USA > Massachusetts > Hampden County > Springfield > The first century of the history of Springfield; the official records from 1636 to 1736, with an historical review and biographical mention of the founders, Volume I > Part 9
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M. Goodwin and M. Ainsworth from the Hebrew Doctors reckon 18 particular capital sins, for which men were first stoned to death and after hanged, and M. Ainsworth doth also say, that the Hebrew Doctors do not understand this hanging of being put to death by hanging, but of hanging a man up after he was stoned to death, which was done for the greater detestation of such henious malefactors.
The Rebelious son, Deut. 21.21, is brought in as an instance of this double punishment, he was first stoned to death, and then hanged upon a tree.
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Thus shalt not let his carkass remain all night upon the Tree , but thou shalt surely bury him in the same day at the going down of the sun, and the reason is added, because he is the curse of God, namely, because such sinners are more eminently cursed of God, because they were punished with the heaviest kind of death that the Judges of Israel did use to inflict upon any Malefactors.
I think I have sufficiently proved that God did appoint the hanging upon a tree to be a type of the temporal curse.
If hanging upon a tree had been appointed by God to be a type of the eternal curse, then every one that is hanged upon a tree should be eternally cursed, and then divers Martyrs that were crucified, as Christ was, are eternally cursed, and the penitent thief was eternally cursed.
But if the circumstances of the Text be well marked, they will tell you plainly, that this hanging upon a tree be a type of the eternal curse, for I. This Law of Moses must not be understood of putting any man to death by hanging, but of hanging a dead body upon a tree after it was first put to death by stoning: but Christ was crucified whilst he was alive. 2. This hanging in Moses time was done by Judicial Law and civil Mag- istrates, and not by the ceremonial Law nor the Priests. 3. This hanging in Moses was commanded to be practiced by the Magistrates of the Jews' Commonwealth, but the death which Christ suffered was a Roman kind of death.
When the Romans did put Christ to that kind of death which they used to inflict upon their base fugitive slaves, they made him cursed in his death in the highest degree they could and yet at the self-same time Christ did redeem us from the curse of th Law, even from the eternal curse, be- cause Christ died not only as a Malefactor by the Roman soldiers, but he died also as a Mediator by his own Mediatorial obedience.
This act of Christ was an everlasting act of Mediatorial obedience, it was no legal obedience, nor was it any human act of obedience as all legal obedience, it was no less than a Mediatorial oblation, and there- fore it was the meritorious procuring cause of our Redemption from the curse of the Law even at that very same time when Christ was made a curse for us by hanging as a Malefactor upon a tree. Therefore the Tree on which Christ was crucified as a Malefactor cannot be the Altar, neither were the Roman soldiers the Priests by whom this mediatorial sacrifice was offered up to God, but it was his own Godhead that was the Altar, by which he offered up his soul to God, a mediatorial sacrifice for the pro- curing of our redemption from the curse of the Law.
Christ redeemed us not from the curse of the Law, by his soul-sufferings only. And of the meaning of Haides.
Good Divines do affirm that Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the Law, not by his bodily but by his soul-sufferings only, which God inflicted upon his soul when his body was crucified upon the Tree.
This kind of reasoning is very absurd, for as M. Broughton well observed, if Christ suffered the wrath of God in his soul only, to redeem our souls, and not to redeem our bodes, then our bodies are not redeemed.
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If Christ suffered the wrath of God in his soul to redeem our souls from the eternal curse, he must also suffer the wrath of God in his body to redeem our bodies from the eternal curse, or else our bodies must still continue under the eternal curse, though our souls be redeemed by his soul-sufferings: Is not this to make Christ an imperfect Redeemer, and to leave a doubting conscience in a Labyrinth of queries?
The truth is, I find much uncertainty amongst Divines what to affirm in this point, for first, some affirm that Christ suffered the wrath of God in his soul only. Secondly, Others affirm the wrath of God as well in his body as in his soul, to redeem our bodies from God's wrath as well as our souls.
Of the Dialogue's arguments taken from the description of the torments of hell; and from the place of suffering the torments of the damned.
By describing the torments of hell you shall be the better able to judge whether Christ did suffer the torments of hell for our redemption, or not. The torments of hell are usually divided into two parts. I. Into the pain of loss. 2. Into the pain of sense. The pain of loss is the privation of God's favor, by an everlasting separation.
