Samuel Clarke · 39 of 54
Proposition XIV. · Part 3
10. Concerning this Messiah, in the setting up of whose kingdom all the promises of God terminate, it is clearly predicted in the Old Testament that he should arise particularly from the tribe of Judah, from the family of David, and in the town of Bethlehem.
The first of these particulars is expressed in those emphatical words of Jacob:—(Gen. xlix. 8, 10.) Judah, thou art he whom thy brethren shall praise,— thy father’s children shall bow down before thee:— The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a law-giver from between his feet, until Shiloh come, [LXX, ἕως ἂν ἔλθῃ τὰ ἀποκείμενα αὐτῷ, till the accomplishment of the promises which God has laid up in store for him,] and unto him shall the gathering of the people be. To which the writer of the Chronicles seems to refer, when he says:—(Chr. v. 1, 2.) The genealogy is not to be reckoned after the birth-right; for Judah prevailed above his brethren, and of him came the chief ruler, [Heb. and from him was it prophesied the ruler should arise.] And the Psalmist,—(Ps.lx. 7. cviii. 8.) Judah is my lawgiver.
The second is expressed in that promise to David,—(2 Sam. vii. 16.) thine house and thy kingdom shall be established for ever before thee, [LXX, ἐνώπιὸν μου, before me;] thy throne shall be established for ever. Which words might, indeed, of themselves be understood concerning a succession of kings in the house of David: But that God had a further and a greater meaning in them, he very clearly explains by the following prophets. By Isaiah:—(Is. xi. 1, &c. compare Rev. iii. 7. v. 5. xxii. 16.) there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots; and then follows through the whole chapter a glorious description of an everlasting kingdom of , over both Jews and . By Jeremiah;—(Jer. xxiii. 5.) I will raise unto David a righteous branch, and a king shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth:—And this is his name whereby he shall be called, the Lord our . By Ezekiel;—(Ezek.xxvii. 23, 24, 25, 26.) they shall be my people, and I will be their God; and David my servant shall be king over them, and they all shall have one shepherd;—and my servant David shall be their prince for ever; Moreover I will make a of peace with them; it shall be an everlasting . And by Hosea:—(Hos. iii. 4.) The children of Israel shall many days without a king and without a prince, and without a sacrifice:—Afterward shall the children of Israel return and seek the Lord their God, and David their king, and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days.
The third particular is expressed in those words of Micah:—(Micah, v. 2. Mat. i. 6.) But thou Bethlehem Euphratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me, that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting. After the passages now cited out of the foregoing prophets, what can be more jejune than to understand these words of Micah concerning Zorobabel only as having been of an ancient family?
11. In the books of the Old Testament it is expressly predicted, that the kingdom of the Messiah should extend not over the Jews only, but also over the . The (Gen. xii. 3. xviii. 18. xxii. 18. xxvi. 4. xxviii. 14.) promise made to Abraham, and so often repeated to him, and to Isaac, and to Jacob, that in their seed should all the nations of the earth be blessed, is thus opened and explained by the prophets.—(Is.xi. 10.) There shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the seek, and his rest shall be glorious.—(Is.xlii. 1, 6. Matt. xii. 18.) Behold my servant—in whom my soul delighteth,—he shall bring forth judgment to the ;—I will—give thee for a of the people, for a light of the . (Is.xlix. 6.) It is a light thing that thou shouldst be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel; I will also give thee for a light to the , that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth. (Is.lvi. 6, 7, 8.—John x. 16.) Also the sons of the stranger, that join themselves to the Lord,—even them will I bring to my holy mountain, and—mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people. The Lord God, which gathereth the outcasts of Israel, saith, yet will I gather others to him, besides those that are gathered unto him. (Ezek. xlvii. 22.) The strangers that sojourn among you,—shall have an inheritance with you among the tribes of Israel. (Mal. i. 11.) From the rising of the sun, even unto the going down of the same, my name shall be great among the ; and in every place incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering; for my name shall be great among the , saith the Lord of Hosts.
