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Caracalla (211 A.D.) is said to have been suckled by a Jewish nurse. And the beastly Heliogabalus (219 A.D.) hated pork, and had received the sign of circumcision." 48.

Many such converts in low places as in high, followed the recruiting drums of the baser serjeants of the Jew, affected some of his obscrvances, and mobbed to his standard when pitched, as often it was by his fanatics, as the naked symbol of an unfraitful monotheism. For so, it was but riddance from fear of the gods, and meant atheism and looseness of lifo.

But when, not as soothsayer, imposter, exorcist,49 but apostle, himself exemplified his idea of the Godhead by its attendant moralities, fail he might to persuade proselytes to the feet of his Supreme, but fail he could not to persuade sincere men to respect, if only from a distance, a faith whoso Divino, ho roflected in his human, righteousness.

No convert to Judaism surely was Julius Cæsar. But ho had tested, what Tacitus at his bitterest, concedes, the "faith inviolably observed" by the Jew.50 And despite grudge of Greek and Roman priesthood, Cæsar insisted that in Romo itself there should be equal security for the worship of the Jew as for that of Greece and Italy.51

Such was his admiration of true Judaism, that in his private chapel, among images of other benefactors of mankind, the good Alexander Severus (222 A.D.-235) reared one to Abraham, and so protected the privileges of his descendants that their effusiveness blessed him as Father of the Synagogue. Adulation this? No. The natural exaggeration of gratitude.

For, except gleams of grace to them as parasites at the Palace, since the ruin of their Capital by Titus, the degradation of more than a hundred and fifty years had been grinding despair into the souls of the children of Abraham, when suddenly an Emperor of Rome consecrates the majesty of their

48 This, possibly, however, as priest of the Syrian sun god, Heliogabalus, whose name he assumed. Milman's History of the Jews, ii. 483, 484

49 Of the low Jews of Rome says Juvenal, "for the minutest corn Jews will sell you any dream you please." Satire vi. p. 60, Bohn. At Rome" the Jews became the principal exorcists." Lecky, European Morals, i. 404.

60 Merivales Rome, vi. 204.

51 Milman's History of the Jews, ii. 484.

great forefather and throws the ægis of Rome in front of their religion.

True that in the imperial oratory, on par with Abraham stood Appolonius of Tyana, Pythagorean heathen, and the Jew's arch heretic, Jesus Christ. True, again, that, confirming the religious privileges of the Jew, the impartial Emperor confirmed also those of the heathen, and worse, the Christian. And still farther true was it, that like his circumcised predecessor, Severus had been priest of the Syrian sun god Heliogabalus, nor ever ostensibly was other than heathen.

But under his sigh of relief from oppression sank out of sight for a while the bitterest antipathies of the Jew. And unless against his slumbering aversion to the Gentile, heathen, or specially Christian, rubbed too roughly, he, once vaunting himself the spiritual paragon of mankind, was content to cower in equality of clientship with those hitherto under foot of his haughtiness. A. G. Laurie.

ARTICLE X.

The Resurrection of the Dead; or an Exegesis of Portions of the 15th of 1. Corrinthians

PART II.

FROM the point in this chapter to which we arrived, in our former article, verse 28 to verse 35, nothing is said by the author that can be of any service to us in our inquiry concerning the resurrection, as presented in this part of Paul's writings. We will, therefore, pass over this portion of the chapter without remark.

Having given a clear and distinct statement of the doctrine of the resurrection, the apostle puts the rest of what he has to say into an answer to a question or questions, which he supposes some one to ask.

But some one will say, How are the dead raised? and with what manner of body do they come? 35.

I. It is generally thought that this passage contains essentially but one question, as if the two clauses related to one and the same process. With this view, to be raised and to come are the same idea. This opinion we do not accept. To one in this world, the resurrection is not coming, but going. Had the author been in the resurrection state, and been writing for the inhabitants of that world, the questions would have been proper ones. How are the dead raised up? and with what manner of body do they come? But as the author re

sided on the earth, and was writing for the benefit of his earthly brethren, he must have intended by being raised an action in one direction, and by coming, an action in the opposite direction It is not difficult, we think, to ascertain what

two actions or processes are here meant.