For as the favour of God through Christ is the fountain of life, because it is the beginning of eternal life. Psa. 36.9, so on the contrary to be totally separated from God's favor by an eternal separation, must needs be the beginning of hell-torments or of death eternal.
God doth not forsake the Reprobates so long as they live in this life, with such total forsaking, as he doth after this life; yea, the very Devils themselves as long as they live in this world (being spirits) in the air, are not so forsaken of God as they shall be at the judgment; for as yet they are not in hell, but in the air, and therefore they have not their full tor- ments as yet.
And yet this pain of loss inay a little further be explained by opening the term Second death, which may be in part described by comparing it with the first death, which I have at large described to be our spiritual death, or the loss of the life of our first pure nature; I may call it a death in cor- rupt and final qualities, as I have opened, Gen. 2.17, yea, all other mise- ries which fall upon us in this life till our bodies be rotten in the grave, I call them altogether the first death, because they do all befall us in this world; therefore on the contrary this second death must needs imply a deeper degree of sinful qualities than did befall us under the first death.
And this term Second death doth plainly tell us that it is such a degree of death as surpasseth all the degrees of death in this life, and that the full measure of it cannot be inflicted upon any man till this life is ended, and then their end shall be without mercy, Jam. 2.13.
The Second part of the torments of hell is the pain of sense, or the sense of all tortouring torments.
As God's rejection is the principal efficient cause of their damnation, so Jesus Christ the Mediator is the principal instrumental cause thereof. because they believed not in him that was promised to be the seed of the woman.
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Now come we to examine the particulars, and whether Christ did suffer the torments of hell for our Redemption. I. Did Christ suffer these tor- ments of hell for our Redemption? Did Christ suffer the second death? Was he spiritually dead in corrupt and sinful qualities without any restraining grace? and did God leave him to the liberty of those corrupt and sinful qualities, to hate and blaspheme God, for his justice and holi- ness, as inseparable companions of God's total separation, for these sinful qualities are inseparably joined to them that suffer hell-torments, as the effect is to the cause. Did Christ suffer this pain of loss when he said, My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?
Did Christ at any time feel the knawing worm of an accusing concience? Was he at any time under the torment of despiration? truly if he had at any time suffered the torments of hell, he must of necessity have suffered these things: for they are as nearly joyned to those that suffer the tor- ments of hell as the effect is to the cause.
Did Christ suffer the torments of hell in his body as well as in his soul, to redeem our bodies as well as our souls from the torments of hell?
How long did he suffer the torments of hell? Was it forever? or how long did he suffer them? and when did the torments of hell first seize on him? and when was he found freed from them? or did he suffer the tor- ments of hell at several times or in several places, or but at one time or place only?
Was he tormented without any forgiveness, or did Abraham deny him the least drop of water to cool his tongue?
Did Christ inflict the torments of hell upon his own human nature? or did his Divine nature forsake his human nature in anger? or did his Divine nature forsake his human nature in anger as it must have done if it had suffered the torments of hell? if so, then he destroyed the personal union of his two natures, and then he made himself no Mediator but a cursed damned sinner.
These and such like gross absurdities the common doctrine of imputa- tion will often fall into.
Christ could not suffer any part of the torments of hell as long as he lived in this world, because the very devils as long as they lived in this air do not suffer the torments of hell, as it is evident by the fearful crying out to Christ, Mat. 8.29.
M. Broughton in a Manuscript saith thus: No words in all the Bible do express anything that Christ suffered the wrath of God for our sins, there- fore it is no small impiety for men from general metaphorical terms to gather such a strange particular: none that ever spake Greek (Spirit of man) gathered hell torments for the just from Haides, or from any other Greek or Hebrew Text. Again, the same Author affirmeth in Rev. II.2, that hell-place and torments are not in this life.
And truly it seems to me that the holy Scriptures do confine hell tor- ments to the proper place of hell itself, which is seated on high before the Throne of the Lamb, and Solomon doth tell us that all men's souls both good and bad do ascend, Eccl. 3.21, and the Hebrew Doctors hold gener- ally that hell is above as well as heaven: and Learned M. Richardson doth
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probably conjecture in his Philosophical Annotations on Gen. I, that hell- place is seated in the Element of fire, and may it not be so, secing its place is next before the Throne of the Lamb where John doth place it, Rev. 14.10. And it is certain by Luke's Parable that hell is seated near unto heaven, or else the comparisons that Luke useth to describe their nearness, were absurd.