12. Concerning the same Messiah, of whom so great things are spoken, and whose kingdom is to be an everlasting kingdom, it is still expressly predicted by the prophets that he should suffer and be cut off. Concerning the very same person, who (with respect to his coming to reign, and to introduce the everlasting jubilee or rest to the people of God, (Heb. iv. 9. σαββατισμός.) is styled Messiah the prince; (Dan. ix. 25.) concerning the very same person, I say, it is in the very same sentence expressly predicted that he should be cut off, but not for himself, (Dan. ix. 26.) [Heb. and the people should not then be his; unto him should not then the gathering of the people be. (Gen. xlix. 10.)] For which reason, and also because the words can with no tolerable sense be applied to any other person, and because moreover the connexion of the whole prophecy leads to the same interpretation; the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah likewise is most justly understood to be spoken of the Messiah: There shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse; (Isa. xi. 1.)—with shall he judge the poor: (Isa.xi. 4.)—Behold my servant—mine in whom my soul delighteth;—he shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the street; a bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench; he shall bring forth judgment unto truth. (Isa. xlii. 1, 2, 3.—Behold, my servant shall deal prudently; (Is. lii. 13.) Surely he hath born our griefs;—he was wounded for our ; he was bruised for our :—He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth: He was taken from prison and from judgment, and who shall declare his generation?—For the of my people was he stricken; and he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death:—When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin;—my righteous servant shall many, for he shall bear their :—He was numbered with the , and he bare the sin of many, and made for the . (Is. liii. 4, &c.)
13. All prophecies of blessings to the worshippers of the true God, expressed either as being to happen in the latter days, or in words which imply a lasting duration, are in reason to be understood as having reference to the times of the promised kingdom of the Messiah, of whom it is expressly said, that he shall bring in everlasting , (Dan. ix. 24.) and that his dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed. (Dan. vii. 14.) Some prophecies of this kind are direct and express. Others, beginning with promises of particular intermediate blessings, and proceeding with general expressions more great and lofty than can naturally be applied to the temporal blessing immediately spoken of, are most reasonably understood to have a perpetual view and regard to that great and general event, in which all God’s promises to his true worshippers do centre and terminate, and of which all intermediate blessings promised by God are justly looked upon as beginnings, types, pledges, or earnests.
14. For since, from the express prophecies before cited, of the Messiah’s everlasting kingdom of , it appears that God had in fact a view to that, as the great and general end of all the dispensations of towards his true worshippers from the beginning; and no prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation, (2 Pet. i. 20.) (that is, the meaning of prophecies is not what perhaps the prophet himself might imagine in his private judgment of the state of things then present,) because the prophecy in old time came not by the will of man, but holy men spake as they were moved by the ; there may, therefore, very possibly, and very reasonably, be supposed to be many prophecies, which, though they may have a prior and immediate reference to some nearer event, yet, by the spirit of God, (whom those prophecies which are express show to have had a further view,) may have been directed to be uttered in such words, as may even more properly and more justly be applied to the great event which had in view, than to the intermediate event which God designed as only a pledge or earnest of the other: For instance; suppose these words of Daniel,—I beheld till the thrones were cast down, [till the thrones were placed,] and the ancient of days did sit:—A fiery stream issued and came forth from before him; thousand thousands ministered unto him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him; the judgment was set, and the books were opened: (Dan. vii. 9, 10.) Suppose (I say) these words were spoken concerning the slaying of a wild beast, or the destruction of a temporal empire, (ver. 11.) yet what reasonable man, who had ever elsewhere met with any notices of a judgment to come, could doubt but the destruction there spoken of was therefore expressed in those words, that it might be understood to be the introduction to the general judgment? The exact and very particular description of a resurrection, in the 37th of Ezekiel, supposing it to be indeed spoken of a temporal restoration of the Jews, yet who can doubt but it was so worded with design to allude to a real resurrection of the dead? The words of Micah: Thou, Bethlehem, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me, that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting: (Micah, v. 2. Mat. ii. 6.) Supposing it possible they could be spoken of Zorobabel, yet, if afterwards there should arise out of Bethlehem one in whom were found all the other prophetic characters of the promised Messiah, who could doubt but the words were intended either solely, or at least chiefly, of the latter? The words of Jeremiah: (Jer. i. 7.