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Untitled Article
think that our author must perceive , on further reflection , that the bare fact of Christ being tempted , has some relation to the controversy concerning his nature ; God cannot be tempted ; and that his growing in grace and wisdom , as well as in stature , is a circumstance not to be overlooked in ' the inquiry into his pre-existence . Had she considered this kind of evidence ,
far stronger than that of mere words ; and also that which arises from the apostles' having reasoned upon the humanity of Christ , arguing from his resurrection to ours by parity of nature ; she would not perhaps have dismissed this doctrine in quite so summary a manner . In the following extract her own view is indicated ; the passage also contains much that is excellent and characteristic : " It appears to me that Jesus Christ , through the whole of the Gospels , speaks of himself as receiving his power from God . In the Acts and the
Epistles likewise the apostles speak of him as deriving his power and glory from God the Father , not only when he is mentioned as a man upon earth , but in his glorified state after his ascension . And , indeed , it is as ascended to heaven and on the right hand of God that they almost constantly speak of him to the earliest converts . There are but two passages in the New
Testament which appear to me clearly to favour the first of our three mentioned sects , or our High Church doctrine , which , with little limitation , may be termed the professed doctrine of all established churches ia Christendom ;
and these are the three first verses of St . John ' s Gospel , and that passage which is to be found from the 5 th to the 12 th verses of St . Paul ' s Epistle to the Philippians . The latter seems to me the strongest and most direct . * Being , ' says the Apostle , * in the form of God , he thought it not robhery to be equal with God . ' Of the first part of the passage Paley and Sherlock ,. * though drawing from it different conclusions , say that the words ia the original will bear a different interpretation . Of this I cannot pretend to judge ; but if , in our common version of the Epistle , the interpretation or
translation of the first part of the passage be right , it is very obvious that the last , which says , ' therefore God , [ even his God , ] ' &c , &c , must be wrong , for they are utterly inconsistent with one another , f The introductory verses to
St . John ' s Gospel , where it is said , ' in the beginning was the Word / &c , &c , are not in my opinion so strong as the above-mentioned assertion of St . Paul ; for a being so great and excellent as to be endowed with power and wisdom to create this world , might be called God from such derived glory , without implying any equality with the Supreme God from whom he has
• " See Paley ' s Sermons on Hebrews xiii . 8 , and Sherlock ' s Sermons ou Philippians it . 9 . " t •* The usual reply to this objection—that the exaltation here meant regards Jeans Christ in his human nature only—appears to me an ingenious subtlety to evade the objection , not to answer it . To be exalted beyond every name that is named in heaven , would certainly be great honour to human nature , as personified in Christ , but would be no honour or exaltation at all to that divine Being , who had thought it no robbery to be equal with God . "
Untitled Article
Joanna Baillie on the Nature and Dignity of Christ * 509
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 2, 1831, page 509, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2600/page/5/
