Letters Addressed to Relatives and Friends; Chiefly in Reply to Arguments in Support of the Doctrine of the Trinity (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: LETTER II, THE TERMS GOD AND LORD. My Dear Father: The words God and Lord do not, I suppose, necessarily denote absolute supremacy, although they do denote dominion and power. In studying the Scriptures, we ought to bear in mind the common sense in which certain terms were used by the common people at the time the Scriptures were written; because we know that, in the course of time, words do very much change their signification. In the Bible we have the term God applied in various ways. In regard to its use among the Greek and Roman philosophers and poets, who lived about the time of our Saviour, we are informed by the history of that period; we know that the term was used with very extensive latitude; and it is natural to suppose that the writers of the New Testament, who were chosen from the people, used their terms as they were used by the people, and intended to give a meaning which would be readily understood by the people. The early Christians used the word God in relation to different degrees of superiority or power, and not as it is now used, in an absolute sense. And I wish these facts to be borne in mind while you peruse this letter. I am free to con fess, that, as a general thing, the term should not now be applied to any but the Supreme Being, because now 12 THE TERMS GOD AND LORD. it has an absolute and definite meaning; though, in considering those passages of Scripture where it is applied to subordinate beings, it must still be used, but always with the fact of its different use in another age of the world, kept steadily in view. In this sense I do admit that the Saviour of the world, the Messiah, may be called a God; and I know that he is constantly called Lord; and why should he not be, when his Father made him both Lord and Christ? But it is conce...