The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1881-11-30

III Vne DlVlne essence; you character
Use this as blasphemy; but the Old
Testament, on which you rest your con-
ceptions of the Unity Of God, prefgured
this; it spoke of the human representa-
tives of the Father on earth (who were
types of me) as divine; and if they (the
mere organs to give effect to the divine
administrator were spoken of as par
takers of the divine nature, how do you
call it blasphemy for me to claim (but in
a much higher sense) to be sharer of
the Divine nature-for me, who consti-
tute the antitype to which all the SYM
bolism of the Old Testament pointed-for
me, whom the Father hath consecrated
(anointed and set apart and sent into
the world Gin my incarnate form), to
claim comsa6stamtiality with God?' That
(such is the train of thought does not
contradict the unity of God; for (see
verse 39) "the Father is in me, and 1 in
him" the Son and the Father constitute
a perfect union; that union which the
psalmist and the author of the book of
Exodus had in mind when they called
even the human representatives of your
theocracy the sons of God Christ was
the realisation of that union of the hu-
man with the divine. In the lowest
sense (such is his argument your judges
were the sons of God; am such (the
Greek is not "the Son of God" but
Gods Son y in the highest sense and the
doctrine that there is but one God is not
impaired by my complete union with the
Father; am his Son in all the fullness of
that term. And if you had understood
the thought which underlay the applica-
ton of the language of the Psalm to your
earthly judges, you would not have stig-
matised it as blasphemy when I claimed
to be one with the Father
The judges of Israel aOere not in reality
gods, and the Jews should have per-
ceived that the designation was only be-
slowed on them on the ground that they
were symbols and types of the Coming
One, 1.-THE express image" of the Father:
was it, therefore, logical, when this King
appeared, that they should deem it un-
suitable to apply the term to him? They
should have erpected King to whom the
term did apply. In other words, they
should have looked for Divine Saviour;
for, to a Saviour who should come forth
as the Son of God, the Scriptures pointed.
This view is corrobola ted if we look
back to chap. viii: S. 1t should be first
noted that in the passage at the hee d of
this article, the statement is that "then
took the Jews up stones again to stone
him" this reference is to chap viii: So,
80, where it is said: "Jesus said unto
them, Before Abraham was, I am. Then
took they up stones, ETC."
Now Jesus had here explicitly affirmed
his pre-existence before he came into the
world. The Jews regarded this as a claim
to divinity. This claim was outstanding
and unretracted, when Jesus said again
in chap. K: I and the Father are one;
it is part of the same declaration of his
character; and this is to be kept in view
when we undertake to construe the pas
sage before us.
We have farther confederation, if we
look forward to verse 38 of chapter K,
where Jesus concludes with the declara-
tion " the Father is in me, and I in him.
The Jews did not understand him as
apologising or mitigating what he had
previously said, to1' therefore" as is de-
clared in the next verse, "they sought
again to take him" If he had explained
away the charge of blasphemy-had soft
ened it down, as our commentators as
sert, why did they seek again to take
him"