The GOSPEL TRUTH

LECTURES ON THE

MORAL GOVERNMENT OF GOD.

 By

 NATHANIEL W. TAYLOR, D. D.,

1859

VOLUME II

 

SECTION III:

THE MORAL GOVERNMENT OF GOD AS REVEALED IN THE SCRIPTURES

 

LECTURE XI:

THE NATURE OF GOD'S MORAL GOVERNMENT AS REVEALED.

 

Section 5: The law in the import of its sanctions -- The reward. -- Proposition stated. -- Eternal life not the sanction of the law of Moses. -- The reward not directly revealed -- Not frequently repeated. -- Made known by inference find representation. -- Does this involve double sense -- The proper and accidental sense of words distinguished. -- Both authorized by usage. -- Allegorical and fantastic interpretations deprecated. -- Twofold sense abundant in the Scriptures. -- Examples in parables: Gen. iii. 15; xvii. S. -- Application to reward promised in the Mosaic law. -- Use of the word life in the Old and New Testament. -- The law of Eden.

 

 

I COME NOW, as proposed, to Sect. 5, the law in the import of its sanctions; and first, of the reward.

 

Concerning this, I state the proposition now to be proved, thus:

 

The reward promised by the law of Gods moral government to the obedient subject is complete or perfect happiness so long as he continues obedient.

 

For the reasons already assigned, I shall first inquire what evidence is furnished by the Mosaic law.

 

To prevent misapprehension, I would here say, that although I suppose a future state was revealed under the Mosaic dispensation, I do not suppose that eternal life -- meaning by it confirmation in holiness and happiness in a future world on condition of perfect obedience in this -- was the sanction of the law of God's moral government as revealed through this dispensation. Such a promise may have been received, but according to principles already stated, I Suppose it to be the same promise of eternal life to personal holiness, which the Gospel more fully reveals. But the reward of the law as such, exclusive of a gracious economy, was simply a reward promised during the continued obedience of the subject. Nothing more and nothing less could be inferred.

 

Again, I need only to advert to the fact which has been so fully explained, that the moral government of God, administered over Israel, is to be carefully distinguished from the theocracy which was also administered over that people. The perfect moral government of God over men as immortal beings, in respect to any formal development of its great principles, was but imperfectly exhibited directly by the Jewish lawgiver. The theocracy or civil institute was very fully and minutely unfolded. I am not saying how much this people knew, or had the means of knowing respecting God's moral government, from earlier revelations; but that it was not the primary or leading object of the mission of Moses formally and directly to unfold the nature and principles of this government. This object was aimed at indirectly and through the medium of the theocracy or civil government, and war, in fact accomplished as has already been explained.

 

Further: we are not to look for those frequent and formal recognitions and statements of the truth now under consideration which we might expect to find in the actual administration of a perfect moral government under a merely legal dispensation. The perfect moral government of God which is here distinguished from the theocracy or civil government which God administered over Israel, was administered under an economy of grace as revealed in the covenant with Abraham, which the law -- the civil institute that Was four hundred and thirty years after -- could not disannul. We shall look in vain therefore, for any instance of a legal reward under God's moral government according to the principles of such a government. There was no perfectly obedient subject to be thus rewarded. Nor, viewing the Mosaic code as a mere national institution, can we rationally expect the direct, literal declaration of our doctrine. The promise in that broad and comprehensive import Which includes perfect happiness, does not pertain to such an institution. All that we are to look for under this institution in formal and literal statement is, the promise of along, prosperous, and happy life to obedient subjects. There is yet another reason why we are not to look for any explicit, literal, formal declaration or development of this great principle of a moral government in the Mosaic economy. The earlier revelations of God were comparatively obscure, and the light which was to be shed on this world was, in the wisdom of God, to be progressive. In accordance with this fact, the Jewish theocracy in the Scriptures, which is often called by way of eminence, THE LAW, was "a shadow of good things to come" -- a covenant or institution not faultless (not perfect), and therefore to give place to another and a better covenant founded on better promises -- it was an example and shadow of heavenly things. (Heb. viii. 5-8; x. 1; Gal. iii. 17, &c.)

