On this page
-
Text (1)
-
Untitled Article
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
-
-
Transcript
-
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
lation in the farmer passages . ' Even so must their wives be grave , not slanderers , ' ( false accusers ^) in the original , ^ &a £ < 5-A #£ , * not deviJs . ' . We come now to 2 ^ fim * . ii . 26 . Paul is instructing Timothy in what man tier he ought to conduct
himself ; The servant of the Lord rfcust not strive , but be gentle unto all men , apt to teach , patient ^ in meekness instructing those who oppose themselves , if God , peradventure , will give them repentance to the acknowledgment of the truth , that they may recover themselves out of the snares of the
devil , who are taken captive by him at his will . ' In this connection it-must be admitted , that the word is used in allusion to the
popular notion , that an evil being , at the head of others , opposed himself to the promulgation of the truth , and to the profession of it , and that the enemies of Christianity are represented as his agents and instruments ; but it admits a question , whether the apostle adopted this opinion or only used the language of those who received
it . In the next ch . iii . 3 . the word $ ia £ o \ os is used in its proper sense ^ and d oes not appear in the received translation . Paul describes the enemies of truth as persons < without natural affection , irreconcileable , false accusers , ' & #£ oAo / .
The last passage in Paul s Epistles in which the word is used , occurs Titus ii . 3 . ' Aged women are exhorted to be in behaviour as becoraeth holiness , fiy &a £ oAa £ , not false accusers / In both these instances it is evident that the apostle does not even allude to the existence or agency of any evil a .
Untitled Article
being influencing and pervertir *^ the human mind . Whether the Epistle to the Hebrews were written by Paul or not is immaterial in the present inquiry : the word Sia&oXo s is used only once ; ch . ii . 14 . The writer
is speaking of the nature of Christ . His object was to shew that it was that of the human raCe . The passage to which we have referred is the following : Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood , he also himself
likewise took part of the same > that through death lie might destroy him who hath the power of death , that is , the devil / It will not for a moment be conceived , that the period of human life is , or ever
w&s determined by the appointment of an invisible though powerful being , the enemy of God and man , and the supposed author of all the evil , both natural and moral , which is imagined to e ; xist in the universe . The writer
evidently refers to something which is not expressed , and it will not be difficult to suggest the * idea to which he alludes . Sin ^ which , by a common figure of speech , is often represented as a berson , is
described as introducing Death into the world , which by the same construction of language is also spoken of as a person ; but according to the philosophy of those times , the devil was the author of sin , and therefore might be said to have
the power of death , which was the consequence of sin . Such metaphors must not be supposed to teach any thing positively , as to the real existence and agency of such beings . They were natural to persons acquainted with the prevailing opinions of those tinacs ^
Untitled Article
32 S Oil the E&istenee of tk € Devil .
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1809, page 328, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1737/page/26/
-