N01184:70
A dissertation concerning the future conversion of the Jewish Nation. Answering the objections of…
A dissertation concerning the future conversion of the Jewish Nation. Answering the objections of the Reverend and learned Mr. Baxter, Dr. Lightfoot, and others. : With an enquiry into the first resurrection. / By Increase Mather, president of Harvard-College, at Cambridge, in New-England. ; [Three lines from Jeremiah]A dissertation concerning the future conversion of the Jewish Nation. Answering the objections of the Reverend and learned Mr. Baxter, Dr. Lightfoot, and others. : With an enquiry into the first resurrection. / By Increase Mather, president of Harvard-Colledge, at Cambridge, in New-England. ; [Three lines from Jeremiah]
London: printed by R. Tookey for Nath. Hillier, 1709
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.
It seems by this, that at the Coming of our Lord the Elect shall rise and be gathered together unto him before the Resurrection of the Non-Elect. Mr. Strong (in his Thirty Sermons p. 279.) thinks that this Text is not to be understood of the General Resurrection, because when the last Trumpet sounds, not Elect only, but Reprobates are brought to judgment, when as this Trumpet in Matthew gathers only the Elect from the Four Winds; therefore (says he) it seems that none shall bear this […] but the Elect, and it shall sound to them as such.
It seems by this, that at the Coming of our Lord the Elect shall rise and be gathered together unto him before the Resurrection of the Non-Elect. Mr. Strong (in his Thirty Sermons p. 279.) thinks that this Text is not to be understood of the General Resurrection, because when the last Trumpet sounds, not Elect only, but Reprobates are brought to judgment, when as this Trumpet in Matthew gathers only the Elect from the Four Winds; therefore (says he) it seems that none shall bear this 〈…〉 but the Elect, and it shall sound to them as such.
And hence some ha•• interpreted this Trumpet as intending the Publication of the Gospel for the Conversion of the Elect, supposing that the Coming of the Son of Man in the Clouds of Heaven with great Power and Glory, spoken of in the preceding Verse, has respect only to his Providential Coming unto the Destruction of Jerusalem. Thus Grotius, and his Admirer Dr. Hammond. But it is a dangerous Exposition that shall make such clear Proofs of our Lord's Second Personal Coming to be nothing but Metapho•• and Allegories. That Phrase of Christ• coming in the Clouds of Heaven is peculiar unto his Coming to begin the great Day of Judgment, Dan. 7.13. with Acts 1.11. His providential Coming to destroy Jerusalem was at the Beginning of the great Tribulation of the Jewish Nation; When as this Coming in the Clouds of Heaven is expressly said to […] after that Tribulation is ended, Ver. 29. That which Matthew expresseth by saying after the Tribulation of those Days, Luke expounds by saying Jerusalem shall be trodden down, until the Times of the Gentiles be fulfilled. This then is one Scripture which seems to indigitate a Resurrection of the righteous as precedaneous to that of the wicked. Another Scripture which seems to speak no less, is that