of God's giving, their carcasses fell in the wilderness, and of that generation, only Caleb and Joshua, which were not of the number of these provokers, attained to that rest, were allowed entrance into Canaan. And just so the Gnostic christians, those that in the time of persecution forsook Christ, and returned to the heathenish, horrid villainies, from which christianity was designed to rescue them, were never to enter into this rest of God's, were certainly to be destroyed with the Jews, with whom they struck in and complied, and desiring to save their lives, should lose them, using their own ways to attain their rest or quiet, should miscarry, and never have part in God's rest; whereas all that have believed, that is, that have or shall adhere and cleave fast to Christ in the present persecutions, and never murmur, nor provoke, do certainly enter into this rest; (as many as survive these persecutions;) happy halcyonian days of a peaceable, prosperous profession of christianity were very shortly to attend them. And this is a sufficient means of explaining that whole fourth chapter of the rest, and the sabbatism, (as that is distinctly severed from the seventh day's sabbath, ver. 4,) which remaineth, (and is now shortly to be had,) to the people of God, the faithful, sincere, constant christians, the true Israelites, ver. 9; and so ver. 10, 11, where also the parallel is observed betwixt this rest of God's giving, and that sabbatic rest, which God is said to have rested, on the seventh day. For as that was a cessation from all the works of the six day's creation, ver. 10, so is this rest, that is now to befal the christians, a remarkable, discernable cessation from all the toils, and labors, that their persecutions under the Jewish unbelievers had brought upon them, and it is accordingly styled rest, or release to the persecuted, 2 Thess. i. 7, and days of refreshment, or breathing from these toils, Acts iii. 19, according as it fell out in Vespasian's time, immediately after the destruction of the Jews.

'As the Jewish Sabbath, in some things, resembled the rest after the creation, (in being a cessation from works of weight and difficulty, with which, formerly, the person was exercised, and so also in respect of the time of observing it, the seventh day,) but, in other things, is the rep

resentation and commemoration of the deliverance out of Egypt, in respect of the tasks and stripes from which they were freed, and of the plentiful condition to which they were brought, so may the word rest, prophesied of by the plalmist, as still future, both after the creation, and after the entering into Canaan, so many years, be fitly interpreted rest from persecutions, and have one eminent completion to this, the Christian's peaceable enjoyment of Christian assemblies, which was now, through the conduct of God, approaching them.' Annot. in loc.

In accordance with the foregoing exposition, Hammond gives the following paraphrase of chap. iv. 1:—

6

Upon those words of God, chap. iii. 15, (an ominous admonition, if it be not heeded,) we have great reason to fear, lest that promise of coming to God's rest, (as for those others to Canaan,) being made to us, a promise of deliverance from our persecutors, and peaceable days of professing the gospel attending it, (see chap. iii. 11, (we may yet, by our disobedience, miss of attaining to it.'

Par. in loc.

SECTION CVI.

Of the doctrines of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment.'-HEB. vi. 2.

THIS eternal judgment is generally supposed to mean a day of judgment in the future life, to be succeeded by the endless happiness of some men, and the endless misery of others. But a different interpretation is given by the eminent writer quoted below.

PEIRCE. In order to give a full view of this author's opinion concerning this text, the reader will pardon me for introducing his note entire, which, though somewhat long, will repay an attentive perusal :

And of the resurrection of the dead; this, together with

the next or last article mentioned, [eternal judgment,] has, I doubt not, inclined many to suppose, that the principles of proper christianity are here spoken of. But if it should be granted, that their interpretation of these two is every way just, it may yet be doubted whether these be principles peculiarly and properly of christianity; they may rather seem in common to belong to that and Judaism, it being plain, that the best and most numerous sect of the Jews, the Pharisees, believed both these principles; and, therefore, as Judaism was prior to christianity, they might well be mentioned as the foundation of that. But, to say the truth, the meaning of these two seem to me to have been mistaken, and that in both of them our author aims at the confirmation which was given to Judaism. Particularly, by the resurrection of the dead, he seems not to intend the final resurrection, but rather the raising of some dead persons, as the widow's son of Zarephath, raised by the prophet Elijah, 1 Kings xvii. 20-23, and the Shunamite's son, raised by Elisha, 2 Kings iv. 32-36. To which instances our author seems to refer very briefly, chap. xi. 35, where he is setting forth the great virtue and excellency of faith in God, and consequently such examples must have a great tendency to confirm the Jews in their faith in God. And this effect we find it had upon the mother of the child whom Elijah raised from the dead, who thereupon said unto him, 1 Kings xvii. 24—" Now by this I know that thou art a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in thy mouth is truth." And whatever tends to promote men's faith toward God may very well promote their repentance from dead works.

