But both these hypothesis are not only notoriously false, but utterly impossible, as will be manifested by and by ; but before I come to the refutation of them, it will ba necessary to lay down some concessions to clear the orthodox doctrine in this controversy, and narrow the matter under debate as much as may be.
(1.) And first. We thankfully acknowledge the Lord Jesus Christ to be the Surety of the New Testament, Heb. vii. 22. and that as such, all the guilt and punishment of our sins were laid up-
OF AlJTf\*OMIA■^Jts^t. 579
on him, Isa. liii- 5, 6. That is, God imputed, and he bare it in our room and stead. God the Father, as supreme Lawgiver and Judge of all, upon the transgression of the law, admitted the spon- sion or suretiship of Christ, to answer for the sins of men, Heb. x. 5, 6, 7. And for this very end he was made under the law, Gal. iv. 4, 5. And that Christ voluntarily took it upon him to answer as our Surety^ whatsoever the law could lay to our charge ; whence it became just and righteous that he should suffer.
(2.) We say. That God by laying upon, or imputing the guilt of our sins to Christ, thereby our sins became legally his ; as the debt is legally the surety's debt, though he never borrowed one farthing of it : Thus God laid, and Christ took our sins upon him, though in him was no sin, 2 Cor. v. 21. " He hath made him to " be sin for us, who knew no sin,'"* i. e. who was clean and altoge- ther void of sin.
(5.) We thankfully acknowledge, that Christ hath so fully satis- fied the law for the sins of all that are his, that the debts of believ- ers are fully discharged, and the very last mite paid by Christ. His payment is full^ and so therefore is our discharge and acquit- tance, Rom. viii. 1, 31. And that, by virtue hereof, the guilt of believers is so perfectly abolished, that it shall never more bring him under condemnation, John v. 24. And so in Christ they are without fault before God.
3. We Hkewise grant. That as the guilt of our sins was by God"*? imputation laid upon Christ, so the righteousness of Christ is by God imputed to believers, by virtue of their union with Christ ; and becomes thereby as truly and fully theirs, for the justification of their particular persons before God, as if they themselves had in their own persons fulfilled all that the law requires, or suffered all that is threatened ; No inherent righteousness in our own persons, is, or can be more truly our own, for this end and purpose, than Chrisfs imputed righteousness is our own. He is tlie Lord our righteousness, Jer. xxiii. 6. We are made the righteousness of God in him, 1 Cor. v. 91. Yea, the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in them that believe, Rom. viii. 4.
But notwithstanding all this, we cannot say, (1.) That Christ became as completely sinful as we. Or, (2.) That we are as com- pletely righteous as Christ ; and that over and above the guilt and punishment of sin, (which we grant was laid upon Christ) sin itself simply considered, or the very transgression itself, became the sin or transgi'ession of Christ ; and consequently that we are as com- pletely righteous as Christ, and Christ as completely sinful as we are.
1. We dare not say, that sin simply considered, as the very transgression of the law itself, as well as the guilt and punishment,
580 THE SECOND APPEXDIX.
became the very sin and transgression of Christ : For two things are distinctly to be considered and differenced, with respect to the law, and unto sin. As to the law, we are to consider it in,
1. Its preceptive part.
(1.) The preceptive part of the law, which gives sin its formal nature, 1 John iii. 4. For sin is the transgression of the law. All transgression arises from the preceptive part of the law of God : he that transgresseth the precepts, sinneth : and under this consider- ation sin can never be communicated from one to another. The personal sin of one, cannot be in this respect, the personal sin of another. There is no physical transfusion of the transgression of the precept from one subject to another : this is utterly impossible ; even Adam's personal sins, considered in his single private capa- city, are not communicable to his posterity.
(2.) Besides the transgression of the preceptive part of the law, there is an obnoxiousness unto punishment, arising from the sanc- tion of the law, which we call the guilt of sin; and this (as judici- ous Dr. Owen * observes) is separable from sin : and if it were not separable from the former, no sinner in the world could either be pardoned or saved ; guilt may be made another's by imputation, and yet that other not rendered formally a sinner thereby: Upon this ground, we say the guilt and punishment of our sin, was that only which was imputed unto Christ, but the very transgression of the law itself, or sin formally and essentially considered, could never be communicated or transfused from us unto him. I know but two ways in the world by which one man's sins can be imagined to become another's, viz. Either by imputation, which is legal, and what we affirm ; or by essential transfusion from subject to subject (as our adversaries fancy) which is utterly impossible ; and we have as good ground to believe the absurd doctrine of transubstantiation, as this wild notion of the essential transfusion of sin. Guilt arising from the sanction of the law may, and did pass from us to Christ by legal imputation ; but sin itself, the very transgression itself, arising from the very preceptive part of the law, cannot so pass from us to Christ : For if we should once imagine, that the very acts and habits of sin, with the odious deformity thereof, should pass from our persons to Christ and subjectively to inhere in him, as they do in us ; then it would follow.
Firsts That our salvation would thereby be rendered utterly im- possible. For such an inhesion of sin in the person of Christ is ab- solutely inconsistent with the hypostatical union, which union is the very foundation of his satisfaction, and our salvation. Though
Owen of Justification, p. 185.
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the Divine nature can, and doth dwell in union with the pure and sinless human nature of Christ, yet it cannot dwell in union with sin.
Secondly^ This supposition would render the blood of the cross altogether unable to satisfy for us. He could not have been the Lamb of God to take away the sins of the world, if he had not been perfectly pure and spotless, 1 Pet. i. 19.
Thirdly, Had our sins thus been essentially transfused into Christ, the law had had a just and valid exception against him ; for it ac- cepts of nothing but what is absolutely pure and perfect. I admire, therefore, how any good men dare to call our doctrine, which teaches the imputation of our guilt and punishment to Christ, a simple doctrine; and assert, that the transgression itself became Christ's ; and that thereby Christ became as completely sinful as we. And,