 

How then would the Jew reason in respect to the rewards of that perfect moral government which was represented by the theocracy? Could he derive but one inference, and would not that be the inference which is expressed in our proposition? Were there any facts to bring doubt or uncertainty over this inference. Not the fact that God did not proceed on the strict principles of legal retribution which pertain to a perfect moral government; for, as we shall see hereafter, the clear exhibition of a future state and of an economy of grace forbid such a conclusion. Or rather the fact that he gave a perfect law of a perfect government in connection with these facta, amounted to a full confirmation of the reality of a perfect moral government and the import of its sanctions. Now add to these considerations the truth that God assumed the relation of a national king, with the facts which it involves, As such he shows himself rigidly exact in respect to its every principle and requirement. He promises in the most absolute forms to award earthly happiness to obedience under the civil constitution, and to do this even by a course of extraordinary and miraculous providence. But if God promised to do, and did actually do this -- if after proving the reality of a perfect moral government, he subverted the laws of nature in the rigid execution of this lower kind of moral government, conferring earthly happiness as the reward of external conformity to the law, for such, in effect, was the known fact -- with how much higher approbation must he regard, and with what richer gifts would he bless the sinless obedience of a perfect heart? In this system of national law it was manifest beyond all denial, that the demand in respect to action went far beyond the condition on which, in effect, its reward of earthly happiness was promised and on which it was given. The demand was for spiritual religion holiness of heart; the condition of the promise was in effect the mere external appearance of what was demanded. What then but perverseness or criminal stupidity could infer, that by the most blameless external conformity one could satisfy the omniscient King? If men were justified and rewarded on such principles by a national ruler, would not the Searcher of hearts -- the perfect moral governor -- give a higher reward to him who should fully meet the demand of his perfect law by the homage of a perfect heart? I know that the error, the capital error of the Jew was in thinking that the demand of the law required external obedience only, and that this would secure the favor of God. But which was the most rational inference from the premises -- that because the national king awarded earthly good for external obedience for the mere show of obedience, this was the full measure of his demand; or, in view of the express and unqualified nature of the demand as reaching to the heart, and of the facts which showed the reality of his moral government under a gracious economy -- that a spiritual obedience would secure a still higher reward I Surely no degree of intellect which makes a man rational, if unperverted, could fail to adopt the latter conclusion. The reproofs and denunciations from God for the want of spiritual service -- the homage of the heart on the part of the people -- show how he expected them to reason on this subject.

 

Here the question might arise, whether these views and those like them in Lecture IV. do not require a double sense or meaning to the language of this part of the Mosaic code 9 This question must be decided by those principles by which we assign to language its meaning. Now one way in which words as the signs of ideas, become precise and definite in their import is by prior use: such import is so definite that there are some meanings which in ordinary use they cannot possess. Thus according to this law the word tree cannot denote the same thing as the word man, nor the phrase the land of Canaan the same thing as the word heaven. To admit any other principle in deciding the meaning of language in its ordinary use, would be to introduce confusion into its use, if not to destroy it as the vehicle of thought altogether. No one can assign a higher place or influence to usage in determining the import of language than I do. It is that, and that only which gives to words what may be called their proper meaning, and their only fixed or permanent meaning so far as they have any. It is of course the only criterion of deciding what that proper meaning is. If then words can never be properly used except in their primary prover meaning, the question concerning their being properly used in a double meaning would be settled at once.

 

But it is to be remembered that prior use is not the only criterion of the meaning of a speaker. The meaning of language and the meaning of a speaker are often two things. The true and only meaning of language as determined by usage, may be called its proper meaning. Any other meaning which the writer or speaker shows by legitimate evidence to be intended by him in the use of it, may be called accidental. Prior use is only one way of ascertaining this intention of a writer or speaker, or rather it is in all cases a decisive criterion, except the writer or speaker furnishes decisive evidence that he uses language in some other import than that which has thus been assigned it. But if he does furnish such evidence, whether by definition or otherwise, that he intends to convey another meaning, then the meaning which he thus shows that he intends to convey is his real meaning. Such a use of words is always an authorized use provided the speaker furnishes some sure criterion of deciding his real meaning. Usage decides that we must use words in the sense which prior use has given them, or show clearly that we use them in some other sense, and in what sense.

