15 ; and also Wisd. xxx. 14. It is said of a whole, in which the parts have themselves and are had in turn, hold and are held in turn ; and here it denotes the strength of the faculty of percep tion (discernment) arising from the maturity of the spiritual age: not habit acquired by practice, dux. rfy g'g/v, because they are pos sessed of more habitual strength of understanding. Exercise follows habit (habitual faculty) ; and strength makes a man put his faculty in exercise with alacrity, dexterity, profit, without affectation or the perverse imitation of others. — TO, a/V^r^/a) properly the organs of the senses, for example, the tongue, the organ of tasting: comp. ala^^t, in perception, sense, Phil. i. 9, note.
1. A/O, wherefore) It might be thought that we should say ds, but : but the particle dib, wherefore, is better fitted to rouse. So Paul also, Rom. ii. 1, note.1 — a<p'svre$, leaving) in this discussion. In other respects these heads of doctrine are not thrown away, but are taken for granted. The apostle speaks, in his own name and in the name of the other teachers, in the plural number. — rbv "koyov, the doctrine, the word) ch. v. 11 [o Xoyo^]. — rqg ap%ris roO Xpiffrov, of the principles of Christ) Three pairs of particulars (heads), which are enumerated in this and the following verse, were of that kind, that a Jew, well instructed among his country men out of the Old Testament, ought to have applied them for the most part to Christianity. Regarding repentance, the resur rection, and the judgment, the point is clear ; for inasmuch as eternal life is only mentioned by implication among these, and expressly in the antithesis, ver. 5, it also agrees with the system of both testaments : as also the apostle speaks of faith toward GOD, not toward the Lord Jesus ; comp. Acts xi. 21, note. He speaks of baptisms in the plural, of which the Jews had various kinds for the purpose of initiation ; and the imposition of hands
1 The illative particle, as being the stronger, absorbs the transitive par ticle.— ED.