to at least that neither the Syriac nor the Vulgate, nor Wiclif, nor Tyndale, nor Cranmer, nor the Rheims use it. The Geneva and King James versions are the only ones which use it. Neither the British nor the American Standard Revisions use it. So far, then, as this parenthesis gives any support to the supposition that it is a later interpolation, or expresses any doubt of its accuracy by Luke, all such objections are removed, and it is a strong link in the strong chain of irrefragable evidence in favor of the historicity of these two chapters of the Gospel by Luke and to which I subscribe with unfeigned sincerity. And if I am to follow no road but that which is blazoned on every milepost by reason or knowledge, then I must stand still in my tracks and die in the wilderor knowledge, then I must stand still and die in the wilderness of life. Pittsburg, Pa. E. M. WOOD.

THE CREED "HE ROSE AGAIN"

THE editors of our new Hymnal have inserted the word "again" in the fifth article of the Apostles' Creed-omitted previously for a period of years-making it read: "He rose again from the dead." This action conforms to that of the Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church which, in 1886, restored the item to that formulary in their prayer book. But why, it has been asked, when once rejected, has it been taken back into service? At least one preachers' meeting, and that in no obscure village, has been called upon for a reply to the inquiry, without eliciting at the moment of inquiry any response. "Why," it was asked, "do our hymn book editors teach a second resurrection of Jesus from the dead?" Or does admiration for the rendering of ancient versions of the creed and a desire to recite in uniformity with other bodies of Christians, prevail over a strict regard to the facts in the case? For, manifestly, Christ did not rise again! He came again to life-"He was dead, and is alive again." But "rose again" conveys, strictly speaking, more than this fact proclaims; and the word "again" is contrary to truth, or, at the least, incongruous with grammatical nicety. A review of the English versions of ancient creeds reveals an almost unvarying use of the phrase "rose again." And translations from the works of modern authors into English preserve quite uniformly the same verbiage. Thus, for instance, Winer, in his Confessions of Christendom, is made to say: "Without the death there could have been no rising again; without the rising again there could have been no confirmation of the hope of eternal life." Similarly, the rendering of mediæval and of earlier allusions to the Creed, as, for example, the reply of the Archbishop of Sens to the Encyclical of the Emperor Charlemagne: "Our clergy teach that the Son hath both risen again and ascended. ." The English of Athanasius's exposition of his faith usually runs, "He rose from the dead," but that of Eusebius of Cæsarea makes it "rose again." The same is also true of a translation of an eighth century canon: "The Son of God was incarnate of the Holy Ghost and of Mary ever Virgin, . . . suffered, was buried, and rose again the third day." These instances run back to the fourteenth century, when

we first come upon the word "again." Thus the MS. Harleian runs: "The thridde day he roos agen from deeth to liif." And, doubtless, this early use of the adverb forced the uniformity of renderings ever since prevailing. Latin scholars may tell us whether the participles and verbs used in numerous formularies and creeds to express the fact of Jesus's return to the world of palpable human action, conveyed fairly this idea of "rising again." The Greek, however, does not seem to imply it. These ancient creeds and versions vary but little, and where they do it is not in the facts stated, but in the order of words, or in a variation of phrase without change of meaning. In Irenæus we read, "resurrectionem a mortuis (resurrection from the dead), and its equivalent kaì tìjv ¿yepoiv έk vEKPŪN. Also speaking of the faith of many pagan races who have accepted Jesus as Lord ("assentiunt multæ gentes barborum, eorum in Christum credunt"), he cites their belief in his suffering under Pilate, and his return in the flesh to the world ("passus sub Pontio Pilato, et resurgeus"). Resurrectionem is varied with "resuscitatum a mortuis" and "resuscitatum a Patre"; and resurrexit, surrexit, resurrexisse, resurgeus seem to be indifferently used-all conveying the idea that Jesus was restored (by the Father) to life, all pointing to the simple fact that he was alive again— not risen again. Alive again, but not a reanimation, as though there had been a temporary suspension of all human functions; but alive again from the dead, a real return from a real death.

The Nicene Creed, though almost invariably translated "rose again," reads, ávaσrávra only. So do versions of this creed in the Greek tongue. There is, therefore, nothing to justify the rendering "again."

