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A Series of Letters, in Defence of Divine Revelation: In Reply to Rev. Abner Kneeland's Serious Inquiry into the Authenticity of the Same. To Which is Added, a Religious Correspondence, Between the Rev. Hosea Ballou, and the Rev. Dr. Joseph Buckminster and Rev. Joseph Walton, Pastors of Congregational Churches in Portsmouth, N. H.Ballou, Hosea

Religion

A Series of Letters, in Defence of Divine Revelation: In Reply to Rev. Abner Kneeland's Serious Inquiry into the Authenticity of the Same. To Which is Added, a Religious Correspondence, Between the Rev. Hosea Ballou, and the Rev. Dr. Joseph Buckminster and Rev. Joseph Walton, Pastors of Congregational Churches in Portsmouth, N. H.

Name: A Series of Letters, in Defence of Divine Revelation: In Reply to Rev. Abner Kneeland's Serious Inquiry into the Authenticity of the Same. To Which is Added, a Religious Correspondence, Between the Rev. Hosea Ballou, and the Rev. Dr. Joseph Buckminster and Rev. Joseph Walton, Pastors of Congregational Churches in Portsmouth, N. H.
Author: Ballou, Hosea

Ballou, Hosea

Revelation; Universalism -- Doctrines

spiritual sense. He informed them "it is the spirit that quickeneth,
the flesh profiteth nothing, the words I speak unto you they are
spirit and life." Some have since misunderstood him, and, to this day,
misunderstand this piece of scripture; and have from thence introduced
the absurd doctrine of transubstantiation, that after the words of
consecration, the bread and wine are the real body and blood of
Christ. So some adhere only to the letter of the word and expound the
law of God in a mere literal sense. It seems the apostle Paul, before
his conversion, understood it so.--Read the 7th chapter of Romans,
from the 6th to the end of the 13th verse. Paul was brought up at the
feet of Gamaliel, a doctor of the law; yet, while in his unregenerate
state, knew not the spiritual meaning of the law of God, (I mean the
holy or moral law) and no doubt he spake by experience when he says,
(as I wrote to you from I Cor. ii. 14) "But the natural man received
not the things of the spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto
him, neither can he know them, because they are spiritually
discerned." By the natural man, I conceive, the apostle meant the
unregenerate man: yea, with the highest degree of human teaching and
knowledge without he is taught of God, by his word and spirit, he
cannot truly understand the things of the spirit of God; and therefore
they are, as I say, misapplied, mangled and made havoc of. Faith is,
by some, only held as a bare assent that Jesus Christ came in the
flesh. None do truly believe that, but by the Holy Ghost.

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