According to this account, the gofpel economy began with baptifm: the miffion of John was divine, and exactly in agreement with an ancient prophecy of Ifaiah. The people firft confeffed their fins, and then were baptized, and the baptiftery was the river Jordan. The verfion of this harmony is that which was made in the reign of James i. that professed admirer of king-craft. It seems awkward to fay, 1 baptize you with water, for it refembles faying, I baptize you with the river fordan. The old Reformation bibles read: I baptize you in water: and the prepofition was fo unpliable in Mark [verfe v.] that the tranflators of the prefent verfion

were

were obliged to read: they were all baptized of him not with, but in the river Jordan: which is the true reading in every one of the accounts. It is not impoffible, that they rendered the word with inftead of in for the fake of avoiding to give an opinion on the precise sense of the word baptize and perhaps for the fake of fuggefting that to baptize might mean to pour. The old Baptifts ufed to fay, feveral covenient words were inferted in other places. In two of the Pfalms of David there was a word of confequence put when the prefent tranflation was made (4): The old black-letter books ufed to read: why have ye fuch pleasur in vaynite, and feke after lyes?....Thou deftroyeft the lyers. Later versions read: how long will ye turne my glory into fhame, loving vanity, and feeking yes?....Thou fhalt deftroy them that fpeak lyes. The Jacobean tranflators rendered: how long will ye feek after leafing?.... Thou fhalt deftroy them that speak leasing. "In Scotland leafing-making was a crime, the creature of an act of parliament. It confifted in mifrepresenting the actions of the king to any of his fubjects, or vice verfa, thofe of his fubjects to the king. It inferred a capital punishment (5).” Perhaps the tranflators did not know the Scotch meaning of the word. Lord Argyle found it out afterward, or rather the Scotch crown lawyers for him. When a religious test was forced on all perfons in office, civil, ecclefiaftical, or military, binding them to a confeffion of faith, and with an engagement never to attempt to alter or change it, as it was in the reign of Charles ii. the Earl of Argyle who fubmitted to take it with an explanation, importing that he took it in fo far as it was confiftent with itfelf, and the Proteftant religion, and that he did not bind himself up from making any alteration that was confiftent with his religion and loyalty, was accused of high treason, leafing-making, and perjury, and was actually condemned on the act against leafing-making, and put to death. How far the craft of which James boafted, operated in this version must be left but it is certain he gave the tranflators rules, and one was, that they fhould not change fome ecclefiaftical words, which implied in the language of his craft, that they fhould change fuch as did not comport with the general defign of ferving the hierarchy by the verfion. There is another lapfe in the above tranflation of John's baptifm which affects the fubject of baptifm, as the word with doth the mode. I baptize you with water unto repentance. The old verfions read: I baptize you in water in token of repentance; that is, as a fignification that you do repent. This is exactly the fenfe in which the fame word is rendered Mat. xii. 41. The men of Nineveh repented εis Tw xnpuyμa, at, or upon the preaching

(4) Pfalm iv. 2... . .v. 6.

(5) HUGO ARNOT, Efq. Hift. of Edinburgh. B. i. C. iv. an. 1681.

of Jonah. So here: I baptize you in water as MeTavolav, at, or upon repentance, and no other sense agrees with the hiftory. The learned Grotius, therefore, paraphrafes it, I baptize you upon that profeffion of repentance, which you make (6).

OHN the Baptift was the protomartyr of the new economy.
Herod put to death.

Jo

Him

Herod put to death. The priests of the temple at Jerufalem followed the example, and procured the crucifixion of Jefus much against the will of the governour. One of the city fynagogues imitated their fuperiours, and purfued Stephen to death for blafphemy. Then perfecution became general, and all the disciples of Jefus, except the apoftles, left the city. By their means the good news of Jefus the deliverer was published, and churches were formed at feveral places, firft in Paleftine, then in other parts of Afia, next in the Afiatick iflands, and laftly in Europe. Out of Jerufalem the difciples proceeded every way, like the radii of a circle. from the centre, and as it is impoffible to fix the time of congregating cach church, or, if it could be, wholly unneceffary, fo an alphabetical lift may fufficiently ferve the prefent purpose.

ACHAIA. Achaia is fometimes put for the whole country of Greece, but in general in fcripture for one province, having Theffaly on the North, on the Weft the river Acheloo, on the Eaft the Egean fea, and on the South Peloponnefus, and of this province Gallio was deputy when Paul first planted Chriftian churches. The Chriftians of this province are honourably characterized in the New Teftament as zealous, liberal, and exemplary, but the number of their churches is not recorded there. They received the word of the Lord immediately from Thessalonica, and formed themselves on the model of that church (1).

ALEXANDRIA was the capital of Egypt, and the refidence of a great number of Jews. They had a fynagogue at Jerufalem for their own

(6) Annot. in Mat. iii. 11. s. μelavosav: Baptizo vos fuper profeffione pænitentiæ quam facitis.

(1) See 1 THESS. i. Chap. 7. 8. 9. ACTS xviii, 12, 27. Roм. xv. 26. xvi. 5. xvi. 15. 2 COR. ix. 2. xi. 10.

