A53669:51
A brief declaration and vindication of the doctrine of the Trinity as also of…
A brief declaration and vindication of the doctrine of the Trinity as also of the person and satisfaction of Christ / accommodated to the capacity and use of such as may be in danger to be seduced, and the establishment of the truth by J. Owen.
London: printed by R.W. for Nath. Ponder, 1669
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.
We have not therefore any original contest in this matter with any, but such as deny either God to be one, or the Father to be God, or the Son to be God, or the Holy Ghost so to be. If any deny either of these in particular, we are ready to confirm it by sufficient Testimonies of Scripture, or clear and undeniable Divine Revelation. When this is evinced and vindicated, we shall, willingly proceed to manifest that the explications used of this Doctrine unto the Edification of the Church are according to truth; and such as necessarily are required by the nature of the things themselves. And this gives us the method of ⟨p. 37⟩the small ensuing Discourse, with the Reasons of it.
The first thing which we affirm to be delivered unto us by divine Revelation as the Object o• ou• Faith is, that God is one. I know that this may be uncontrollably evidenced by the •ight of Reason it self, unto as good and quiet an Assurance as the mind of man is capable of in any of its apprehensions whatever. But I speak of it now, as it is confirmed unto us by Divine Revelation. How this Assertion, of one God, respects the Nature, Essence, or Divine Being of God, shall be declared afterwards. At present it is enough to represent the Testimonies that he is one, only one. And because we have no difference with our Adversaries distinctly about this matter, I shall only name some few of them, Deut. 6. 4. Hear O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord. A most pregnant Testimony; and yet notwithstanding, as I shall elsewhere manifest, the Trinity it self, in ⟨p. 38⟩that one divine Essence is here asserted, Isa. 44. 6, 8. Thus saith the Lord, the King of Israel, and his Redeemer, the Lord of Hosts, I am the first, and I am the last, and besides me there is no God; Is there a God besides me? Yea there is no God, I know not any; In which also we may manifest that a plurality of Persons is included and expressed. And although there be no more absolute and sacred truth than this, that God is one; yet it may be evinced, that it is no where mentioned in the Scripture, but that either in the words themselves, or the context of the place, a plurality of persons in that one sense is intimated.