Jah-as the Essence of all perfection and grace

Zebaoth-then shall His holy will be done by all the earthly Hosts, even as it is done by the heavenly.

46

"In that day shall Jehovah be one, and His name One." (Zech. xiv. 9.) That is, Jehovah's Attributes shall no longer be profaned by the heathen who apply them to their abominable idols. And whereas we know Him now only in part, as He was pleased first to reveal Himself by His attributes, and afterwards more fully, "in these last days," by His Son, then shall we know, even as also we are known." For although in Jesus "dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead," yet was this "bodily;" and while His Incarnation was a marvellous revelation, His flesh was also a "veil." Hereafter will be communicated unto us what now is incommunicable, and what is yet comprehended in Jehovah - the centre, so to speak, around which all other Divine attributes revolve-will be made manifest in its effulgence, to the inexpressible delight of His saints.

SCRIPTURE EMENDATIONS.

1 COR. xi. 10" On this account,

ought the woman to hold power in the head, even as the angels.'

Perhaps no passage has caused so much perplexity as this. Two errors present themselves in our English Version-1st, The translation. 2nd, The marginal gloss on this erroneous rendering.

The translation above, at first sight, presents no radical difference as compared with the A.V., but though slight, it is all important.

"Her" in the text has no authority. The translators, no doubt, and all ever since, yea, before our version appeared, thought that the woman's own natural head was meant. It is not so.

First, as to the rendering above. "For this cause "will do; or "therefore," or any similar expression. "To have" may be retained if any prefer it. "The head" is the simple rendering, known even to a beginner in the Greek. "Even as," though not per

As the Roman Joris-pater, and the Syrian Adonis, &c.

haps very readily to be sustained by examples, may fairly be considered the same as "according to," an admitted rendering of dia. Authority for iniin, is abundant; see Heb. i. 1; Matt. xxi. 19; Mark xii. 26; 1 Thess. i. 2; Philemon 4.

In ver. 3; we read "the head of woman is the man." This is the woman's head referred to in ver. 10. Whatever power the woman exercises it must be held in this head; she is to be his delegate. Is this degrading? The man is under the same conditions: "the head of every man is Christ." Let this be duly recognised, and there will be no lordly assumption of authority, no compulsory rule. It has been said, "if man is the head, woman is the heart." Certainly man is not complete without the woman. There is a painful consciousness of something wanting from his side when alone. Again, the head of Christ is God." The life of Christ illustrates this. "I came not to do mine own will," says our glorious Head. "I do nothing of Myself; but as my Father has taught Me, I speak these things," says the great Teacher again. Here then is a catena, the links of which downward are -God, Christ, man, woman. God alone is absolute. Christ says, "I do alway the things that please Him." Just in proportion as man does so towards His Head, and woman towards hers, will there be happy concord.

As to the marginal gloss; it is astonishing how it could ever be said that "the power on the head" was the veil-a sign that the woman is under the power and authority of the husband. It never was such a sign. Whenever it is used in Scripture, it is as a refuge for modesty; thus Rebekah when she saw Isaac, and had learnt who he was, "took a veil and covered herself."

In the A.V., the continuity of the argument is broken: "man is not of the woman, but woman of the man. Neither was man created for the woman, but the woman for the man. Therefore ought the woman, &c." It is a natural and proper relationship, even were it not a divine order. The woman can claim no exemption, the man may make no concession. "Woman's rights" are well defined in the word of God; her happiness is well cared for, her honour jealously guarded. "Men ought to love their wives as their own bodies .. even as the Lord the Church."

An obscure writer quotes Callistratus as using the expression ovoía τριχώματος to denote a kind of topping composed of braids of hair. We know what ovaía means, and we know what pixóμa means; but if the two are said to mean "power on her head," we only smile on the delusion. The apparent difficulty has caused desperateness: few have had the simplicity to say, "we know nothing about it," as the Editor of the pictorial Bible has said, and search has been made even where authorised help could not possibly be found.

The most that could be said for this elucidation is-that it was a happy discovery. Here is no scholarship displayed, none was needed. It is a small contribution to the right understanding of that Book whose Author is God, and whose ethics are pure and sufficient for all the purposes of a godly life.

Clifton.

W. HOWELL.

"MYSTERY," ITS OUTSIDE AND INSIDE.

"Important truths still may our teachers hold,

And moral mysteries with art unfold!
GRANVILLE.

REV. SIR,-From St. Matthew's Gospel we learn, that unto those whose hearts are open to receive the truth in the love of it, it is granted to understand the secret things of God, but to those who are prejudiced and selfconceited, or careless and inattentive in matters of so great importance,to them it is not granted, (xiii. 11.) In this verse occurs the word "mysteries." The study of words is interesting. Allow me to transmit to you the result of my study on the word "mystery." This word should be made so transparent to the mind, that the objects represented, may be seen through. The person is different from the picture which represents it: the substance from the shadow projected by it.

