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ling the body" "is used to express cruel torturing where life is not taken," and that this punishment was such as the Jews could not inflict, they not having the power of life and death in their hands. After a few lame attempts at criticisms and explanations of this kind, Mr. Ballou gives the following paraphrase of the text, as expressive of its true meaning:

"I say unto you my friends, be not so much afraid of them who have power only to scourge you in their synagogues [the Jews,] and to administer cruel tortures to your bodies, but have not authority to take your lives, as of that more extensive authority, to which your brethren, the Jews, will deliver you, by bringing you before governors and kings; for this power [Romans] can, after inflicting cruelties on your bodies, doom your lives and bodies to be destroyed in gehenna"!! See "Ballou's Explanation of the doctrine of Future Retribution!" p. 113. What an explanation!Look at it! The Roman Inquisitors never tortured heretics more barbarously than this expositor has tortured this solemn text. Mr. Ballou represents Christ, in plain English, as warning his disciples as he sent them forth to preach his gospel, not to fear the Jews, their bitterest and most inveterate enemies, who could only torture their bodies, but to fear the Romans, who could take their lives, at the instigation of the Jews!! Did Christ ever give such a nonsensical, pusilanimous warning? Never. To this attempt at explaining away this text I object,

1. The attempt to make the original word, rendered kill in the text, mean torture, is an outrageous violation of the laws of sound criticism. Apokteinai, here rendered kill, is literally rendered. It denotes according to the best lexicographers, kill, slay, slaughter. 2. Mr.Ballou has but little confidence in his own exposition. He is greatly embarrassed with this text. Hear him.

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It will undoubtedly, by some, be objected, that as Jesus said, Fear not them that kill the body, &c. he assigned to those whom he told his disciples not to fear, the power to take their lives. To meet this objection, we confess we have

not so ample means as we could wish, nor so much as we might probably obtain by a little more exertion than we have time to employ at present. But what little we have, being MEASURABLY SATISFACTORY to us, we give to our readers, hoping that further light on the subject will from some quarter arise."

Here it is manifest by Mr. P's own confession, that Universalists are troubled with this text. It is in their way. The champion, and father of the system, confesses that he has not "AMPLE MEANS' to sustain his explanation,that his attempt to make it harmonize with his doctrine, is only "measurably satisfactory," and that he is "hoping that further light will arise." Should you speak out honestly your own convictions, I doubt not that you would confess as much as Mr. B. does.

2. I turn out Thomas Whittemore, the Editor of the Trumpet, against this explanation. Hear him. He evidently has no confidence in Mr Ballou's views of the text.

"Does it say, God will destroy both soul and body in hell? No; it says he is able to do so. It describes his ability, not his will nor his purpose." See Universalist Guide, p. 92.

Here Mr. Whittemore is in direct collision with Mr. Ballou. His language is a virtual admission that the power to be feared is not the Roman government, but the Omnipotent Jehovah.

3. Against both of these perversions of this text, I will turn out Hosea Ballou 2d. I am told he has written an elaborate article in the Universalist Expositor, in which he has considered and amply refuted both Mr. Whittemore's and Mr. Ballou's attempts at explaining this text away.

4. As a further refutation of Mr. Ballou's perversion of this passage, I will refer you to Wakefield's Translation, a work to which your preachers and authors frequently refer, as of great authority. He renders the text thus;

"Now I say unto you, my friends, fear not them who kill the body, and after this can do no more; but I will show

you whom to fear, fear him, who, after having killed hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, fear him."

5. The Universalist explanation makes Christ utter nonsense and contradict himself. Suppose I give you here all you ask. What then? Christ is made to utter such nonsense as this:

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"My Friends, fear not the Jews, your most inveterate enemies. They can only scourge you in their synagogues and deliver you to the Romans and instigate them to put you to death but I will forewarn you whom you shall fear, fear the Romans, for they have power to kill your lives,and send you immediately to the paradise of God; yea I say unto you fear them'!!! What nonsense! Dare you look up to heaven and charge Christ with uttering such folly ?

