John, Acts, 1 Cor. gone astray, until he recover her (by his instructions?) 6. 49. The souls fathers or instructors of yours did receive the doctrine Manna in the state of wilderness or of solitude, and are fallen into the state of spiritual death. 21. 38. Art thou not that Egyptian philosopher whose knowledge, before these instructions, made an uproar in the minds, and led into the wild opinion four thousand souls that were by their errors murderers of human minds? 10. 5. But with many of them God was not pleased, for the knowledges of their souls were overthrown in the opinions of the wild barren system. Heb. 11. 38. Their souls wandered in human knowledges Rev. deserted by the truth, and inhabited by the spirit of the earth. 12. 6. And the spirit woman fled into retirement, or into a solitary doctrine, where she hath a knowledge prepared of the word of God. 14. And to the spirit woman were given two mighty knowledges of a great soaring spirit, that she might fly into solitude, or into meditation, into her prepared knowledge where she is nourished (with the word of God) for a time, and times, and preserved from the spirit of the devil. 17. 3. So his knowledge carried my soul away in the spirit into the opinions of the imperfect human system and I saw a doctrine full of blasphemous notions. Of Babylon. By the Babylon that is mentioned in the Scripture I understand a great philosophical spirit or system, built up with human knowledges, a high degree of the spirit of the world or of the human philosophy, a strong and dangerous opinion of one's self, a lamentable state of the soul, one of the steps of her regeneration, a strange philosophy in which the people of God cannot praise the Lord (Psalm 137. 4); a knowledge admired by, and the glory of, the souls that are governed by the spirit of the earth (Isaiah, 13. 19); a philosophy that is ruled by the spirit Lucifer (14. 4, 12); that is perverted by its own. worldly wisdom and knowledge, and that trusts in its wickedness (47. 10); a mistaken system, in which the soul is in captivity (Jere. 29. 4)); an idolatrous philosophy (50. 2); out of which the soul is ordered to remove, that she be not partaker of her sins, and receive not of her plagues (8; Rev. 18. 4); a most proud philosophical knowledge (Jere. 50. 31); a spirit that exists in many philosophical instructions, and in many souls, and that is abundant in human riches or knowledges (51. 13; Rev. 17. 15;-18. 12, 13); a high worldly system that destroys all the human mind (Jere. 51. 25); with which the spirits that rule the human opinion commune, or commit fornication, and by which the souls that inhabit the human philosophy are made drunk (Rev. 17. 2); an intoxicating degree of the knowledge of good and evil; a philosophy that instructs the souls who deviate from the commandments of God, and that teaches all the errors and vices that are the abominations of the human mind (5); a philosophical knowledge of an ele vated degree, that glorifies itself (18. 7); that deceives all souls by its sophistry (23); and kills the souls or double knowledges of prophets, of saints, and of all human philosophers (25); a false human system from which the Lord will redeem the souls that are the people governed by his word (Isai. 48. 20; Jere. 24. 5, 6, 7); a sorrowful condition, but a very important instruction in regeneration, that puts the mourning soul in remembrance of Jerusalem, and in longing for its consolations (Psalm 137). It is possible that the Babylon spoken of by the prophets be only philosophical, and that in the Revelation, spiritual. If so, I should consider the last as being still more hurtful to the soul than the first, by which I should take it to be figured. Joshua, 7. 21. When I saw among the spoils a goodly knowledge belonging to, or in the spirit of, the Babylonish philosophy, my soul coveted it, and took it; and, behold, it is hid in my heart in the midst of my system. 2 Kings, 17. 24. And the spirit that governs the Assyrian system, brought human minds from the philosophy Babylon, and placed them in the system of the philosophy Samaria, instead of those of the children of Israel: and they possessed the spirit Samaria, and dwelt in the systems or knowledges thereof. 30. And the followers of the Babylonian philo sophy made the false god Succoth-benoth. 20. 14. And Hezekiah said, their knowledges are come from a far philosophy, even from the philosophy Babylon. 2 Kings, 20. 17. Behold, the instructions come, that all the knowledge that is in thine system, and that which the instructors of thy soul have laid up in store unto this present instruction, shall be carried into the Babylonian notions. 18. And the souls begotten of thine shall be bereft of their knowledge in the system wherein dwelleth the spirit (or the vanity) that ruleth the philosophy Babylon. 24. 12. And the soul of Jehoiachin, King of Judah, went out to the philosophy of the King of Babylon. 15. And his opinions carried away the soul of Jehoiachin to the spirit Babylon, into cap tivity, from the religious system Jerusalem to the Babylonian knowledge. 25. 11. And the fugitive souls that fell away to the 20. And brought their souls to the system of the 28. And set his throne, or the knowledge his philosophical Kings that were with his opinions in the Babylonian spirit. 2 Chron. 33. 11. Wherefore the Lord brought upon their souls the notions of the captains of the host of the King of Assyria, which took the soul of Manasseh among the errors or difficulties of the world, and bound her with their strong opinions, and carried her to the Babylonian system. 2 Chron. 36. 6. Against the knowledge of his soul came up the knowledge of the King of Babylon, and Ezra, bound her in human notions, to carry or to lead her to the spirit Babylon. 7. The opinions of the spirit Nebuchadnezzar also carried to the philosophy Babylon of the precious knowledges that belonged to the religious system consecrated to the Lord, and he put them in his own Babylonian system. 20. And the souls whose knowledges escaped from the destructive doctrine, carried he away to the Babylonian notions. 5. 14. And the precious knowledges of the religion consecrated to God, or inhabited by the Spirit of God, which Nebuchadnezzar took out of the religious system that was in the spirit Jerusalem, and brought them into the human system of the philosophy Babylon, those did Cyrus, the King, take out of, or did release from, the Babylonian system, and they were delivered unto Sheshbazzar. 8. 1. This is the genealogy of the souls that went up with mine from the notions of the spirit Babylon. Psalm 137. Isaiah, 13. 8. O doctrine that cometh forth from the philosophy Babylon, who art to be destroyed (in the soul). 1. The burden of the spirit Babylon, which the soul Isaiah, that proceeds from the spirit or knowledge Amos, did see. |