It is easy to account for Englishmen's love of obsolete forms and even of inaccuracies, illiterate and literate alike. But scholarly America is attaching great significance to whatever is age-old. And sometimes we crowd out better meanings-at least the more comprehensible ones-in our zeal for the ancient, or in our desire to share in terms which some arrogantly have reserved to their exclusive use. Thus Protestants insist on saying "Holy Catholic Church" not only because the phrase is ancient, but as teaching that no one church can be exclusively catholic.

The widely spread study of early English is also having its effect in fixing in the public mind a genuine taste for our early linguistic expressions, and so lends to venerable formularies an importance not wholly intrinsic.

Among some of these we discover the reason for the present persistence of this word "again." For instance, while the ninth century gives us, "Tham thridden daege he aras from deadum," and the twelfth century, "Thridden degge he aras from deatha," the fourteenth says: "The thridde day he roos agen from death to liif." Or-as varied in a Prymer of the same period-"The thridde day he roos agen fro deede." Of course this usage determined the form of expression employed in the King James version of the New Testament, wherever reference is made to the resurrection of Jesus: But what compelled our American revisers to adopt, without change, the misleading, or at the least the inexact rendering which includes the adverb "again"?

We lose nothing in the stateliness of form, in rhetorical rhythm and swing by reciting: "The third day he rose again from the dead." But we gain nothing except a conformity with the usage of churches antedating our own-which may or may not be helpful-and a return to that recital of the Creed in bygone centuries when our English tongue was hardening in its final mold. S. REESE MURRAY.

Washington, D. C.

A CHALLENGED STATEMENT

....

ON page 651 of the METHODIST REVIEW (for July, 1906), was a statement which in my opinion ought to be challenged as not merely being without either biblical or reasonable support, but as being contradicted by a plain declaration of Holy Writ. "That he [Moses] was raised and glorified is evident from the account of the transfiguration of Christ." Again: "The account of the transfiguration showed that Moses was not held in the embrace of death. . . . . It is said Moses and Elias appeared with Christ in glory and consequently in bodily form that had been glorified." Now, if these allegations about Moses are true, Moses and not Christ is the "first fruits of them that slept." For Christ's transfiguration preceded his resurrection, and no one had yet been raised from the dead. And if Samuel could appear to Saul in the home of the witch of Endor and predict the occurrences of the following day, if Dives after death could supplicate Abraham and be informed of the unalterable nature of his doom; and if purely spiritual beings could appear in bodily form to Abraham at his tent door, could eat and drink with him, and walk with him to the brow of the hill overlooking Sodom it certainly is not difficult to conclude that there was no impossibility or unreasonability in the appearance of Moses on the mount of transfiguration with an assumed form or no form. Indeed, to affirm such an impossibility is logically to assert that all the dead are without the power of communication both with the living and with each other, if not, indeed, to shut them up in unconscious existence. For if a disembodied spirit was unable to converse with Christ on that momentous occasion, and resurrection must either be accomplished for the purpose, or assumed to have previously transpired, then all the saints who sleep are under similar disability, and Paul is greatly mistaken when he affirms that to be absent from the flesh is to be "present with the Lord," and declares a doubt which could not exist in his mind when he writes: "I knew a man in Christ above fourteen years ago (whether in the body, I cannot tell; or whether out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth;) such a one caught up to the third heaven." For if a disembodied spirit cannot see, be seen, communicate intelligibly, and remember what he has seen and heard in his disembodied state, Saint Paul must have known it and would have perceived that only with his body was he "caught up to the third heaven." To my mind the appearance of the disembodied personality of Moses in company with Elias forms one of the most comforting, and at the same time most indisputable, assurances of which we have possession that our loved ones, who are passed over, are already in a state of felicity which will be further perfected when the "graves give up their dead." Owatonna, Minn. HENRY G. BILBIE.