—vi. 5.) Babylon hath been a golden cup;—the nations have drunken of her wine, therefore the nations are mad: Flee out of the midst of Babylon,—be not cut off in her :—My people, go ye out of the midst of her, and deliver ye every man his soul from the fierce anger of the Lord. Who, that considers the nature and character of the Babylon in Jeremiah’s time, and compares it with the nature and character of the Babylon described by St John, can doubt but the spirit which influenced Jeremiah foresaw and intended to allude to that Babylon which had (Rev. xvii. 4.) a golden cup in her hand full of abominations, (ver. 2.) and the inhabiters of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication, (ch. xviii. 3, 4.) and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her:—Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues: For the words of Jeremiah are more strictly applicable to this latter Babylon than to that in his own time. Again; The words of Isaiah:—(Is. vii. 14.—Matt. i. 23.) Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call his name Immanuel, that is to say, God with us. Supposing Isaiah himself could possibly at that time understand them concerning a son of his own, concerning a son to be born of a young woman afterwards, who at the time then present was a virgin; and that his being styled Immanuel meant nothing more than that, before this child was grown up, Judah should be delivered from the then threatened incursions of Israel and Syria; (all which, notwithstanding the seeming connexion of the words in the place they stand, is very difficult to suppose;) yet, if afterwards any person, comparing the solemn introduction wherewith the words are brought in, “Hear ye now, O house of David; is it a small thing for you to weary men, but will ye weary my God also? therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; behold a virgin shall conceive,” &c. If any one, I say, comparing this solemn introduction with the promises repeated to the house of David in other passages of the prophets, that there should be born unto them a Son who should (Is. ix. 7.—Ezek. xxxvii. 25.) sit upon the throne of David and upon his kingdom for ever, and of the increase of whose government and peace there should be no end;—and considering, moreover, the character of this promised Son, that he should (Dan. ix. 24.) finish , and make an end of sins, and make for , and bring in everlasting : If a person, considering and comparing these things, should in his own days find a son really born of a virgin, attested to by numerous miracles, and by God’s command named Jesus, (which is synonymous to immanuel, a potent Saviour or God with us,) because he (Matt. i. 21.) should save his people from their sins, that is, should (Dan. ix. 24.) make for , and bring in everlasting ; Could such a person possibly entertain the least doubt, whether God, who sent Isaiah to repeat the fore cited words to the house of David, did not intend thereby to describe, if not wholly and solely, at least chiefly and ultimately, this latter saviour? In like manner; suppose those great promises to David, (2 Sam. vii. 13, 14, 16.) concerning the establishment of the throne of his Son for ever, were by David, and the prophet himself that delivered them, understood (τῇ ἰδία ἐπιλύσει, as St. Peter speaks,) concerning Solomon, and a succession of kings in his family; yet, when following prophecies clearly and expressly declared, that out of the root of Jesse should arise a Messiah who should reign for ever, no reasonable man can doubt, but that the former and less clear prophecy was likewise intended of God, and therefore rightly applied by the apostles of Christ to the same purpose? To give but one instance more: Suppose the words, (Ps. xvi. 10.) Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thy Holy One to see corruption, were by David spoken concerning himself, (which, however, can by no way be proved,) yet who, that (Acts. ii. 30.) knew David himself to be a prophet, and that had compared the other prophecies concerning the (Is. xi. 1, &c.) branch out of the roots of Jesse, the (Ezek. xxxvii. 24.) one shepherd of Israel, even God’s (ver. 25.) servant David who should be their prince for ever, and yet was to be (Dan. ix. 26.—Is. liii. tot.) cut off before he should reign for ever; and that had himself seen (as St. Peter did) and actually conversed with Christ risen from the dead; who, (I say) in these circumstances, could possibly doubt but that (2 Sam. xxiii. 2.) the spirit of the Lord which spake by David intended the fore-mentioned words should be understood of, and applied to Christ? And the like may be said concerning some other prophecies which are vulgarly supposed to be applied typically to Christ.
