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tains of the celestial origin of Jestis * though highly favourable to the exalted notions which they entertained concerning his pre-existent nature .
there appears to have been no other cause for their rejection , but their conviction , founded probably on a very Dear and direct testimony , that it formed no part of the production of the Evangelist .
" Now / ' says Dr . Priestley , " what could bring persons so opposite to each other , as the Unitarians and Gnostics are represented to have beca , to agree in this one thing , but such
historical evidence as was independent of any particular system of faith ; and which , in the case of the Gnostics , must have been so strong as to overturn the natural influence of their
system ? " * We are assured by Dr . Priestley , that < c Jus ? tia Martyr is the first writer who mentions the miraculous conception , " ( meaning , of course , subsequent to the time when the passages in question were penned , ) " and that between his time and the publication of the Gospels there was a period of about eighty years . " f Now , whoever examines his arguments with Trypho , as recorded by himself , relating to this subject , must , I think , be convinced that though he was extremely eager to establish th « fact of the miraculous
conception , he felt the grounds upon which it rested to be far less stable than those on which his faith in the other facts ot the gospel history was established , " Since , " says he , " it has been fully proved that Jesus is the Christ of God , whatsoever he is , if I shall not be able to prove that he
did pre-exist , and condescended to be made man of the like passions with us , and to be born , and to take upon him our flesh , according to the good pleasure of the Father ; it will be more reasonable to say that I was mistaken in tins point , but not to deny that he was the Christ , though he should seem to vou to be made
man ot man , and nothing could be proved but that he was made Christ by election . For there are some of our profession who acknowledge him to be the Christ , though tiiey say lie
* Theological Kepos . Vol . IV . i > . 283 , f Ibid , p , J& 2 .
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was made roan of man , with whom I cannot agree , though the * greatest part of us should assert the same . ' This consciousness of the comparative instability of those grounds , is indeed , very apparent from the gel
neral complexion of his arguments . It is not till toward the conclusion of his remarks that he ventures to bring forward the narratives ascribed to the evangelists , but refers ia the first instance to the supposed prediction of the event , ( Isaiah viL 14 , ) "Behold &
virgin shall conceive , " &c . y maintaining that this prediction * must have been fulfilled in Jesus , who vyas the only person of the Jewish nation " that was or was even said to have bcea conceived" in that manner . Trypho , on the other hand , asserts , that the passage simply expresses that
' * a young woman should conceive ;" on which Justin charges him and Ids race with obstinacy in resisting evidence . To confirm his point , he appeals to various other passages which he imagines refer to it , but which , I believe , no modern or unbiassed
interpreter of prophecy would , suspect to have any such application ? Thus he asserts that the expression of Jacob when pronouncing his blessing on Judah , " the blood of the grapes /' elegantly shews that the blood which Christ had should not be of human
extraction , but should proceed from the power of God . He goes on through several sections to maintain that Christ talked with Abraham , Moses and Joshua , and with God
himself , " who before all creation begat a certain rational power , " and then asks , " whether the words * who shall declare his generation becauae his life was taken from the earth / do not seem to intimate that he whom
God delivered unto death for the iniquities of the people had not his origin from man . " And quoting Moses concerning washing in the blood of the grape , and Ps > ex . 3 , 4 , in which mention is made " of the
worub of the morning /' - he again asks , " if it does not prove that it was fixed long before , that the God and Father of all things should beget him ( Jesus ) also of the womb of a woman . " Ps . xix . is also referred to generally to prove w that God did come from heaven an 4 was * n ad « «» &n amongst men . After oecupysng ' rnany
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402 On the Passages ascribed to Matthew and Luke .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), July 2, 1826, page 402, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2550/page/22/
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