the Divine love. The words of the entire verse show how while God's love is like a shepherd's care for the entire flock, it is detailed and definite to each want, whether of wearied mothers, or frail lambs. This Christ means when He says, "I know my sheep." For He means not only I know who they are, but what they are. Bristol. URIJAH R. THOMAS. No. CCCXLII. The Body Becoming a Second Personality. "O WRETCHED MAN THAT I AM! WHO SHALL DELIVER ME FROM THE BODY OF THIS DEATH? I THANK GOD THROUGH JESUS CHRIST OUR LORD." Rom. vii. 24-25. This is THE writer of this chapter represents himself as having two personalities. The one personality is represented as the inner man, and the other as the outer man, that is, the body. A word or two about the human body. I. It is in the UNREGENERATE MAN A PERSONALITY. "I am carnal," that is, I am become flesh. an abnormal, a guilty, and a perilous fact. The right place of the body is that of the organ, the instrument, the servant of the mind, a mere force which the mind should use for its own high purpose. But this, through the pampering of its senses, the gratification of its lusts, and through the creation of new desires and new appetites, by the mind's imagination, becomes such a power over man that Paul represents it as a personality, the thing becomes an ego. This is terribly sad, yet it is, alas, common: almost everywhere the body is the ego of the man, the "I" that inspires, rules, directs. II. As a personality it BECOMES A TYRANT. "O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" It is represented in this chapter as a personality that enslaves, slays, destroys the soul, the inner man. It is a "body of death." It drags the soul to death. When man becomes conscious of this tyranny, as he does when the "commandment" flashes upon the conscience, the *See "Homilist," Vol. viii. Page 109. E soul becomes intensely miserable, and a fierce battle sets in between the two personalities in man. The man cries out, "What shall I do to be saved?" " Who shall deliver me?" III. As a tyrant IT CAN ONLY BE CRUSHED BY CHRIST. "I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord." In the fierce battle Christ came to the rescue, and struck the tyrant down. In this epistle the writer shows that man struggled to deliver himself (1) Under the teachings of nature, but failed. (See chap. i.). He became more enslaved in materialism. (2) Under the influence of Judaism, but failed. By the deeds of the law no man was justified or made right. Under Judaism men filled up the measure of their iniquities. Who, or what, then, could deliver? No philosophers, poets, or teachers. Only one. "Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ." No. CCCXLIII. The Gospel Mission. 'WHEREUPON, O KING AGRIPPA, I WAS NOT DISOBEDIENT TO THE HEAVENLY VISION, BUT SHEWED," &c. Acts xxvi. 19, 20. I Mark how Paul worked out his new and Divine mission. PROMPTLY. "I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision.” "When it pleased God to reveal His Son in me," &c. II. CONTIGUOUSLY. "Shewed first unto them at Damascus and at Jerusalem," &c. This is the order, the nearest at hand, then gradually proceed. III. REFORMATIVELY. "That they should repent and turn to God." Repentance implies two things. (1) A renewed mind. (2) A renewed life. "Works meet for repentance." Conduct answering to the renewed state of the soul. The Preacher's Scrap Book. REMARKS OF VARIOUS CRITICS ON THE NEW REVISION. HE Rev. G. Vance Smith regards it as a good work accomplished." He considers, however, that many of the old renderings have been unnecessarily sacrificed. to a quite gratuitous literalism." "In the use of the tenses in the New Testament Greek, there is evident very much of the Hellenistic influence. Men whose native language was so 46 closely akin to the ancient Hebrew, and to whom Greek was only an acquired tongue, did not use the varied and copious tenses of the Greek verb with the freedom or accuracy of a Xenophon or a Thucydides." He instances John iv. 23, 24, as illustrative of the clumsiness of such renderings As a rule, in the Revised Version, the article is too often expressed. "This sometimes injures the idiom of the English, and in truth impairs or misrepresents the force of the original. The Greek article was used to generalise as well as to render definite; in such cases, the meaning in English is better rendered by a than by the. In Matt. vi. 25, the sense would have been given by omitting the article rather than retaining it with 'food' and 'raiment.' So Matt. vii. 24, 25, 'the rock,' a rock' is more suitable to English idiom; as in 2 Cor. xii. 12, where the Greek is τὰ μὲν σημεῖα τοῦ ἀποστολοῦ, rendered 'the signs of an apostle.' Here the generalising force of the article is recognised, and the rendering is correct. In this case, the form allowed in Matt. v. 15, and elsewhere would not have been admissible, showing us that the change there was unneeded, and that the Authorised is right." As to the rendering of pronouns-" The Authorised was 'cast ye your pearls,' but the Greek is without the word 'ye' and so the revisers have left it out, but then it is latent in the verb, and many readers will think that the English sounds better with it, while nothing is gained to the sense by leaving it out." As to the prepositions, ev "is constantly used after the manner of Hellenistic Greek, and can only be understood when 66 6 66 attention is paid to the way in which the Hebrew Beth is expressed in the Septuagint. It is constantly used of the instrument, frequently of the manner or accompaniment, and also of the cause. The instrumental force of the word the revisers have sometimes recognised and sometimes not, and this quite arbitrarily, for anything that appears." Ephesians iv. 30 now reads :-" Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God in whom ye were sealed.” “Can any intelligible meaning be assigned to the Greek, except the obvious instrumental seuse so constantly met with? Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God by which ye were sealed '-by the reception of which, or the inspiration of which, ye were marked out, set apart, secured as disciples unto the expected day of the second coming. Such is clearly the sense of the verse, but it is missed altogether. by the new version." Excepting generally to the employment of the word "Ghost" instead of "Spirit," he objects to "the personal turn so gratuitously given to the pronouns," as "himself," Rom. viii. 16, the Greek being the neuter pronoun autó. He recognises the fact that a quasi-personality is occasionally attributed to veμa but argues that the same kind of personality is attributed to charity" now rendered "love," 1 Cor. xiii. 4-5, where the revisers have " actually changed the Authorised personal pronouns feminine, into the corresponding neuters.” On a much debated rendering, he says:-" In Matt. v. 37, we read, 'Let your speech be, Yea, yea : Nay, nay: and whatsoever is more than these is of the evil one.' The margin runs, 'Or evil: as in ver. 39; vi. 39.' This tells us that affirmations which are stronger than Yea, yea: Nay, nay, are the suggestion of Satan. Can this really have been the speaker's meaning? . . .The words Tò πovηpóv occur twice in the New Testament with the general or abstract meaning, as similar phrases often do in classical writers. The two places are Luke vi. 45, 'The evil man (oπovηpos)... bringeth forth evil.' (Tò Tovηpóv); Rom. xii. 9, 'abhorring evil' (TÒ Tovnрóv). These cases are beyond question, and they would abundantly have justified the retention of evil,' as in the Authorised form of the prayer." Contrasting the different modes of dealing with the words "Hades," and "Gehenna," the one being transferred, as a proper name, and the other translated "hell," he says: "Gehenna was the name of a valley near Jerusalem. The word by its Hebrew etymology means 'valley of Hinnom,' an ancient name found in the Old Testament (2 Kings xxiii. 10; 2 Chron. xxviii. 3). In former times it had been the scene of idolatrous rites and of human sacrifices to the god Moloch. Hence to the later Jews it was a place of abomination, and to mark its character it was defiled by the various refuse of the city there thrown and kept burning that it might be consumed. A veritable place of fire, deserving of its name and reputation! where, amidst corrupting matters, worms, too, might live, until the all-consuming element swallowed them up. Thus there was here literally a Tûρ aviov, an age-enduring fire, an unquenchable fire'-a place 'where their worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched.' (Mark ix. 43-48). It is easy to understand that, Gehenna being such a place as this, it would become the representative, in popular speech, of the place of punishment reserved for the wicked and the unbelieving, who were doomed to destruction at the final judgment on the coming of the Messiah." "in Dr. Robert Young thus criticises the use of the words "princes and "governor" in Matt. ii. 6:-"Though both these words are derived from the same root, and should be rendered uniformly, they are left untouched; while in Mark xiii. 9. and Luke xxii. 12, the former is rendered 'governor,' and the latter in Luke xxii. 26 and Acts xv. 22 remains 'chief.' That shall rule' is made' which shall be shepherd of,' though the old rendering is retained in Rev. ii. 27, xii. 5, xix. 15, while in John xxi. 16 it is made 'tend,' and in Acts xx. 28 it is 'feed."" 6 Dr. Joseph Angus remarks:-"The effect of small changes on the argument and connection of pages deserves illustration. In Rom. ii. 17, the reading ‘Behold' should be 'But if '—the effect of the addition of a single letter. Behold' may make the previous verses refer to Jews. 'But if' makes the previous verses refer to 'every one who judges' Jew or Gentile; and the verses 17-29 refer specifically to Jews. In Rom. ii. 13, the true reading is For not the hearers of a law (not the law) are just before God, but the doers of a law (not the law) are justified.' The principle laid down is universal, and not applicable to Jews only. In Rom. viii. 11, through (or by) his Spirit that dwelleth in us,' is probably the correct reading; but the margin, because of his Spirit that dwelleth in us,' has respectable support. In the one case the indwelling Spirit is the means of our resurrection; in the other the indwelling Spirit is the ground or reason for it." Dr. Phillip Schaff notes some mistranslations in the Authorised Version which are now corrected :-Cananæan, an Aramaic word, |