תמונות בעמוד
PDF
ePub

himself bound to propose the gospel to the Jews firft, agreeably to what he declared at Antioch in Pifidia; "it was neceffary "that the word of God fhould firft have

"been spoken to you." Acts, ch. xiii. ver. 46. If the Jews rejected his ministry, he quitted the fynagogue, and betook himfelf to a Gentile audience. At Corinth, upon his first coming thither, he reasoned in the fynagogue every fabbath; "but when the Jews opposed themselves, and blafphemed, "he departed thence," exprefsly telling them, "from henceforth I will go unto the "Gentiles; and he remained in that city a

66

66

year and fix months." Acts, ch. xviii. ver. 6—11. At Ephefus, in like manner, for the space of three months he went into the fynagogue; but "when divers were “ hardened and believed not, but spake evil "of that way, he departed from them and

66

feparated the difciples, difputing daily in "the school of one Tyrannus; and this "continued by the fpace of two years." Acts, ch. xix. ver. 9, 10. Upon infpecting the history, I fee nothing in it which

nega

tives

tives the fuppofition, that St. Paul pursued the fame plan at Theffalonica which he adopted in other places; and that, though he resorted to the fynagogue only three fabbath-days, yet he remained in the city, and in the exercise of his miniftry amongst the Gentile citizens, much longer; and until the success of his preaching had provoked the Jews to excite the tumult and infurrection by which he was driven away.

66

Another feeming difcrepancy is found in the ninth verse of the first chapter of the epistle; "For they themselves fhow of us "what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how and how ye turned to God from idols "to serve the living and true God." This text contains an affertion, that, by means of St. Paul's miniftry at Theffalonica, many idolatrous Gentiles had been brought over to Christianity. Yet the history, in defcribing the effects of that miniftry, only fays, that "fome of the Jews believed, and of the de"vout Greeks a great multitude, and of the "chief women not a few," (ch. xvii. ver. 4.) The devout Greeks were those who already

[blocks in formation]

worshipped the one true God; and therefore could not be faid, by embracing Christianity, 66 to be turned to God from idols."

Οι

This is the difficulty. The answer may be affifted by the following obfervations : The Alexandrian and Cambridge manufcripts read (for των σεβομένων ελληνων πολυ πληθος) των σεβομένων και ελληνων πολυ πληθος. Iu which reading they are alfo confirmed by the Vulgate Latin. And this reading is, in my opinion, ftrongly supported by the confiderations, firft, that o σεCoμevol alone, i. e. without eλλves, is used in this fenfe in this fame chapter, Paul being come to Athens, διελέγετο εν τη συναγωγή τοις 18δαιοις και τοις σεβομενοις: fecondly, that σεβομενοι and ελληνες no where come together. The expreffion is redundant. The o σeboοι σεβομɛvoi must be ɛλλques. Thirdly, that the xa is much more likely to have been left out incuriâ manus than to have been put in. Or, after all, if we be not allowed to change the prefent reading, which is undoubtedly retained by a great plurality of copies, may not the paffage in the history be confidered

[merged small][ocr errors]

as defcribing only the effects of St. Paul's difcourfes during the three fabbath-days in which he preached in the fynagogue? and may it not be true, as we have remarked above, that his application to the Gentiles at large, and his fuccefs amongst them, was posterior to this?

[blocks in formation]

CHAP. X.

THE SECOND

EPISTLE TO THE THES

SALONIANS.

No. I.

IT may feem odd to alledge obscurity itfelf as an argument, or to draw a proof in favour of a writing, from that which is ufually confidered as the principal defect in its compofition. The prefent epistle, howevea, furnishes a paffage, hitherto unexplained, and probably inexplicable by us, the existence of which, under the darkness and difficulties that attend it, can only be accounted for upon the fuppofition of the epiftle being genuine; and upon that fuppofition is accounted for with great ease. The paffage which I allude to is found in the second chapter: "that day shall not "come, except there come a falling away "firft, and that man of fin be revealed, the "fon of perdition, who oppofeth and ex"alteth himself above all that is called God,

« הקודםהמשך »