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J . s Reply to the Clergyman on the Divinity of Christ . 249
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The only question then is , whether the word a ^ itar /^ og is not a word equivalent to it ? The clergyman says it is not * In addition to the authorities already quoted to . shew that it is I shall add that of Archbishop Nevvcome , who renders the clause , " Did not esteem it a prey £ o be like God /* And in his notes he says , ' * ' Wakefield shews from Eustathius , that according to the genius of the Greek language , pL ^ Ttct y ^ o ^ \ s equivalent to ccoTfayuux /'
Having produced such authorities in support of ray rendering of the passage , and to shew that aptoLy ^ QL and a ^ Ttay ^ og are equivalent , I leave the clergyman to enjoy his triumph .
But , exclaims the clergyman , " Surely we live in an annus mirabilis of criticism , less than of politics . But , unless I greatly mistake , the text in question not only proves the equality of Christ with the Father , " which , as we have seen , he himself has sufficiently proved that it does not ; " but likewise , " he adds , "( what necessarily follows from such equality ) his proper divinity . " But if the former is not true , the consequence resulting from its sup * posed truth , has no foundation .
" Christ , " says the clergyman , il said to be in the form of God , and to take upon himself the form of a servant , Now if the taking upon him the form of ft servant , denote hi $ becoming a man in the lowest order of society , his being in the form of Gqd must , l > y every anaiogy of language , denote his being God : for what Tight has J . M . to understand the two evidently parallel and contorted phrases ^ the form of God
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and the form of a servant , differently ?"
That this is a mere begging of the question , I shall not content myself with asserting ; but shall prove , by shewing that the phrase , being in the form of a servant , does not mean to be a servant ^ and that being in the form of God 9 does not mean to be God . Jesus Christ says to his disciples , cc I am among you as one that serveth , * but he also says to them , Call no man master upon earth , for one is your master , even Christ . * * Was he then really a servant g Does he not assert the contrary ? When he took on him the form
of a servant by laying aside his garment , girding hiniself with a towel and ' washing bis disciples * feet , the most servile office to which he could submit , did he in reality become their servant ? Hear what he liimself says upon that occasion , * Ye call me mas ~ ter and lord : and ye say wellr for so I am . If I thei >» your lord and waster have washed your feet ; ye also ought to wash one another ' s fceU" If to take the form of a servant , means to 6 e ~ come a servant ; to be in the likeness of sinful flesh , must , * by
every analogy of language , " mean to be sinful flesh , but this cannot be admitted . To take the form of a servant then , cannot mean to become a servant . So on the other hand , to be in the form of Qod 9 cannot mean to be God ; for we all know that , that which is in the form or likeness , or is the image of any thing , is not that thing in the form or likeness of which , or the image of which it is . " God said , let us make man 'in our image , after our likeness ,
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1808, page 249, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2392/page/21/
