portant as giving the account of the revelation of this name Jehovah from God and its introduction into use among men, that it shall be a contradiction in terms to a multitude of passages which the editor or supple- menter had indulged himself by inserting amid the comparatively brief original details. The truth is given in the common old interpretation of Exod. vi, 2, 3, that not the syllables, but the signification of the name jEnovAii(q. v.), as the independent, unchange- able fulfiller of his promises to the patriarchs, was re- vealed to Moses at the bush. It is true that these merely natural perfections would fail to inspire right feelings towards God, if they were to be contemplated as in a state of separation from moral perfections. But the two classes of attributes are inseparable in actual reality, and probably were never even conceived of bj-- the Hebrew mind as separable, if we judge from the line of argument in the closing chapters of Job. Cer- tainly Exod. xxxiv, C, 7 makes an express claim for the inclusion of moral perfection, as well as omnipo- tence and unchangeableness, in the signification of the name Jehovah — "Jehovah, Jehovah El, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in good- ness and truth, keeping mercj' for thousands, forgiv- ing iniquit}- and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear [the guilty] ; visiting the iniquity of the Withers upon the children, and upon tlie chil- dren's children, unto the third and to the fourth [gen- eration]." The concluding words of this jrruclaina- tion of the name Jehovah, hj him to whom it belongs, make the truth apparent that the name Jehovah could not come out in its full and true meaning except through many successive generations, and therefore could not be properl}' known to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but became known to their descendants as they observed the unchanging course of his special provi- dence towards Israel. Once more, it must never be forgotten that God Almighty and Jehovah are not names sharply opposed to one another, much less dia- metrically so, as is necessarily assumed in the inter- pretation of Exod. vi, 3 which we have been contro- verting ; on the contrary, so far as it goes, God Al- mighty is identical with or included binder Jehovah, giv- ing the meaning of it incompletely, as the Almighty God, yet failing to bring into view that he is unchange- able besides. Nevertheless, it is only by its incom- pleteness that El Shaddai differs from Jehovah ; there is no antagonism between them, there is a mere differ- ence of degree. The children of Israel were now to think of their God as Jehovah, almighty, and also un- changeable, as he was manifesting himself to be; whereas it was his almightiness alone of which their fathers had had experience. In the age of those pa- triarchs, therefore, and considering the imperfect view which they could have of him, so far from El Shaddai and Jehovah being opposing titles, they were practi- callj' one and the same ; precisely as a cube appears to be merely a square when we take notice of its length and breadth, but cannot observe its thickness. To bring this out is to lay bare the real source of many critical misconceptions about the text which has been so greatly misused, and about the patriarchal histor}'. Accordingly the identit}' of these two names in the patriarchal times is explicit!}' enougli asserted in Gen. xvii, 1, "And when Abram was ninety years old and nine, Jehovah appeared to Abram, and said unto him, I am El Shaddai, walk before me, and be thou perfect." The critics concede that this text belongs to the fun- damental document, as they call it ; and since it makes their interpretation of Exod. vi, 3 impossilile, and in fact dashes to pieces their hypotliesis of a distinction of writers according to tlie use of the one divine name or the other, they have been driven to make a purely conjectural alteration of the text, and to read Elohim instead of Jeliovah. This is a desperate expedient, whicli involves the confession that the facts of the case are fatal to their liypotheses, and that the editor
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or supplementer must be supposed to have made an intentional cliange of tiie divine name, which they detect and correct, as they restore the original word Elohim. How desperate the resource is may be un- derstood the better when we recollect that they make the Jehovist or the editor such a simpleton as to be unaware that Exod. vi, 3 pours contempt upon all his previous interpolations; and yet they imagine him so ■wary or cunning liere as to strike out the original word Elohim in order to make the better piece of patchwork by substituting his favorite title Jehovah. The text, as it stands, is conclusive evidence that in the days of Abraham El Shaddai was identical with Jehovah so far as the signification of this latter Mord had then been unfolded; that is, there was then no difference in the subjective appreliension of the mean- ing of the two names. But the objective significance of Jehovah was always deeper and fuller ; and at the time of the mission of Moses thej' came to be distin- guished in the apprehension of the church, for the ele- ment of unchangeableness was seen to he involved in the name Jehovah. From the time of the worship of the golden calf, and of the gracious pardon granted to the people at the intercession of Moses, to whom a new revelation of the name and character of the cov- enant God was vouchsafed, the moral characteristics of tlie name Jehovah came out more prominently still, as in Exod. xxxiv, 6, 7, already quoted. Yet it is onlj' in the times of the New Testament that its full meaning has been unfolded (that is, as fullj' as it can be in this world), in connection with the person and work of him who is Jehovah Tsidkenu, "the Lord our Righteousness;" who said of himself, "Before Abraham was, I am ;" and who in the epistle to the Hebrew Christians has this name applied to him and explained of him, that he is Jehovah, who in the be- ginning laid tlie foundation of heaven and earth, and who shall continue the same wlien thejj^ shall be fold- ed together like a garment, the Saviour who has of- fered one sacrifice for sins forever, Jesus Christ, the same yesterday and to-day and forever.