had heard to their disadvantage in this matter ; but he was forced to beheve enough to excite his serious disapprobation.
19. For there must be also heresies among you, that they which are approved may be made manifest among you.
This is the reason why he believed what he had heard. He knew that such things must happen, and that God had a wise purpose in permitting them; comp. Matt. 18, 7, "It must needs be that offences come." Evil as well as good is included in the divine purpose. It is purposed not as evil, but for the sake of the good which infinite wisdom evolves from it. Also heresies. This does not mean heresies in addition to schisms, as something different from them. But heresies as well as other evils. ' I hear there are divisions (o-xtV/xara) among you, and I beheve it, for such divisions (atpecrcts) must occur.' What in the one verse are called schisms^ in the next are called heresies ; both words having the general sense of divisions. The nature of these divisions is to be determined by the context. The word (atpeo-is) heresy means literally an act of choice., then a chosen way of Hfe, a sect or party ; not always m a bad sense, but in the sense of schools ; as, " the heresies of philosophers" means "the schools or different classes of philosophers." So in the New Testament it is re- peatedly used of " the sect of the Pharisees," or " of the Sad- ducees,'' Acts 15, 5. 5, 17. Here and in Gal. 5, 20 it means dissension. The ecclesiastical sense of the word heresy^ is, the choice of an opinion different from that of the church, or a doctrine contrary to Scripture. There is nothing to favour the assumption that such is its meaning here.
That they which are approved may he made manifest. This is the end which God has in view in permitting the oc- currence of such divisions. It is, that they which are approved (ot SoKt/Aoi), the tried^ those who have stood the test, and are worthy of approbation. The opposite class are called (dSoKt- ftot) reprobate. By the prevalence of disorders and other evils in the church, God puts his people to the test. They are tried as gold in the furnace, and their genuineness is made to ap- pear. It is a great consolation to know that dissensions, whether in the church or in the state, are not fortuitous, but are ordered by the providence of God, and are designed, as storms, for the purpose of purification.