Muornpov means a revealed secret. The ancient Pagans had mysteries: and these were always secret: but all Greeks, without distinction of rank or education, might be initiated (μυεισθαι): such was the case in the Eleusinian mysteries. Little is known respecting the rites observed in these mysteries, since no one was allowed to divulge them. It is the remark of

The

Josephus, "that the principal doctrines of each nation's religion, were made known among heathens, only to a chosen few, but among the Jews, to the people no less than to the priests." (Deut. xxiv. 29; Deut. vi. 7.) It appears that in many of these pagan mysteries, certain emblems or symbols (thence called themselves Mysteries) were displayed either to the initiated in the course of their training, or to the people and that the explanation of these to the initiated, was the mode in which they were instructed. These mysteries were probably the remains of a worship which preceded the rise of the Hellenic mythology, and its attendant rites, grounded on a view of nature less fanciful, more earnest, and better fitted to awaken philosophical thought and religious feeling. general belief of the ancients, was, that they opened to man a comforting prospect of a future state. The word mystery is often understood as something hidden from us, and which we are not to seek to know. This is the reverse of the Scripture sense: Which (1) is something which WAS kept secret, and is now made manifest. God's purpose of calling the Gentiles and giving them equal privileges to the Jews, must have been unknown to human wisdom. It was against all appearances and probabilities at that time. (Rom. xvi. 25, 26.) "The mystery of the Gospel." (Eph. vi. 19.) Or (2) something of an emblem, whose signification is explained to all disciples. "To you, it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God:" (Matt. xiii. 11:) i.e., to all the disciples. All who believed in his works, done in the Father's name, were received if they would come to Him as disciples. Many parts, indeed, of the Gospel scheme, are very imperfectly revealed; but Paul calls any doctrine a mystery, not so far forth as it is hidden, but, on the contrary, so far as it is revealed; e.g., marriage is a great mystery, "but I speak concerning Christ and His Church." (Eph. v. 32.) Marriage he means, is a mystery not in itself, but when regarded, as an emblem of the union of Christ and His Church. An emblem, is a picture representing one thing to the eye, another to the understanding: a painted enigma, or a figure representing some obvious history, instructing us in some moral truth. In the Revelation xvii. 5, "Mystery, Babylon the Great," &c., this female figure is an emblem. The Church of Rome, to this

day, delights to be styled Holy Mother Church. Holy she is in the sense that the Hebrews call harlots, and such a mother as spurious children have for their mother; the father is seldom mentioned by them. The whole antichristion state, is a "mystery of iniquity," (2 Thes. ii. 7,) and is conversant about ceremonies, pageants, rites, sacraments. The whole Roman system in its rise, in its powers, in its agencies, such as the confessional and the inquisition, is a succession of mysteries. It is a parody of the truth, even of the "mystery of godliness" (1 Tim. iii.); has its counterpart in the "mystery of iniquity," i.e., policy palliated with the name of piety, dissembled sanctity, which is double iniquity. Rome was raised in a mystery, she grew to her greatness insensibly and cunningly. "O foul Circe Megæra! Now when the circle of thine existence lies complete and the eye glances over the numerous years which were lent thee-to do evil as thou couldst!! I behold thee once a child, bright-eyed (Rom. i. 8), afterwards, the devil's playfellow, nay plaything, and also at length, a squelched putrefaction. (Rev. xvii. 2), with the head-dressings, and hungerings, the gaddings and hysterical gigglings that came between,-what shall I say was the meaning of thee at all?" It is observable that the word mystery, has also a special ecclesiastical signification. Muσrnpiov is the Greek ecclesiastical word for sacrament. Does not the author of the Apocalypse intend to teach us that the sacramental system, would be a prominent feature of the Apostasy? Had the Latin word which has been adopted into our own language, been that employed, it would at once have conveyed such meaning. Instead thereof, the Greek ecclesiastical word is used, of which sacramentum is the Latin rendering. The sacraments instituted by Christ Himself, Rome has in various ways corrupted, added others and substituted salvation by sacraments for salvation by faith. In the Church of England Communion Service, we who have duly received these holy mysteries," it is worthy of remark, that the word "receive" would make it clear, if any one could otherwise have doubted, that the mysteries are the bread and wine, regarded as symbols or emblems, having a moral meaning hidden beneath the material substance. By commemorating the

