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O eceiving this letter, it appeared to me to contain a request, which, had it been made previous to the sending abroad of a report to my disadvantage, had been fair, and I should have freely complied with it. But as things were, I did not feel free to write any explanation to Mr. B., till he should have given some explanation of his conduct towards me. I wished for no humiliating concessions from a man so aged and so respectable as Mr. B.; but I did think myself entitled to some explanation; and that to have complied to his request without it, had been a tame acknowledgment of guilt and fear, of neither of which I was conscious. To this purpose I wrote (on Oct. 7.), in answer to his of Sept. 3, wishing for nothing but a few lines, acknowledging that if he had mistaken my meaning, and thereby injured me, he was sorry; or any thing, however expressed, that should have discovered his regret for having been the occasion of

misrepresentation.

doing we deviate from the Scrip tures: nor is it an article of reve lation that Mr. Baxter's views are erroneous, or that the notions of Calvinists in general concerning Imputation and Substitution are true. I write not thus because I feel the justice of either of these charges, but because I dislike such circuitous methods of judging concerning truth and error. They are unworthy of a candid enquirer after truth, and chiefly calculated to inflame the prejudices of the ignorant. If I have used the term Calvinistic in controversy, it has been merely to avoid circumlocution, and not as discriminating my opponents on account of their differing from Calvin.

Mr. B. supposes that I suspect him of "insidious designs." No; I do not, nor ever did. I never thought him capable of this; but I do think him capable of being so far prejudiced against another, as to think that to be right towards him, which he would think very wrong, if done to himself. I am, affectionately yours, A. F.

LETTER II. On Imputation. Jan. 8, 1803.

But to this letter Mr. B. has written no answer. I have to thank you, however, for the copy of a letter which he addressed to you, dated Dec. 6. Here I find myself charged with having changed MY DEAR BRother, my sentiments; with agreeing with Mr. Baxter in several of his lead- WHILE Mr. B. refuses to give any. ing peculiarities; and with deny-explanation of his conduct, there ing the doctrines of Imputation and Substitution, IN THE SENSE IN WHICH CALVINISTS COMMONLY HOLD, AND HAVE HELD THEM.

I own I feel dissatisfied with this second-hand method of attack, in which the oracles of God are nearly kept out of sight, and other standards of orthodoxy set up in their place. Each of these charges may be true, and yet I be in the right, and Mr. B. in the wrong. It is no crime to change our views, unless in so

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can be no intercourse between me and him. I have no objection to give the most explicit answers in my power to the questions on Imputation and Substitution. I shall therefore address them to you; and you are at liberty to show them to whom you please.

To impute*, signifies, in general, to charge, reckon, or place to account, according to the different objects to which it is applied.

From 20 and Aoyičopai.

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This word, like many others, has charging, reckoning, or placing to a proper and a figurative meaning. the account of persons and things, First: It is applied to the charg- THAT WHICH DOES NOT PROing, reckoning, or placing to the PERLY BELONG TO THEM, AS account of persons and things THOUGH IT DID. This, of course, THAT WHICH PROPERLY BE- is its figurative meaning. In this LONGS TO THEM. This, of course, sense the word is used in the folis its proper meaning. In this lowing passages: "And this your sense the word is used in the fol- heave-offering shall be reckoned lowing passages. "Eli thought unto you as though it were the that she (Hannah) had been drunk-corn of the threshing-floor, and as Hanan and Mattaniah, the fulness of the wine-press." the Treasurers, were counted faith-"Wherefore hidest thou thy face, ful."-"Let a man so account of and holdest me for thine enemy?"us, as the Ministers of Christ, and" If the uncircumcision keep the stewards of the Mysteries of God." righteousness of the law, shall not "Let such an one think this, that his uncircumcision be counted for such as we are in word by letters, circumcision ?"" If he hath when we are absent, such will we wronged thee, or oweth thee ought, be also in deed, when we are pre- put that on my account." sent."-" I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us."* Reckoning or accounting, here, is no other than forming an estimate of persons and things, according to what they are, or appear to be. To impute sin, in this sense, is to charge guilt upon the guilty in a judicial way, with a view to his being punished for it. Thus Shimci besought David that his iniquity might not be imputed to him. Thus the man is pronounced blessed, to whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity: and thus Paul prayed that the sin of those who deserted him might not be laid to their charge.t In this sense, the term is ordinarily used in common life. To impute treason, or any other crime to a man, is the same thing as charging him with having committed it; and with a view to his being punished.

