tor and magazine will continue to flourish for a long time to come. I shall feel obliged if you can find room in the RAINBOW to explain to me the parable of the Unjust Steward, and our Lord's remarks, Luke xvi. 8, For the sons of this age are more prudent as to that generation which is their own, than the sons of light." And verse 9, And I say to you, Make for yourselves friends with the deceitful wealth, that when it fails, they may receive you into aionious mansions.' And a word about chap. xvii. 86. I am as you are, a believer in the kingdom of God upon earth, but do not Christ's words to his disciples, 'In my Father's house are many mansions, I go to prepare a place for you,' contradict this doctrine? This is the only passage I find it difficult to reconcile with my hope. A few words will be useful to me. W.W."

1. Who is meant by the Unjust Steward, we will not venture to say, after the manifold guesses of able commentators; but the moral of the parable, or the practical lesson our Lord draws from it, is easily understood and of great importance. Although the lord of the steward had been largely defrauded, yet he praised the rogue, (ver. 8, first-half,) not of course for his fraud, but for his selfish cunning; just as we would say of a man without principle, whose ingenious villany had been successful from his own point of view-"He is a clever scoundrel ;"-poor praise certainly, nay, severe censure, properly understood, because it means not only that he had injured his fellow men, but that he had done so by prostituting to base purposes mental ability which God had given him for a nobler end. The steward in the parable, seeing that beggary would be the result of his detected fraud if something were not promptly done to avert it, bethought him of a plan which, though it would further rob his employer and bring others into an alliance of dishonesty with himself, yet, as the sense of obligation would make the allies his friends, it would exactly answer his purpose. He had but one

thought,-self, and in his judgment-we had better say nothing about his conscience the end justified the means. Now, our Lord, whose teaching on the subject of money is, like his teaching on every other subject, profound, heart-searching, and far-reaching, says in substance, 'Be faithful with it; use it for God, in the cause of truth, and righteousness, and charity; and when you come to the house of many mansions, the children of God who have been helped from time to time through the trials of the pilgrimage, will give you a loving welcome there.' Luke's remark here is significant: "And the Pharisees, who were money lovers, heard all these things, and they derided him "-openly sneered at teaching which they abhorred for its very excellence, and abhorred especially for the severity with which it smote their notorious covetousness. They at least, as a class, had but a poor prospect of getting splendid interest for their gifts of self-denying benevolence, in the shape of a loving welcome from the sons of God at the resurrection and the kingdom. It is then that a cup of cold water in Christ's name, and a dinner or a supper to the poor are to be rewarded; and as we cannot serve God and Mammon, let our rich brethren gratefully seize the golden opportunity and serve God with mammon. (Matt. xxv. 34-36.)

2. Luke xvii. 36, is not contained in any of the oldest manuscripts, but substantially it is found in Matt. xxiv. 40, where it is genuine, and whence probably some scribe has copied it into Luke. When the Lord

comes, it will be a time of startling separations: "One shall be taken, and one shall be left."

8. The preparation of a place for the Church, whatever or wherever it may be, does not affect the locality of the kingdom, for that is and must be upon the earth, and cannot be anywhere else. The Church, the body of Christ, will be rulers in and over the kingdom; and doubtless, their royal palace will be that wonderful city which the beloved disciple saw in vision descending from heaven. This, we believe, is the place which the Lord went to prepare for us; and in relation to which he adds, "And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and recive you unto myself; that where I am, ye may be also." This magnificent city, whose Builder and Maker is God, will descend upon the new earth and be its eternal metropolis (Rev. xxi. 1-8); but it will shine with the glorious brightness of the Shekinah over Jerusalem during the millennial age. (Isa. iv. 5; lx. 1-8.)

III. "Would you be kind enough to explain in what sense we are to understand the following declarations? That whosoever believeth in him may not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him might not perish, but might have eternal life. He that believeth in him cometh not into judgment, but he that believeth not hath been judged already, because he hath not believed in the only Son of God. Now many of the Samaritans of that city believed in him for the saying of the woman which testified, He told me all things that ever I did. For this is the will of my Father, that every one which looketh on the Son, and believeth in him, shall have eternal life, and I should raise him up at the last day. He that believeth in the Son hath everlasting life.' (John iii. 15, 16, 18, 36; iv. 39; v. 24; vi. 40, 47.)

