Five Pebbles from the BrookEnglish, George Bethune
Religion
Five Pebbles from the Brook
English, George Bethune
Everett, Edward, 1794-1865. Defence of Christianity; Rationalism
He will observe too that these writers, supposed to have been the
inspired followers of Jesus Christ, have applied many passages of
the Old Testament as prophecies of Jesus, when it is most
certain, (and is at the present day allowed by Christian Biblical
Critics of the highest standing) from examining those passages in
their context in the Old Testament, that they are not prophecies of
Jesus; and that some of the passages cited are in fact no
prophecies at all, but are merely historical. Nor is this all, these
authors have cited as prophecies and proof texts, passages which
do not exist in the Old Testament. From which it seems to follow
that they must have forged those passages, or quoted them from
some Apocryphal book; which they believed to be inspired. If they
were capable of the first, they were not the honest and inspired
followers and disciples of Jesus Christ; if they were capable of the
last, they were not Jews but Gentiles, ignorant that the Jews in the
time of Jesus, acknowledged no books as inspired scripture but
the books of the Old Testament. See Appendix, A.
A reasonable and reasoning man, such as I have supposed, may
ask himself if it be possible that men filled with the Holy Ghost,
and whose minds were supernaturally opened to understand the
scriptures, could make mistakes such as these.
Lastly, he will recollect, on discovering what is about to be stated,
that the Apostles and followers of Jesus Christ were Jews, and
consequently could not be ignorant of what was notorious to the
whole nation, for instance, that the Jewish Sabbath begins at
sunset on Friday evening, and ends at sunset on Saturday
evening. Nevertheless the author of the Gospel called of Matthew
makes ch. xxviii. 1. the Sabbath to end at dawn of day on Sunday
morning: while the author of that called of John apparently
reckons, ch. xx. 19. the evening of the first day of the week as a
part of the first day of the week; whereas it is in fact, according to
the law and customs of the Jews, who then and now reckon their
days from sunset to sunset, the beginning and a part of the
second day of the week. Such mistakes appear to me to indicate
that the writers of those Gospels were Gentiles not perfectly
acquainted with Jewish customs, and therefore not Matthew and
John.[fn 6]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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