Secondly: It is applied to the

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It is thus I understand the term, when applied to justification. " Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness. To him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted unto him for righteousness."† I do not suppose that "faith" in these passages means the righteousness of the Messiah; for it is expressly called "believing." It means believing, however, not as a virtuous exercise of the mind, which God consented to accept by a composition, taking a part for the whole; but as having respect to the promised Messiah, and so to his righteousness, as the ground of acceptance. Justification is ascribed to faith, as healing frequently is in the New Testament; not as that which imparted the benefit, but that which afforded occasion to the great physician to exercise his power and mercy.

But if it were allowed that faith, in these passages, means the object

* Num. xviii. 27-30. Job xiii. 24. Rom. Philemon 18.

+ 2 Sam. xix. 19. Psalm xxxii. 2. 2 Tim. ii. 26.

iv. 16.

+ Rom. iv. 3, 5.

believed in, still this was not Abraham's own righteousness; and could not be properly imputed, or counted by Him who judges of things as they are, as being so. It was reckoned to him, as if it were his, and the effects or benefits were actually transferred to him; but this was all. Abraham did not become meritorious, or cease to be unworthy. "What is it else, to set our righteousness in the obedience of Christ," says Calvin, "but to affirm that hereby only we are accounted righteous, because the obedience of Christ is imputed to us, as if it were our own?"

It is thus also that I understand the imputation of sin to Christ. He was made sin for us, in the same sense as we are made the righteousness of God in Him. He was accounted in the divine administration, AS IF HE WERE, OR HAD BEEN, the sinner; that those who believe on Him might be accounted AS IF THEY WERE, OR HAD BEEN righteous.

of any one, "he was made suffering;" but it allows us to say, he was made an offering for sin," which was suffering."

The other reasons, however, which Mr. B. suggested, determine my mind to consider aμapría, in this place as meaning sin itself, and not the penal effects of it, I doubt not but that the allusion is to the sin-offering under the law, but not to its being made a sacrifice. Let me explain myself. There were two things belonging to the sinoffering: (1.) The imputation of the sins of the people, signified by the priest's laying his hands on the head of the animal, and confessing over it their transgressions, and which is called " putting them upon it;"† that is, it was counted in the divine administration as if it had been the sinner, and the only sinner of the nation. (2.) Making it a sacrifice, or "killing it before the Lord for an atonement," Lev. i. 4, 5. Now the phrase made sin, in 2 Cor. v. 21. appears to refer to the first stop in this process, in order to the last. It is expressive of

what was preparatory to Christ's suffering of death, rather than of the thing itself; just as our being made righteousness expresses what was preparatory to God's bestowing upon us eternal life.

Mr. B. charges me with having explained the phrase "made sin" made a sacrifice. I have already said, that what I asked him was purely for information. Consider ing his answer as worthy of attention, I have since endeavoured to form a decided opinion on the passage, and to give what he ad- But the verb πoiǹσev, made, is vanced its due weight. I perceive not to be taken literally; for that that many able writers, and among would convey the idea of Christ them Dr. Owen, understand the being really the subject of moral term auapría, in this as in many evil, which none contend for. It other places, of a "sin-offering" is expressive of a divine constituand I must say, I see no force in tion, by which our Redeemer with the objection, that it sounds incon- his own consent stood in the singruous to say Christ was "made ner's place, as though he had been punishment," "made suffer- himself the transgressor; just as ing;" for the same objection might the sin-offering under the law was, be brought against the express words of the prophet - "When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin." The genius of our language does not allow us to say

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ПTepi apaρrías, in Rom. viii. 3. seems to mean an offering for sin; as it certainly does, Heb. x. 8.

+ Lev. xvi. 21,

and by punishment, the infliction of evil upon the guilty, in displeasure against him. It is the opposite of reward, which is the bestowment of favour upon the obedient, in token of approbation of his conduct. Finally: Imputation ought not to be confounded with transfer. In its proper sense, we have seen there is no transfer pertaining to it. In its figurative sense, as applied to Justification, it is righteousness itself that is imputed; but its effects only are

in mercy to Israel, reckoned, or accounted to have the sins of the people "put upon its head." Thus He was made that sin which He knew not, and which is properly opposed to the righteousness of God, which we are made in Him. But this, it will be said, is not a "real and proper" imputation. True; nor is such an imputation maintained, I should think, by Mr. B., any more than by me. A real and proper imputation, unless I have mistaken the meaning of the term, is that in which there is no transferred. So also in respect of transfer of any kind; and if applied to Christ, would amount to a charge of his having actually committed sin.

