It may be assumed as a maxim, which cannot be controverted; that a doctrine of such importance as that which relates to the Being that made us, and whom we are to worship, whether it be one person, one intelligent agent, or consisting of two or three such persons; cannot depend upon one or two particular passages of scripture, especially such as are doubtful and obscure; but must be what is apparent throughout the whole, wherever the name of God occurs, and be every where plain and intelligible to the ordinary plowman, who makes use of his understanding, as to the greatest scholar.
Now if you apply this rule to the doctrine of the Divine Unity, to there being one God only, one in the strictest sense, one person: you find this to be the most plain and evident, in every page of the sacred writings, where the Divine Being is mentioned. For always, some one of the singular pronouns, I, thou, he, me, thee, him, are used concerning that ineffable and peerless majesty; which demonstrate the point, to every sound understanding, that God is one single person, beyond the possibility of confutation; and necessarily exclude Jesus Christ, and every other person whatsoever, from being God.
But with respect to the Trinity, as it is called to there being Three Divine Persons, who are each of them God, and to be adored, by distinct personal invocations, God the Father, God the Son, and God the holy Ghost; there is not one book of the Old Testament, wherein a man of a plain unprejudiced understanding, could find, that there were any more persons than one, or any other than the single person of Jehovah, who was God, and to be worshiped.
The far greater part of the books of the New Testament can not be said to hold forth an idea of any such three divine persons and their worship; speaking expressly of one person only, who was God, and to be worshiped; so that we must necessarily infer, that the sacred writers of these books knew nothing of such three divine persons, but of one only.
No comments:
Post a Comment