ON LOVE; PART MCCCLIV
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FIRST IS THE GREAT COMMANDMENTS: “The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:29-31).
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WHAT THEN IS LOVE? In a general sense love is benevolence, good will; that disposition of heart which inclines men to think favorably of their fellow men, and to do them good. In a theological sense, it includes supreme love to God, and universal good will to men. While this IS from an older definition of Charity, which IS rendered in the King James Bible from the same Greek word agape which IS generally rendered as Love, we should amend our own definition here to include the idea that in the reality of Love a man will accord to ALL men ALL things that he would accord to himself and to say that Love IS our thoughts and attitude of the equality of ALL men regardless of their outward nature or appearance…that ALL ARE equally children of Our One God.
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PLUS THE EVER IMPORTANT AND HIGH IDEAL TAUGHT TO US BY THE CHRIST: “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them” (Matthew 7:12).
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We ended the last essay with some thoughts on the Master’s words saying that “whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:33). This IS a seemingly difficult task indeed; difficult mostly because we DO NOT understand the relationship of forsaking ALL to the most basic Truths of religion and here especially the Judaeo-Christian religions. This idea of forsaking ALL IS the meaning behind the first of the Ten Commandments and IS the essence of first of the Great Commandments offered by Jesus. Jesus tells us “The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength” (Mark 12:29-30). While the Master IS speaking here to Jews and reminding them of the essential parts of the law first offered by Moses, these ideas ARE essential components of every world religion as the whole idea of ALL IS that a man’s focus will come off of the self and the pettiness of the Life he lives in this world. The objective IS ever to focus upon the Truth that IS hidden by the vanity and exacerbated by the nurturing and indoctrination that most every man endures. The relation between forsaking ALL and this Great Commandment should be clear through the idea that to focus ALL upon the Lord, ALL one’s heart, soul, mind and strength, leaves naught to focus upon one’s carnal Life and whatsoever had become important to him before the reality of his Repentance, his change of focus and the beginning of his Transformation. In this we should try to understand how that the forsaking IS of those things that had NO importance spiritually, be they thoughts, attitudes, the psychic gratification of career, family, etc., riches or anything that takes up one’s attention in this Life. In essence what one must forsake IS the role of vanity in his Life, a vanity that IS one’s perishable and decaying condition, separate from God, and pursuing false ends 4. From the spiritual perspective these false ends ARE ALL things that must be forsaken and we should try to remember the very special state of the man who IS a disciple of the Lord. This high calling IS the ultimate objective in which lies the fullness of our Transformation and the reality of “the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body” as we read in our selection from Paul’s Epistle to the Romans which we repeat here saying:
“they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you. Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh. For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God. For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in
hope, Becauseexpectation that the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body” (Romans 8:5-23).
There IS a great significance to this idea of Redemption as we have been discussing over the last few essays and while we DO NOT understand it personally, we DO see the reality of it in the bible’s showing us the lives of the Master, Peter, Paul, and certain of the Old Testament personalities. ALL of these exhibit some measure of those “greater works” that the Master promises to ALL that will “believe on” Him; we must NOT however see this believing in a nebulous doctrinal way but rather in the defining idea of “pisteuo eis” as shown to us by Vincent who tells us that this believing IS: to accept and adopt His precepts and example as binding upon the life 4. This IS of course the reality of keeping His words which IS the most basic reality of the entirety of the Master’s teaching; it IS the reality of His saying that “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do” (John 14:12). There IS a depth in these words that IS missed by most ALL of the church that yet adheres to the ideas of Christology from the founding philosophies of the church fathers and the reformers after them. We should try to see Jesus as our Great Teacher. Moses also was a great teacher but, being 1500 years earlier, his message was designed for a population that had NO message and one which, as Alexander Maclaren tells us, DID continually fall back into surrounding idolatry 12. While Mr. Maclaren shows us this in relation to the first chapter of Genesis with its introduction of the idea of One God, we can see that this remains True throughout the history and the prophets presented to us in the Old Testament. We should also see how that the cultural environment was almost continual conflict and war up until the captivity of both Samaria and Judah. Their captivity offered a change which, while unwelcome, changes their history into a more conciliatory one where their fate IS in the hands of other rulers which eventually ARE the Romans. Under Roman rule the Jews are again permitted to practice their religion in an environment where the surrounding idolatry IS now the Roman gods and the Roman view of Life. Perhaps it was the closeness of the Roman ways with which the Jews ARE surrounded that places them on the path that Moses originally ordained and it IS to this version of Israel that Jesus comes. Here we should also remember that while the Master DID come to the Jews, to teach and correct their new religious ways, His mind was ever set upon the whole world system or, better, that part of the world that had NOT already received their own versions of the revelations of Truth. Jesus came to show men the True relationship between everyman and God; He came with a message suited for the times, a message that NO longer needed the ancillary ideas given by Moses as civil laws intended to control a barbarous and superstitious population. Jesus’ message was clean of the DO’s and DON’Ts of everyday living which had become the essence of the Jews’ mitzvah. Jesus came to show us the heart of the law and how that this can work out in the lives of men through His own example and the eventual example of His apostles and True disciples. Jesus came to show us agape as the Way, the Truth and the Life, from a spiritual perspective, for everyman.
