Hos. vi. 3. “Then shall we know, _if_ we follow on to know the Lord;” thus making the prophet to declare that the attainment of knowledge is dependent upon our perseverance in the search after it. This is an important truth, but is not the meaning of the verse, which is simply an emphatic exhortation to know God and to persevere in knowing Him. “Yea, let us know, let us follow on to know, the Lord.” Hosea xiii. 14. “O death, I will be thy plagues; O grave, I will be thy destruction.” Though there is some difference of opinion respecting the right rendering of the earlier part of this verse, all are agreed that these should be rendered as they are quoted in 1 Cor. xv. 55, “Where are thy plagues, O death? Where is thy destruction, O grave?” Matt. vi. 16. The rendering “they disfigure their faces, that they may appear unto men to fast,” misleads the reader by conveying the impression that the Pharisees were endeavouring to obtain credit under false pretences--were seeming to fast when not doing so in reality; whereas the conduct condemned is that of parading, and calling public attention to, their religious observances. “They disfigure their faces, that they may be seen of men that they are fasting.”[73] So also in verse 18. Matt. xi. 2. “Now when John had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples.” Here the true force of the passage is missed. “Christ,” as used by us, is a proper name, designating the person, and not simply the office of our Lord. It was not because John had heard of certain works done by Jesus of Nazareth that he sent his disciples to Him, but because he recognized in the accounts which were brought to him deeds characteristic of the Christ, the promised Messiah. “When John heard in the prison the works of the Christ.” Matt. xv. 3. “Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition?” The commandment of God might indeed be transgressed by compliance with the traditions of men, but this is not the meaning of our Lord’s words. The Pharisees had asked why the disciples did not observe the traditions of the elders respecting washing. Our Lord justifies them by calling attention to the wrong doing of those who so exalted these outward observations, in themselves mere matters of indifference, as on their account to make void the commandments of God. “Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition?”[74] Mark vi. 20. “For Herod feared John, knowing that he was a just man and an holy, and observed him.” This erroneous rendering has come down through Tyndale, the Great Bible, and the Genevan, the last of these, however, giving it in the less obscure form, “and did him reverence.” The passage is rightly given by Wycliffe, “and kept him;” _i.e._ kept him in safety. Luke i. 59. “And they called him Zacharias.” The form employed in the Greek expresses that the action here spoken of was attempted only, not completed, “they would have called him Zacharias.”