There is yet another interpretation, which may be given of this expression, and may, perhaps, please some better than that already mentioned, and, therefore, may deserve to have some brief notice taken of it. By the dead, then, sometimes, we are to understand those who, though they are not actually dead, yet are, as it were, under the sentence of death, and whose danger of it seems such as cannot be avoided. Thus God says to Abimelech, Gen. xx. 3-"Behold, thou art a dead man.", 2 Sam. xix. 28-" All my father's house were but dead men

before my lord the king." And remarkable is the passage of St. Paul, 2 Cor. i. 8-10, "We would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure, above strength, insomuch that we despaired even of life; but we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raiseth the dead; who delivered us from so great a death, and doth deliver; in whom we trust that he will yet deliver us.” Again, Rom. xi. 15-"If the casting away of them [the Jews,] be the reconciling of the [Gentile] world, what shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead?”

'If such a death and resurrection may be here understood, there can be nothing more pertinent than the great miracle which God wrought for the deliverance of the Jews, when he first set up the Mosaic institution. The people, being hemmed in between the sea on the one side, and Pharaoh and his army on the other, could look upon themselves as no other than dead men, and therefore, Exod. xiv. 11-" They said unto Moses, Because there were no graves in Egypt, hast thou taken us away to die in the wilderness." And if the restoration of Israel is described as a raising dead and dry bones to life, Ezek. xxxvii. 1-14, why may not such an eminent deliverance as God then gave them from Pharaoh and his army, be spoken of in like manner? This had the effect which might well be expected to promote their repentance and faith towards God, as we read, Exod. xiv. 31— "And Israel saw that great work which the Lord did upon the Egyptians, and the people feared the Lord, and believed in the Lord, and in his servant Moses."

And of eternal judgment: the common interpretation makes this to refer to the final judgment. And, were this granted, what was said in the preceding note might easily be here applied to show that this principle was held by the Jews, as well as it is by christians. But, farther, is it likely that our author would pretend to waive this, when he really, in the progress of his epistle, insists considerably upon it, chap. ix. 27, 28, x. 27-37! Besides, I do not find that ever the final judgment has this epithet given to it. The life the righteous shall go

into is said to be aionios, everlasting, as is also the punishment of the wicked, Matt. xxv. 46, and the fire wherewith they shall be tormented, ver. 41. There is no difficulty, therefore, about the words being applied to the effects and consequences of the sentences that will then be passed; but the time in which the trial is made and the sentences passed is always supposed to be limited and' have an end, and that after this follows the actual retribution, according to the sentences respectively passed upon those who are judged; nor is that judgment ever, that I remember, said to be eternal.

'I think, therefore, that the words are to be understood in a very different manner, and krima here seems to me to be put for temporal judgments. Thus the word is used, 1 Pet. iv. 17, the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of the God, where the context will not suffer us to take it in any other sense; Comp. ver. 16, 18, 19. So again, 1 Cor. xi. 29—He that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord's body. What this judgment was, appears by the next verse-for this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep. See also ver. 34. The word aionios, which we have rendered eternal, I take to respect not the time to come, but the time past, and to signify ancient, or past long ago. That the word is thus used without any respect to eternity, we may see, Rom. xvi. 25, 2 Tim. i. 9, Tit. i. 2. See also these places in the LXX., Psalm lxxvii. 5, Prov. xxii. 28, Jer. xviii. 15, Ezk. xxxvi. 2. According to this account of the words, we may consider the Jewish religion as established by the ancient and tremendous judgments, of the execution of which, the books of Moses give an account; such as the deluge, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and more especially the drowning of Pharaoh and his host in the Red Sea, and perhaps the judgments of God upon the Israelites in the wilderness for their impenitence and unbelief. Of this last he had, indeed, treated before, but not as a foundation of the Jewish religion, but as an example by which christians might be warned.' Note in loc.