Judas the servant of, Jude Behold, I John saw, Apoc.

133

ANNOTATIONS

UPON

CHAPTER V.

V.

(A) The introit, what. (B) Epistles and gospels very necessary; why CHAP. epistles when all are not so. The reason and defence of that denomination. (C) Advent, what, and why observed. (D) Christmas day, its antiquity, variously observed in the primitive times. The precise day dubious, and unnecessary to be known. Calvin passionately for it. Observed by the synod of Dort and the Belgic Church. A main argument for it. (E) Two communions anciently in one forenoon. (F) Why the feasts of St. Stephen, St. John, and Innocents, are celebrated near Christmas day. (G) Antiquity of the Circumcision feast. (H) Epiphany, what, ancient. (I) Ash-Wednesday and Lent, the original and various observation of them. (K) Palm-Sunday, how observed. (L) The holy week, why so called. (M) Maundy Thursday, a day of great note. (N) Good Friday, anciently a very high day, a day of general absolution. (0) Easter Eve, the great day of baptizing competents. Watching the sepulchre, whence derived. (P) Easter day of Apostolical institution. (Q) Easter Monday and Easter Tuesday very anciently observed. (R) Dominica in Albis. (S) Rogation days, why instituted. (T) Ascension day, why rarely mentioned in antiquity. Pentecost, what. Synods anciently summoned about this time. (V) Whit-Sunday, why so called, a private conjecture. (W) St. Andrew's day, why the first festival. (X) Conversion of St. Paul, why not observed. Paul and Peter, one entire festival, and anciently, and of late years. (Y) The purification of Mary, anciently how called, why Candlemas day. (Z) The annunciation of the Virgin Mary, how ancient. (AA) St. Philip and Jacob, and All Saints. (BB) St. Peter hath no single day. (CC) The festival of Mary Magdalene, why discontinued.

A The introits.] The introits were certain psalms, appointed for certain days, and were at first devised as decent employments for the people, whilst the priest was ascending up to the high Altar. They did somewhat resemble those psalms of degrees appointed in the service of the temple.

B

Epistles and gospels.] The epistles and gospels need no advocate to plead for them, it not being imaginable that Christians assembling for sacred exercises, should omit the main fundamentals of Christianity; or that the Jews should

L'ESTRANGE.

V.

CHAP. have the law and the prophets read in their synagogues every Sabbath day, as it is clear they had, and that the Christians should debar themselves of having the epistles and gospels (the great evidences of their faith) rehearsed in their assembly places, in their churches. Having had occasion before 134 to deliver the practice of the primitive Church in this particular, and to evidence that those leading fathers did not, és eτUXEV "at peradventure," and casually to read these lessons, but were studious to fit and dispose them to the concernment of every festival, I shall not actum agere, but only add that without those lessons the festivals would signify little, for what can more illustrate the design of the holy day, than the recital of the history upon which it is founded? So that these canonical narratives may pass for the prime office of every day, for which they are set apart. But some will say, why epistles, when several of them were taken out of the Acts, as that for St. Stephen's day, and several others; some out of the Revelation, as that for Innocents' day; yea, some out of the Old Testament, as that for Ash-Wednesday, out of Jeremy, Isaiah, and others. To this it is answered, that (though it were more proper, in my opinion, to call them lessons, yet) since denomination usually is derived from the major part, the word epistle is no unapt appellation for them, the paucity of the rest being considered. Deplorable is that cause which hath nothing but a logomachy and word-war to defend it had this word-catcher searched into antiquity, he might have seen Clemens thus bespeaking the Corinthians, ȧvaλάβετε τὴν ἐπιστολὴν Παύλου τοῦ μακάριου τοῦ ἀποστόλου τί πρῶτον ὑμῖν ἐν ἀρχῇ τοῦ εὐαγγελίου ἔγραψεν ; “ take into your hands the epistle of blessed Paul the Apostle; what writes he first to you, in the beginning of his gospel?" whence it is evident that anciently the word gospel denoted the whole system of the New Testament, which we restrain now to the noblest part of it. And it being so, we shall the less weigh the objection, but pass on to discourse what hath come to our cognizance, as most observable, relating to those days severally taken, not intending to speak to all, but to such only as, being of most remark, have afforded the most plentiful matter for memorials.

a Clemens Epist. ad Corinth. 47.