We should not look at the Master’s commandments as rules which IS the habit of the church which perhaps, from the human perspective, motivates men toward ‘disobedience’, but as the Way to Truth and Life. While most ALL Christianity has embraced Jesus words saying “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6) as their mantra and they have used these words to show their ‘religious’ superiority over the rest of the world, they have never Truly understood its meaning. Out of their context the words have come to mean that if a man DOES NOT accept the Lord Jesus, he IS forever doomed and for some this idea reaches out to ALL men regardless of their own religion and way of Life. In the Christian treatment of this idea even the most devout Buddhist, or Hindu or Muslim, those that Truly follow the precepts of their respective religions in the most ‘Christian’ way of agape, ARE lost and CAN NOT reach that place called heaven; a place that even the least devout Christian has earned merely by being a Christian. While there IS NO logic in this Christian idea, while the whole of the idea renders the reality that “there is no respect of persons with God” (Romans 2:11) moot, the church has used it as a recruitment tool against the fears of a ‘hell’ which they themselves have created. Jesus’ words saying that “I am the way, the truth, and the life” ARE quite True but DO NOT refer to His person as Jesus but rather to the Truth of His relationship to the Father which He expounds upon in His continuing words. The Master IS explaining the reality of the Trinity to men who DO NOT yet comprehend, to men who see men as men ONLY as DOES most ALL of the church which has perpetuated this lack of KNOWING by showing Jesus as an actual son, in the flesh, of the Father. We must try to see here that the way that Jesus presents the Truth over the course of these chapters from John’s Gospel IS a revelation that CAN NOT be realized by men whose focus IS yet on the self as a man with his thoughts, attitudes and emotional response to the vanity in which he lives. And, we can tell by the very nature of the dialogue that these apostles DO NOT yet Truly understand what the Master IS presenting. While much of the church takes literally the idea that ‘Jesus comes to live in the believer’, a wholly doctrinal view, they pay scant attention to the causal factors that we cite in our trifecta. We should try to see that because there IS NOT yet True revelation in the lives of these apostles, the Master IS forced if you will to explain the theme in human terms which CAN NOT Truly be understood by the carnal mind; such things ARE revealed ONLY to the Truly Repented and Transforming man which these disciples ARE. It IS the Truly Repented and Transforming man that Loves the Lord to such an extent that he IS willing to to accept and adopt His precepts and example as binding upon the life 4 and then DOES so; “he will keep my words” as the Master tells us in our trifecta which we repeat saying:
- “If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:31-32).
- “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21).
- “He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him. Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world? Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him. He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father’s which sent me” (John 14:21-24).