 

Let it then be kept in mind, that in determining the meaning of language, as that which the speaker intends to convey to the hearer -- that in judging of his intended meaning, prior usage as it fixes the meaning of words is one kind of evidence, and one which, unless other decisive evidence be furnished of another meaning, is ever to control interpretation; that, nevertheless, prior use is not the only evidence of a speaker's meaning, nor can it by any means set aside other decisive evidence of a different meaning; that the meaning of language is not lost nor in the least degree obscured on the principle now stated, for in both cases, decisive evidence though different in kind is furnished of the intended and real meaning; and that when this is done, whether it be the evidence resulting from prior use, from definition, or from a representative system, language is properly used, and is to be interpreted according to the manifested intention and design of him who uses it.

 

What this evidence is which proves an accidental or acquired meaning to be the real meaning of a speaker, is an inquiry which deserves the attention of every interpreter of language. I cannot enter now into the consideration of it to any extent. It is however, important to my object to show that what I have called the mode by inference and representation, constitutes decisive evidence on this point. In regard to the former I remark, that nothing is more easy or common than to use language in such a manner, that in view of known facts and in particular circumstances, it shall, in the way of palpable inference, turn the mind to something beyond the proper import of the language used; and this, as certainly and as clearly as any direct and literal phraseology could do. In such a case there can be no doubt of the speaker's design to convey the inference itself to the mind of the hearer; and accordingly, we decide by this true and only criterion, the inferential meaning to be a part, and frequently the principal part of his real meaning, and often also his only meanings Nor does this mode of speaking lead to any confusion or peculiar liability to mistake. For it is always attended with decisive evidence of the real design of the speaker. It is therefore as easy to distinguish such an inference from one which, though legitimate, is not intended, as to distinguish, (as we always must,) the real from the possible meaning of direct literal expressions by attendant evidence. At all events, let the inference be manifested as I have supposed, and let it involve personal reproach and insult, and we never fail to regard it as intended.

 

In connection. with this mode, that of representation or of exhibiting one thing by another, may also exist, as has been shown in Lecture IV. When these concur, the evidence of the real meaning of the speaker is peculiarly decisive. The latter however, when existing alone as a common and well-understood mode of conveying knowledge, is scarcely less satisfactory than that by words used in the import which usage has given them. I am aware that the contrary is extensively supposed to be true, and that the mode of conveying truth by representation is also supposed to be peculiarly vague and peculiarly liable to abuse. That it has been and is still greatly abused, I readily admit. But it is not more abused or perverted than language when used according to the laws of actual usage.

 

It admits of a question, I think, whether this mode involves any peculiar obscurity in itself considered, compared with that of literal language, and whether what we call the obscurity of the Old Testament on some subjects does not consist rather in the less frequent repetition of some truths, as that of a future state; and in less specific statements of others, as that respecting the office and work of the Messiah. It may be in a given case more obscure than literal language, but the question is, can it not be made as clear?

 