6. It is not true that the Jews could not, or did not put Christians to death in the Primitive Church. It is true the power of putting to death judicially was in the bands of the Roman Governors, but it is a matter of fact, well known to all intelligent persons, that the Jews frequently put the saints to death in a lawless manner. They stoned Stephen, and instigated Herod to put James to the sword. Hear the testimony of Jesus on this point. Addressing the Jews he says: "Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes, and some of them ye shall kill and crucify, and some of them ye shall Scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city." Matt. 23: 34. Here the position of Mr. Ballou, that the Jews could not, or would not, as a matter of fact, kill the saints, is refuted by the testimony of a witness from heaven. To the Jews he says: "Some of them ye shall kill, and crucify." Mr. Ballou says the Romans would do the killingand not the Jews. Have you any doubt as to which of these witnesses you are to believe?

7. Again, if Mr. Ballou's exposition is correct, Christ in this text, attempted to ensnare his disciples in a bewitching temptation. Christ warned them to fear men-not the Jews-but the Romans. Solomon says: "The fear of man bringeth a snare." Did Christ exhort his followers to fear

their enemies and thus cast them into the snare of the wickI trow not? I cannot make these things har

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8. Nor is Mr. Whittemore's explanation any more rational. He regards Christ as merely asserting the power and not the determination of God to punish the wicked after the body is killed? This is not only charging Christ with solemn trifling, but with Jesuitical duplicity. Look at the circumstances under which he made use of the warnings in the text. He was for the first time sending his disciples out to preach his gospel. They were to encounter the cruelest opposition and persecution. He frankly told them of this that they were going forth as sheep amidst wolves. This was adapted to alarm their fears, and the danger was that they would be overawed by their murderous enemies. To bear them up and render them fearless of men, he reminded them of that punishment, which awaits the impenitent after the death of the body. "Be not afraid of them that kill the body, but after that have no more that they can do, but I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear, fear him, which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, fear him." How solemn! How significant! How appropriate! But just attach the sense Mr. Whittemore would put upon the words of Christ, and lo! how useless and unmeaning this solemn text. Let us see how it will sound.

"Be not afraid of them that kill the body, but after that have no more that they can do, but I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear, fear him which after he hath killed, hath power to cast into hell, yea, I say unto you fear him, for he will not do it! You need not fear that he will ever do this; he only has the power to do it. There is no danger." What puerility! What a tissue of unmeaning words! What solemn warnings where there is nothing to be feared. This explanation virtually charges Christ with hypocrisy. makes him warn his disciples in the most solemn manner where he knew there was no danger. Who would do this but a hypocrite? Universalists sometimes tell us, that the

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believers in a future judgment get up"bug-bears" and "scarecrows" to play on the passions of the weak and simple; but here they virtually charge the Holy Jesus with the same hypocrisy.

Once more. Your authors attempt to get rid of the natural common-sense meaning of Luke 12: 4, 5, & Matt. 10: 28, by a learned criticism upon the meaning of the word gehenna, rendered hell in this and several other texts in the New Testament. Mr. Ballou says: "The word rendered hell in our text (Matt. 10: 28,)means nothing but that place of execution, where malefactors were cast alive and consumed in fire." See Book above referred to, p. 114. Now to this I briefly reply,

1. The doctrine of future retribution does not depend for its support upon the meaning of the words rendered hell.Let these words denote what they may, and the doctrine is nevertheless abundantly sustained by numerous texts and considerations, where the word hell does not occur.

2. If we should substitute the word heaven for the word hell in this and similar texts, then the grammatical construction of the passages would render it necessary to understand the word heaven as sometimes denoting in the scriptures, a place or state of punishment in the future world. To illustrate. Substitute the word heaven for hell in Matt. 10: 28, and the sense of the text would not be changed. "Fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in heaven." Or as it would read in Luke, "Fear him, which after he hath killed hath power to cast into heaven." You see that the word heaven substituted for that of hell, does not alter the meaning of the text. The text in such an event would impart a peculiar meaning to the word heaven. It would go to show that, in one instance, at least, the word heaven represents a state or place of punishment, where body and soul might be destroyed after the body is killed.

3. There is no authentic evidence that there was any place in or near Jerusalem in the days of Christ, called gehenna (hell) in which malefactors were cast alive and consumed in fire. Neither the New Testament writers, nor

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