It IS in the third part of our trifecta that we see the causal factors for the reality or, better, the realization of that reality, God and Christ in man. We should understand here that it IS the literal ideas that the Master offers us that ARE the KEY to unlocking the deep mysteries which reveal the True nature of man through the True nature of Jesus the Christ. In such ideas as “he that hath seen me hath seen the Father” which theme He continues saying “Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works” (John 14:9, 10), He speaks of God in Him. We should understand that from the perspective of men that “Christ in you” has the same effect according to the reality that “he that hath seen me hath seen the Father“. This reality IS shown to us in the Master’s words saying “If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him” and if we can see here the inseparable nature of the Father and the Son, we can begin to have realization of this mystery. The KEY here IS clear as Jesus tells us that this revelation comes to the man of whom He says “he will keep my words“. Later in this same chapter of John’s Gospel the Master introduces the idea of the Holy Spirit and we should understand that while the church presents this aspect of God as being in the Christian believer as a separate entity, it IS the entirety of the Trinity that IS within men. We can see this from the same words above, that “we will come unto him, and make our abode with him” as the Christ and the Father plus Jesus’ revealing words regarding the Holy Spirit; we read:
“If ye love me, keep my commandments. And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you. Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also. At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you” (John 14:15-20)
The first point that we should understand here IS that the whole idea of the Holy Spirit IS the result of the first words here, that one will “keep my commandments“. We CAN NOT divorce this from the idea of having the Holy Spirit, “the Spirit of truth“, and we should understand that His disciples, by way of keeping His words, CAN receive Him. We should understand as well that “the world cannot receive” and this largely because they DO NOT “keep my commandments“. If we can see that in the idea of “I will pray the Father” IS the simplicity of the causal effect for they that “keep my commandments“, we can perhaps see how that this flow of “the Spirit of truth” IS intimately tied to the Master’s words that follow saying “If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him“. Can we see the way that the Trinity IS One God realized and active in the Life of a man who fulfills his part which IS to “hath my commandments, and keepeth them“. This Trinity, these three Aspects of our One God, ARE inseparable and act together according to the defining parameters of each: the Will Aspect of God IS manifest as the Soul, the Christ principle, the Love of God, which IS working through the singular Truth of expressing that Love through form. This IS of course a simple way of looking at a complex mystery and here we should try to see how that Jesus’ words both explain this reality and hide it from view as He tells His apostles that “I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you” in the midst of His showing them the reality of the Holy Spirit which ends in the idea that “I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you“. Again, we KNOW that the apostles DO NOT yet understand the Master’s words; they DO NOT yet realize the God Within, and continue to ask the Master to further explain. We should note here that while they have the basis for such realizations of Truth in that they DO keep His words, such concepts are wholly alien to them and to most ALL who were NOT involved in Jewish mysticism or the Kabbalah. Such who KNOW such mystical ideas were NOT favorably received by the doctrinal Jew much like esoteric and occult ideas ARE decried by today’s Christian. The apostles however ARE fishermen and other assorted common folk so for them as men to understand Jesus’ teaching IS a difficult thing. As Souls, as the unction by which “ye know all things” (1 John 2:20), however they KNOW and it IS Jesus’ teaching that slowly awakens them and becomes part and parcel of their Transformation which Paul shows us IS “the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:2).