THE ITINERANTS' CLUB

THE GENERAL EPISTLE OF JUDE-CONTINUED FROM May-June ReviEW, 1906

VERSE 9. The view of those who hold that his statement about Michael is from an apocryphal book, The Assumption of Moses, is not sufficiently attested to regard it as more than mere conjecture. This passage is not a mere speculative statement but has its lesson in the next clause: "Durst not bring against him a railing judgment, but said, The Lord rebuke thee." The "durst not" is in relation to God, not to Satan. "Michael shows his dread of transcending the bounds of his own duty, and arrogating to himself an office and authority belonging to the Lord alone." The charge against the false disciples whom Jude would rebuke is stated in the eighth verse: they "set at naught dominion and rail at dignities." Not so Michael: he modestly refused to bring railing judgment against the devil but left the penalty to God, and said: "The Lord rebuke thee." Rosemuller, quoted by Bloomfield, puts the meaning thus: "If Michael scrupled to revile the devil (an exalted angel, the worst of demons) who himself, though impious, had received from God some power in the world, how can we excuse those who do not hesitate to revile human magistrates, nay, even good angels." And Doddridge says: "If the angel did not rail even against the devil, how much less ought we against men in authority, even supposing them in some things to behave amiss." This passage of Scripture, so embarrassing to the interpreter, has nevertheless a rich meaning to our own age which lies on the surface and on which commentators agree. The rejection of both human and divine authority is an evil of our own times against which this verse of Holy Scripture makes its protest.

Verse 10. "But these speak evil of those things which they know not: but what they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves." The Revised Version is quite similar: "But they rail at whatsoever things they know not: and what they understand naturally, like creatures without reason, in these things they are destroyed." Jude is giving a fuller description of the characters of those whom he is considering, mentioned in the fourth verse, “ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ." The arraignment is very sharp; "they rail at whatsoever things they know not." Adam Clarke renders this: "They do not understand the origin and utility of civil government; they revile that which protects their own persons and property. This is true of most insurrections and seditions." This interpretation is hardly consonant with the train of thought, as civil governments do not seem to be under consideration, but rather their relation to God. It is better with Alford to refer it to the spiritual world. This is characteristic of all corrupt hearts in relation to spiritual things. They rail at them although they do not

understand them. This practice is not unknown in our own time. Much of the bitter attitude toward sacred truth is the result of ignorance and because it is a reproof of evil deeds and consequently distasteful. The greater the ignorance the greater the bitterness. Not content with railing at sacred things of which they are ignorant, they are controlled by their natural passions and appetites, "what they understand naturally, like the creatures without reason." This is the subordination or neglect of their reason and submission to that blind instinct such as is common to the animal creation. "In these things are they destroyed." All sin is the destruction or corruption of that which is best and noblest in man. Yielding to natural instincts, discarding the reasoning faculty, rejecting Divine authority, have but one outcome. Such a course is fatal, corrupting the moral nature and calling for Divine penalty. Against this class Jude pronounces woe and prophesies further destruction of them.

VERSE 11. "Woe unto them! for they went in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for hire and perished in the gainsaying of Korah." This passage and other references to the Old Testament indicate that this letter is addressed to the Jewish element or they would be without significance to the readers. The three incidents were well known and were illustrative of the degenerate character of the Jews. The precise point in these references is somewhat obscure but should be interpreted in its broader aspects. The characters were similar but the acts were different. They all indicate hostility to God. "They went in the way of Cain." Cain's sin was the murder of his brother (Gen. 4: 8-12). The roots of Cain's sin were jealousy and anger. In the murder of Abel he violated that sense of brotherhood which includes not alone man's natural relations by heredity but the broader relations of humanity. The question which the Lord asked him showed the deep significance of his crime: "And the Lord said unto Cain, Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not; am I my brother's keeper?" Beginning in jealousy because Abel's offering had been accepted and his own rejected, he forgot the sense of brotherhood. His jealousy developed into hatred and finally into murder, and he became the first murderer recorded in sacred history. The sin here referred to is a violation of a sense of God's authority and of human brotherhood, a sin culminating in anger, jealousy, and crime. Cain became a type of all those who obey the impulses of their own natures instead of ordering their lives according to the commands of God. Some have regarded Cain in this passage as representing bad men everywhere and of all classes.

A further description is "they ran greedily after the error of Balaam for hire." Here again we cannot tell the exact characteristics intended to be set forth. As the primary sin of Balaam was covetousness, so, "Reckless of all that it costs, the loss of God's favor and heaven, on they rush after gain like Balaam." De Wette quoted by Alford says: "But they were poured out (ruined) by the deception of the reward of Balaam." Butler's sermon on the character of Balaam is well known and well worthy of study. A brief quotation from it may be fitting here. "So that the object that we have before us is the most astonishing in the world: a very