death and dying love of Messiah, Christians avow their special relation to Him, and renew their obligations to be faithful to their Divine Master. "Sursum corda," "Lift up your hearts" means, look not so much to the outward signs in the sacraments here below, but use them as ladders, to raise you up to Christ in the upper chamber, heaven! The idea of 8 sacrifice in the supper of the Lord was originally entirely of a symbolical kind, and this idea originally had not the least reference to the sacrifice of Christ. It was only the spiritual offering of praise by the Christians, which was thought of, but this certainly pre-supposed the sacrifice of Christ for man. Afterwards, however, the reference to this latter sacrifice, became more prominently brought forward: but still only as implying the symbolical, or the commemorative representation of the sacrifice of Christ. Bishop Copleston says, "The word sacrifice was indeed used by Augustine in the fifth century, in speaking of the cele bration of the Lord's Supper: but the word sacrifice, in that age, was not appropriated to the slaughter of a victim, or even to a form of expiation : it originally meant, what the composition of the term evidently denotes, any sacred rite or ceremony performed by man, any offering to the Deity, whether in token of adoration, of thanksgiving, or of prayer. The idea that the Lord's Supper is a propitiatory sacrifice for sins is not apostolic, but apostatic. The Pilgrims of Paray le Monial shocked scriptural Christians lately, by chanting these words:

"Sweet Sacrament, I thee adore :

Oh ! let me love Thee more and more!"

Does the Marian really believe that the host is God, and that he is doing right in worshipping it? Let me en treat each Papalin to consider the above reasoning: and that the word sacrament among ancient Christian writers meant a mystery, i.e., emblem: and also that the idolatrous heathen believed that he was doing right in worshipping his idol. (Isaiah xliv. 10, 20.) "He feedeth on ashes: a deceived heart hath turned him aside, that he cannot deliver his soul, nor say, Is there not a lie in my right hand?" Wherein is this withering denunciation less applicable to the worship of a piece of bread, than of a

Ως λόγος ἀρχαίων ὡς ὑδρογενὴς διέ ταξεν,

Ἐκ θεό θεν γνώμασι λαβὼν κατὰ δι πλακα θεσμόν.”

"In essence all divine,

Of all things earthly, the sole Maker is, Their end, their middle, their beginning, He. So ancient records tell-so, too, that sage, Who, waterborn, yet heaven inspired, proclaimed,

That twofold law: on diptich tablets graved."

Υδρογενὴς points to Moses. Δίπλακα may refer both to the twofold nature of law-duty to God and man-as taught in the ten commandments, and to the tablets on which they were inscribed, which may have been made to fold together.-Notes and Queries.

THE BISHOP OF LONDON DOES NOT SPEAK WITHOUT HIS BOOK; OR, THE NEW GRIEVANCE OF THE SYNA

GOGUE ORGAN.

THE following is the sad complaint made in the Jewish Chronicle of the 24th ult. :

"The Bishop of London, at the recent meeting in connection with the London Hospital Sunday Fund, after referring to the fact that all denominations had united in the undertaking, characterised it as one great act of Christian charity.' Now seeing that charity is a virtue of Jewish origin and Jewish ordinance, and also, we may add of Jewish practice, it is rather singular that the Bishop should have availed himself of this particular occasion to ascribe charity to Christianity,

seeing that even he must admit that the Jews have contributed a large proportion to the fund raised for the hospitals, and that even in his own Metropolitan Cathedral the donations were remarkably small."

Be comforted. The Bishop of London will not for a moment withhold his assent to your proposition, nay his Lordship will make your plea even stronger than you imagine. Christian charity, as well as Christian verity, is DECIDEDLY of Jewish origin. A fact which neither Christian Bishop nor Jewish Rabbi dare deny.

But perhaps the demurrer to his Lordship's position insists that such charity as the Bishop of London spoke of was a principle of Talmudical or Rabbinical judaism. If so, some very unpleasant questions spring up, which are-Does the Bishop's critic know anything about that judaism? If he does, does he think that none out of Finsbury Square knows anything about it? We regret that our space this month compels us to postpone, to our December issue, H. C. Oxoniensis' continuation of his introductory paper to his Essays on the Talmud, in which this very subject is discussed. However, not to keep the Finsbury Square Oracle in suspense, we just give him a couple of passages from Talmudical and Rabbinical enactments, which will convince him that the charity of Talmudical judaism is something utterly different from CHRISTIAN CHARITY:"A daughter of Israel shall not nurse the son of a Gentile woman, for she would rear a worshipper of the stars and planets; nor shall she act as midwife to an idolatrous woman, But she may do that office, for remuneration, to avoid invidiousness."

The following is the corollary to the above: "From hence thou learnest that it is unlawful to cure idolaters even for remuneration; should one, however, be afraid of them, or apprehensive of their invidiousness, he may heal for remuneration, but to do it gratis is unlawful." We purposely omit giving references at present, or more specimens of Talmudical charity. The chief Rabbi's house is not far from the office of the Jewish Chronicle, Dr. Adler can supply both. H. C. Oxoniensis will do all that is required in that line in our coming issue. At present, we simply maintain that the Bishop of London does not speak without his Book, whatever the synagogue oracle may do.