The church DOES NOT see any of this even as a possibility as they lean upon the literal ideas that agree with their constructed doctrinal approach to the Lord. Most ALL ARE fixated upon the doctrinal idea of Christian religious superiority which IS based in the out of context words saying “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” which IS Jesus’ answer to His questioning disciples and the lead in to the fullness of the fourteenth chapter of John’s Gospel, the chapter where ALL of these mystical ideas ARE born. The doctrinal precepts that follow upon these words ARE founded in a total lack of understanding of the True meaning and the depth of several Greek words, pistis and pisteuo being chief among them. In their nebulous ideas of faith and believing they have fully discounted the Master’s criteria that enables one to Truly KNOW some measure of the Truth, a criteria that IS repeated several times in this chapter from John….that one must accept and adopt His precepts and example as binding upon the life 4. He tells us this saying such things as “If ye love me, keep my commandments“; “He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me“; If a man love me, he will keep my words; He repeats this in a negative sense as well saying “He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings“. In this we should see that the ideas of His commandments, His words, and His sayings ARE synonymous and show us that we should simply keep His words as evidence that we Love the Lord as this IS framed for us in the first of the Great Commandments. We should understand here that this sense of Love IS a special one that IS the product of our Transformation which in turn is the product of our Repentance and, when we ARE fully Transformed we DO per force live according to the Great Commandment as we ARE then “waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body“. We should understand here that this IS the difference between the True disciple and the man who merely claims to be so based in his doctrinal beliefs and while being a True disciple appears most difficult, the whole of the reality of it IS agape. It IS this factor of agape that Jesus brought to us and while the concept ever existed it was perhaps understood that the opposite pole of this, vanity, could NOT be overcome by the ancient Jew from Moses to the captivity. Against this Moses offers us the law while incorporating into the law many, many references to the treatment of others in thought, in attitude and in action. It IS these aspects of the law that ARE built into the Ten Commandments and which ARE simplified in the text of Moses ancillary laws where specifics of men’s thoughts, attitudes and actions ARE given. We should try to see also that the basis of ALL the law IS summarized by Jesus in the first of the Great Commandments and that the basis for right thought, right attitude and right action ARE the reality of the second….ALL IS covered in these two commandments. We should try to see as well that there IS a dual reality incorporated into much of the Ten Commandments; many reflect NOT ONLY upon men treatment of others but upon one’s treatment in thought, attitude and action toward the Godhead as most ALL ‘offences’ draw men further away from their focus upon the things of God. James shows us this from its source which he calls temptation and which IS the primary idea of vanity’s effect upon the human psyche. James tells us “every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. Do not err, my beloved brethren” (James 1:14:16). The apostle IS showing us here that it IS our focus upon ourselves that leaves in our “bondage of corruption” while the Great Commandments show us the polar opposite which IS the reality of agape.
The reality of ALL this IS simply the conflict between the vanity into which one IS born and then nurtured and indoctrinated into the ways of the world, and the reality of agape of which Paul tells us “all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Galatians 5:14). Vanity IS a human condition, a condition of the human animal body with its attendant personality while agape IS the condition of the Soul. Simply put the whole goal of the human family, individually and corporately, is that we “be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:2); it IS in this renewing that the carnal mind takes on the condition of the Soul as we continually move closer to “the adoption“, the True Union between the Soul and his expression on this Earth. In Moses day it was the law, both the deeper aspects concerning the relationships of men with others and the ancillary rules of conduct that supported those aspects, that was intended to bring men closer to this Union which was clearly exhibited in the Life of Moses and some other Old Testament figures. Moses and some of the prophets and kings had this special relationship with the Godhead which IS to say that they could more clearly hear the prompting of their own Souls working through their personalities grounded in this world and the customs of the day. It IS by this Power unleashed by the Soul and interpreted by the mind, the renewing mind if you will, that the miracles and the Wisdom were possible and we should understand here the role of interpretation. Perhaps it IS up to that point of True Redemption where the Transfiguration changes a man to be as the Master of whom Paul tells us that “in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” (Colossians 2:9) that the interpretations of ‘divine’ prompting ARE contributed by the renewing mind but, to be sure, there IS such interpretation. It IS based in this function of the personality that we see such differences in the words of the apostles and in the use of their words by the various church fathers and reformers. It IS in through the personalities of these men that their opinions were formed which, while based in the promptings of their own Souls, were influenced by the yet un-Redeemed personality and put forth in their thoughts as history shows us. In the end there IS but One Truth and it has eluded most ALL men from the beginning of the Christian era. Most ALL have put forth interpretations of that Truth based in their own measure of realization of that Truth. It IS this Truth that the Master shows us and which His apostles clarify in human terms and amplify for us and this Truth IS agape, Love according to the Great Commandments.
