are more removed from our from prescribing the act, does no more than regulate direct inspection, should be exhibited to our apprehen- the mode. "If his offering be a burnt sacrifice of the sion in the same manner. The conceptions which we herd, let him offer a male." Had their sacrifices, therethus form may be imperfect and inadequate; but they fore, reference only to cases of ceremonial offence, are, nevertheless, just and true; consequently the lan- then it would follow that they had been deprived of the guage in which they are expressed, although borrowed, worship of their ancestors, which respected the obtainis not merely figurative, but is significant of something ing of the Divine favour in the forgiveness of moral real in the things concerned." offences, and that they obtained, as a substitute, a kind of worship which respected only ceremonial cleansmanifestly, as the type of something higher; and they had also the patriarchal rites with renewed sanctions and under new regulations; and thus there was a real advance in the spirituality of their worship, while it became, at the same time, more ceremonial and exact. To apply this to the case before us, the blood or life of Christ is called our ransom and the price of our re-ings and a ceremonial reconciliation. They had this, demption. Now, admitting that these expressions are not to be understood literally, does it follow that they contain mere figure and allusion? By no means. They contain truth and reality. Christ came to redeem us from the power of sin and Satan, by paying for our deliverance no less a price than his own blood. "In him we have redemption, through his blood." "The Son of Man came to give his life a ransom for many;" and we are taught, by this representation, that the blood of Christ, in the deliverance of sinful man, corresponds to a price or ransom in the deliverance of a captive, and consequently is a price or ransom, if not literally, at least really and truly. 2. That the offerings which were formerly prescribed under the law had reference to moral transgressions, as well as to external aberrations from the purity and exactness of the Levitical ritual. "Atonement" is said to be made" for sins committed against any of the commandments of the Lord." It appears, also, that sins of "ignorance" included all sins When Christ is called "our passover," the same ana- which were not ranked in the class of " presumptuous logical use of terms is manifest, and in several other sins," or those to which death was inevitably annexed passages which will be familiar to the reader; but we by the civil law, and, therefore, must have included hesitate to apply the same rule of interpretation through many cases of moral transgression. For some specific out, and to say with the author just quoted, and Arch-instances of this kind sin-offerings were enjoined, such bishop Magee, who refers to him on this point with ap- as lying, theft, fraud, extortion, and perjury (4) probation, that Christ is called a "sin-offering" and a 3. That if all the sin-offerings of the Levitical insti"sacrifice" analogically. These terms, on the con- tute had respected legal atonement and ceremonial putrary, are used properly, and must be understood lite- rification, nothing could have been collected from that rally. For what was an expiatory sacrifice under the circumstance to invalidate the true sacrifice of Christ. law, but the offering of the life of an innocent creature It is of the nature of a type to be inferior in efficacy to in the place of the guilty, and that, in order to obtain the antitype; and the apostle Paul himself argues, his exemption from death? The death of Christ is as from the invalidity of Levitical sacrifices to take away literally an offering of himself, "the just for the un-guilt from the conscience, the superior efficacy of the just," to exempt the latter from death. The legal sin-sacrifice of Christ. It follows, then, that as truly as offerings cleansed the body and qualified for the cere- they were legal atonements, so truly was Christ's monial worship prescribed by the law; and the blood death a moral atonement; as truly as they purified the of Christ as truly purifies the conscience and conse- flesh, so truly did this sacrifice purify the conscience. crates to the spiritual service required by the Gospel. The circumstances differ, but the things themselves are not so much analogical as identical in their nature, though differing in circumstances, that is, so far as the (4) Vide OUTRAM De Sac.; HALLET's Notes and Discourses; HAMMOND and ROSENMULLER in Heb. ix.; RICHIE's Pec. Doctrine. CHAPTER XXII. REDEMPTION.-PRIMITIVE SACRIFICES. make atonement for your souls; for it is the BLOOD (or LIFE) that maketh atonement for the soul." The great reason, then, of the prohibition of blood is, that it To the rite of sacrifice before the law, practised in is the LIFE: and what follows respecting atonement is the patriarchal ages, up to the first family, it may be exegetical of this reason; the life is in the blood, and proper to give some consideration, both for the farther the blood or life is given as an atonement. Now, by elucidation of some of the topics above stated, and for turning to the original prohibition in Genesis, we find the purpose of exhibiting the harmony of those dispen- that precisely the same reason is given. "But the sations of religion which were made to fallen man in flesh with the blood, which is the life thereof, shall ye different ages of the world. That the ante-Mosaic sa- not eat." The reason, then, being the same, the quescrifices were expiatory, is the first point which it is ne- tion is, whether the exegesis added by Moses must not cessary to establish. It is not, indeed, at all essential necessarily be understood in the general reason given to the argument, to ascend higher than the sacrifices of for the restraint to Noah. Blood is prohibited for this the law, which we have already proved to be of that reason, that it is the life; and Moses adds, that it is character, and by which the expiatory efficacy of the "the blood," or life," which makes atonement." Let death of Christ is represented in the New Testament. any one attempt to discover any reason for the prohibiThis, however, was also the character of the more an- tion of blood to Noah, in the mere circumstance that it cient rites of the patriarchal church; and thus we see is "the life," and he will find it impossible. It is no the same principles of moral government, which dis- reason at all, moral or instituted, except that as it was tinguish the Christian and Mosaic dispensations, car-life substituted for life, the life of the animal in sacriried still higher as to antiquity, even to the family of fice for the life of man, and that it had a sacred apthe first man, the first transgressor; "without shed-propriation. The manner, too, in which Moses introding of blood there