I need not say that the abuse of it furnishes no reason against the use of it. Nor do I admit that it is especially liable to abuse. True indeed, it would be so if we might, as some actually do, regulate, limit or extend our interpretation of such language by the mere fact of resemblances, and this by giving the reins to fancy and conjecture; or if we might discard all those principles and laws of evidence which are to guard and limit and guide the interpretation of such language. And so the same disregard of fixed principles, the same lawlessness in interpreting other language, would lead and I may say has in fact far more frequently and extensively led to similar results. The question then is, not whether this mode of interpreting language has been in fact perverted and abused -- for what mode has not been? -- the question is, whether it is not as strictly and definitely and plainly guarded by certain principles and laws of interpretation as any other? I could not well express more abhorrence than I feel for any mode of eliciting the import of the sacred oracles which dispenses with the severe logic of interpretation, suffers the imagination to run riot in tracing resemblances and analogies, and sanctifies its results by the pretense of some second sight or sense as a peculiar prerogative of the interpreter. It is true indeed that the natural man, the man enthralled by groveling appetite and passion, discerneth not the things of the Spirit, neither can he know them. Such a man under such mental tyranny must be a miserable interpreter of the lively oracles of God. His very intellect by the had dominion of this state of mind, is not only unfurnished with the first principles, the very elements of successful interpretation, but is stupefied and cramped as to all vigorous action on such subjects. The soul's constitutional discernment is peculiarly blunted in respect to the beauty, and weight, and excellence of divine realities, and disqualified for that perception which is necessary to give them their practical influence. In this state of sinful enthrallment the man cannot appreciate, nor apprehend, nor successfully judge of the things of God's revelation. But then this same man, as truly as any other man, has those powers and properties of the soul which may be roused from this state of dormancy and inaction; his susceptibilities to other objects than those which now engross him may be touched and excited; his intellect may be awakened and directed to those matters of unwonted attention; and then he must and may learn what is the meaning of the Spirit, by the self-same mental process, and by the self-same laws of interpretation, as those by which the most privileged saint must learn it. To talk of any other mode of discovering the import of God's revelation than the healthful and earnest use of the mental powers, influenced indeed in some cases by the Spirit of truth, but employed with honest intention on the materials of discovery, and directed by the sober well-known laws of interpretation, is enthusiastic dreaming.

 

These principles I shall now attempt to illustrate and confirm in respect to scriptural language, having a special reference to the general subject before us. I remark --

 

1. That the Sacred Scriptures abound in instances in which language has a proper and accidental meaning, i.e., a double sense. Here I wish it to be remarked that I do not attribute two proper meanings to the same language, i.e., two senses, both of which are acquired by usage. When words by a change of import acquire by usage a further meaning than their original meaning, then the whole comprehensive import is not two meanings, but one comprehensive proper meaning, because usage now assigns this as the meaning, and there is therefore no longer any distinctive mark by which the parts of the meaning can be distinguished and pronounced two meanings. One part is decided to be included in the proper meaning on the same ground as is the other, viz., that of usage. But when words are used in a meaning not acquired by usage, and this in addition to the meaning which is acquired by usage, then there is a distinctive mark or characteristic in these meanings by which they may be distinguished and regarded as two meanings. Now if I mistake not, it has been simply and solely from overlooking this fact, that some have become so zealous in contending against a double sense. They have seen with great clearness that words can have but one proper meaning; that whether it be more or less comprehensive, still as a proper meaning, a meaning acquired by usage, it is but one; that the parts of it cannot be distinguished as two by any distinctive characteristic, both being determined to belong to the language on the same ground, viz., usage. But while they, have seen this on the one hand, they have not seen on the other, that words may be used, and if their meaning is ever enlarged or extended must be used, in an accidental meaning, i.e., a meaning not acquired by previous usage; that this meaning, though as real as the proper meaning, is still arbitrary in this first instance, and must remain so till subsequent usage shall render it the proper meaning, and that still it is that which is intended by the speaker as really as any meaning can be. What therefore they contend for is very true, viz., that no language can originally possess two proper meanings or senses. In other words, terms have in no instance two primary meanings. To this of course I fully subscribe. But what I maintain is, that words may have two senses, the one being a pro per sense, the other an accidental sense, i.e., the one being the sense of prior usage, the other a sense or meaning which the speaker intends to convey to the mind being manifested by some other evidence than that of prior usage. If these remarks be just, then the controversy about a double sense, as I before intimated, is a mere dispute about words, or rather a controversy resulting from the want of correct definition.

 