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sin. Sin itself is the object of imputation; but neither this nor guilt is strictly speaking transferred, for neither of them are transferable objects. As all that

Mr. B. further argued thus: "If Christ had not died as a sub-is transferred, in the imputation stitute -if sin, sin itself had not of righteousness is its beneficial been really imputed to him, he effects; so all that is transferred could not have been made a curse in the imputation of sin, is its for us." All this is freely ad- penal effects. To say that Christ mitted, save what respects the term was reckoned, or counted in the really," against which my ob- divine administration, as if he were jection is already stated. "Nor the sinner, and came under an could he have been punished," he obligation to endure the curse for adds, "in our stead by eternal us, is one thing; but to say that justice for though an innocent he deserved the curse, is another. person may suffer, yet, properly To speak of his being guilty by speaking, there cannot be punish- imputation, is the same thing in ment where there is no guilt, either my ear, as to say he was criminal personally contracted, or imputed." or wicked by imputation; which, If this sentence had ended with the if taken improperly, for his being word "guilt," I should have fully reckoned as if he were so, is just ; admitted it. Guilt imputed is not but if properly, for his being so, is properly opposed to guilt con- inadmissible. Guilt is the insetracted. The term " imputed" is parable attendant of transgres here used for "transferred," to sion.* If Christ by imputation which it is not synonymous. But became deserving of punishment, we are perplexed here by affixing different ideas to the same term.

I will endeavour to define my own, endure the punishment of another is not and then attend to the thing sig-guilt, any more than a consequent exemption from obligation in the offender is innocence. nified, By sin, I mean transgres- Both guilt and innocence, though transfersion; by guilt, desert of punish-able in their effects, are themselves untransment for having transgressed:*

*ferable.

Some have defined guilt, an obligation to punishment: but a voluntary obligation to

This is admitted by Dr. Crisp, who on this ground argues his point, That Christ was really the sinner, or guilt could not have been charged upon him. Sermons, p.272.

we by non-imputation cease to | he should, as it were hand to deserve it; and if our demerits be hand, wrestle with the armies of literally transferred to Him, his hell, and the horrors of eternal merits must of course be the same death. The chastisement of our to us and then, instead of ap- peace was laid upon him. He was proaching God as guilty and un-stricken of his Father for our sins, worthy, we might take conse- and bruised for our iniquities: quence to ourselves before him, whereby is meant, that he was put as not only guiltless, but meritori- in the stead of wicked doers, as ous beings.

surety and pledge; yea, and as As to Christ's being punished, the very guilty person himself, to I have no doubt, and never had, abide and suffer all the punishof his sufferings being penal, any ment that should have been laid more than I have of our salvation upon them. Yet do we not mean being a reward: but as the latter that God was at any time his is not a reward to us, so I question enemy, or angry with him. For whether the former can properly how could he be angry with his be said to be a punishment to Him. beloved Son, upon whom his mind What he bore was punishment, rested? or how could Christ by his that is, the expression of divine displeasure against transgressors, in whose place He stood: so what we enjoy is reward, that is, the expression of God's well-pleasedness in the obedience and death of his Son but neither is the one a punishment to Him, nor the other a reward to us.

intercession appease his Father's wrath towards others, if full of hatred, he had been bent against himself? But this is our meaning: That he suffered the grievousness of God's rigour; for that he being stricken and tormented by the hand of God, DID FEEL ALL THE TOKENS OF GOD WHEN HE IS ANGRY AND PUNISHETH." Inst. B. II. Ch. xvi. § 10, 11.

There appears to me great accuracy in the Scripture phraseology on this subject. What our Saviour I remember Mr. B. once said to underwent is expressed by the me, "Christ was not made sin by term sufferings. Once it is called participation; but he was every chastisement: yet there he is not thing excepting this." Herein I said to have been chastised, but perfectly agree. When it is al"the chastisement of our peace lowed that he was accounted as was upon him." This is the same the sinner, yea as the greatest of as saying, He bore our punishment, all sinners, as though he had been He was made a curse for us, that made up of sin itself, every thing is, having been reckoned or ac- is allowed short of a participation counted the sinner, as though he in sin. If it be not, however, it had actually been so, he was lies upon him to point out a possitreated accordingly, as one that ble medium between his being had deserved to be an outcast from treated as though he were a transheaven and earth. I believe the gressor, and his actually being one. wrath of God that was due to us | I am, affectionately yours, was poured upon him; but I do not believe that God for one moment was angry or displeased with him, or that he smote him from any such displeasure. "It behoved him," says Calvin, "that

(To be continued.)

A. F.

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