tained against the Jews and Judaizers, that by the law and the working of the law, no one could attain this disawory, present himself a dikatos before God, and enter into the relation with God founded upon it; but that every man appears as a sinner in God's sight, till entering by faith into fellowship with Christ (the only perfect dikatos by whom mankind are delivered, in the way that we have described from the state of dμapría), he presents himself in union with Christ (ἐν Χριστῷ as a δίκαιος before God, and enters into the entire relation with God, implied in this predicate, is viewed by God as dikaog, and established in all the privileges connected with this idea (dikatora). Consequently Paul includes in the idea of diraiwos that act of God, by which he places the believer in Christ in the relation to himself of a dikalos, notwithstanding the sin that still cleaves to him. Aikawσurn denotes, then, the subjective appropriation of this relation, the appearing righteous before God, by virtue of faith in the Redeemer, and the whole new tendency and aim of the life, as well as the whole new relation to God, now received into the consciousness, which is necessarily connected with it; the righteousness or perfect holiness of Christ appropriated by faith, as, the objective ground of confidence for the believer, and also as a new subjective principle of life. Thus the righteousness of faith in the Pauline sense includes the essence of a new disposition; and hence the idea of drawouvn may easily pass into the idea of sanctification, though the two ideas are originally distinct. Accordingly, it is not any arbitrary act on the part of God, as if he regarded and treated as sinless a man persisting in sin, simply because he believes in Christ; but the Objective on the part of God corresponds to the Subjective on the part of man, namely faith, and this necessarily includes in itself a release from the state inherited from Adam, from the whole life of sin and the entrance into spiritual fellowship with the Redeemer, the appropriation of his divine life. The realization of the archetype of holiness through Christ contains the pledge that this shall be realized in all those who are one with him by faith, and are become the organs of his Spirit; its germ and principle is already imparted to them in believing, although the fruit of a life perfectly conformed to the Redeemer, can only be developed gradually in its temporal

manifestation. The connexion of these ideas will be rendered clearer by developing the Pauline idea of faith.

་

What Paul distinguished by the name of Faith has its root in the depths of the human disposition. It presupposes a revelation of God in a direct relation to man, and faith is the reception and vital appropriation of this divine revelation by virtue of a receptivity for the divine in the human disposition, of the tendency grounded in human nature and the need implanted in it for believing in the supernatural and divine, without which tendency and need, man, however his other faculties might be cultivated, would be no more than an intelligent animal. Something must be presented as an object of knowledge adapted to this part of the human constitution, but this object must be of a kind that can be correctly recognised and understood only by the disposition; it presupposes a certain tendency of the disposition, in order to be known and understood, while it also tends to produce a decided and enduring tendency of the disposition: An inward self-determination of the spirit grounded in the direction of the will is claimed by this object, while a new and constant self-determination is produced by it. It is not in reference to the object of faith, but to the inward subjective significance of this act of the inner man, as that which forms the characteristic of true piety in all ages, that Paul compares the faith of Abraham with the faith of Christians, Rom. iv. 19, where he exhibits Abraham as a pattern of the righteousness of faith. When Abraham received a promise from God, of which the fulfilment seemed to be incompatible with the natural order of things, he raised himself by an act of faith above this impediment, and the word of the Almighty which held forth something invisible, had greater influence upon him than that order of nature which presented itself to his understanding and bodily senses. Hence this faith, as a practical acknowledgment of God in his almighty creative activity, and as a reference of his whole life to the sense of his dependence on God, a true honouring of God:' and it was this faith which gave its peculiar significance and character to the life of

A state to which the intellectual fanaticism of a party in the present age, zealous for the pretended autonomy of reason, seeks to degrade 2 Α διδόναι δόξαν τῷ θεῷ. Rom. iv. 20.

man.

1

1

Abraham. This faith, says Paul, was counted to him by God for dikatorum; that is, although Abraham was not sinless, (as no man is,) yet through this tendency of his inward life by virtue of his faith, he entered into the relation to God of a díralos; and this was no arbitrary nominal act on the part of God, but his faith was viewed by God, to whom the inward soul of man is manifest, as an index of the disposition by which Abraham became susceptible of all divine communications, and from which alone the sanctification of his whole life could proceed. Now this is applied by Paul to faith with a special reference to Christianity. There is only added a peculiar direction caused by the object on which this faith is fixed, by which also the conception of it as subjective is modified. Faith in this sense presupposes the consciousness of sin, the renunciation of any merits of our own before God, the longing after freedom from the dominion of sin, and our not yielding to despair even under the most vivid sense of sinfulness," but confiding in the grace of redemption; thus there is an entrance into communion with the Redeemer, and a new principle of life is received which continually penetrates and transforms the old nature.

