nances as ultimate and perfect means of salvation. These scribes were in much estimation for their knowledge of the Mosaic writings. But as they interpreted them according to the letter only, without attending to their spiritual meaning, they gave to them a merely temporal and worldly sense. As however this was in some measure founded on the divine communications and introductory to better things, it is not said to be destroyed, as was the case with the wisdom of the wise, but to be displaced, or removed from its former consequence. This the gospel has done with the literal interpretation of the Jewish scriptures, by revealing the more just and fuller meaning of those divine communications, to which the literal sense was merely subservient. The application of Isaiah's prophecy to the Gentiles and Jews who rejected the gospel, indicates the grounds on which they did so, viz. as to the former, its not agreeing with their established philosophical notions, and as to the latter, its not according with their worldly interpretations of the Mosaic revelations. The Jewish infidel was so far right as he upheld a system of positive divine laws, but he erred in not using his reason so as to perceive that this system, though apparently one of bodily ordinances, was, in reality, if rightly understood, of a spiritual nature. This view of it would have led him, as it was intended to do, to look to the promised Redeemer as the means by which its true spiritual character was to be unfolded and established, and, so, to faith in Christ. On the other hand, the philosophical infidel was so far right as he maintained the necessity of obedience to the law of his mind, but he erred in not submitting to be guided herein by the means which God had appointed for that end. The due exercise of his reason under the superior control of the divine providence, would have led him to receive the scheme of the gospel as the only effectual method of producing the spiritual obedience which he professed to aim at. The error of the Jew was the preference of a bodily to a spiritual system; that of the heathen, the preference of a spiritual system of his own devising, to one emanating from God. In both cases the error arose from placing an undue dependance on natural reason, limited in its exercise to the present aspect of

things. Under these two classes, of the heathen moralist and the worldly-minded Jew, are comprised all the opponents of the gospel on the ground of reason.

V. 20. I. "The scribe versed in the literal sense of the Jewish

scriptures?" yeaμμateus;· Though this is the appropriate term for a Jewish scribe, yet I think there is an allusion to his literal mode of expounding the Mosaic scriptures, and for which reason also he might properly be called ygaμμateus: in which sense I think this word is used in Matt. ch. XIII. 52.

II. "These persons who dispute the truth of the gospel on principles derived from the present constitution of things?" σUYTYTYS TOU αιώνος τούτου; -The primary meaning of awv is duration, whence it is applied to denote the world or creation as it continues at present. The phrase altogether I think is indicative of both the moralist and the scribe, whom St. Paul, after naming separately, thus classes together in a description drawn from the circumstance which in each of them was the foundation of his rejection of the gospel; viz. reasoning upon it with a view only to the present constitution of things. Though they differed as to their objections, yet each of them was OUGHTYTYS TOU ALWvOS TOUTOU, a disputer of this world. And accordingly, their several systems of opinion are, in the latter part of the verse, both included under the phrase σοφιαν του κοσμου τούτου, or worldly wisdom-s -see n. 5.

This

III. Do they deny the fulfilment of the prophecy ?”. supposed denial is implied in the question which follows. It is very properly made to come from the philosopher and the scribe.

IV. "I ask you then,"

the succeeding question "has not

God?" &c. and the proofs of the assertion implied in it, and which are stated in v. 21. and so on to the end of the chapter, are clearly addressed to the Corinthians, because by them only would their proper force be admitted. Indeed, the whole strength of the Apostle's

reasoning rests on the circumstance of their having received the gospel. And it is to be considered as an argumentum ad hominem. This opinion is confirmed by v. 26. where St. Paul appeals to them by name for the proof of his argument:-Βλεπετε γαρ την κλησιν ύμων, αδελφοι.

v. "Shewn worldly wisdom, both Heathen and Jewish, to be foolishness” εμωρανεν την σοφιαν του κόσμου τούτου; The phrase σοφιαν του κόσμου τούτου, includes both the wisdom of the philosopher and the understanding of the Jew. See n. 2. of this verse; where it will be observed that the adjunct Tou alwvOS TOUTOU, gives the same general meaning to σus, that the similar phrase of του κοσμου τούτου does here to σοφιαν. The verb εμωρανεν is in consequence used as a term of general meaning answerable to both απολλυμι and αθετεω in v. 19.

