revelation he makes of them.-The apostle in this epistle, proves by all sorts of arguments taken from the Scriptures of the Old Testament, from many other things that God had done and spoken, and from the nature of these institutions themselves, as here also by the express words of the Holy Ghost, that these sacrifices of the law, which were of God's own appointment, were never designed nor approved by him as the way and means of the eternal expiation of sin. And he doth not deal herein with these Hebrews on his apostolical authority, and by new evangelical revelation, as he did with the church of the Gentiles; but pleads the undeniable truth of what he asserts from these direct records and testimonies which themselves owned and embraced. Howbeit, although the books of Moses, the psalms and the prophets were read to them, and among them continually, as they are to this day, they neither understood, nor do yet understand the things that are so plainly revealed in them. And as the great reason hereof is the vail of blindness and darkness that is on their minds, 2 Cor. iii. 13, 14.; so in all their search into the Scripture, they are indeed supinely slothful and negligent. For they cleave alone to the outward husk or shell of the letter, utterly despising the mysteries of truth contained therein. And so it is at present with the most of men, whose search into the mind of God, especially as to what concerns his worship, keeps them in the ignorance and contempt of it all their days.

Obs. V. The constant use of sacrifices to signify these things, which they could not effect or really exhibit to the worshippers, was a great part of the bondage that the church was kept in under the old testament.-And hereon, as those who were carnal bowed down their backs to the burden, and their necks to the yoke; so those who had received the Spirit of adoption, did continually pant and groan after the coming of him, in and by whom all was to be fulfilled. So was the law their schoolmaster unto Christ.

Obs. VI. God may in his wisdom appoint and accept of ordinances and duties to one end, which he will refuse and reject, when they are applied to another-So he doth plainly in these words, those sacrifices, which in other places he most strictly enjoins. How express, how multiplied are his commands for good works, and our abounding in them! Yet when they are made the matter of our righteousness before him, they are as to that end, namely, of our justification, rejected and disapproved. Secondly, The first part of ver. 5. declares the will of God concerning the sacrifices of the law. The latter contains the supply that God in his wisdom and grace made of the defect and insufficiency of these sacrifices. And this is not any thing that should help, assist or make them effectual, but somewhat brought in, in opposition to them, and for their removal.

• But a

This he expresseth in the last clause of this verse. body hast thou prepared me.' The adversative di, but,' declares that the way designed of God for this end was of another nature than those sacrifices were. But yet this way must be such, as should not render those sacrifices utterly useless from their first institution, which would reflect on the wisdom of God by whom they were appointed. For if God did never approve of them, never delight in them, to what end were they ordained? Wherefore, although the real way of the expiation of sin, be in itself of another nature than those sacrifices were, yet was it such as those sacrifices were meet to prefigure and represent to the faith of the church. The church was taught by them, that without a sacrifice there could be no atonement made for sin; wherefore the way of our deliverance must be by a sacrifice. It is so, saith the Lord Christ, and therefore the first thing God did in the preparation of this new way, was the preparation of a body for me,' which was to be offered in sacrifice. And in the antithesis intimated in this adversative conjunction, respect is had to the will of God. As sacrifices were that which he would not,' to this end, so this preparation of the body of Christ, was that which he would, which he delighted in, and was well pleased withal. So the whole of the work of Christ, and the effects of it, are expressly referred to this will of God, ver. 9, 10.

And we must first speak to the apostle's rendering these words out of the psalmist. They are in the original n

, mine ears hast thou digged,' 'bored,' prepared.' All sorts of critical writers and expositors have so laboured in the resolution of this difficulty, that there is little to be added to the industry of some, and it were endless to confute the mistakes of others. I shall therefore only speak briefly to it, so as to manifest the oneness of the sense in both places. And some things must be premised thereunto.

1. That the reading of the words in the psalm is incorrupt, and they are the precise words of the Holy Ghost. Though of late years sundry persons have used an unwarrantable boldness in feigning various lections in the Hebrew text, yet none of any judgment have attempted to conjecture at any word that might be thought to be used in the room of any one of them. And as for those which some have thought the LXX. might possibly mistake, that signify a body,' as 7, which sometimes signifies a body' in the Chaldee dialect, or 2, there is in neither of them any the least analogy to, that they are ridiculously suggested.

2. It doth not seem probable unto me, that the LXX. did ever translate these words, as they are now extant in all the copies of that translation, Σωμα δε κατηρτίσω μοι. For, 1. It is not a translation of the original words, but an interpretation

and exposition of the sense and meaning of them, which was no part of their design. 2. If they made this exposition, they did so either by chance, as it were, or from a right understanding of the mystery contained in them. That they should be cast upon it by a mere conjecture, is altogether improbable. And that they understood the mystery couched in that metaphorical expression (without which, no account can be given of the version of the words) will not be granted by them who know any thing of those translators or their translation. 3. There was of old a different reading in that translation. For instead of wμa, a body,' some copies have it wr, the ears,' which the Vulgar Latin follows; an evidence that a change had been made in that translation, to comply with the words used by the apostle.