15. It is not agreeable to reason, or to the analogy of Scripture, to suppose that the Jews, before our Saviour’s time, could have a clear and distinct understanding of the full meaning, even of the express prophecies, much less of those which were more obscure and indirect; when both were intended to be only as it were a light shining in a dark place. But thus much is evident, that the Jews, both before and in our Saviour’s time, had from these prophecies a general expectation of a Messiah, and that this Messiah was to be, not merely a “temporal” deliverer, but אביצר, Pater futuri seculi, the head of the future state, as well as of the present. Nor does it at all appear that our Lord’s disciples, when they (Luke, xxiv. 21.) thought he would have Israel, or when they (Acts, i. 6.) asked if he would at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel, I say, it does not at all appear that they expected merely a “temporal” kingdom, but their error was in expecting a present kingdom; and therefore our Lord’s answer to them, is not concerning the nature but the time of the kingdom. And the modern Jews, at this day, who to be sure have entertained no prejudicate notions from the New Testament writer’s interpretation or application of prophecies, have (I think) still an universal expectation, that the Messiah shall be their prince in the future state as well as in the present.
16. When Jesus Christ, by (John x. 25.) the works which he did in his father’s name, and (John v. 36.) which his father gave him to finish, had proved himself to be sent of God; (which truth the apostles likewise confirmed by their testimony, by their works, and by laying down their lives, not for their opinions, which possibly erroneous and enthusiastic persons may sometimes sincerely do, but in attestation to facts of their own knowledge) and it appeared, moreover, that there was wanting in him no circumstance, no sine qua non, no character, appropriated by any of the ancient prophets to the promised Messiah, he had then a clear right to apply to himself all the prophecies, which either directly spoke of the Messiah, or which, through any intermediate events, pointed at him, and were applicable to him.
17. The application of this latter sort of prophecies to Christ is not allegorical. It is not an allegorical application, much less an allegorical argument or reasoning. But they are applied to him, as being really and intentionally, in the view of , the end and complete accomplishment of that, whereof the intermediate blessing was a pledge or beginning.
18. The application of this latter sort of prophecies to Christ, was never by reasonable men urged as being itself a proof that Jesus was the true Messiah. Nay, the application of the most direct and express prophecies whatsoever, (unless when the characters be so particular as not to be at all compatible to different persons, or the marks of time be very definite and exact,) has not of itself the nature of a direct or positive proof, but can only be a sine qua non, an application of certain marks or characters, without which no person could be the promised Messiah. Many men were of the seed of Abraham, and of the tribe of Judah, and of the family of David, and born in Bethlehem of Judea, and suffered, and were cut of; and yet neither any nor all of these characters could prove any man to be the promised Messiah, but the want of any one of them would prove that any man was not he. The proof of Jesus being the Christ were (John v. 36.) the works which his father gave him to finish. The application of direct and express prophecies to him is nothing but such a congruity of marks or characters as removes all objections by which an adversary would endeavour to prove that it was not he. Ought not Christ (Luke, xxiv. 26.) to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory, is not proving from his sufferings, that Jesus was the Christ; but removing the objection, by which some were apt to infer from his sufferings that he could not possibly be the Christ. The application of indirect prophecies to him is only a giving of further light from the analogy and conformity of the Old Testament to the New, by way of illustration and confirmation, to such as have been before convinced by the direct proofs. The proof, therefore, of the truth of Christianity does not stand upon the application of prophecies; but the works by which Christ proved himself to be sent of God gave him a right to apply to himself the prophecies concerning the Messiah; and the marks or characters of the promised Messiah, given by the prophets, were so many tests by which his claim was to be tried. “Miracles,” indeed, “can never render a foundation valid, which is in itself invalid; can never make a false inference true; can never make a prophecy fulfilled, which is not fulfilled; can never mark out a Messias, or Jesus for the Messias, if both are not marked out in the Old Testament:” But miracles can give a man a just and undeniable claim to be received as the promised Messiah, if the prophetic characters of the Messiah be applicable to him: And this it is by which Jesus was proved to be the Christ.