I. He describes their nearness by two persons talking together, the one in heavenplace, and the other in hellplace.
2. He describes their nearness by seeing each other's case, Luke 16, and so doth Isaiah in Chap. 24.
3. Hence we may see the reason why Haides is put as a common name to both places; both places are usually called Haides in sundry Greek Writers, as if they were but two Regions in the same world of souls: one Region for the godly, and the other for the wicked, where the godly and the wicked may see each other's condition, and talk together in their next adjacent parts, Luke 16.23.
It is evident that Christ did not suffer the torments of hell in this world, because there was no necessary use of such sufferings, for such sufferings are no way satisfactory to the justice of God for our sins; for the rule of God's justice doth require that soul only to die with sins, the soul that sins shall die; one man shall not die for another man's sin, Ezek. 18. By this rule of justice God cannot inflict the torments of hell upon an innocent to redeem a guilty person.
And as God doth tye himself to this Rule of Justice touching the ever- lasting state of men's souls, so he doth appoint civil Magistrates to ob- serve this Rule of justice touching the bodies of sinful Malefactors, they may not punish an innocent for a guilty person, but that man only that sins must die, as 2 Kings 14, doth expound the meaning of the judicial Law in Deut. 24.16. I hold it a point of gross injustice for any Court of Magistrates to torture an innocent person for the redemption of a gross Malefactor.
Of the nature of Mediatory obedience, both according to the Dialogue and the Orthodox.
I. That Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the Law, not by suffering the said curse, but by a satisfactory price of Atonement, namely, by paying or performing unto his Father that invaluable precious thing of his Mediatorial obedience whereof his Mediatorial sacrifice of Atonement was the master-piece.
2. A sinner's Righteousness or Justification is explained and cleared from sonie Common Errors.
That which Christ did redeem us from the curse of the Law, was not by bearing of the said curse really in our stead, (as the common doctrine of imputation teach) but by the procuring his Father's atonement by the invaluable price or performance of his own Mediatorial obedience whereof his Meditorial sacrifice of atonement was the finishing master- piece, this kind of obedience was the rich thing of price which the Father required and accepted as satisfactory for the procuring of his atonement for our full Redemption, Justification and Adoption.
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And according to this tenor the Apostle Paul doth explain the matter, lie doth teach us to place the obedience of the Mediator in a direct opposi- tion to the first disobedience of Adam, Rom. 5.19, he makes the merit of Christ's Mediatorial obedience to countervail the demerit of Adam's disobedience; for the disobedience of Adam was but the disobedience of a mere man, but the obedience of Christ was the obedience of God-man, and in that respect God the Father was more highly pleased with the obedi- ence of the Mediator than he was displeased with the disobedience of Adamı.
It is necessary to distinguish between Legal and Mediatorial obedience; Legal or natural obedience is no more, but human obedience performed by Christ as a Godly Jew unto the Law of works, all actions of Christ from his birth until he was thirty years of age, must be considered but as natural or but legal acts of obedience: I cannot see how any of these actions (which yet it somewhat corrects, as we shall find in due place) can be called Mediatorial obedience.
Of the Divers ways of Redemption.
If so, then there is no need that our blessed Mediator should pay both the price of his Mediatorial obedience, and also bear the Curse of the Law for our Redemption.
I never heard that ever any Turkish Tyrant did require such double satisfaction of any Redeemer for the Redemption of Galley-slaves. I never heard that ever any Tyrant did require to pay both the full price that they demanded for their redemption of their Gallcy-slaves, and to bear their punishment of their curse and slavery also in their stead; I think no cruel Tyrant did ever exact such a double satisfaction therefore I cannot choose but wonder at the common doctrine of imputation, because it makes God the Father more .rigid in the price of our Redemption than ever Turkish Tyrant was, and to be a harder Creditor in the point of satis- faction than ever any rigid Creditor was among men.
