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converfion to chriftianity. And the plain inference from this is, that the orthodox Fathers must neceffarily have fuppofed, that the chriftian church, in general, was at first unitarian, and that it continued to be fo a confiderable time. For none of them say, or hint, when this caution on the part of the apostles ceased; and they represent them as using it in the very latest of their writings, as in thofe from Paul after his confinement at Rome, and therefore not long before the destruction of Jerufalem, At that time, therefore, they must have thought that the great body of chriftians were unitarians, and without being confidered as heretics on that account.

But the most decifive proof of this is their univerfally concluding, that the doctrines of the pre-existence and divinity of Christ were never taught clearly and explicitly till it was done by John, in the introduction to his gofpel, which they supposed to have been published among the last of the books of the New Teftament, and after the death of the other apoftles.

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CHAPTER VII.

Of John being thought to have been the firft who clearly and boldly taught the doctrines of the Pre-exiflence and Divinity of Chrift.

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As this is an article of confiderable consequence, I fhall produce a redundance of evidence in fupport of it; nothing being better calculated to fatisfy us, that, in the opinion of the christian Fathers, the doctrines of the pre-existence and divinity of Christ were not generally received in the life-time of the other apoftles; and, therefore, that fimple unitarianifm could not have been confidered as any herefy in the early These authorities I fhall produce, as I have generally done others, nearly in the order of time in which the writers flourished. I fhall only first observe, that John feems to have got the title of Jeory, divine, from this circumftance, of his teaching the doctrine of the divine logos, which was fuppofed to be peculiar to him. This appellation

ages.

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appellation is given to him in the title to the book of Revelation. It is mentioned by Athanafius in his Sermo Major de Fide*, and alfo by Cyril of Alexandria+. For a fimilar reafon Ifaiah is ftiled Theologus by Eufebius, in If. xxiv. 10.

I fhall also remind my reader in this place, that this hypothefis of John having taught the doctrine of the divinity of Christ in the introduction of his gofpel, does not occur in the earliest writers, These being nearer to the fource of information, fay that John had a view to the Gnoftics only, both in his epiftles, and the introduction to his gofpel. This was the opinion of Irenæus, who wrote about the year 170; for which fee this work, vol. I. p. 253. The first writer who fays that John meant the unitarians, I believe,

was Origen.

Montfaucon's Collectio, vol. 2. p. 13.

Hom. Opera, vol. 2. p. 75

t Montfaucon's Collectio, vol. 2. p. 450.

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SECTION I.

The Acknowledgments of the Chriftian Fathers that John was the first who taught the doctrines above-mentioned.

ORIGEN, though a zealous defender of the doctrines of the pre-existence and divinity of Chrift, yet, as will appear in its proper place, only confidered them as more fublime doctrines, fit for the more perfect chriftians. He fays, that " John "alone introduced the knowledge of the

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eternity of Chrift to the minds of the "Fathers*. John himself was tranfformed into God, and fo became partaker "of the truth, and then pronounced that "the word of God was in God from the beginning +."

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* Joannes fola ejus æterna in notitiam fidelium animarum introducit. Opera, vol. 2. p. 428.

+ Sanctus itaque theologus in deum tranfmutatus, veritatis particeps, domini verbum fubfiftere in deo principio, hoc eft deum filium in deo patre, pronunciat, Ibid.

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"No one," fays this writer, "taught the "divinity of Chrift fo clearly as John, who

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presents him to us, faying, I am the light "of the world, I am the way, the truth, and "the life, I am the refurrection, I am the gate, I am the good Shepherd, and in the "Revelation, I am the alpha and the omega, "the beginning and the end, the first and the laft. We may therefore boldly say, that, "as the gofpels are the first fruits" (or the "most excellent part)" of the fcriptures, "fo the gospel of John is the first fruits of "the gofpels; the fenfe of which no per"fon can conceive, except he who reclines "on the breast of Jefus, and who receives "from Jefus his mother Mary, and makes "her his own. He must be another John, "who was shewn by Jefus as another Jesus. "For he who is perfect does not himself "live, but Chrift lives in him. And fince "Chrift lives in him, he fays to Mary con

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cerning him, Behold thy Son, Chrift " himself*.

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* Ουδείς γαρ εκείνων ακραίως εφανέρωσεν αυτή την θεότητα ως Ιωάννης, παραςησας αυτον λεγοντα, εγω ειμε το φως τα κοσμο, εγω ειμι η οδος, και η αλήθεια, και η ζωή. εγω ειμι η

ανάςασις.

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