was no remission." duces the subject is indicative, that, though he was reThe proofs that sacrifices of atonement made a part newing a prohibition, he was not publishing a "new of the religious system of the patriarchs who lived be- doctrine;" he does not teach his people that God had fore the law, are, first, the distribution of beasts into then given, or appointed, blood to make atonement; but clean and unclean, which we find prior to the flood of he prohibits them from eating it, because he had made Noah. This is a singular distinction, and one which this appointment, without reference to time, and as a could not then have reference to food, since animal subject with which they were familiar. Because the food was not allowed to man prior to the deluge; and blood was the life, it was sprinkled upon, and poured as we know of no other ground for the distinction, exout at the altar: and we have in the sacrifice of the cept that of sacrifice, it must, therefore, have had re- paschal lamb, and the sprinkling of its blood, a suffiference to the selection of victims to be solemnly offered cient proof, that before the giving of the law, not only to God, as a part of worship, and as the means of draw- was blood not eaten, but was appropriated to a sacred ing near to him by expiatory rites for the forgiveness sacrificial purpose. Nor was this confined to the Jews; of sins. Some, it is true, have regarded this distinc- it was customary with the Romans and Greeks, who, tion of clean and unclean beasts as used by Moses by in like manner, poured out and sprinkled the blood of way of prolepsis, or anticipation, a notion which, if it victims at their altars; a rite derived, probably, from could not be refuted by the context, would be perfectly the Egyptians, as they derived it, not from Moses, but arbitrary. But not only are the beasts which Noah from the sons of Noah. The notion, indeed, that the was to receive into the afk spoken of as clean and un-blood of the victims was peculiarly sacred to the gods, clean; but in the command to take them into the ark, is impressed upon all ancient pagan mythology. a difference is made in the number to be preserved, Thirdly, the sacrifices of the patriarchs were those of the former being to be received by sevens, and the lat- animal victims, and their use was to avert the displeater by two of a kind. This shows that this distinction sure of God from sinning men. Thus in the case of among beasts had been established in the time of Noah, Job, who, if it could be proved that he did not live beand thus the assumption of a prolepsis is refuted. In fore the law, was, at least, not under the law, and in the law of Moses a similar distinction is made: but the whose country the true patriarchal theology was in only reasons given for it are two: in this manner, those force, the prescribed burnt-offering was for the averting victims which God would allow to be used for piacu- of the" wrath" of God, which was kindled against Elilar purposes, were marked out; and by this distinction phaz and his two friends, "lest," it is added, "I deal those animals were designated which were permitted with you after your folly." The doctrine of expiation for food. The former only can, therefore, be considered could not, therefore, be more explicitly declared. The as the ground of this distinction among the antedilu- burnt-offerings of Noah, also, after he left the ark, vians; for the critical attempts which have been made served to avert the "cursing of the ground any more to show that animals were allowed to man for food, for man's sake," that is, for man's sin, and the "smiting previous to the flood, have wholly failed. any more every thing living." In like manner, the end of Abel's offering was pardon and acceptance of Gon, and by it these were attained, for" he obtained witness that he was righteous." But as this is the first sacrifice which we have on record, and has given rise to some controversy, it may be considered more largely at present, however the only question is its expiatory character. As to the matter of .he sacrifice, it was an animal offering. "Cain brought of the fruit of the ground," "and Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock, and of the fat thereof;" or, more literally, "the fat of them," that is, according to the Hebrew idiom, the fattest or best of his flock. Le Clerc and Grotius would understand Abel to have offered the wool and milk of his flock, which interpretation, if no critical difficulty opposed it, would be rendered violently improbable by the circumstance that neither wool nor milk is ever mentioned in Scripture as fit oblations to God. But to translate the word rendered firstlings, by best and finest, and then to suppose an ellipsis and supply it with wool, is wholly arbitrary, and contradicted by the import of the word itself. But, as Dr. Kennicott remarks, the matter is set at rest by the context; " for, if it be allowed by all, that Cain's bringing of the fruit of the ground means his bringing the fruit (itself) of the ground, then Abel's bringing or the firstlings of his flock must, likewise, mean his bringing the firstlings of his flock" (themselves).(5) A second argument is furnished by the prohibition of blood for food, after animals had been granted to man for his sustenance along with the "herb of the field." This prohibition is repeated by Moses to the Israelites, with this explanation, "I have given it upon the altar, to make an atonement for your souls." From this "additional reason," as it has been called, it has been argued that the doctrine of the atoning power of blood was new, and was then, for the first time, announced by Moses, or the same reason for the prohibition would have been given to Noah. To this we may reply, 1. That unless the same reason be supposed as the ground for the prohibition of blood to Noah, as that given by Moses to the Jews, no reason at all can be conceived for this restraint being put upon the appetite of mankind from Noah to Moses; and yet we have a prohibition of a most solemn kind, which in itself could have no reason enjoined, without any external reason being either given or conceivable. 2. That it is a mistake to suppose, that the declaration of Moses to the Jews, that God had "given them the blood for an atonement," is an additional reason for the interdict, not to be found in the original prohibition to Noah. The whole passage in Lev. xvii. is, "And thou shalt say to them, Whatsoever man there be of the house of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among you, that eateth any manner of blood, I will even set my face against that soul that eateth blood, and I will cut him off from among his people, FOR THE LIFE of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it upon the altar, to This is farther supported by the import of the phrase (5) Two Dissertations. See also MAGEE'S Discourses. |
