1. That becaiise redemption is sometimes to be taken metaphori- cally, for mere deliverance, when it is spoken of God without any men- tion of a price or ransom, in such cases as wherein it was impossible that a ransom should be paid (as in the deliverance of the children of Israel from Egypt and Pharaoh, when it is expressly said to be done by power and an out-stretched arm, Deut iv. S-i), therefore it must be so understood when it is spoken of Christ, the mediator, with express
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mention of a price or ransom, and when it was impossible but that a ransom must be paid, is a loose consequence, not deserving any notice.
2. That all the places of Scripture where mention is made of God being a redeemer and redeeming his people may be referred unto these heads: —
(1.) Such as call God the redeemer of his church in general, as the places before mentioned; and these are all to be referred imme- diately to the Son of God (the manner of his redemption being de- scribed in the New Testament) ; and so proper redemption is intended in them, compare Isa. liv. 5, with Eph. v. 25, 26.
(2.) Such as mention some temporal deliverance that was typical of the spiritual redemption which we have by Jesus Christ; and it is called redemption, not so much from the general nature of de- liverance, as from its pointing out to us that real and proper redemp- tion that was typified by it. Such was God's redeeming his people out of Egypt.
So there is no mention of redemption in the Scripture, but either it is proper, or receives that appellation from its relation to that which is so.
8. This is indeed a very wretched and cursed way of interpret- ing Scripture, especially those passages of it which set out the grace of God and the love of Christ to us, — namely, to do it by way of diminution and lessening. God takes and uses this word that is of use amongst men, namely, " redemption ; " saith he, " Christ hath redeemed you with his own blood,— he hath laid down a price for you." For men to come and interpret this, and say " He did it not properly, it was not a complete redemption, but metaphorical, a bare deliverance," is to blaspheme God and the work of his love and grace. It is a safe rule of interpreting Scripture, that in places mentioning the love and grace of God to us, the words are to be taken in their utmost significancy. It is a thing most unworthy a good and wise man to set out his kindness and benefits with great sw^elling words of mighty weight and importance, which, when the things signified by them come to be considered, must be interpreted by way of minoration; nor will any worthy man do so. Much less can it be once imagined that God has expressed his love and kind- ness and the fruits of it to us in great and weighty words, that, in their ordinary use and significancy, contain a great deal more than really he hath done. For any one so to interpret what he hath spoken, is an abomination into which I desire my soul may never enter.
What the redemption of a captive is, and how it is brought about, ■we know. God tells us that Christ hath redeemed us, and that with his own blood. Is it not better to believe the Lord, and venture our souls upon it, than to go to God and say, " This thou hast said, indeed, but it is an improper and metaphorical redemption, a de-
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liverance, that we have?" The truth is, it is so faz' from truth that God hath delivered the work of his grace, and our benefit thereby, in the death of Christ, in words too big in their proper signification for the things themselves, that no words whatever are sufficient to express it and convey it to our understandings.
That Moses, who was a type of Christ in the work of redemption, and is called a redeemer, did redeem the people without the proper payment of a valuable ransom, therefore Christ did so also ; — to con- clude thus, I say, is to say that the type and thing typified must in all things be alike ; yea, that a similitude between them in that where- in their relation consists is not enough to maintain their relation^ but there must be such an identity as in truth overthrows it. Christ tells us that the brazen sei'pent was a type of him: John iii. 14, " As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up." Now, if a man should thence argue, that because the brazen serpent was only lifted up, not crucified nor did shed his blood, therefore Christ was not crucified nor did shed his blood, would he be attended unto? The like may be said of Jonah, who was alive in the belly of the whale, when he was a type of Christ being dead in the earth. In the general nature of deliverance from captivity, there was an agreement in the corporeal deliverance of Moses and the spiritual of Christ, and here was the one a type of the other; in the manner of their accomplishment, the one did not re- present the other, the one being said expressly to be done by power, the other by a ransom.