Jesus said to his apostles, that he was going away to prepare a place for them, and would come again to receive them to himself; that where he was there they might be also. this very chapter Paul had referred to this coming of Christ. "They that are Christ's," he says, "shall be made alive," or raised from the dead, "at his coming." This coming is at the hour of their death; and that, therefore, is the time of their resurrection. Paul believed and taught that Jesus would not be alone when he came for his disciples; that his saints would be with him, 1 Thess. iii. 13. In another place he says that the dead. God will bring with Jesus, 1 Thess. iv. 14. This may be only an inference of Paul from the words of Jesus, relating to another subject, namely, that he would come in the glory of his Father, with his angels; or it may be that he had received direct instructions on this subject. If the saints are to come with Christ, the interrogator in the passage before us would like to ask, With what manner of body do they come? He assumes that they will have entered the body which they are to occupy forever, and will come with it. It is easy to see that this implies a previous resurrection, which could only be coincident with the coming of Christ for his disciples, namely, at death.

This view is confirmed by the teaching of this same apostle in 2 Cor. v. 1-8, where he says, the earthly tabernacle is dissolved and the house that is of heaven assumed at the same moment, that is, at death. He says, too, that in the earthly body we are absent from the Lord; but that being absent from the body we are present with the Lord; and this last implies that we are clothed upon with the immortal robes. Our being with the Lord is the promise of Jesus that he will take us to himself, that where he is, there we may be also.

We conclude that the verse we are considering relates to two processes, first, the resurrection, and second, what is supposed to take place with some, after they have entered on tho resurrection state. "How are the dead raised?" What is the nature of the change which they experience in going from this world to the next? And when Jesus and his saints come, according to his promise, to take his disciples to the place prepared for them, "with what manner of body do they come?" This meaning is consistent in itself, and the interpretation agrees perfectly with what the same author teaches in other places.

II. If we follow Paul in our notice of this language, wo shall take up the last question before we do the first, namely, with what manner of body do they come? This shows us plainly that the character of the resurrection body was a matter of deep interest then, as it has been ever since. Then, from the way the author takes the subject up, it is plain that some thought the future or resurrection body would be the same which we now have. He certainly discards this idea, which he would not have done if nobody had held it. This theory is inconsistent with the doctrine of a continuous resurrection, and makes it altogether a future event. We are very confident Paul's doctrine is the continuous or progressive resurrection. Such, too, is the teaching of Jesus to the Sadducees. He says that the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, were raised before the time of Moses. We can think of no point of time so suitable as the moment of their death. That was being" gathered to their fathers."

No one seems to have held to a future life without a future body. No question is asked involving that idea. The point at issue seems to have been, whether the future body would be physical or spiritual.

Thou foolish one, that which thou thyself sowest, is not quickened, except it die; and that which thou sowest, thou sowest not the body that shall be, but a bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other kind; but God giveth it a body, even as it pleased him, and to each seed a body of its own, 36-38.

The epithet," thou foolish one," (aphron apoor,) which Paul applies to his supposed interrogator, looks to us uncivil, not to say abusive. At the same time, if there is any thing reproachful or discourteous in it, there was no one to take offence. The words are those of Paul; and if any one of them is not the best that could have been employed, he is alone to blame. The literal sense of aphron is unwise, from a negative, and phren the mind. Jesus had used the word and applied it to the learned Pharisees; and Paul had applied it to himself, and claimed the indulgence of his brethren in boasting a little, as he calls it, on that ground. See Luke xi. 40; 2 Cor. xi. 16, 19.

III. The comprehensive character of the question, How are the dead raised? is an important point in this discussion. It is a common practice of a certain class of interpreters to assume that all the apostle says about the resurrection in this chapter applies to the righteous. It is very plain that those who take this ground, look upon the apostle's description of the resurrection state as indicative of an exalted condition of glory and felicity that can belong to none but the righteous. That this condition belongs only to the righteous we gladly admit. And hence, when we find conclusive proof that it is a condition designed for all men, we are driven irresistibly to the conclusion that all men will be righteous in the immortal world. We use the word irresistibly, because we doubt not that some do, as we once did, resist this conclusion with all their might, instead of accepting it joyfully, as we might expect.

NEW SERIES. VOL. XXI.

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