The Bishop's etymological substitute for the Hutchinsonian hypothesis is, as he acknowledges, wholly conjectural. No proof can be given that the root ever signifies goodness; nor to my mind does it appear at all probable, that, in a language consisting of so few etymons, the same three letters should import such totally distinct ideas as goodness and an oath. That it signifies the latter we know, but evidence is still to be produced that it ever signified the former. And if there ever was such a word in the language, the same difficulty would occur about the retention of the in the plural noun, as we know that it is found in the singular. The idea of relation and of goodness, for which the Bishop contends, is as fully conveyed by the Hutchinsonian etymology as by his own; nay, in a much more energetic sense.

In relation to the singular noun Eloah, the Bishop says, "Unless it be proved, which we believe will not easily be done, that the exposition of it, as applied in a passive sense to the Second Person of the Trinity in particular, in the passages in which the word occurs, produces some particular emphasis or propriety in all, or at least in many of them; that exposition, and that appropriation of the word, will remain very questionable." Now what the Right Rev. Critic deems incapable of proof, with respect to many of the passages in which the title ALUE is found, appears to me

plain on a cursory inspection of them. Let us select a few by way of experiment.

The title ALUE occurs first, I believe, in Deut. xxxii. 15. "Then he (Jeshurun) forsook God (ALUE) that made him; and lightly esteemed the Rock of his Salvation." Now, without staying to prove that "the Rock of Salvation" is a title of the Divine Mediator, and that it is another title of the same Personage who is before called ALUE; or that ALUE could be "the Rock of Salvation," temporal or spiritual, only as he was to be made a curse (Karapa, Gal. iii. 13.) for man; it will be sufficient to refer you to the declaration of St. Paul, (1 Cor. x. 9.) that it was Christ whom the Israelites, or Jeshurun, "tempted, forsook, and lightly esteemed."

From Moses we proceed to the book of Job, where the name ALUE frequently occurs. The first passage to which I shall direct your attention, is one of great importance, as it appears in the form of a Divine determination, given to a question which had been in debate between the afflicted patriarch and his friends. (Chap. iv. 17.) It proceeds from the lips of Eliphaz, who in prefacing the rehearsal of it, assumes to himself the Spirit of inspiration. (Ver. 13, &c.) There is, I conceive, no reason fór doubting the claim which he makes, from the circumstance of the erroneous judgment he formed of the character of Job when not under the same influence. The

decisive language of the heavenly vision is evidently intended to lay prostrate all self-righteous hopes. It runs thus, according to our English version: "Shall mortal man be more just than God (ALUE)? Shall a man be more pure than his Maker?" But might it not be rendered thus? "Shall wretched man" (N) "without ALUE be justified, or shall man" ( man in his best estate) "be pure without his Maker," the sole author of the new creation?* But if the version of our English Bible be preferred, no doubt can exist respecting the propriety of the term ALUE, according to the preceding interpretation of that word, in such a connexion.

Nearly the same view may be taken respecting the introduction of the title ALUE in Job xxxiii. 12; especially if it be considered that it stands connected with the account which Elihu gives of the ANGEL INTERCESSOR, the "one of a thousand," towards the close of the same chapter, whose language concerning man is there stated to be, "Deliver him from going down to the pit; I have found a ransom."

The next passage to which I refer you is Job xvi. 20. "O that one might plead for a man with God (ALUE,) as a man pleadeth for his neighbour." Without entering into a critical examination of the patriarch's passionate wish, it

* See Letter XXXIV.

may be sufficient to remark, that its object was an access to God, in order to plead his cause before him, with the same familiarity and confidence as when a man pleads with his fellow men. In allusion to this wish, Elihu is introduced (chap. xxxiii. 6.) saying, "Behold, I am, according to thy wish, in God's stead. I also am formed out of the clay." Now without contending, as some Hutchinsonians have done, that Elihu was a personification, or at least a type, of the Son of God, on what ground could Job found such a wish, but on the knowledge which our next reference will show that he possessed of the future incarnation of the personage whom he calls ALUE; and what hope could he entertain of success in pleading his cause before him, except what he derived from his future " agony and bloody sweat, his cross and passion;" or, in other words, from the prospect of his being "made a curse for us."

A few words will suffice on Job xix. 25-27. "For I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth. And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God, (ALUE) whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold and not another." That the REDEEMER (+) in the first part of this wonderful decla

אלוה not אל *

†The name given to the near kinsman, Num. xxxv. 19, &c.

ration, and the ALUE in the second part, are one and the same person, you will not, I presume, hesitate to admit; nor that the redemption asscribed to the ALUE was to be effected by his "being made a curse for us."

In Psalm xviii. 31, occur the following animated questions, "Who is God (ALUE) but JEHOVAH; or who is a Rock save our God?

(.אלהינו)

(12.) Of this Psalm the Bishop says in his critical notes, "The title of this 18th Psalm might be thus rendered, 'To the Giver of victory. A Psalm of the servant of JEHOVAH, the beloved, who spake unto JEHOVAH the words of this song, in the day that JEHOVAH delivered him from the hands of all his enemies, and from the power of hell." He adds, approving the view of the subject which he quotes, "The Syriac entitles it, A thanksgiving on the ascension of Christ." Now admitting that the man Christ Jesus is the complainant in the former part of the Psalm, to whom may he be supposed to attribute his deliverance "from the power of hell," or, "the curse of the law," but to the Godhead with which the manhood was united, and which bears the name of ALUE to indicate that union?

The only other passage to which I shall refer you, is Isa. xliv. 8. "Is there a God, ALUE, besides me? Yea there is no God (Rock) Now it is evident that the

I know not any."