1 COR..

occafional

occafional ufe, and the ordinary fervice of fuch of their families as refided. ftatedly there. It was in this congregation that the difpute first began with Stephen, and which ended with his death. It seems natural to fuppofe that fome of this fynagogue firft informed their families at Alexandria of the gofpel, but profane hiftory gives another account of the matter. The author of the Alexandrian or Pafchal Chronicle, who wrote about the middle of the fourth century fays, in the year thirty-nine the evangelift Mark preached the word of Chrift to the people of Alexandria, and first formed a church there, over which he prefided two and twenty years (2). An annalift of after times, deeply verfed in what the Greeks call eloquence, that is, the art of fwelling hiftorical truths into lies by the ufe of great words, reports the matter thus: "In the fourth year of Domitian, the first pontiff or high-prieft of the church of Alexandria, the immediate fucceffor of Mark the apoftle being dead, Abilius fucceeded him, and became the fecond bishop of Alexandria (3)." To translate their bombaftick phrafes into plain English, the ftory is this: Mark went to Alexandria, and as he walked along the street he had the misfortune to burft the ftitching of his fhoe, fo that he could not proceed till it was repaired. He turned into the ftall of Hananiah or Ananias the first Jew Cobler he came at to get it mended. During the operation, being countrymen, they got acquainted. The Cobler was a man of good abilities, and Mark informed him that the promised Meffiah had appeared. The good man taught other Jews in Alexandria what tidings Jefus had brought, and fo formed the firft Chriftian affembly at Alexandria: but when in after ages the Greeks wrote this ftory, fimple as it was, they called Ananias a patriarch, his mean houfe a temple, and their doctrine a new law like that on Mount Sinai to be guarded by fire, and thunder, and fmoke (4). Whoever formed this church, it was of no account in the days of the apostles, at least no mention is made of it in their writings, but in after ages it was the granary that contained feeds of deftruction that over-ran the whole Chriftian world, for it incorporated the grand Jewish errour of a worldly Meffiah, and the dregs of Egyptian literature along with the fimple names of fpiritual things in the New Testament, lofing the latter in the antiquated glare of the former: but even this judaizing and paganizing church preferved for many ages at least shadows of the original mode of baptism.

(2) Chron. Pafchale feu Chron. Alexand. cur. et ftud. DU FRESNE. Paris. 1688. p. 230. (3) ZONAR. Annal. cur. et ftud. DU FRESNE. Paris. 1686. Tom. i. p. 582.

(4) EUTYCH. Patriarch. Alex. Eccl. Alex. orig...cum Com. J. SELDEN. Lond. 1642...ABR, ECHELLENS. Refp. ad SELD. Com. Rom. 1661...J. BASNAGE Hift. Eccl. Tom. i. liv. ii. Hift. du Patriarchat d'Alexand.

ANTIOCH. There are two Antiochs mentioned in the New Teftament. The firft is the ancient capital of Syria, a city of true eaftern magnificence, the refidence of the Macedonian kings of Syria for many hundred years, and afterwards of the Roman governours of that province, fo that it was called the Queen of the Eaft, and when bishops became princes the church obtained the names of the great patriarchate of the Eaft, and the eye of the eaftern church.

The Jews who fled from the perfecution of Stephen firft preached to their refident countrymen, and to profelytes, the Lord Jefus, and the band of the Lord was with them and a great number believed, and turned unto the Lord (5).

This city is remarkable in ecclefiaftical history for three things. Here the difciples of Jefus were firft called Chriftians. Here the gofpel was preached to Grecians, who were incorporated in the church. Here also Barnabas and Saul were fent out by the church under the direction of the Holy Ghoft to travel through pagan cities, to give light to the Gentiles, and to publish Jefus for falvation unto the ends of the earth (6).

It is a character to the gofpel that it was firft taught in the most popu lous, enlightened, and learned cities, never fhunning the publick eye, but challenging full examination, and that in thofe cities it obtained numerous converts by conviction without the aid of force or fraud.

ANTIOCH IN PISIDIA. Pifidia was a province of Afia. Antioch was a city of the province. Here was a fynagogue of the Jews. Hither Paul and his companions came, and on the Sabbath-day, they went to the fynagogue. After the reading of the leffons, the rulers invited the strangers to speak. Paul accepted the invitation, and in a brief narrative reported the accomplishment of the ancient prophecies in the perfon of Jefus, and exhorted them to embrace the benefits of his miffion, left they should incur fuch punishments as the fame prophecies had denounced against the defpifers of it. There were two forts of worshippers in the fynagogue, the one native Jews, the other profelytes. The first withdrew displeased; the last approved of what they had heard, and invited the apostle to repeat it next Sabbath-day. During the week the affair no doubt was the fubject of much converfation in the city, and the next Sabbath-day almoft the whole city came together to the fynagogue to hear. The Jews were extremely offended at this apparent invafion of their privileges, by idolatrous Gentiles, and they contradicted and oppofed what was spoken by Paul. Paul and Barnabas, seeing the obftinate fury of the Jews, addreffed their difcourfe to the idolatrous citizens, who with great Joy embraced the good news of a Saviour, and out of them was formed the first church of