3. The words, therefore, in this place, were the words whereby the apostle expressed the sense and meaning of the Holy Ghost in those used in the psalmist, or that which was intended in them. He did not take them from the translation of the LXX. but used them himself, to express the sense of the Hebrew text. For although we should not adhere precisely unto the opinion, that all the quotations out of the Old Testament in the New, which agree in words with the present translation of the LXX. were by the scribes of that translation, transferred out of the New Testament into it, which yet is far more probable than the contrary opinion, that the words of the translation are made use of in the New Testament, even when they differ from the original; yet sundry things herein are certain and acknowledged. As, 1. That the penmen of the New Testament do not oblige themselves unto that translation, but in many places do precisely render the words of the original text, where that translation differs from it. 2. That they do oftentimes express the sense of the testimony which they quote, in words of their own, neither agreeing with that translation, nor exactly answering the original Hebrew. 3. That sundry passages have been unquestionably taken out of the New Testament, and inserted into that translation, which I have elsewhere proved by undeniable instances. And I no way doubt but it hath so fallen out in this place, where no account can be given of the translation of the LXX. as the words now are in it. Wherefore,

4. This is certain, that the sense intended by the psalmist, and that expressed by the apostle, are the same, or to the same purpose. And their agreement is both plain and evident. That which is spoken, is as an act of God the Father towards the Son. The end of it is, that the Son might be fit and meet to do the will of God in the way of obedience. So it is expressed in the text, 'mine ears hast thou bored, or a body hast thou prepared me; then said I, Lo I come to do thy will, O God.'

This is the sole end why God so acted towards him. What this was, is so expressed in the psalmist, mine ears hast thou bored,' with a double figure. 1. A metaphor from the ear, wherewith we hear the commands we are to obey; obedience being our compliance with the outward commands of God, and the ear being the only means of our receiving those commands, there is nothing more frequent in the Scripture, than to express obedience by hearing and hearkening, as is known. Wherefore, the ascription of ears to the Lord Christ by an act of God, is the preparation of such a state and nature for him, as wherein he should be meet to yield obedience unto him. 2. By a synecdoche, wherein the part is put for the whole. In his divine nature alone, it was impossible that the Lord Christ should come to do the will of God, in the way whereby he was to do it. Wherefore, God prepared another nature for him, which is expressed synecdochically by the ears for the whole body; and that significantly, because as it is impossible that any one should have ears of any use, but by virtue of his having a body; so the ears are that part of the body, by which alone, instruction unto obedience, the thing aimed at, is received. This is that which is directly expressed of him, Isa. 1. 4, 5. He wakeneth, morning by morning, he wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned. The Lord God hath opened mine ear, and I was not rebellious; or, I was obedient. And so it is all one in what sense you take the word 72, whether in the more common and usual, to dig or bore, or in that whereunto it is sometimes applied, to fit and perfect. For I do not judge there is any allusion in the expression, unto the law of boring the ear of the servant that refused to make use of his liberty at the year of release. Nor is the word used in that case,, but 7, Exod. xxi. 6. But it respects the framing of the organ of hearing, which is, as it were, bored; and the internal sense, in readiness unto obedience, is expressed by the framing of the outward instrument of hearing, that we may learn to obey thereby.

Wherefore, this is, and no other can be, the sense of the words of the psalmist; namely, that God the Father did order things towards Jesus Christ, that he should have a nature wherein he might be free, and able to yield obedience unto the will of God, with an intimation of the quality of it, in having ears to hear, which belong only unto a body. This sense the apostle expresseth in more plain terms now after the accomplishment of what before was only declared in prophecy, and thereby the vail which was upon divine revelations under the old testament,

is taken away.

There is, therefore, nothing remaining exposition of these words of the apostle, pense of the Holy Ghost in the psalm.

but that we give an as they contain the And two things we

must inquire into. 1. What is meant by this body. 2. How God prepared it.

6

1. Zou, a body,' is here a synecdochical expression of the human nature of Christ. So is the flesh taken, where he is said to be made flesh, and the flesh and blood whereof he was partaker. For the general end of his having this body, was, that he might therein and thereby yield obedience, or do the will of God. And the special end of it was, that he might have what to offer in sacrifice unto God. But neither of these can be confined unto his body alone. For it is the soul, the other essential part of human nature, that is the principle of obedience. Nor was the body of Christ alone offered in sacrifice unto God. He made his soul an offering for sin,' Isa. liii. 10. which was typified by the life that was in the blood of the sacrifice. Wherefore it is said, that he offered himself unto God, chap. ix. 14. Eph. v. 2. that is, his whole entire human nature, soul and body, in their substance, in all their faculties and powers; but the apostle, both here and ver. 10. mentions only the body itself, for the reasons ensuing. 1. To manifest that this offering of Christ was to be by death, as was that of the sacrifices of old; and this the body alone was subject unto. 2. Because, as the covenant was to be confirmed by this offering, it was to be by blood, which is contained in the body alone, and the separation of it from the body carries the life along with it. 3. To testify that his sacrifice was visible and substantial, not an outward appearance of things, as some have fancied; but such as truly answered the real bloody sacrifices of the law. 4. To shew the alliance and cognation between him that sanctifieth by his offering, and them that are sanctified thereby; or that because the children were partakers of flesh and blood, he also took part of the same, that he might taste of death for them. For these, and the like reasons, doth the apostle mention the human nature of Christ under the name of a body only, as also to comply with the figurative expression of it in the psalm. And they do what lies in them to overthrow the principal foundation of the faith of the church, who would wrest these words unto a new ethereal body given him after his ascension, as do the Socinians.

2. Concerning this body, it is affirmed that God prepared it for him. Κατηρτίσω μοι, thou hast prepared for me; that is, God hath done it, even God the Father; for unto him are those words spoken, I come to do thy will, O God, a body hast thou prepared me.' The coming of Christ the Son of God into the world, his coming in the flesh by the assuming of our nature, was the effect of the mutual counsel of the Father and the Son. The Father proposeth to him what was his will, what was his design, what he would have done. This proposal is here repeated, as unto what was negative in it, which includes