holiness of the LORD which he loved, and bath married the daughter of a strange god.

EZRA *, who lived about this time, hath recorded the fact at large, and fully explains the matter; chap. ix. 1. The people of ISRAEL and the priests have not feparated themfelves from the people of the lands, for they have taken of their daughters for themfelves, and for their fons, and the holy feed have mingled themselves with the people of those lands.

Ver. 10. And now, O LORD, what shall we fay after this? for we have forfaken thy com. mandments, which thou hast commanded by thy fervants the prophets, faying, The land which ye go to poffefs is an unclean land, &c.

Ver. 12. Now therefore give not your daughters unto their fons, neither take their daughters to your fons, &c.

Chap. x. 2. We have trefpaffed against our GOD, and have taken strange wives of the people of the land. Now therefore let us make a covenant with our GOD, to put away all the wives, and fuch as are born of them, ver. 3.

The putting away thefe heathen women was a duty, and this by the positive law of GOD. For GoD having, as it were, forbidden the banns in exprefs words (Deut. vii. 3.) their marriages were abfolutely null and void ab initio; they could contract no valid marriage whatsoever with them, and therefore must put them away. This affords us a strong proof of the lawfulness of polygamy, where the

See alfo Nehemiah xiii. 23—29.
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woman

God

woman was not excepted againft, as by the law above mentioned, or by fome other: for if this were otherwise, we should hear of putting away all but the first in all cafes. ĜOD would not have fuffered any marriage which was contrary to the feventh commandment, any more than those which were contrary to Deut. vii. 3. When we compare EZRA and MALACHI together, we find by the former, that the Jews took heathen women for their wives; and by the latter, that they not only did this, but put away their Ifraelitish wives for that very purpose. This is plainly what ver. 14. calls dealing treacherously with their wives, their divorcing them for this unhallowed purpose. There the prophet ufes the like arguments against them as he had before used, ver. 10. with regard to their dealing treacherously with their brethren-Have we not all one father? hath not one GOD created us? why do we deal treacherously every man against his brother, by profaning the covenant of our fathers? When they put away their Jewish wives, and married the beathen idolatrous women, they profaned the covenant of their fathers; that is,

that command of GOD delivered to their fathers, not only in the original institution of marriage, which forbad putting away, but also that pofitive law, Deut. vii. 3. which forbad marriage with beathens. They dealt treacheroufty with their brethren; that is to say, with the parents and relations of their unjustly-divorced wives, who gave them their daughters or fifters in marriage, to abide with them, not

to

to be put away. They dealt treacherously also with their wives, in putting them away.-Therefore the prophet reproves them, and calls them to repentance by the following confiderations, ver. 14, 15; which I will endeavour to lay before the reader in a paraphrase suitable to the literal and true meaning of the original Hebrew, and conformable to the analogy of divine revelation, as delivered to us by MOSES and the prophets. Then it will appear, that these distinguished servants of GOD were not guilty of concealing, difguifing, or diffembling the truth; nor God Himself capable of fuffering His feventh commandment, as well as the original inftitution of marriage, to be tranfgreffed, not only with impunity, but allowance, uniformly through fo many ages, or of leaving His church and people utterly ignorant of His mind and will touching fo important a matter, for all that time,

hwy 78 81-Et ne unus fecit? Mont.And did not one make? Here our commentators, mifled by our tranflators, and these by the vulgar error of the finfulness of polygamy, tell us, that "these words fignify GoD's making "but one woman at the beginning'; He had the

refidue of the fpirit, and therefore could "have made more women for ADAM if He "had pleafed." One misfortune attending fo ignorant a comment, is, that the word woman, unlefs, among other changes, women were of the mafculine gender under the Old Teftament, though of the feminine under the New Tef

cannot fignify one אחר

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tament;

tament; for is certainly of the mafculine gender-n is the feminine-See Judges ix. 53-8 8-mulier una. Mont. & al freq. This, befides an undue transpofition of the words, is, I take it, a conclufive reafon for faying they mistake the paffage. It is not-Did not he make One ?-but-Did not One* make? like ver. 10. Have we not all ONE Father? Did not ONE GOD create "us? Did not One, or THE ONE, make "both you and your Jewish wives? Did "He not form both of you-(fee Deut. "xxxii. 6.) naturally of the fame feed of "Abraham-fpiritually by the fame holy difpenfation and ordinances ?-At ver. 14. it "is faid-ann-she is thy companion, or affociate-ni nes-and a wife, or woman, of thy covenant-i. e. a partaker "with thee in the covenant made with Abra"ham and his feed after him. So the prophet "Zech. ix. 11. where GOD fays to the daugh"ter of Zion-As for thee-In (or by) the blood THY COVENANT I have jent forth thy prifoners, &c. where — thy covenant-compared with the context "in this place of Malachi, clearly determines "the meaning to be as above, and it stands "here as oppofed to the daughter of a strange

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בריתך

GOD, ver. 11.—8—And He hath

* If the attentive reader will compare the N—one, in this place, with 8-one GOD, ver. 10. furely he muft fee, that the fame Almighty Perfon is meant. There he is faid to create-here to make. Comp. Gen. ii. ter part.

3. lat

66

(or hath He not ?) the remainder of the Spi"rit-Hath He not the fame power He ever “had ?—Is His hand fhortened at all, fo "that He cannot complete your restoration "if He pleases, or punish you ftill more severely, if you continue difobedient to His "commandments? Spirit is here used for power, mighty, but efpecially irresistible power; as Pf. cxxxix. 7. If. lix. 19. If. "Îxiii. 14. If. xxxiv. 16.-p 8 21 "And what did THE ONE feek? Dimba yu

-a + † feed of GOD-an ‡ holy feed (fee Ezra ix. 2. compare ver. 14.) therefore take "beed to your fpirit-that is, your temper-affections"-as is very often applied, (see Numb. xiv. 24. 1 Sam. i. 15.) Sam. i. 15.)" and none of you deal treacherously against the wife of thy youth, (whom thou haft married when a

8.

* So the power of the Spirit is often used for the Spirit itself. Comp. If. xxxii. 15. Luke xxiv. 49. Acts i. Sée alfo fudges xiii. 25; xiv. 19; xvi. 17, 20. Rom. i. 4. with 1 Cor. vi. 14. & al. freq. In an old edition of the Bible, printed in the year 1615, there are short notes added in the margin; and in the note on the word Spirit, in this text, it is explained to mean power and

virtue.

Et quid Unus quærit nifi femen DEI. Vulg.

This can have nothing to do with polygamy, because, if it had, we should have hardly found it allowed of GOD, and practifed by his faints; or, in fact, have found fome of the most diftinguished and bleffed men, that ever lived, the offspring of polygamous marriages; witnefs holy Jofeph, and the prophet Samuel. Befides all this, we may obferve, that the Jews, who are in this place of Ezra emphatically ftyled the holy feed, were defcended from the twelve fons of Jacob, half of which were born under polygamy.

virgin)