19. From what has been said concerning the application of indirect prophecies, it is easy to observe the nature and use of types and figures, and allegorical manner of speaking; that these were much less intended to be ever alleged for proofs of the truth of a doctrine; and yet, in their proper place, may afford very great light and assistance towards the right understanding of it: An instance or two will make this matter obvious. There is a very remarkable passage in the epistle to the Galatians, where the apostle himself styles the thing he is speaking of, an (Gal. iv. 24.) allegory; that is, he draws an argument, a simile. The allegory, or similitude, he makes use of is not alleged by him as a “proof” of the truth of the doctrine he is asserting, but as a proof of the falseness and groundlessness of a particular objection urged by the unbelieving Jews against it: The doctrine the apostle asserts (both in the epistle to the Romans and in this to the Galatians,) is, that Christians of the , who imitate the faith and obedience of Abraham, (being circumcised with the circumcision—of Christ, Col. ii. 11.) are equally capable of being admitted to the benefit of God’s promises to his people, as the Jews of the literal circumcision, who were lineally descended from that patriarch. In opposition to this, the Jews alleged, that since to the Israelites confessedly (Rom. ix. 4.) pertained the , and the glory, and the , and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises; since theirs, confessedly, were the fathers or patriarchs, to whom all the promises of God were originally made, it could not possibly be true, nor consistent with the promises of God made to their fathers, that these Israelites, who had been all along the peculiar people or church of God, should at last be rejected for not receiving the gospel; and that believers from among the of all nations should be received in their stead. Now, in reply to this objection, the apostle argues with the greatest justness and strength, from the analogy of a like case acknowledged by themselves, in which the reason of the thing was the same, even from the analogy of God’s method and manner of proceeding in the giving of those very original promises to the patriarchs, upon which this prejudice of the Jews was founded. (Gal. iv. 21. &c.) Tell me, says he, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law? That is, will ye not attend to the analogy of God’s method of proceeding, in those very promises on which ye depend? For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bond-maid, the other by a free woman: But he who was of the bond-woman, was born after the flesh; but he of the free woman, was by promise: Which things are an allegory, &c. That is to say, even originally, the promise was not made to all the children of Abraham, but to Isaac only, which was, from the beginning, a very plain declaration that God did not principally intend his promise to take place in (Rom. ix. 8.) Abraham’s descendants according to the flesh, but in those who, by a faith or fidelity like his, were in a truer and higher sense the children and followers of that Great Father of the faithful. In like manner, and for the same reason, the promise was not made (Rom. ix. 10.) to both the sons of Isaac, but to Jacob only; and, among the posterity of Jacob, all (Rom. ix. 6.) were not Israel, which were of Israel. What ye (Gal. iv. 21.) yourselves, therefore, saith St. Paul, who are so desirous to be under the Mosaic law, cannot but acknowledge to have been originally and always true, the same is true (ver. 29.) now. What was true concerning the two sons of Abraham, and likewise concerning the two sons of Isaac, who were the patriarchs with whom God’s was originally made, is, by continuance of the same analogy, true concerning the established with the families, and with the nation of the Jews, descended from those patriarchs; it is true concerning the church of God through all successive ages; it is true concerning the (Gal. iv. 25.) Jerusalem which now is, and concerning that which is to come. As (ver. 22.) Abraham had two sons, the one by a bond-maid, the other by a free woman: And as (ver. 30.) the son of the bond-maid, though, according to the flesh, no less truly his natural descendant than the other, yet was not to be co-heir with him, who, by the promise of God, was appointed to inherit: So, says the apostle, the (ver. 25. 26.) Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children, the visible earthly church, which received the external ceremonial law from Mount Sina, is not, by that outward general denomination, entitled to the eternal favour of God: But the Jerusalem which is above, which is the mother of us all, of all who, by true faith and sincere obedience are pleasing to God; this heavenly Jerusalem, this spiritual invisible church or city of the living God it is, to which all the promises of God, made in all ages to his church, are, in reality, originally and finally appropriated.
