stantially the same.

Now, if the passage be

not taken in this sense, but be supposed to imply, that God had not instituted sacrifices at the time of the departure of the Hebrews from Egypt, then a direct contradiction is given to the Mosaic history, which expressly declares, that God himself had ordained the slaying of the paschal lamb, not only before the giving of the law at Sinai, but before the migration of the Israelites from Egypt. And that this was really a sacrifice, and is repeatedly called by Moses by the very same term, which is here applied to denote sacrifice by the prophet, has been already fully shewn in Number XXXV. of this work.

Or again, if we concur in the interpretation of this passage, as given by the Jewish doctors Jarchi and Maimonides, and adopted by Dr. Kennicot, we may consider it as a declaration on the part of God, that he had not first commanded the Israelites concerning the sacrificial rites, after he had led them out of Egypt, The passage in Jeremiah, say they, refers to the transaction at Marah. (See particularly Kenn. Two Diss. pp. 153. 209.) The Jews, when they had arrived here, three days after they had left the Red Sea, murmured at the bitterness of the waters; a miracle was wrought to sweeten them, and then God made a statute and ordinance for them, and proposed to them

in exact agreement with what is here said in Jeremiah, to obey him, to give ear to his commandments, and keep his statutes, and that he would in turn be their protector. (Ex. xv. 25, 26.) Now, this having been some time before the formal institution of the sacrificial rite at Mount Sinai, and the Jews having always dated the beginning of the law from this declaration at Marah, the Jewish doctors maintain it to be true in fact, that God did not first enjoin their code of sacrificial observances, but commanded them concerning moral obedience; and thus understand the form of expression in Jeremiah, as we do that of St. Paul, Adam was NOT deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression; (1 Tim. ii. 16.) that is, Adam was not first deceived, and was not first in the transgression, but Eve. The meaning of the passage in Jeremiah would then be, that as God had not, in the first instance, enjoined to the Jews their sacrificial ritual, after he had led them out of Egypt; so they were not to attach to the observance of all its minutiæ, a superiority over moral obedience, but the contrary, the latter having been first commanded.* This explanation agrees in substance with the

See Maim. Moreh. Nev. pars. iii. cap. 32. ap. fin.Kennicot's Two Diss. pp. 153. 209,-and Jenn, Jew. Ant. vol, i. p. 312.

former and from both it manifestly appears, that this passage has no relation to the original institution of animal sacrifice.

The whole of this subject is fully and ably treated by Mede, who sums up his entire argument in these words. "According to one of these three senses, are all passages in the Old Testament disparaging and rejecting sacrifices literally to be understood: namely, when men preferred them before the greater things of the Law; valued them out of their degree, as an antecedent duty; or placed their efficacy in the naked rite, as if ought accrued to God thereby; God would no longer own them for any ordinance of his; nor indeed in that disguise put upon them were they." Mede's Works, pp. 352, 353.

NO. LVIII.

ON THE SACRIFICE OF ABEL, AS EVINCING THE DIVINE INSTITUTION OF SACRIFICE.

PAGE 47. (m) Hallet considers this single fact as supplying so strong an argument on the present question, that he does not hesitate to pronounce it, a demonstration of a divine institution. For, he says, Abel's sacrifice could not have been acceptable, if it had not been of divine appointment, according to that obvious maxim of all true religion, In vain do they

worship God, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. (Mark vii. 7.) Thus says he, Abel must have worshipped God in vain, had his sacrificing been merely a commandment of his father Adam, or an invention of his own. And to make this matter more evident, he asks, why we do not now offer up a bullock, a sheep, or a pigeon, as a thank-offering after any remarkable deliverance, or as an evidence of our apprehensions of the demerit of sin. The true reason is, because we cannot know that God will accept such will-worship, and so conclude that we should herein worship God in vain. As Abel then did not sacrifice in vain, it was not will-worship, but a divine appointment. To this, he adds, the want of a right to slay animals before the flood, unless conferred by God for this very purpose of sacrifice, gives yet farther confirmation. Hallet on Hebr.

xi. 4.

Dr. Richie remarks, that the divine acceptance is not confined to the sacrifice of Abel, but that we find it extended also to others offered under the patriarchal dispensation. Thus, God is said to have smelled a sweet savour, (a strong expression of his acceptance,) when Noah offered his burnt-offering. Job's care, likewise, to offer burnt-offerings for his children, is mentioned as an eminent effect of piety, and with particular marks of approbation, (Job,

ch. i.) And the honourable mention, which is made of the sacrifices offered by other pious men in this period of the world, leaves no room to doubt of their having been likewise graciously accepted by God. It is, moreover, to be observed, that the oblation of some of those early sacrifices, was expressly ordered by God himself: as the burnt-offering of Abraham, (Gen. xxii.) and those which were offered by the three friends of Job. (Job. xlii.) Now that it is more natural to think, that God would order and accept of, the performance of a mode of worship, which had been instituted by himself, than that he would thus countenance one, which had been the product of mere human invention, is a thing which will not bear much dispute. See Dr. Richie's Pec. Doct. vol. i. pp. 149, 150. In-> deed, whoever wishes to see the subject of the divine institution of sacrifices satisfactorily treated, may consult the last named work, p. 136— 151. to great advantage. See also Barrington's Misc. Sac. vol. iii. p. 67-71. and Heideg. Hist. Patr. Exercit. iii. § 52, 53. tom. i.

This last writer considers the εμπυρισμός, οι the burning of the sacrifice by fire from heaven, a decisive proof of a divine institution : and that the patriarchs were favoured with this infallible sign of the divine acceptance of their sacrifices, the language of Scripture, he thinks, leaves us no room to doubt. That it was by