The way of Redemption are ranked into three sorts. I. By exchange of one captive for another; but we are not the redeemed, for God did not give his Son into the hands of Satan to redeem us from under the power of Satan. 2. There is a Redemption by force and strength, but this may be called a deliverance rather than a Redemption, but however Christ did not thus redeem us from God's wrath; for then Christ must be stronger than his Father, John 14.28. 3. Therefore Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the Law, and so consequently from his Father's wrath, by no other way or means, but by that rich and invaluable price or merit of his Mediatorial obedience.
And this way of Redemption is often taught and confirmed by the holy Scriptures, as in I Cor. 6.20, I Pet. 1.19, and in this sense only we have atonement, Rom. 5.11, and redemption through the blood, Eph. 1.7, and in this sense he gave his life a Ransom for many, Mat. 20.28, and in this sense he gave himself to redeem us from all iniquity, and to clens us to himself, Ti. 2.14.
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It is evident by another typical ceremony of Redemption that Christ hath redeemed us by a price only, and not by bearing the Curse of the Law for us, Lev. 25.25. 39.
It is a dangerous error in the tenet of the Lutherans to say, that one drop of the blood of Christ is sufficient to redeem the whole world.
Of that wherein the true meritorious efficacy of the blood of Christ lieth.
The true meritorious efficacy of the blood of Christ lies not in this. that it was a part of the corporal substance of the Lamb of God without spot; nor in this, that he suffered his blood to be shed by the Roman sol- diers in a passive manner of obedience, but it lieth in this, that it was shed by his own active priestly power, by which means only it became a Media- torial sacrifice of atonement.
Christ at one and the same time died both as a Mediator actively, and as a Malefactor passively, as I have explained the matter. Gal. 3.13, and in other places also.
But for your better understanding of the meritorious efficacy of the blood of Christ consider two things. 1. Consider what the Priestly nature of Christ, and 2. Consider what was his Priestly action. I. His Priestly nature was his Divine nature, for he is said to be a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedeck, of whom it is witnessed that he liveth, or that he ever liveth. Heb. 7.8.
But yet withall take notice that the term He, Gen. 3.15, doth compre- hend under it his human nature as well as his divine; yea, it doth also comprehend under it the Personal union of both his natures.
Consider what was his Priestly action, and that was the sprinkling of his own blood by his own Priestly nature, that is to say, by his divine nature, Isa. 53.12, namely, by the active power of his own divine Priestly nature, Heb. 9.14, that is to say, he separated his soul from his body by the power of his Godhead when he made his soul a trespass-offering for our sin, Isa. 53.10. and the manner of sprinkling of blood by the Priests upon the Altar, must be done with a large and liberal quantity, and there- fore it is called pouring out, and this sprinkling with pouring out did typifie the death of the Mediator; a large quantity of bloodshed must needs be a true evidence of death.
And secondly, In this respect the blood of Christ is called the blood of God, Acts 20.28, not only because his human nature was united to his Divine nature, for by the communication of proper ties that may be attributed to the Person which is proper to one nature only; but secondly, it is called the blood of God in another respect, namely, because he shed his blood by his own Priestly nature, that is to say, by the actual power of his divine nature, for he offered himself by his eternal Spirit, Heb. 9.14.
In like sort he is called Jehovah our Righteousness, Jer. 20.3. because his Mediatorial obedience (whereof his oblation was the masterpiece) was actuated by Jehovah, that is to say, by his divine nature as well as by his human.
So then I may well conclude that the death of Christ was a Mediatorial sacrifice of atonement, because it was the act of the Mediator in both his
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natures, in his human nature he was the Lamb of God without spot, and in his Divine nature he was the Priest to offer up his human nature to God as a Mediatorial sacrifice of atonement for the full Redemption of all the Elect.
It was the holiness of his Divine nature that gave the quickening power to the oblation of his human nature, John 6.63.
In this answer John 6.63, our Saviour declareth two things.
1. That the gross and carnal substance of his flesh and blood considered by itself alone had no meritorious efficacy, and therefore his legal obe- dience cannot profit us.
2. Our Saviour in his answer declared wherein the true force and effi- cacy of his sacrifice did lie, namely, in these two things.
1. In the Personal union of his human nature with his divine nature.
2. It lies in his Priestly offering of his human nature by his own divine nature.
Whether the Jews and Romans put Christ to Death.