In agape we should see that the need to follow the law IS NO longer the Way to the Truth and it IS in this idea that we should see the words of Paul who has been interpreted as telling us that the law IS moot, that works ARE a false objective and that it IS grace through their nebulous idea of faith that IS the way. Through the muddiness of men’s doctrines the message IS that the law and “the works of the law” ARE NOT for the Christian. While Paul says that such were a stumbling block, that the Jews “stumbled at that stumblingstone” (Romans 9.32), the fault was NOT in the law but in the way that the Jews’ doctrines sought to work out the law in their lives. The Jews largely ignored the commandments pertaining to Right Human Relations, an interpretation of agape which IS expressed as ahab in the Jews’ language. If we can see that it IS those commandments that show Right Human Relations, that show both Love and the absence of it found in the commandments that pertain to killing, stealing and the ideas of covetousness of that time, perhaps we can better understand the differences between the such commandments that pertain to the reality of agape and those that pertain to the rites and rituals, to the dietary and health laws. The differences ARE intentionally clear, there IS little or NO crossover and we could highlight the difference by comparing the law saying “Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD” (Leviticus 19:18) and such commandments as “the priest shall take some of the blood of the trespass offering, and the priest shall put it upon the tip of the right ear of him that is to be cleansed, and upon the thumb of his right hand, and upon the great toe of his right foot” (Leviticus 14:14). The former IS clearly in regard to Right Human Relations while the latter IS firmly fixed into rites and rituals and “the works of the law“. We should remember that the Apostle Paul was a Jew, a Pharisee, and a rather devout practitioner of his faith. In this we should see that Paul was very familiar with the rote practices of the Jews as taught and overseen by the Pharisees which the lexicon describes as a sect that: in addition to OT books the Pharisees recognized in oral tradition a standard of belief and life. They sought for distinction and praise by outward observance of external rites and by outward forms of piety, and such as ceremonial washings, fastings, prayers, and alms giving; and, comparatively negligent of genuine piety, they prided themselves on their fancied good works 2a. While this IS a Christian view of the Pharisee, it DOES go far in showing us Paul’s intent in decrying works and “the works of the law“. It IS NOT the whole law that Paul speaks against in the generality of his words on works and the law; he goes far to show us the reality of the Great Commandments and those commandments that flow from these. He DOES this in teaching us about the Power of agape and if we could but see that in his words on grace and faith that it IS agape that IS to be KNOWN, we could then better understand his rather unique portrayal of agape as the True Way to Life.
It IS agape that the disciple KNOWS and it IS agape that the aspirant to discipleship strives toward KNOWING. It IS agape that IS the singular KEY to the Kingdom of God. Paul shows us this in relation to the law and specifically to that part of the law pertaining to Right Human Relations. We read this in his words to the Galatians saying “all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself“, words that lead into His descriptions of those things contrary to agape in “the works of the flesh” and those that support agape in “the fruit of the Spirit” (Galatians 5:14, 19, 22). The apostle shows us this more specifically in his words to the Romans saying “Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law” (Romans 13:8-10). We should try to see here that it IS agape that causes one to understand the True meaning of Jesus’ words saying “whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple“. It IS in our True understanding of the meaning of agape and its expression with NO “respect to persons” that we can understand the Master’s other words saying “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:33, 26). And it IS in understanding these things, agape and the lack of singular Love expressed by the idea of hate, that brings us to a fuller realization of the intent of the first of the Great Commandments saying “thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength” (Mark 12:30). We should see here that to KNOW the second of the Great Commandments and to express it in one’s Life IS to also express the first and that the same IS True in the opposite direction. Such IS the Power of agape, a Power that comes to one in his Repentance as he focuses upon the things of God; a Power that IS enhanced in Transformation as one comes to replace the carnal mind with the spiritual Power of the unction. A power that IS perfected in “the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body“; the Power that shows itself in that perfection in the Transfiguration by which we fully conform with the Master’s words saying “Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid” (Matthew 5:14). It IS unfortunate that the doctrines of men see NONE of this as the reality of spiritual Life despite the clear words of the Master.
We will continue with our thoughts in the next post.
The Mantram of Unification
- 2a New Testament Greek lexicon on biblestudytools.com
- 4 Word Studies in the New Testament; Marvin R Vincent D.D. 2nd edition
- 12 Expositions of Holy Scripture–Project Gutenberg’s and Baker Book House’ Expositions of Holy Scripture, by Alexander Maclaren–(1826-1910)
Those who walk on the well-trodden path always throw stones at those who are showing a new road.
Voltaire, Writer and Philosopher
