them, Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of God.-But as touching the Resurrection of the dead, Have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living*. Now this very Text, had it been impartially considered, would alone have been sufficient to convince these Answerers of the truth here contended for. At least it convinced a much wiser man, the excellent HUGO GROTIUS, whose words to his friend Ger. Vossius are as follow: "In Mosis lege (non dico in veteri Testamento: nam "de Prophetis, præsertim posterioribus, res longe alia est) æternæ vitæ non fieri mentionem nisi per um"bras, aut rationis consequentiam, certissimum mihi videtur, Christi authoritate, qui Sadducæos non "verbis directis, sed ratiocinando refellitt." There is not, I repeat it, any plain Text in the whole Bible (and this is amongst the plainest) so strangely mistaken and perverted: For, 1. The appellation of the GoD of Abraham, &c. is generally understood to be quoted by

66

*Matt. xxii. 29-32.

Our

† Ep. 130. ed. Am. 1687. EPISCOPIUS had the very same idea of this argument-- Et sane opinionum, quæ inter Judæos erat, circa vitam futuri sæculi discrepantia arguit promissiones Lege factas tales esse ut ex iis certi quid de vita futuri sæculi non possit colligi. Quod et Servator noster non obscure innuit, cum resurrectionem mortuorum colligit, Matt. xxii. non ex promisso aliquo Legi addito, sed ex generali tantum illo promisso Dei, quo se Deum Abrahami, Isaaci, & Jacobi futurum spoponderat : quæ tamen illa collectio magis nititur cognitione intentionis divinæ sub generalibus istis verbis occultatæ aut comprehensæ, de qua Christo certo constabat, quam necessaria consequentia sive verborum vi ac virtute manifestâ qualis nunc et in verbis Novi Testamenti, ubi vita æterna & resurrectio mortuorum proram et puppim faciunt totius Religionis Christianæ, et tam clare ac diserte promittuntur ut ne hiscere quidem contra quis possit." Inst. Theol. lib. iii. § 1. c. 2.

our blessed Lord, as a direct proof* of the Resurrection of the dead body, in the same manner that St. Paul urges the case of JESUS:-But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of them that slept. But can any thing be more irrational or absurd? The bodics of Abraham and the Patriarchs were yet in dust, and reduced to their primitive earth. So that in this sense, the reasoning is so far from proving that God WAS NOT the God of the dead, that it proves, he was. For Abraham's body continued yet lifeless at the very time when God was called his God: Whatsoever was to be the future condition of it, that could not influence the present appellation of the God of Israel. What hath led men into this mistake is the introduction to the argument,-But as touching the resurrection of the dead,-which they supposed an exordium to a direct proof: Whereas it is an intimation only, to what an indirect proof tended; namely, that the Resurrection of the body might be inferred through the medium of the separate existence of the soul; which was the only point Jesus proposed to prove directly to them. The case stood thus: He was here arguing against the SADDUCEES. Now these supported their opinion, of no resurrection of the body, on a principle that the soul had no separate eristence, but fell into nothing at the dissolution of its union with the body; which Principle once over

Mr. Le Clerc, in his Defense des Sentimens sur l'Histoire Critique, has fallen into this mistake. Nôtre Seigneur presse ces termes, en sorte qu'il suppose qu'il ne faut qu'entendre la langue dans laquelle l'Ecriture parle pour reconnoitre la Resurrection, Matt. xxii. 31.-Il ne faut que lire ce raisonnement de Jesus Christ, pour sentir qu'il est tiré de cette expression, étre le Dieu de quelqu'un, que l'on ne pourroit appliquer à Dieu, si celui, dont on dit qu'il est le Dieu, etoit mort sans devoir jamais resusciter. pp. 102, 103. † 1 Cor. xv. 20. VOL. V.

EE

thrown,

thrown, they had nothing left to oppose to the writings of the Prophets, or the preaching of JESUS. Against this principle therefore our blessed Lord thus divinely argues :-"But as concerning the Resurrection of the dead, You ground your denial of it on this supposition, that the soul dies with the body; but you err aş much in not knowing the Scriptures, as in not rightly conceiving of the power of God. For the words of the Law, which you allow to be a good authority, directly prove that the soul doth not die with the body, but hath a separate existence. Now Moses tells us, that God, long after the death of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, called himself their God: But God is not the God of the dead, but of the living; therefore the souls of those Patriarchs are yet existing in a separate state."This is the force of the argument *.