"All who believe in the Son are, in these passages, declared to have everlasting life. The two declarations are equally clear and distinct, and are inseparably conjoined; so that whoever has this belief in the Sonwhatever it may mean-has everlasting life in possession. Yet, what is the fact now? With few exceptions, every one professes to believe in the Son, in Christ, nay, that Christ is their Saviour,' died for them, and rose again for their justification. But what is the result? Wherein is the benefit of the profession? Just this and no more :-that very few indeed profess to know whether they really believe or not, whether they have indeed 'found the Christ' or not, know the Lord or not; or indeed profess to say they find in their belief-whatever they mean by it—any salvation at all. In what sense Christ can be claimed by such professors as their Saviour, or indeed as a Saviour of any, it is hard to explain. Whatever our Lord Jesus Christ and his apostles meant by believing in the Son, it is beyond dispute that our Lord not only purposed that whosoever believed in him should have everlasting life, but that every one who believes should know, on the warrant of his word, that he has everlasting life, and will not come into condemnation. It is true, a mere profession is not belief. But most men profess in words just what Paul told the Philippian jailer to believe, and he should be saved. The question then is, in what sense are we to believe in the Son,-believe in Christ? How is this profession of belief in Christ, so readily and

easily, and so inconsequentially, made to be turned into saving faith? I am aware it is said the reception of Jesus as the Christ is an essential preliminary to a place in the kingdom; but I would maintain that believing in the Son, believing in Christ, is more than a preliminary-a step only towards obtaining eternal life; for whom to know is eternal life;' and he that believeth in Christ hath eternal life. How else could Paul say, 'I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.' An explanation of the passages quoted, and an answer to queries, would much oblige, WILLIAM HAMILTON, M.D."

Really, Dr. Hamilton has set us a task for a volume, and even if we meant to write one on the old scholastic definitions of a great many kinds of faith, which assuredly we do not, as our time is much better employed, we could not thereby increase his light on the subject, as his letter shows. But that our own position in relation to this fundamental subject may be distinctly understood-although we hardly think it possible that it can be misunderstood-we say at once that nothing can be clearer than the doctrine that the believer has eternal life now. He is "alive unto God in Christ Jesus" (Rom. vi. 11), not "through" as our translators vaguely have it: "He hath passed out of death into life "Tηv Swηy" the life." (John v. 24.) "We know that we have passed over from death into the life." (1 John iii. 14.) "Christ is our life." "Our life is hidden with Christ in God." (Col. iii.) "Christ liveth in me." (Gal. ii. 20.) But it is surely needless to multiply quotations, for this profound, gracious, and most precious doctrine is the gospel. Life and immortality in Christ, and only in Christ is the sublime truth we have found in Scripture, and ever since we found it, the value of the Book has been literally unspeakable, for that holy truth sheds light on many things which were perplexing riddles before we saw it. We, therefore, understand the Scriptures quoted by our correspondent in their strict and literal sense, and endorse his comment, "that our Lord not only purposed that whosoever believed in him should have everlasting life, but that every one who so believes should know, on the warrant of his word, that he has everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation."

But the simple assent to an historical fact, without the consciousness of personal interest in that fact, is not the faith of which the Scriptures speak. The multitude admit that Jesus is the Christ. They cannot do otherwise. For the same reason they admit that the Pharaohs reigned in Egypt, and the Cæsars in Rome; but admissions of this kind are of no moral value; they do not touch the heart, and therefore, cannot influence character.

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The believer in Jesus Christ has eternal life now. The gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord. It is a gift, sublime and wonderful, and cannot be anything but a gift; but it is not the less true that it is an essential preliminary to a place in the kingdom. Our Lord said 80. Except a man be born again (or from above), he cannot see the kingdom of God." The "life" is purely of grace, but the "kingdom is to be sought for, and a man's position in it will be determined by his works. Without the life, no man will ever think of seeking for the kingdom, but his place in the kingdom depends upon the use he makes of that life. (1 Cor. iii. 12-15.)

IV. "May I ask replies to the following questions? 1. If the Babylon of Isa. xxi. 9 and Jer. li. 7, 8, was a city built on the plain of Shinar, by what authority is the Babylon of Rev. xiv. 8, xvii. 5, and xviii. 2, applied to Rome? 2. Is there any thing in the Apocalypse to indicate that the writer employed the name of the ancient city (Babylon) in a mystic sense? J. SMITH. (Bacup.)"

