CHAPTER VI.

No Traces to be found of our Lord's Perfonal Appear ance in the World previous to his Birth.

THE

HE direct evidence, which Mr. Hawker has produced from fcripture, in favour of our Lord's pre-exiftent ftate and dignity, has been examined in the two foregoing chapters. The interpretation which I have there given of the different paffages, feems to be confirmed by the confideration which Mr. Hawker himself has fuggefted, viz. that had Chrift really enjoyed fuch a ftate, it is more than probable "that fome appearances of him should have been difcovered, through the many intermediate ages from the fall of man to his advent in the flesh." (r) But in my opinion, no account of fuch appearances is' any where to be found.

The firft argument which Mr. Hawker brings forward, as tending to prove the personal appearance of Jefus Chrift in the early ages of the world, is taken from the confideration, that the invifibility

of

(r) P. 87.

of the Divine Being to mortal eyes, is the uniform doctrine of the fcriptures; when, at the fame time, there are many very. ftriking paffages, in the Old Teftament, in which the perfonal appearance of Jehovah is faid to have happened.

Had Mr. Hawker here recollected his own definition of the term God, he muft have perceived that this argument would have proved much more than he intended it to prove. By the term God, he profeffes to understand God the Father, together with the Son, and the Holy Spirit. This is evident from his explanation of I Cor. xv. 24— 28. (/) And this, being allowed to be a proper definition,

(f) P. 90 note. The paffage is, "Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule, and all authority, and power. For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he faith all things are put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted which did put all things under him. And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then fhail the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all." The last claufe Mr. Hawker thus explains, " And then God the Father, together with the Son and Holy Spirit, will be all in all.” It is furely ftrange that any person should thus interpret the apostle's words, when he himself declares, v. 24, that by the term God he meant the Father only. This, as Dr. Priestley very juftly observes, is not quoting scripture, but making it.

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definition, it dire&ly follows, that all those paffages which affert the invifibility of God, affert the invifibility of the Son, as well as of the Father. According to Mr. Hawker, therefore, it could be neither the one nor the other who made this perfonal appearance.

Mr. Hawker profeffes alfo to be of opinion, that, in the relation the Jewish Scriptures give us of the appearances of Jehovah, but one and the fame being is uniformly defcribed, (t) and that this being was Jefus Chrift. (u) Of courfe he must suppose that Jefus Chrift was the Jehovah who manifefted himself to Mofes, and faid, thou canft not fee my face, and live. See Ex, xxxiii. 2023. And yet he advances this very paffage as a proof of the invifibility of the fupreme Father! (v)

Having obferved thus much to fhew how very inconfiftent Mr. Hawker, in this inftance, is with himself, I will endeavour to inform my reader how it is, these seeming contradictions of fcripture, refpecting the invifibility of the Divine Being, may be reconciled; and which, if they could not be reconciled, would bear as hard upon the trinitarian hypothefis, as they do upon our own. For if Je

fus Chrift be God, of the fame nature with his Father, it follows that he must also be invifible as well as the Father.

(t) P. 98. 99.—(u) P. 95.—(v) P. 94.

That

That God is invifible, in the ftri&t fenfe of the word, is a doctrine I moft firmly believe. As the uncreated Spirit, who fills immenfity, it is impoffible that he should be the object of mortal fight. But it does not, therefore, follow, that he cannot make extraordinary manifeftations of himfelf by outward fymbols, by fire, by cloud, by an audible voice, and by fome particular figure. And furely it is much more natural to fuppofe, that all the appearances, recorded in the Old Teftament, were of this fymbolic nature, than to imagine, as Mr. Hawker does, that there are two Jehovahs, the one of whom was vifible, and the other invifible. (w) For this is contrary to the affertion of Mofes, who declared to the children of Ifrael from God himfelf, that Jehovah their God was ONE Jehovah, by whom must have been intended, that very Jehovah, who had all along manifefted himself to them.

But Mr. Hawker is of opinion, that there are many paffages, in the New Teftament, which may

be

(w) It may be asked, in this place, how it is that Mr. Hawker reconciles his ideas on this fubject with his affertion, p. 331, "That there is not an attribute or a name by which the incommunicable character of Jehovah is known in fcripture, but what we find equally applied to our blessed Lord;" when, according to himself, in his third fermon, the Father poffeffes the attribute of invifibility, but the Son poffeffes it not.

be confidered as prefumptive proofs that Jefus Chrift is the Jehovah fo frequently mentioned in the Old Testament, as having made a visible appearance. These paffages I will now examine.

John viii. 58. Before Abraham was, I am. This expreffion I am, Mr. Hawker obferves, is the incommunicable name of the great Jehovah, and he thinks it probable, that when our faviour diftinguished himself by it, he referred to his appearance to Mofes, as Jehovah, in the bufh. See Ex. iii. 14. But it has already been proved, p. 33, that in the former inftance the expreffion is elliptical, and that it fhould have been rendered, Before Abraham was, I am he, that is, the Meffiah.

I Cor. x. 4. They drank of that spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock was Chrift. By this we are to understand nothing more than that the rock, to which Paul alludes, reprefented Chrift. In other words, that there was, according to the apoftle's opinion, a resemblance between the rock, which supplied the children of Ifrael with water in their journey through the wilderness, and Jefus Christ, from whom all the bleffings of the gospel may be faid to flow to chriftians.

I Cor. x. 9. Neither let us tempt Chrift, as fome of them alfo tempted, and were deftroyed of ferpents. Concerning