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Untitled Article
which are due to a moral benefactor . Whsn the world shall have become worthy of such men , if the causes , under heaven ' s blessing , of so mighty a change can be distinctly traced , their histories , recorded by kindred minds , will probably be found to have been amongst the most efficient agencies of the felicitous transformation .
The Translation and Exposition of Paul ' s Epistles , the produce of labour continued , at intervals , for thirty years , is a work which must ultimately find its place , and that a prominent one , on the shelves of every good theological library . For the production of a commentary of high merit and permanent worth ,
Mr . Belsham was eminently qualified . If he did not bring to the task that profound and extensive acquaintance with classical literature which some have possessed , he was intimately and critically conversant with the Greek of the New Testament and the Septuagint , which is a much more important requisite ; his attainments as a scholar were of no mean or limited description ; and he well knew how to avail himself of whatever could enrich his
work in the researches of the most eminent philologists . His translation is avowedly rather " Eclectic" than original , and the remark may also be applied to his exposition . He did not affect novelty in the one , or eloquence in the other . His object was to elucidate the meaning of his author , and he has succeeded to a far greater extent than any commentator who preceded him . From whatever quarter it might come , he welcomed any version , any paraphrase , any criticism , by which any of the " things hard to be
understood * ' in the Apostle ' s writings could be rendered more intelligible . By accumulation , comparison , and selection , he constructed from the materials furnished by others the most complete work of the kind which has yet been produced . By the constant exercise of a sound judgment ; by steady adherence to the principles of interpretation which he had laid down for his own guidance ; and by ever keeping in view the design of the writer in each of his epistles , and the drift and bearing of his argument , as previously
ascertained by those masterly analyses which are exhibited in the work itself , he gave a harmony and unity to the whole as unbroken as if it had been the entire original production of a single mind . Some few discrepancies which there are in it , are evidently occasioned by the variations which must take place in the mind during so long a period , rather than by the plan which he pursued . It would be difficult to point out any work with which this can fairly be compared in which they are not much more abundant .
There can be little doubt that in process of time this great contribution to biblical criticism will render important service to the cause of Unitarian Christianity . The latent proofs with which the E p istles abound , that P&ul * s apostleship was of Christ , and that Christ ' s mission was of God , are wrought out and set in the clearest light and nqost convincing form . Evidence , most forcible and impressive , of the reality of the gospel revelation , is elicited where the careless reader would not have suspected its existence ;
and in passages , often , which , if they had not repelled by their seeming obscurity , would have been deemed fruitful only in objections and difficulties . Nor is the effect of the light thus collected and thrown upon the pacjes of this portion of Scripture less fatal to the speculations of the Trinitarian than to the objections of the Unbeliever . The modes of expression which have so long been associated with his peculiar tenets are traced to their sources , watched in their application , and shewn to afford him not even
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On the Character and Writings of the Rev . T . Bettkam . &J
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1830, page 87, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2581/page/15/
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