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that, which he is treating of, and which he expresses by the Greek word Diatheke as intentionally equivalent to the Hebrew word Berith, is not a last will and testament but a covenant made between two or more contracting parties.

III. Having thus ascertained the sense, in which St. Paul uses the word Diathekè throughout the eighth and ninth chapters of the Epistle to the Hebrews, we must next consider the mode in which ancient covenants were made and ratified for, upon this circumstance is built the whole argument; being in fact no other, than an argument from general to particular.

Now the mode, in which ancient covenants were made and ratified, was by the sacrifice of a victim nor was the covenant deemed firm and binding upon the parties, until this ceremony had been duly performed.

1. Of the existence of such an opinion and such a practice, it is not difficult to produce various instances; instances, which shew both very remote antiquity and very extensive diffusion.

The oldest example upon record is the covenant, which God made with Noah and with every living creature that there should never more be a flood to destroy the earth. In this covenant, the contracting parties were, God on the one side, and Noah with the whole animated creation on the other side. The purport of it was, that there should never more be a deluge. And the cere

mony, by which it was made and confirmed, was the sacrificial slaughter of every variety of clean beast and clean fowl. First in order, the victims were devoted: and then, over the dead victims, the covenant was formally ratified'.

From this primitive ceremonial was doubtless borrowed the common ceremonial, which the posterity of Noah carried with them into their various settlements.

(1.) Thus, when the Lord made a covenant with Abraham as yet childless, that his seed should be like the stars of heaven and that they should possess the whole the whole range of country from the river of Egypt to the river Euphrates: the mode of ratifying the covenant was by the slaughter of a heifer and a she-goat and a ram and a turtle-dove and a young pigeon. After they had been slaughtered, the victims were divided in the midst and the semblance of a smoking furnace and a burning lamp miraculously passed between the pieces2.

(2. Thus when Abraham and Abimelech made a covenant between themselves, Abraham gave to Abimelech seven ewe lambs as a testimony that he had digged the well which the servants of Abimelech had violently taken away from him. These lambs were plainly enough given for the purpose of sacrifice; as we may collect, both from the reason of the thing, and

1 Gen. viii. 20–22. ix. 1—17.

2 Gen. xv.

from the circumstance of seven being a favourite sacrificial number throughout the east': and, over their dead bodies, the covenant between the two princes was formally ratified 3.

(3.) Thus again, when Jacob made a covenant with Laban, he offered sacrifice (we are told) upon the mount, and caused his brethren to partake of the sacrificial feast. The rite no doubt was performed, that so the covenant might be duly ratified over the slaughtered victims'.

(4.) A similar custom prevailed among the ancient Greeks; as we learn from the vivid description, which the poet Eschylus has given us, of the ceremonial used by the seven confederated chieftains in ratifying their covenant to stand by each other against the hostile town of Thebes.

The seven warlike leaders, says he, having sacrificed a bull over a black shield, and having dipped their hands into the blood, sware by Mars and Bellona and blood-loving Terror, that they would either subvert by violence the city of the Cadmèans, or that in death they would moisten the earth with their own gore.

'See Numb. xxiii. 1, 4, 14, 29, 30. and Asiat. Res. vol. vii. p. 251, 252.

2 Gen. xxi. 22-32.

Gen. xxxi. 44-54.

See Spencer. de leg. Heb. rit. lib.

iii. dissert. 2. cap. 3. sect. 2. p. 145, 146. 4 Ανδρες γαρ έπτα θέριοι λοχαγεται,

Ταυροσφαγεντες ες μελάνδετον σακος,

Here again we see a covenant ratified over a slaughtered victim'.

(5.) The same practice was familiar to the Romans; as we may collect from the charge, whether true or false, which was brought against Catiline and his associated conspirators. It is said, that they pledged themselves to each other over the slaughtered body of a man, by drinking the blood of their victim mingled with wine. Now, whether the alleged crime was ever perpetrated or no, such a ceremonial could never have been thought of by those who accused them of the deed, had they not been familiarized to the custom of making covenants over a sacrifice'.

1

Και θιγγάνοντες χερσι ταυρείου φονου,
Αρην, Εννω, και φιλαιματον Φοβον,
Ωρκωμοτησαν, η πολει κατασκαφάς
θεντες, λαπάξειν αστυ Καδμειον βια,

Η γην θανοντες την δε φυράσειν φονῳ.

Eschyl. Sept. cont. Theb. ver. 42—48. A similar rite is described by Homer, who was consider. ably more ancient than Æschylus, as employed by the Greeks and the Trojans in the ratification of the covenant preparatory to the judicial combat of Menelaus and Paris. See Iliad lib. iii. ver. 264-301.

2 Fuere eâ tempestate, qui dicerent, Catilinam, oratione habitâ, cum ad jusjurandum popularis sceleris sui adigeret, humani corporis sanguinem, vino permixtum, in pateris circumtulisse; inde, cum post exsecrationem omnes degustavissent, sicuti in sollemuibus sacris fieri consuevit, aperuisse consilium suum, atque eo, dictitare, fecisse, quo inter se fidi magis forent, alius alii tanti facinoris conscii. Sallust. de bell. Cat. § 22.

Doubtless many covenants are mentioned in Holy Scripture without any specific notice being taken of the ratifying sacrifice: but the mere silence of the inspired writer does by no means prove the absence of the ceremony; on the contrary, we may infer from those passages, wherein a full account of the matter is given, that sacrifice was the perpetual and regular concomitant.

2. Such was the ancient mode of ratifying covenants: and we are carefully to observe, what we shall find to be a circumstance of prime importance in the Apostle's argument, that the slaughter of the victims, over which and by which the covenant was made, was, in the strictest sense of the word, A SACRIFICE.

This vital position is established by the language, which the sacred writers invariably employ, whenever they describe the character of the victims slaughtered for the confirmation of a covenant: they always speak of those victims, as being A SACRIFICE to the Lord'. Among the many passages which might be adduced in proof of such an assertion, there is one which particularly deserves our attention: because its phraseology most distinctly specifies the exact mode, in which covenants were wont to be ratified; and thence throws a strong light upon

See Gen. viii. 20-22. and ix. 9-17. Gen. xxxi. 44 and 54. Exod. xix. 5. and xx. 24.

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