A26923:559
An end of doctrinal controversies which have lately troubled the churches
An end of doctrinal controversies which have lately troubled the churches by reconciling explication without much disputing. Written by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for John Salusbury, 1691
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
§. 22. By the Law, Paul usually meaneth the written Law of Moses, as contained in the very words now in our Bibles: As by the Word of God we usually mean the Scripture. Therefore though it contain much of the Law of Nature, yet as a written Law, and part of a Law of Peculiarity and Policy of that Nation, even the Decalogue may be said to be done away, though as the Law of Nature and of Christ it still remain.
§. 23. By the Works of the Law then, which Paul mostly disputeth of, and by [He that doth these things shall live in them] is meant, That this Law, besides the sweet and easy Precepts of faith and Love, did as part of the Matter of the Jews Obedience, require abundance of burdensome Externals, and he that would not do all those must die (for Obedience even to those commanded Tasks was then made necessary by God): And as to temporal death, it was not by that Law to be escaped, but on the strict terms thereby required: So that doing these things, was necessary to life temporal, ⟨p. 139⟩(and to eternal in sincerity): And the driving on the People by temporal punishments to these externals, was that Body of the Law which the mistaking Jews had separated from the Soul of it.
§. 23. By the Works of the Law then, which Paul mostly disputeth of, and by [He that doth these things shall live in them] is meant, That this Law, besides the sweet and easie Precepts of faith and Love, did as part of the Matter of the Jews Obedience, require abundance of burdensome Externals, and he that would not do all those must die (for Obedience even to those commanded Tasks was then made necessary by God): And as to temporal death, it was not by that Law to be escaped, but on the strict terms thereby required: So that doing these things, was necessary to life temporal, ⟨p. 139⟩(and to eternal in sincerity): And the driving on the People by temporal punishments to these externals, was that Body of the Law which the mistaking Jews had separated from the Soul of it.