1. Čommentators generally try to be consistent with themselves; but we pity those who trust them in the grand region of unfulfilled prophecy ! The same theological ingenuity that transforms Jerusalem, and Israel, and the kingdom of heaven into the Church, has found the Man of Sin, or the Antichrist, in the Roman Pontiff; and so, of course, consistency requires Babylon to mean Rome. How terribly has the Divine Book suffered at the hands of its friends! Babylon will undoubtedly be rebuilt in more than its ancient splendour, on its ancient site, as the capital of Antichrist's dominions, and the rival of Jerusalem, the city of the great King. Prophecy requires this, and the requirements of prophecy will be ready at the proper moment. We are quite prepared to give substantial reasons for the conclusion to which the study of this matter brought us years ago; but in this place there is only room for the answer, not the argument-the result, not the process.

2. Nothing. The mystical sense, in which certain writers delight themselves, is nonsense-humbly begging their pardon. The only instance of the mystical sense in the book is in chap. xi. 8, and there it is not only good sense but profoundly suggestive, as the mystic allusion is expressly affirmed and explained. If our "spiritualising" friends would only take the hint which this verse gives, we might hope that, by and by, theology would be a thing of sunshine instead of fog.

THE

PIOUS FRAUD S.

(Continued from page 86.)
"AWAKING."

THE verb "egeiro," the primary and usual meaning of which in the Greek classics is to awaken from sleep or to kindle as with a sudden flash, and the secondary meaning only to raise or lift, occurs one hundred and thirty-four times in the New Testament alone. In several of these instances, and some of us would think in the large majority of them, the primary meaning ought to have been conveyed in the English version. Yet, strange to say, our authorised translators have, except in three or four passages, systematically adopted the secondary sense. Thus, though they correctly render Gehazi's language in the Old Testament, "The child is not awaked," yet throughout the New Testament the dead are always described, not as awakened, but raised: sleepers also, with the exceptions above referred to, are not awakened, but raised; nor are these the only cases in which the substitution of this secondary sense has emasculated the original text. The question naturally arises, Were our authorised translators influenced by a desire to suppress and keep out of sight the idea of sleeping in death? In the presence of so many passages where saints are said to have fallen asleep,

this would of course be impossible. Nevertheless, it can hardly be denied that the prevalent notions as to the vivacity of dead men would not have kept their hold so tenaciously on the popular mind, had the New Testament sense of "awakening" been habitually and consistently exhibited. In order that our readers may pass their own judgment on this matter, the following passages (gathered out of a vast many similar ones) in which our English version uses the verb "raise," have been restored to their legitimate form :-And Joseph, having waked up, took the young child and his mother. He took her by the hand and the damsel woke up.-Heal the sick, awaken the dead. Then all those virgins woke up and trimmed their lamps.-After three days I shall be awakened up.-Many bodies of the sleeping saints woke up.-He is not here, he has awakened. As if a man should cast seed into the ground and should sleep and wake night and day.-As touching the dead that they awake.— Go, tell John that the dead are awakened.-He touched the bier, and said, Young man I say unto thee, be awakened.-The Queen of the South shall wake up in the judgment.-For as the Father waketh up the dead and quickeneth them, even so the Son quickeneth whom he will.— Lazarus, whom Jesus had awakened from the dead.-And he took the damsel by the hand and said unto her, Talitha cumi, which is, being interpreted, Damsel, I say unto thee, Awake. And immediately the damsel arose [a different word being employed for "arose," indicating the action for standing upright].-The angel smote Peter on his side and woke him up, saying, Arise up quickly. [Here again in our authorised version the same English word is made to do duty for two different Greek words. The angel having raised Peter up, then commands him to raise himself up.]-Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you that God should wake up the dead?-If Christ hath not been wakened up, then they which fell asleep in him have perished.— But some man will say, How are the dead awakened ?-It is sown in corruption, it is waked up in incorruption. [And so throughout this sublime resurrection chapter, 1 Cor. xv.]

It is observable that when the "false witnesses" testified to the prophecy about destroying the temple and raising it in three days, instead of reporting the word actually employed for raising, viz. "egeiro," they adopt a different term, indicating the action of an architect, viz. "oikodemeo." What Jesus had said (see John ii. 19) was, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will wake it up;" for he spake of the temple of his body. Whatever verb he used, Syriac or otherwise, he was employing it in its primary sense, as the disciples subsequently came to understand, though not till after the resurrection. His auditors on the spot however understood it in the secondary sense of rearing up, for the manifest reason that they were all then standing in the temple and discoursing about it. But this is no reason why we, in our translation, should abstain from exhibiting the primary sense when the primary sense was intended by the speaker. This case therefore forms no exception to the rule. [Touching the untruthfulness of the "false witnesses," it may perhaps be lawful for us to say that their misapprehension of our Lord's meaning was an error which they shared with the disciples themselves; or rather, that it was not the only one of their malicious statements which stamped them with the character of" false witnesses."]