466 STATE AND ORDINANCES OF THE CHURCH [EXERC. XIX.
they receive hereby is incredible; for by them are they defended JSrom evil,—as some by the sign of the cross, others by the first words of the Gospel of John worn about them. ‘They are sanctified in the law; and, in a word, the Targum on the Canticles, chap. viii. 3, tells us that “God chose them above all people, because they wore the phylacteries”! So just cause had our Lord Jesus Christ to re- prove their hypocrisy, superstition, and self-justification, in the use, abuse, and boasting of these things: Matt. xxii. 5, “ All their works they do for to be seen of men: they make broad their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their garments.” This about the “borders of their garments” was an after-institution ; yet, because of its answer- ableness unto this, we may add it in this place. To this purpose God gives his command, Num. xv. 38-40, “ Speak unto the children of Israel, and bid them that they make them fringes in the borders of their garments throughout their generations, and that they put upon the fringe of the borders a riband of blue: and it shall be unto you for a fringe, that ye may look upon it, and remember all the commandments of the Lorp, and do them; and that ye seek not after your own heart and your own eyes, after which ye use to go a whoring: that ye may remember, and do all my command- ments, and be holy unto your God;” which law is repeated again, Deut. xxii. 12, “Thou shalt make thee fringes upon the four quar- ters of thy vesture, wherewith thou coverest thyself” These 3S, “locks,” or “fringes,” made of thread fastened unto the wings or skirts of their garments with a riband, nan, of a blue colour (which
how to make at present the Jews confess they know not, but sup-
pose it was made with the blood of a fish called chalazon, mixed with vermilion), had virtue and efficacy from the institution of God, who alone is able to bless and sanctify things in themselves indiffer- ent unto a sacred use, to the keeping of their hearts in a due reve- rence unto himself, and their eyes from wandering after false wor- ship and superstition; which being now removed and taken away, the things themselves are, among the present Jews, turned into the
greatest superstition imaginable. Their principal vanities about
these things, having been represented by others out of Maimonides his treatise on that subject, need not here be repeated.
22. The last appointment of God, occasioned by the mercy so- lemnly remembered in the passover, was the dedication of all the
first-born males unto himself. ‘The law of this dedication is recorded
Exod. xiii. 12, 13; and the manner of its performance is further added Num. xvii. 15-17, “Every thing that openeth the matrix in all flesh, which they bring unto the Lorp, whether it be of men or beasts, shall be thine: nevertheless the first-born of man shalt thou surely redeem, and the firstling of unclean beasts shalt thou
redeem. And those that are to be redeemed from a month old —
SECT. 22-24.] BEFORE THE GIVING OF THE LAW. 467
shalt thou redeem, according to thine estimation, for the money of five shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary, which is twenty gerahs. But the firstling of a cow, or the firstling of a sheep, or the firstling of a goat, thou shalt not redeem; they are holy: thou shalt sprinkle their blood upon the altar, and shalt burn their fat for an offering made by fire, for a sweet savour unto the Lorp.” The whole dedi- cation of the first-born males is distributed into three parts:—(1.) Children, who were to be redeemed with five shekels, twenty gerahs to one shekel; that is, about twelve shillings of our money. (2.) Clean beasts, such as were appointed to be offered in sacrifice on other occasions, as the kine, the sheep, and the goats. These were to be offered unto God in a sacrifice of burnt-offering, without redemption or commutation, after they had been kept a month with the dam. (3.) Unclean beasts, whereof an instance is given in the ass; which were either to be redeemed with money by an agreement with the priest, or to have their necks broken, at the choice of the owner. And all this to call to remembrance the mercy of God in sparing them and theirs when the first-born of man and beast, clean and un- clean, in Egypt were destroyed: for hence a peculiar right of especial preservation arose unto God towards all their first-born ; and this also not without a prospect towards the redemption of the “church of the first-born” by Jesus Christ, Heb. xii. 23.
23. And this gave a period to the first dispensation of God to- wards the church in the posterity of Abraham, [which had lasted} for the space of four hundred and thirty years. With the provision and furniture of these ordinances of worship they left Egypt, and, passing through the Réd Sea, came into the wilderness of Sinai, where they received the law, and were made perfect in the beauty of typical holiness and worship.
24. Unto these ordinances succeeded the solemn vowodssia, or giv- ing of the law on Mount Sinai, with the precepts and sanctions thereof, mentioned in several places by our apostle; as chap. ii. 2, “ For if the word spoken by angels was steadfast, and every transgression and dis- obedience received a just recompense of reward.” Chap. x. 28, “He that despised Moses’ law died without mercy under two or three witnesses.” Chap. xii. 18-21, “ For ye are not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, nor unto black- ness, and darkness, and tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words; which they that heard entreated that the word should not be spoken to them any more: for they could not en- dure that which was commanded, And if so much as a beast touch the mountain, it shall be stoned, or thrust through with a dart: and so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake.” Verse 25, “They escaped not who refused him that spake on earth.” And in other place.