Unitarianism Defended: A Series of Lectures by Three Protestant Dissenting Ministers of LiverpoolMartineau, James
Religion
Unitarianism Defended: A Series of Lectures by Three Protestant Dissenting Ministers of Liverpool
Martineau, James
Unitarianism
If an Athanasian received a divine commission to prepare a Gospel,—a
statement of the essentials of Christianity,—for the use of some
unevangelized nation, he would not, we may presume, habitually represent
the Son, in his very highest offices, as inferior to the Father, as
destitute of independent power, as without underived knowledge, and
possessed only of a secondary and awarded glory. At all events, these
representations would not be made without instant explanation; and the
writer would accuse himself of rashly periling the mysteries of God, if
he committed himself to such statements without guard or qualification,
in broad unlimited propositions. Yet these are precisely the phenomena
of Scripture. It is perpetually maintained by Trinitarians, that the
miracles of Christ were acts of power, inexplicable except by proper
Deity, united with his humanity; and that his superhuman wisdom was an
expression of that Divine Nature which blended itself with his mortal
constitution. If so, his miracles were wrought and his teachings
dictated by that element of his personality which was God,—that is, by
GOD THE SON;[244] but this, our Lord unequivocally denies; “The Son can
do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do;” “I can of mine
own self do nothing.”[245] “The words which I speak unto you, I speak
not of myself; but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the
works;”[246] “As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the
Father;”[247] “The works which the Father hath given me to
perform.”[248] These passages declare, with all the precision of which
language admits, that the wisdom and the might which dwelt in Christ,
were not those of the Son, but those of the Father; the incarnate God
had no concern with them, for they are ascribed exclusively to him who
never became incarnate. Indeed we ask, and we ask in vain, for any one
divine act or inspiration ascribed by our Lord to this humanized Deity
with whom his mortal nature was united: his teachings are one prolonged
declaration that the divinity that dwelleth within him was THE FATHER.
If he felt within him a co-equal Godhead, how could he make the
unqualified affirmation, “My Father is greater than all?”[249] Or can a
more specific disclaimer of Omniscience be framed than this; “Of that
day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels who are in Heaven,
NEITHER THE SON, but the Father?”[250] Dr. Adam Clarke, unable to resist
this overpowering text, expresses his suspicion that it is not
altogether genuine, and that the words, “neither the Son,” should be
expunged. It would appear that the temptations to “mutilation” are felt
by other parties than the Editors of the Improved Version. If it be
said, that in the passages which have been cited, the subordination
alleged of Christ, refers to his human nature, and his mediatorial
office, then it follows that his highest title may become the name of
what is called his lowest capacity; and if this be so, no medium of
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