In proof of my position as I have explained it, that much of the language of the Sacred Scriptures has a double sense, or is used to convey two distinct meanings, I refer to the parables of the Scriptures, and what I maintain is, that the language of these has both a proper and accidental meaning as I have explained these terms. Take as an example the parable of the prodigal son. "A certain man had two sons, and the younger of them said unto his father," &c. Now the question is not whether this is not a fictitious or false narrative, nor whether our Lord is to be justified in giving a false narrative in such a case. Both are admitted. But a real meaning belongs to false propositions as well as to those which are true. The falsehood of the narrative therefore, instead of precluding, implies a real meaning which is false. Falsehood or fiction can be predicated of nothing else but of some real meaning of the terms. What propositions then are false in the present instance? Why that "a certain man had two sons," and every proposition in the parable. Every proposition in the parable therefore has a meaning which is false. And if this were not so -- if the language had no meaning which is false, it can have none which is true; for divest it of all meaning according to the usage of terms both true and false, and it becomes absolutely destitute of all meaning and wholly useless in its design. As another test, I ask, can any one read this parable and not bring the image of the returning son and the glad father distinctly before the mind and home to all its sensibilities? Do we not find this touching, melting family scene possessing our thoughts and feelings in spite of ourselves; is it not necessary that it should be so to secure the ultimate effect of the parable; and was not this intended by the speaker? What brings these thoughts and feelings into the mind but the language of the parable? Here then is one meaning, viz., the proper meaning of the words -- their meaning according to usage actually and clearly conveyed, unavoidably conveyed, and designedly conveyed to the hearer. And if this is not a real meaning of the language, nothing can be. But will any one say that our Lord intended to convey no meaning by the language of this parable except that which is false? Did he not also intend to convey one which is true, and a meaning too not pertaining to the language of the parable according to any prior usage? Is it not most manifest that by the phrase two sons, our Lord intended to designate Jews and Gentiles, and by the word father, God himself; and thus to turn the minds of his hearers as truly and intently on these objects as objects of thought, as had he used these words themselves? This will not be denied. It is manifest then that in this parable, and the same is true of every other, the design of the speaker is to use language in its proper meaning, and through this meaning which is justifiably false, to turn the thoughts of his hearers to a substantial reality, which is therefore another and a very diverse meaning of his language. And I flatter myself after what has been said, that these meanings are justly distinguished as two.

 

But if language may have two distinct meanings when one of them is false, it would seem a fortiori, that it may have two meanings when both of them may be true. As examples of this I refer to the following:

 

(Gen. iii. 15.) "And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall. bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel." That this language has what I have termed a proper meaning, and describes the aversion of mankind to serpents and their practice of destroying them, I cannot doubt. Indeed to deny it, seems to me to involve the rejection of the most decisive evidence of the meaning of language which can exist in any case; I mean the exact agreement between the meaning of words as fixed by usage, and known facts or things -- e. g., that horse is black. Who that knows the meaning which words have acquired by usage and has eyes to see, can doubt in such a case the meaning of the speaker.

 

That the passage also conveys another meaning, which the words according to usage do not express, is placed equally beyond doubt by the known facts in the case, as well as by apostolic allusions. Our first parents, could not be ignorant of him by whom their ruin was accomplished, nor fail to understand from this assurance, that this enemy of man was to be vanquished by one born of a woman. The allusions of the apostle to this destroyer under the name of the serpent, and as the introducer of sin and death into this world, with their declarations that the Son of God was manifested to destroy him that hath the power of death, and that Satan should be bruised under the feet of his followers, are sufficient to convince us of the reality of the second and improper meaning of the passage under consideration.

 

As another example I refer to Gen. xvii. 8. That this language had its proper meaning, and that God did here truly promise to Abraham the literal country of Canaan, is evident not only from the agreement between words and things, but from the undeniable facts that the promise was both understood and fulfilled in this import. That this language possessed another, and what I have called a representative meaning, is also placed beyond a question by many considerations as well as by the context. Abraham, it will be admitted, had some just knowledge of God. He had also a knowledge of a future state. He had been expressly told that in him all the families of the earth should be blessed. The Almighty had promised to be his exceeding great reward. Such a man must have known how to estimate the favor and friendship of his covenant God; how to trust his grace and to measures his promises. Could this friend of God then have heard this covenant repeated again and again; could he have listened to this promise of an earthly country, and know as he did that he was a stranger and a pilgrim on earth and was to live forever beyond the grave, and doubt the design of his Maker to carry his thoughts and his hopes upward to a better country, even an heavenly? Let us look also at the accompanying assurance, I will be thy God. Had this friend of God then confined his expectations to mere earthly good, would he not have degraded this great and precious promise in a manner altogether unworthy of its import and its author? What it was for God to be the God of Abraham in the days of Christ, we know. He was not the God of the dead but of the living. He was the same when the promise was made. How then could Abraham, how could any one hear the promise of the land of Canaan, made in such circumstances and in such a connection, and fail to look for a city which hath foundations whose builder and maker is God? Without then adverting to the declarations of the apostle that the Gospel was preached unto Abraham, and that this covenant with him comprises that Gospel in all its promises of grace and of glory, it is sufficient to settle the question before us, that I have stated the fact as stated by the apostle, and adopted the same argument to prove it. (Vide Heb. xi. 8-16.)