As far as faith includes entering into vital fellowship with the Redeemer, and forsaking the old life of sin, it bears a special reference to the two chief points in which Christ presents himself as Redeemer, as the one who died for the salvation of men, and who also by his resurrection gave them the pledge of an eternal divine life: hence the two-fold reference of faith to Jesus the Crucified and the Risen, the negative and positive side of faith in relation to the old life which it renounces and to the new life which it lays hold of; it is the spiritual act by virtue of which, in surrendering ourselves to him who died for us, we die to a life of sin, to the world, to ourselves, to all which we were before,-whether we are Jews or Gentiles-and rise again in his fellowship, in the power of his Spirit to a new life devoted to him and animated by him. Hence it appeared to the apostle, as he develops

1 The do in Romans iv. 22, points to this connexion. Wherefore, as faith includes all this, as the apostle had before explained, it was imputed to Abraham as δικαιοσύνη, as if the δικαιοσύνη had already been completed by it.

2 In this respect, a πιστεύειν παρ' ἐλπίδα ἐπ' ἐλπίδι.

the sentiment in the sixth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, an absolute contradiction for any one to say that he believed in the Redeemer and yet to continue in his old life of sin. How shall we—he asks-we who (by the act of faith) are dead to sin, live any longer therein? And he demonstrates from the nature of faith in its reference to the death and resurrection of Christ, that faith cannot exist without a renunciation of the former sinful life and the beginning of a new divine life.

From the nature of Tiariç as the governing principle of the Christian life, arises the peculiarity of the Christian standingpoint, in relation to the Jewish as the legal standing-point; and the various indications of this contrariety serve more distinctly to characterise the nature of mioris as the fundamental principle of the Christian life, on which account we wish to consider the subject more in detail.

The law always presents itself as imperative, and makes the salvation of men dependent on the perfect fulfilment of all its commands. "Do all this, and thou shalt live." But since no one can fulfil those conditions, the law can only produce despair. But the gospel addresses the man who despairs of himself, "Do not give thyself up to the feeling of despair.' Ask not how thou canst make the impossible, possible. Thou needest only receive the salvation prepared for thee; only believe, and thou hast with thy faith all that is needful for thy inward life. Paul admirably illustrates this by applying to it the passage in Deut. xxx. 12.2 Say not to thyself, Who

1 That interpretation of this passage, which supposes it to express the opposition between Belief and Doubt, appears to me not to be supported by the connexion, which leads us to expect a contrast of the righteousness by faith with the righteousness by works, the Oeoû dikaιoσúvn with the idia; and the ToûT' σTI, which, from comparing Rom. ix. 8, and other similar Pauline expressions, must be thus understood-" this is equivalent to saying;" and besides the relation of the Pauline words to the Old Testament quotation, since, according to the interpretation we have adopted, the Pauline application admirably suits, in spirit and idea, the meaning of the Mosaic words, which is not the case with the other interpretation.

2 This passage certainly refers to the Mosaic religious institutions, and the words are fitted to distinguish them in their simple religious and moral character from the other religions of the East. But as far as the law, understood according to its own spirit, made certain requirements which it gave no power to fulfil, Paul might justly apply these words to mark the peculiar Christian standing-point; he found an idea

shall ascend to heaven and prepare a path for me thither? For Christ has descended from heaven and has prepared such a path. To ask such a question, is to desire that Christ would descend again from heaven for thy sake. But say not, Who shall descend for me to the regions of the dead and deliver me thence? Christ has risen from the dead and has delivered thee from the power of death. To ask this, is to desire that Christ might now rise from the dead for thy sake, as if he were not already risen. Instead of asking such questions, only let the gospel be cherished with vital power in thy heart;-believe in Him who descended from heaven and rose from death, and thus obtained salvation for thee. Whoever has this faith is truly pious and may be assured of salva tion."

Viewed in the light of legal Judaism, the commandments appeared as merely an outward counteraction of the internal corruption of man, which refused to be cured from without; it was only rendered more apparent by the law; hence the letter only tended to death; it called forth the consciousness of spiritual death and of merited unhappiness, 2 Cor. iii. 6.

The law in reference to its operation on the conscience could be described only as νόμος γράμματος, κατακρίσεως, θανάτου, apapríaç. But when from faith in the Redeemer, a new divine principle of life proceeds, when from faith in the redeeming fatherly love of God, a child-like love develops itself as the free impulse of a life devoted to God, when, instead of the former opposition between the human and divine will, a union is formed between them-then the law no longer appears as a written code, outwardly opposing a will estranged

here expressed which is only realized by Christianity, and is thus prophetic of what Christianity alone accomplishes.

1 Rom. x. 5. If Paul, in the second member of the contrast, has not opposed Christ to Moses, and employed Christ's own words-and such, no doubt, might have been found among the traditionary expressions of Christ which would have been fit to mark this contrast-it does not follow that he was unacquainted with any collection of the discourses of Christ, or that he could not suppose any such work to be known by the Christians at Rome, for his object was answered by borrowing from the Mosaic writings a motto for the righteousness of faith, which would first find its proper fulfilment in the gospel.

2 It was perfectly consonant with the Pauline views to distinguish the law by these predicates, though it may be doubted whether, in Romans viii. 2, the Mosaic law is intended by the word vóuos.