Christ and Other Masters (Volume 1); An Historical Inquiry Into Some of the Chief Parallelisms and Contrasts Between Christianity and the Religious Systems of the Ancient World. with Special Reference to Prevailing Difficulties and Objections (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: CHAPTER III. On the Characteristies of Religion under the Old Testament. OuSe yandp Sti' 'lovSalovs n6vovs 6 v6nos tfv, ouSe S1' avToits fj1vovs ol irpotpriTat eirefiirovTO, dAAti irpbs 'lovSulovs fiev eirefiirovTo, Kal iroptt 'lovSaltav eSuaKovTo- irttrifs Se Trjs oKovfievys trav S1Sair- Kanduv lepbv Ttis irept eOv yv1l1ffeas, Koi vris KaTa 1]/uxV ironelas. S. Athanasius, contra Gentes, cap. xii. (p. 57, ed. Benedict.) Chap. III. Having now in some measure cleared a way to our investigation, first, by pointing out the special tendencies of modern disbelief, and secondly, by undermining one of the more plausible positions which its advocates have sought to occupy, I shall proceed to ascertain the leading traits by which Revealed Religion was distinguishable in all the earlier stages of its progress. For since Christianity professes to reach backward into periods long anterior to the human lifetime of its Founder; since it claims to be most vitally connected with the Old-Testament ceco- nomy, and since the roots from which it sprang are there; we see not only the importance, but necessity, of analysing the ideas embodied in the Hebrew institutions, of reverting to the solemn ordinances of the Law, and studying the oracular voices of the Prophets. .We shall thus be able to compare the aspects Chap. III. of religious thought and feeling as displayed in members of the sacred commonwealth with contemporary systems of the heathen world. If Hebraism resemble these in such a manner as to justify the inference that it was derived from any or from all of them, then Christianity, in turn, professing to have grown directly out of it, is ultimately resolvable into heathen elements. Or, if again the principles alike of Heathenism and Hebraism be nothing more than natural proje...