 

But I proceed to consider the language of the Scriptures, particularly that of the Old Testament. I refer --

 

First, to the language used to express the legal reward of obedience under the Mosaic law. Whenever the legal reward of the Mosaic law is described, I suppose the language has what I have called a representative meaning, and as it teaches that obedience to the national law (this being decided on according to the principles before stated) is entitled to the specified reward while continued, so it as clearly teaches or asserts that obedience to the law of God's perfect moral government while continued, is entitled to its reward. This view of the subject shows with what decisive conclusiveness Paul, when discussing the subject of justification under the perfect government of God, cited the passage from the Mosaic code, "The man that doeth them, shall live in them."

 

Secondly, I refer to the use of the word life to denote the reward to be graciously given to the imperfectly holy. As the national government of God was administered under a gracious economy, so was his perfect moral government. As the word life was used in some cases to denote the gracious reward under the former, so it would at first in such a use and in the case of the true penitent, denote also the reward promised to such under God's perfect moral government, i.e., eternal life. This would of course be a transferred meaning. Now as I said, words often change their meaning, and a transferred or representative meaning by usage becomes the more usual meaning, and may even exclude the literal meaning altogether. This change, by which the latter meaning is wholly excluded, is especially natural and common when the new meaning respects what is by far the most important and prominent relation or truth, and more especially when it is that in which there is most occasion to use the word, and still more especially when there is no occasion to use it in any other meaning. As then the doctrine of a future happy life to the truly penitent was compared with a life of mere earthly good, pre-eminently important, and as this doctrine in the progress of divine revelation was more extensively understood by the people, and more frequently alluded to or dwelt on by their religious teachers, the word life was not only the term most naturally adopted to express this truth, but it lost, occasionally at least, its former and inferior meaning, and at length when the national law ceased, it lost it altogether. Of this the following examples will be sufficient (Ps. xvi. 11): "Thou wilt show me the path of life; in thy presence is the fullness of joy; at thy right hand are pleasures for evermore." Nothing can be plainer than that the Psalmist here had no reference to earthly good; and surely he was not looking to these pleasures for evermore as the reward of sinless obedience. Prov. xii. 28: "In the way of righteousness is life, and in the pathway thereof there is no death." If any further proof of the fact before us respecting this Jewish usage were necessary, it would be sufficient to refer to the language of the Saviour and of his apostles: "He that hath the Son hath life," &c.

 

The above examples are not referred to, to prove that in every instance in the Old Testament in which life is promised to the penitent, it is not to be understood as having at the time a double import, instead of this exclusive import, acquired by usage. In Ezekiel, xviii., for example, it may have a double, i.e., a proper and a transferred meaning. This remark is of importance, because it shows how entirely unessential it is in such cases to decide this question, in order to justify us at this age of the world in quoting this class of passages in the Old Testament, as having exclusively the latter meaning. For if they had a double meaning at the time, then they had the latter meaning, and this to us is strictly their only important meaning; or rather, in respect to us, they leave lost their former meaning, but retain fully and perfectly the latter, and are therefore to be quoted accordingly.

 

In respect to the law of Eden, I observe that it clearly teaches that so long as our first parents were obedient they should not die, i.e., should live; and what the life promised is, is inferred with entire satisfaction from what we have said of the Mosaic law in connection with the fact that the law of Eden is given in the language of Moses and is Jewish language. For if the principle of reward was developed by the Mosaic law in the manner supposed, it must have been understood, if justly understood by Moses and by those for whom he wrote, to have been the same in Eden.

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