in order to throw difficulties and difcouragements in his way, and puzzle truth with learned obfcurities,-He fays, the late Mr. Hutchinson "was of opinion, that being derived "from, to take an oath, fignified the "perfons of the deity engaged in an oath to per

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I

form a covenant, and the learned editor of "M. De Calafio's Concordance at London, has "introduced this notion into that Concordance "under the root n juravit, &c. And the "late Mr. Catcot in his fermon on the Elabim, "tells us, that by that word are to be under"ftood perfons who have fworn to a covenant, "have laid themfelves under a conditional exe--> "cration. And he lays fo great a stress upon fog "this interpretation, as to count it indifputable. "He reprefents it as a point of very great “consequence to be acknowledged and defended, " as if it were even neceffary to the right under"Standing of fome of the chief doctrines in re"vealed religion."

Here then the Doctor has given us a key to the oppofition.It is the extraordinary Aress. Mr. C. has laid upon the interpretation of Aleim," and the introduction of it by Mr. R. into his edition of M. De Galafio, which has awakened. the opponents curiofity, which might, by their own accounts, have been yet asleep. -For: fays the Arch-deacon, (p. 6.) whilft, for in"ftance, the derivation of Elobim from the "verb Alah, in the conftruction of juravit }

Or

or adjuravit, was confidered only as a pro"bable conjecture, it feemed to carry no more weight than other learned conjectures do; "Nor was it thought worth the while to be very "curious or particular in enquiring into the reafons of preferring it to any of the other "derivations."

But whence proceeds this fatal indolence, this—I had almost faid, criminal indifference about the Hebrew language and the things delivered in it? could not HE, who teacheth man knowledge, frame a language that should convey it? would God when he made a revelation of himself and will, make it in a language the meaning of whofe words man could not attain-has God revealed himself by various names, and shall it be thought amazing that any of them fhould exprefs that moft tranfcendent goodness, without which man had better not have been, the affurance of his redemption?

----

The wifer Heathens were full of the importance of divine names, as an ingenious author from Jamblicus obferves." Which they did "not hold to be of human inftitution, but "from the gods, and what therefore could "not be altered, as not retaining the fame "peculiar force when translated into any other.

language, and (what is worth obferving) that "the barbarous (i; e. the Jewish and oriental "names) were more emphatical and brief, and "had the least ambiguity and variety of diction.

"And whatever the moderns, who are sharp. fighted above measure, can do; they, the "ancients, always taught, that we must know "the ufe and meaning of names, before we "can the things themfelves, and that by this "means is their nature best investigated and "manifested. Thus Plato in Cratylo, # To

1.

ડ

" And

ορθως διδάσκειν, δεν πρωτον εξετάζειν τα ονόματα, "in order to learn rightly, we must first accu"rately enquire into, and fift out names." And again, names have the power of teaching things, and he who truly understands their "names, plainly difcerns the things themselves. "This is what Diodorus fays in Thucydides, 3. δι' λογοι διδασκαλοι των πραγμάτων γιγνονται, words are the teachers of things." "to mention no more, Plutarch, in his Isis and "Ofiris, delivers it as the opinion of all phi& fofophers as well his own, τις μη μανθανοντας όρθώς ακόειν ονομαίων, κακώς χρήθαι και τοις πραγ σε μασιν.” They who are not exact in undertanding names, will make but a bad ufe of, or easily mistake in, the things themselves." Now this general opinion of the fignificancy of names has no foundation of truth in any names but the Hebrew; and that they meant this of the Hebrew names is pretty plain from Plato, who, though he derives divine names originally from the Gods, yet confeffes the Greeks had them from barbarians, .e. the Jews or Orientals. b is one of thefe fignificant names,

66

The

The plural mafculine in the Hebrew is formed by adding to the fingular, then vice versa, the fingular is found by taking from the plural. Take from, and you leave

ים

אלהים is the fingular of אלה to conclude, that

for its fingular. I have reason therefore

Now I find that fingular, and n plural, are each names in S. S. for that being we call God. But the plural cannot be ufed upon account of there being no fingular, because we find the fingular used alfo for

God; and the Lexicographers agree in making

I likewife find ; אלה the plural of אלהים

that the very fame three letters, as a verb, fignify to swear, adjure, fo put under the penalty, obligation, curfe or execration of an oath, &c. And as a noun, an adjuration, the penalty, obligation, curfe or execration of an oath. The word then, when applied perfonally (as) it is when applied to God) must have a perfonal fignification; and may be rendered-the fwearer, adjuror, obligor, &c. and in the plural it will fignify more perfons than one, the fwearers, obligors, &c. But then the plural D', which is the word moftly used for the deity, cannot be put for the effence of God; his effence is, and can be but one. But as perfonality is allowed in the effence; it may properly express that perfonality. And the noted text in Deut. vi. 4. feems to point it

⚫ See Buxtorf under the word.

out,

out,-Jehovah our Aleim is one Jehovah, i. e. the felf-fubfiftent being our Allies is one selffubfiftent being.

If fallen man was to have fomething done for him to put him in ftatu quo, to make him rectus in curia; what more comfortable name could God reveal himself by, and use the ofteneft, than one which implied that his Creators were alfo his Saviours, and had done for him what he could not perform for himself, and were his Allies in his warfare upon earth. Of this import is the name ALEIM, And as the fuffering part of the covenant, the ab, the whole curfe of the law, from which Chrift redeemed us, was to lie upon one, Perfon of the Aleim alone, which he had engaged himself by an Ale to fuffers

Can that perfon be more expreffively, more patheti cally pointed out, than by a participle paffive of the verb Ale, fo called & ALUE, the adjured, the obligee to bear the i.e. the perfon on whom the paffive part of the Ale, fell "who fwore to bear the evil,

Ale

and changed not." For as each, perfon of the deity was under an Ale to perform his refpective part, fo none but the second perfon was under an to fuffer, an mbæ What more natural,

which was his part.

He was not

because he incurred the

what

of the

oath, but because by this 7 of the oath, he took upon