From this remarkable instance, it is well worth observing, by the way, that when the apostles are supposed to argue with the Jews ad hominem, the meaning is, that arguments alleged by the apostles to the Jews in particular, differ from arguments brought to the , in this; not that they were at any time arguments drawn from things acknowledged by the Jews, and in themselves otherwise inconclusive; but that they were drawn, justly and strongly, from things well known among the Jews, though what the were strangers to.
The correspondences of types and antetypes, though they are not themselves proper proofs of the truth of a doctrine, yet they may be very reasonable confirmations of the foreknowledge of God; of the uniform view of under different dispensations; of the analogy, harmony, and agreement between the Old Testament and the New. The words in the law, concerning one particular kind of death, (Deut. xxi. 23.) He that is hanged is accursed of God, can hardly be conceived to have been put in upon any other account than with a view and foresight to the application made of it by St. Paul. (Gal. iii. 13.) The analogies between the (Exod. xii. 22. 46. Johni. 29. xix. 36. Rev. i. 5.) Paschal Lamb, and the Lamb of God slain from the foundation of the world; between the Egyptian bondage and the tyranny of sin; between the (1 Cor. x. 1, 2.) baptism of the Israelites in the sea and in the cloud, and the baptism of Christians; between the (Heb. iii. 15.-9. iv. 1, 2, 3. 1 Cor. x. 1-11.) passage through the wilderness, and through the present world; between (Heb. iv. 8. 9.) Jesus [Joshua] bringing the people into the promised land, and Jesus Christ being the captain of salvation to believers; between the of rest (Heb. iv. 5. ix. 1.) promised to the people of God in the earthly Canaan, and the eternal rest promised in the heavenly Canaan; between the (Numb. xxxv. 25. 28.) liberty granted from the time of the death of the High Priest, to him that had fled into a city of refuge, and the purchased by the death of Christ; between the (Heb. ix. 25.) High Priest entering into the holy place every year with blood of others, and Christ’s (Heb. iv. 12, 24, 26.) once entering with his own blood into heaven itself, to appear in the for us; these (I say) and innumerable other analogies, between the (Col.ii. 17.) shadows of things to come, the (Heb. x. i.) shadows of good things to come, the (Heb. viii. 5.) shadows of heavenly things, the (Heb. ix. 9.) figures for the time then present, the (Heb. ix. 23.) patterns of things in the heavens, and (Heb. ix. 2.) the heavenly things themselves; cannot, without the force of strong prejudice, be conceived to have happened by mere chance, without any foresight or design. There are no such analogies, much less such series of analogies, found in the books of mere enthusiastic writers, much less of enthusiastic writers living in such remote ages from each other. It is much more credible and reasonable to suppose, (what St. Paul affirms,) that (1 Cor. x. 6.) these things were our examples; and that, in the uniform course of God’s government of the world, (Ver. 11.) all these things happened unto them of old for ensamples, and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come. And hence arises that aptness of similitude, in the application of several legal performances to the morality of the gospel, that it can very hardly be supposed not to have been originally intended. As (1 Cor. v. 6, 7, 8.) know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. Again; (Phil. iii. 3.) we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus; and have no confidence in the flesh. And (Col. ii, 13, 11.) you being dead in your sins, and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath God together with Christ:—In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh, by [the Christian, the spiritual circumcision,] the circumcision of Christ. And (1 Cor. ix. 13, 14, 8, 9, 10. 1 Tim. v. 18.) do ye not know that they which—wait at the altar, are partakers with the altar? Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel.—Say I these things as a man? or saith not the law the same also? for it is written in the law of Moses, thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen? or saith he it altogether for our sakes?