2. The second mistake is, that JESUS, by these words, insinuates that Moses CULTIVATED the Doctrine of a Resurrection, or a Future state. But here again the Objectors seem to forget, against whom the argument is addressed, the SADDUCEES. Now these not only held that Moses did not teach, but that he did NOT BELIEVE that Doctrine. This was the error JESUS aimed to confute; and only this; because the opinion that Moses did not teach or cultivate it, was no error at all, as appears, amongst many other reasons, even from hence: that the Jews might reasonably understand the title of the God of Abraham, &c. to mean the peculiar tutelary God of Abraham's Family; for the terms Jacob and Israel are frequently used in Scripture for the whole nation of the Jews; Aaron for the whole order of the priesthood; Dan, Judah, &c. for the whole body of each Tribe: And, as in reason they might, so by the History of the early * See note [HH] at the end of this volume.

Jews,

Jews, we find in fact, they did understand it in this

sense.

The real force therefore of the text, here urged, amounts to this, from JESUS's argument it appears, that the separate existence of the soul might be fairly inferred from the writings of Moses: Which inference I not only grant some carly Jews did make, but have proved likewise; though not indeed from these words, for the reason given above. And so much my Answerers might have understood, had they only observed that this has all the marks of a new Argument*, unknown to the Pharisees; as indeed both the dignity of our Lord's character, and the impression he would make on his Opposers, seemed to require it should be. Accordingly we find they are struck dumb; and the multitude that heard this, astonished at his doctrine †. But would Either of them have been so affected with an old foundered argument, long hacknied in the Schools and Synagogues of the Pharisees? Nay, how should it be otherwise than NEW? for the words, I am the God of Abraham, &c. as delivered by Moses, were supposed, both by Pharisees and Sadducees, to be spoken of a NATIONAL GOD; as in Gen. xvii. 8, 9. xxvi. 3. xxviii. 13. They therefore could not see how it implied the continued existence of the Patriarch Abraham, &c. But Jesus, in using the word God, to GOD, signify the Maker and Lord of all things, rightly inferred that the Patriarchs still continued to exist. I am not ignorant, that the modern Rabbins employed this argument very familiarly for a Resurrection; but

See note [II] at the end of this volume. + Matt. xxii. 33. The learned Pocock, speaking of this Argument, says, His e Lege depromptis cum Sadducæos ad silentium adegisset Christus, dicitur perculsam fuisse turbam doctrinâ ejus. Unde patet luculentiori ipsum contra eos argumento usum, quam ullo adhuc usi fuerant Pharisæi. Notæ miscell. ad Portam Mosis, cap. vi.

they borrowed it from the GOSPEL, as they have done many other things; the reason of which, our rabbinical Commentators, such as Lightfoot, not apprehending, have supposed the borrowing to be all on the side of the lenders but more of this matter in its place.

I

Thus much for this celebrated Text. In which, however, the learned Dr. Sherlock, the late Bishop of London, finds enough to support himself in his own opinion, That the Law of Moses afforded a good proof of a future state to the ancient Jews. But to whom did it afford this proof? To the ancient Jews, who understood the words in the text, in question, to relate to a national God; or to us Christians, who understand them of the Creator of the Universe? Now though I cannot agree with his Lordship in this conclusion, yet agree with him in a better thing, which is, That the Law of Moses affords a good proof of its own divinity; indeed, by a medium his Lordship never thought of, namely, That it afforded no proof of a future state at all. But what if his Lordship meant no more than what his respectable Father endeavoured to prove †, viz. that the EXTRAORDINARY PROVIDENCE (which I hold to be the very circumstance which kept the Jews from the knowledge of a future state) indeed shews that they had the knowledge of it? If this be the case, all I have to say is, that Their proof of a future state from the LAW, begins just where my proof of its divinity ends.

II. We come next to the Parable of the rich Man and Lazarus; where the former, being in Hell, desires Abraham, whom he saw afar off in Paradise, to send Lazarus to his father's house, to testify to his Brethren,

• Sermons by the Bishop of London.

Sermons by the Dean of St. Paul's, on the Immortality of the Soul and a Future State, p. 141.

and