Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

f

to turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers.

Q. But how is St.John the Baptist's being the Elias that was to come reconcileable with his own denial of it?

A. It being the general persuasion of that age, as it had been all along the prevailing notion among the Jews, that Elias should, in his own person, come to prepare the way for the Messias; St. John the Baptist might very well, as he did, deny himself to be that very Elias who had lived in the time of king Ahab, of whose second coming into the world the Sanhedrim then enquired, according to their mistaken construction of the prophecy of Malachi." Now this no ways contradicts our Saviour's affirming him to be the person foretold under the name and character of Elias, in the true signification of that prophecy; which all Christian interpreters think very applicable to St. John the Baptist, so like Elias in temper, office, and other circumstances, that the resemblance might be a sufficient ground for the calling him by that name. The business of both was to promote a general reformation of manners among those who should receive their doctrine. They were both eminent prophets, superior to those of the same character in their own age. Both of singular abstinence and austerity, retired from the world, and distinguished from the fashions of it by a particular habit. They were both courageous and zealous in opposing the prevailing corruptions of their own times, though the great and powerful were the supporters of them. All this plainly proves, that the Baptist came in the spirit and power of Elias. Which sense is abundantly confirmed by all those applications that are made of Malachi's prophecy in the New

Mal. iv. 5, 6.

Mat. xi. 14. John i. 21. h iv. 5, 6.

Pp

i

Testament to St. John the Baptist. And by returning answer to that demand, who he was? That he was the voice crying in the wilderness, prophesied of by Esaias, he did in effect, and by necessary consequence, affirm himself to be Malachi's Elias, though not that Elias they erroneously expected; because that prophecy of Esaias was acknowledged to point at the same person with the other in Malachi,*

Q. What was St. John's education and manner of living till he entered upon his office?

A. After he had providentially escaped the executioners of Herod in his childhood, he retired early into the deserts, where he led a solitary and mortified life; his habit was a rough garment made of Camel's hair, and a leathern girdle;' his food was locusts and wild honey. By locusts some understand grasshoppers; others, the tops of plants and herbs; though there may be no great necessity for the change of the word, if we consider that some locusts are counted clean meat in Scripture; and that they were a common meat not only in the eastern and southern parts, but even in Palestine itself. The wild honey is conceived to be such as the bees had stored up in hollow trees or caverns, and ordinary provision to be found in the woods.

m

Q. What character does our Saviour give of St. John the Baptist?

A. That among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist, and that

i James v. 17. 18. 1 Kings xvii. 1. xvii. 4, 16. xix. 6-8. 2 Kings i. 8.

Mat. iii.

1 Kings xviii.
Mat. xvii. 10, &c. John i. 23.

Mat. xi. 11.
Luke i. 80.

1 Kings Mat. iii. 4.

[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]

he came neither eating nor drinking, which implies a way of living more than ordinarily rigorous and

austere."

Q. Wherein did St. John the Baptist exceed those prophets that went before him?

A. In the excellency of his office, which was to fit and prepare the minds of the people for the immediate reception of Christ and his doctrine; both which were attested by St. John in a plainer manner than by any of the old prophets. In that he was honoured with more signal revelations, and his doctrine attended with greater success and efficacy, almost the whole nation flowing in to his baptism, and confessing their sins.

Q. How was St. John the Baptist called to his office? A. The word of God came to him; which phrase, as used in the Scriptures, implies the prophetic spirit communicated to those that were to be extraordinary preachers to the people; but whether imparted to him by vision or dream, or any other way, is not so material to enquire, as difficult to resolve; only we may observe, that whereas the spirit of prophecy seemed to be ceased among the Jews since the death of Malachi, it was now revived in John the Baptist, and was to be continued by the great prophet and his Apostles.

Q. What success had St. John's ministry?

A. His resolute preaching, joined with the severity of his life, drew to him many hearers from Jerusalem and Judæa, and from the region round about Jordan; and great was the number of his proselytes, who were baptized of him, confessing their sins." For his first preaching was in the wilderness of Judæa, the towns

[merged small][ocr errors][merged small]

and cities that were about the place of his education: and from thence he made converts round about Jordan, the river whereof supplied him with a conveniency for baptizing the great number of his followers.

Q. What was the manner of his preaching?

A. Impartially to condemn the vices of all ranks and orders of men, and to press upon them the duties of their particular places and relations."

Q. Why was St. John called the Baptist?

A. Because those whom he made his proselytes he entered into this new institution of life by baptism; a rite indeed made use of by the Jews, but never before St. John's time, to figure out to them repentance and remission of sins. Besides he had the great honour to baptize his Saviour;" which though he modestly declined, yet our Lord enjoined it, and it was accompanied with a miraculous attestation from heaven.

Q. Why was St. John's baptism called the baptism of repentance?

A. Because it was the first time baptism was made use of to shadow out repentance and remission of sins; and that was the main qualification required of those that became his disciples, and the fittest to dispose them to receive our Saviour, and to entitle them to that pardon of sin which the gospel brought along with it.

Q. How did St. John bear testimony of our Saviour?

A. By ingenuously declaring to the Jews, who had fixed their minds upon him, as if he were the promised Messiah, that he was not the Christ, and that there was one to come after him, the latchet of whose shoes he was not worthy to unloose. And he persisted in his testi

[ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

mony unto his death; the truth of which he was the better qualified to attest, in that it was revealed to him by God after a more especial manner.

Q. But did not St. John doubt, towards the end of his life, of the truth of his testimony, when in prison he sent two of his disciples to enquire whether our Saviour was he that should come, or whether they should look for another ?"

A. St. John could have no doubt about it himself, who had it confirmed by divine Revelation; but his disciples were the rather unwilling to acknowledge Jesus for the Messias, because they thought he did eclipse the glory of their master. They believed John the Baptist to be a prophet, and that he came from God; yet they could not digest his testimony of Christ, because that set him above their master; which appears from the complaint they made, He that was with thee beyond Jordan, to whom thou bearest witness, behold the same baptizeth, and all men come to him. Therefore St. John sent this message for the conviction of his disciples, that when he was cut off, they might not be shaken in the belief of Christ, but adhere and cleave fast to him.

X

Q. How, and upon what occasion, was St. John the Baptist put to death?

A. He was beheaded by the command of Herod, who was provoked by his freedom in reproving him for his adultery and incestuous embraces, that prince keeping Herodias, his brother Philip's wife." Though Josephus makes the motive of it to proceed from Herod's apprehension of St. John's popularity, which might occasion some innovation or insurrection.

Mat. xi. 2, 3.

* John iii. 26.

Mat. xiv. 3, &c.

« AnteriorContinuar »