3

J V.21. 1. "The worldly-minded" xooμos—————which signifies in + its primary sense orderly arrangement, and so the world as originally created; thence, mankind as its inhabitants, and these as formed with their natural faculties. But as a contrast is here intended between reason and revelation, it would appear to be used with a further distinction to designate those persons, who, in their judgment of things, were altogether guided by the notions derived from their natural unassisted reason. It applies therefore not only to the Heathens who were without a revelation, but also to those Jews who misinterpreted their scriptures by worldly-minded explanations suited to the natural state of things. Compare Schleusner. Lex. on this text under the word Kooμos in the sixth sense.

II. "Did not by means of worldly wisdom acquire a knowledge of God agreeable to the wisdom of God,”. The regular order of the Greek words would be, ουκ εγνω τον Θεον εν τη σοφία του Θεου : that is, knew not God in the wisdom of God, or according to that application of human knowledge which God designed. That the Gentiles "knew God though they glorified him not as God" appears from Rom. ch. i.

21.

Indeed the corrupt notions of the great mass of the heathens respecting God is undoubted. And if those of more cultivated minds might be said to be better informed on the subject, yet it is evident that their knowledge was far from suitable to the intention of God, since it neither prevented them from countenancing the prevailing idolatry (ibid. v. 22, 23.), nor did it enable them to ascertain their duty with accuracy or purity, and much less to practise it. Those Jews also who gave a worldly-minded sense to their scriptures, must have had a very imperfect notion of God as a spiritual being. So that as to anything that unassisted reason had done, mankind were, before the preaching of the Gospel, altogether without any just knowledge of God.

III. By this foolishness, which is the subject of our preaching", δια της μωρίας του κηρυγματος -I think St Paul here ironically uses the term wpias as the name of the doctrine of the crucifixion ; taking it from v. 18. where he states it to be in effect such to those who reject it. Knguyμaros is an adjunct, expressing that this doctrine was not deduced by a course of reasoning, but proclaimed as à message, and, by implication, a divine one. In the regular construction, the order of the words would be, dia тou иnguyμATOS TYS μwgias,. but as the question here is not about the mode of delivery but about the doctrine itself, was is placed first to mark more strongly its opposition to σopias: the opposition of the doctrine of the crucifixion to the principles of mere morality.

IV." To deliver those who believe the doctrine from that state of error”, σώσαι τους πιστεύοντας. The general meaning of owoal is here determined by its connexion with ουκ εγνω εν τη σοφία του Θεού in the former clause, to mean a deliverance from error. This deliverance the Apostle states positively, in full confidence that those whom he addressed could not doubt that the notions respecting God derived from the Christian revelation were superior to all others. For, as to the notions entertained by those Jews who rightly understood their scriptures, they, strictly speaking, were derived from

Christianity, since the true interpretation of those writings was founded on it, so that either mediately or immediately, the true knowledge of God was owing to the Christian revelation. This verse forms the first branch of the answer in proof of the assertion implied in the question in the preceding one," has not God", &c. This branch relates to the knowledge of God, the second to the rule of life, which extends from this verse to v. 25, inclusively.

V. 22. I.

'Unbelieving Jews" Ioudaithe unbelievers of that nation, properly so called, since those who received Christianity did not rest on their privileges as Jews. The absence of the article implies this distinction.

-It is not, I

II. "A prince of great worldly power" σnuior think, directly stated in Scripture, what particular sign of divine" power it was that the unbelieving Jews so frequently demanded, as the unequivocal proof of our Lord's claim to be the Messiah foretold by the prophets. But as it is certain that our Lord and his Apostles performed many miracles of almost every description, their demand could not have been merely for any miracle, but for one of such a kind as they had not been gratified with. Of this kind was thes miraculous restoration of their national power. And considering their worldly-mindedness, and that this indeed was a thing much desired by all of that nation (see Acts, ch. 1. 6.), we may conclude that this was the miracle which they looked for as the essential one for establishing our Lord's claim, the special sign of divine power which would command their belief in him. If this was the case, the circumstance was, doubtless, sufficiently notorious to make St. Paul's allusion to it here evident, though he does not specify it.

From the circumstance

III. "Heathen moralists” 'Exλnves that in Greece the intellect was most highly cultivated, and that all the western nations thence derived their principal knowledge, it' was usual with the Greeks to speak of all persons in civilized life as divided into Greeks and barbarians, by which terms were denoted