Neither did he die a passive death by the power of the Roman soldiers, as the Jews thought, and as the Priests and other carnal Protestants do think: All the men and devils in the world could not put him to death by their power, I mean they could not separate his soul from his body, till himself pleased to do it by his own Priestly power, John 10.17, 18, his soul was not separated from his body by the sense of those pains which the Roman soldiers inflicted upon him, as the souls of the two thieves were crucified with him, for Christ died no sooner nor later than the very punc- tual hour in which God had appointed to make his oblation.
The Centurian did plainly see a manifest difference between the manner of Christ's death, and the death of the two thieves that were crucified with him, for as yet they did still continue alive in their torments till after the time that Joseph of Arimathea had begged our Saviour's dead body of Pilate, at the Sun-set Evening: for Joseph did not go to Pilate to beg our Saviour's body until the Evening was come, Mat. 27.57, Mar. 15.52, 53, and that was at Sun-set, it could not be when the first Evening was come but Christ was dead long before this, for he gave up the ghost at the ninth hour, and yet by the course of his nature he might have lived in his torments as long as the two thieves did, for the Roman soldiers did crit- cify all three alike.
What then was the true reason why Christ died three hours before the thieves? had he less strength of nature to bear his torments than they? or did the Roman soldiers add more torment upon his body than upon the two thieves? or did the Father's wrath kill him sooner than the two thieves as some think? Surely none of all these things did hasten his death before the two thieves, but the only true reason was because he did actuate his own death as a mediatorial sacrifice of atonement (at the just hour appointed by his Father) by the joint concurrence of both his natures.
Of the Dialogue's Distinction of Christ's dying as a Mediator and as a Malefactor.
I have already showed you that Christ died a twofold death: for he died
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both as a Malefactor at one and at the same time; as a Malefactor he died a passive death, but as a Mediator he died an active death, and the Scriptures doth often speak of both these deaths, sometimes jointly and sometimes severally: when the Scriptures doth mention his passive death then it saith that he was put to death, killed and slain. But secondly, the Scriptures doth sometimes speak jointly of his passive death and of his Mediatorial death together in one sentence, as I Romans 8.13, and in Gala- tians 3.13, (which Scriptures I have opened at large in the first part.) Luke 22.19, compared with 1 Cor. 11.24, Luke 22.20, so Isa. 12, with Rom. 4.25. The Scriptures doth sometimes speak of his Mediatorial death only as Isa. 53.10, he gave his soul to be a trespass-offering himself by his eter- nal spirit, Heb. 9.14, and he laid down his own life, John 10.17 and 18, and he sanctified himself, John 17.19. therefore seeing the holy Scriptures doth teach us to observe this distinction upon the death of Christ, it is necessary that all God's people should take notice of it, and engrave it in their minds and memories.
When I speak of Christ as a Malefactor, then the Scribes and Pharisees must be considered as the wicked instruments thereof, yet this must be remembered also, that I do no mean that they by their torments did sepa- rate his soul from his body, in that sense they did not put him to death, (himself only did separate his own soul from his body by the power of his Godhead) but they put him to death. because they did that to him which they thought sufficient to put him to death: and men are often said to do that which they endeavor to do, as in the example of Abraham, Heb. II.7, Haman, Esth. 8.7, Amelek, Exod. 17.16, Saul, Psa. 143.3. The Magicians, Exo. 8.18. The Israelites, Numbers 14.30, as the matter is explained in Deut. 1.14, and in this sense it is said, that the Jews did kill and stay the Lord of life, because they endeavored to do it.
He laid down his life by the same power by which he raised it up again, John 10.17, 18.
Yea, his Mediatorial death may well be called a miraculous death.
Christ died not by degrees (saith M. Nichols in his Day-Starr) as his Saints do, his sense do not decry, &c.
Austin saith thus. Who can sleep (saith he) when will, as Christ died when he would? Who can lay aside his garment, so as Christ laid aside his flesh? Who can leave his place as Christ left his life? his life was not forced from him by any imposed punishment, but he did voluntarily ren- der it up as a Mediatorial sacrifice: in his life time he was often touched with the fear of death, but by his strong crying out unto God with daily prayers and tears he obtained power against his natural fear of deatlı, before he came to make his oblation: as I have expounded, Heb. 5.7.
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