C

V.

First Sunday in Advent.] The first initiation of our CHAP. Saviour into the office of a Mediator was His manifestation in the flesh, and incarnation; a thing promised all along, from the very fall of wretched man, until, as the Apostle said, "the fulness of time was come," Gal. iv. 4. And the more remote from this time, the more obscure the prophecies; the nearer the more explicit. First, Gen. iii., "the seed of the woman shall break the serpent's head." Go on to Abraham, Gen. xii. 3, "in thy seed" (declaring specificatively in whose) [Gen. 22. 18.] "shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." Go on to David," of the fruit of thy body will I set upon thy throne," Psalm cxxxii. 11. Proceed to Esay, the prophecy is more apodeictical, more demonstrative, "behold a Virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and she shall call His name Emanuel," chap. vii. ver. 14. Go nearer to the approaching of this time, still more Ecce's, "behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and thou shalt call His name Jesus," Luke i. 31. And the Virgin Mary to herself, "behold from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed," ib. v. 48. All this to keep up the hope of the long looked for theophany, and the Messias's appearance in the flesh. God Himself having thus led in the nativity of our Saviour, with such a train of anteceding predictions to assure man that He would come, the Christian Church thought it also expedient that the day of commemoration, that "He is come," should be somewhat more than ordinarily attended. And upon this very account she hath assigned to this great festival the four Sundays preceding, (the first beginning always next before, or after, or on St. Andrew's day,) which are as it were one Christmas Eve, or as so many heralds to proclaim the approaching of His feast, and are therefore called Advent Sundays as fore-speaking Christ's birthday; and therefore the ancient author of the Nativity Sermon ascribed to St. Cyprian begins it with adest diu expectata nativitas, i. e. "the long looked for nativity which we expected all this time of Advent 135 is come at length." And upon this account proper lessons taken out of the evangelist, or gospel prophet Esay, agreeable to their design are allotted them.

D

Christmas day.] This anniversary solemnity cannot be denied to be as old as up to Gregory Nazianzen's time, he

V.

CHAP. and his great intimate St. Basil having each an excellent homily upon it, τὰ δὲ νῦν θεοφάνια ἡ πανήγυρις, εἴτ ̓ οὖν yevénia, saith one", "this celebrity is called God's appearance, or His nativity.” "Ονομα θώμεθα τῇ ἑορτῇ ἡμῶν Oeopávia, saith the other, "we name this our festival the theophany. Nor is there in either homily one syllable inferring the either usage or institution of that day to have commenced then, wherefore we may presume it was existent long before; indeed, Nicephorus sadly tells us so, relating no less than twenty thousand Christians massacred by fire on that day, being assembled at church, under the Dioclesianic persecution. A matter not incredible, for if it be true, as little doubt is to be made of it, what Gildas reports of us Britons", that after that persecution ceased, "the Christians began again to repair their churches, and celebrated festivals," why should not this great day make one? What rational argument can be opposed to dissuade us that we should not think it of as long duration as any other festival (the Lord's day excepted) whatsoever, considering that even Christianity itself resulteth from it? In the determination of the precise and true day, antiquity itself hath been to scek, as well as modern times. Clemens Alexandrinus, who flourished about the end of the second century, saith that of Tepieрyóτεροι, "the most curious inquisitors after the year and day of Christ's nativity, have fixed it, some on the twenty-fifth of the month of Pachon," (our May,) " and some on the twentyfifth of Pharmouthi," (our April). The Churches of Egypt observed it constantly upon the sixth of January, celebrating both it and His baptism on the same day, which they called the Epiphany. The Asiatic Grecians, and Syrians, turned over His baptism to another day, retaining still the sixth of January for His nativity. The Church of Rome, pretending to a more perfect information from the censual rolls of Augustus Cæsar, kept close to the twenty-fifth of December: from thence it was first transported to Antioch, as is evident from St. Chrysostom's homily preached there upon that day, where he declareth the darkness of uncertainty wherein those

b [Orat. 38. in Christi Nativit.]
c [Homilia in Sanctam Christi ge-
nerationem. Appendix, tom. ii. p. 8.
S. Basilii.]

d [See p. 87.]

e Stromat., lib. i.
f Cassian. Collat. x. 2.