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gkal argument that the church may possess itself of the goods of Heathens , Mr . Conybeare remarks the first instance of the misapplication of a scriptural type leading to a moral error of judgment , if not of practice . Tertdllian closes the list of those who are enumerated in the third Lecture , and from hkh the reader : will hardly expect more sobriety than from his predecessors in typical exposition , a practice so seductive to a lively imagination .
The foifrth Lecture brtfrg £ us to the school of Alexandria , distinguished , according to Mr . Cohybeaie , by not confining its allegorical interpretations to the illustration of those doctrines which are derived from the undoubted evidence o $ Scripture , as the apostolic fathers did , but endeavouring by means of it to give the appearance of scriptural authority to the doctrines of their Platonic or Eclectic philosophy . Of this school the two most illustrious names are Clemens and Origen , Clemens believed that the heathen
philosophers had either acquired from the Mosaic writings a knowledge of the truths which they contain , or that they had enjoyed a portion of the same inspiration from which the Jewish legislator had derived them ; and while with the most multifarious erudition he endeavours to shew the conformity of the heathen theology with the Jewish and the Christian , he labours , on the other hand ^ by the aid of allegorical interpretation , to deduce the doctrines of philosophy from the Scriptures . He regarded nearly the whole df
them as bearing an enigmatical character , and the Mosaic law as having a fourfold meaning , literal , moral , mystical , and prophetical . Like Philo , who was evidently his model ,, he applies the commencement of the book of Genesis to the Platonic theory of an archetypal universe , allegorizing the history of our first parents , and occasionally grafting Christian ideas on the fancies of his Jewish predecessor . The simplest portions of the history do not escape his ingenuity ; thus , in the three days' journey of Abraham ,
previous to the offering of Isaac , he discerns the progressive advancement of the human mind towards the comprehension of the ideal universe ; and the same event be conceives to afford an adumbration of the three persons of the Trinity , and the third of them to prefigure that on which our Lord rose from the dead . The same course is pursued with the narratives of the GospeL The five loaves miraculously blessed by our Lord , are interpreted to be the five senses of tnan , and the feet of the Redeemer , bedewed , as he
expresses it , by the ointment of repentance , to typify either the doctrines of truth , or the apostles who preached those doctrines . Origen , the most eminent of all the philosophizing theologians whom Alexandria produced , is still more celebrated than Clemens in the history of allegorical interpretation , partly from the reputation which other circumstances attached to his name , partly from his real merit and services to the cause of biblical criticism , and
from his opinions on this subject being conveyed in the more accessible form of commentaries and homilies on Scripture . Hence , he has even obtained the unfounded reputation of being the inventor of the allegorical system . Like Clemens , he turned the history of the New Testament into type and allegory , as well as that of the Old . Having given some specimens of the extravagant length to which he carried this practice , Mr . Conybeare observes ,
* ' It is indeed calculated to excite both wonder and regret , that one bo distinguished for learning , genius , and , it may fairly be added , for piety , should have attached so little of value to the plain , literal , and practical exposition of the text ; should have spoken at times as though doubtful , not only of the worth , but even the truth of the simplest narrative ** , unless -viewed through ( he medium of allegory . Not only in the parables and the actions
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Review . *— The Bampton and Hukem Lecture * . J 15
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1828, page 115, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2557/page/43/
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