Status
Available
Publication
London: Printed for R. Hunter, 1819, 160 pp
Subjects
Language
Physical description
22 cm
Local notes
Jones: Unitarian minister.
Critique of John Bellamy's Bible translation.
In writing of creation, Moses refuted pagan philosophies of eternalism and cosmogonies that assumed only natural causes or actions of inert matter and chance, by describing God as deliberately planning heavens and earth in his mind, then directing the making of it.
11-14: "The advocates of atheism endeavoured to throw a veil over the evidences of design in the works of nature, as proving, if admitted, a designing cause, and that by denying all previous ideas or models of material things in the supreme mind. ... The Jewish lawgiver had to defeat this philosophical craft: and he has done it in a manner truly admirable. He first places a spiritual author at the head of the creation; then represents him, before he beings to create, as previously forming models of all the things to be created: next he exhibits him as moving to and fro over the surface of the deep, in order to survey, as it were, where and how to begin his projected plan. In a step further, we see him issue his commands to the ministers that surround his throne, to carry his plans into effect, conformably to models placed in their hands. Immediately after the execution, he views the work, and pronounces on its merit."
20-22: "The phrase *after his kind* is repeated in connexion with all the creatures which God commanded to be made: it is therefore manifest that it has some definite and important meaning. When one thing is said to be done *after* another, we mean that it is done in imitation of it, that it is done in conformity to it, the thing imitated being a pattern or model, prior in point of time to the copy or imitation. But the kinds of things were not yet in existence; they could not therefore, in the sense of *kinds*, be the standards of the things to be created. ... The meaning of Moses, however, is clear and consistent. According to his representation, the creator, as a necessary step to render his words conformable to his design, first drew a plan of the whole in his own mind. This plan consisted of *general ideas*, intended to serve as models for the several classes of things to be carried into effect. As the creator designed things to be formed in classes or kinds agreeable to given models, it was natural in Moses to designate the kinds of copies by the very same name which designates the originals in the mind of God. Moreover, the classes of things called kinds, now actually existing in nature, prior to our conceptions, become themselves prototypes of those general conceptions which we call *ideas*: and thus it is, that the same word in Hebrew, when applied to things in the divine mind, meant *models*; when applied to the class of things, signifies *kinds*; to ourselves, denotes *ideas*; and yet retains the same radical signification. ...
"The atheistical philosophers, considering the phenomena of nature as the result of matter and motion, rejected the doctrine of ideas or models; while Moses and his followers insisted on them as inseparable from the existence of a supreme intelligence; for this obvious reason, that nothing can proceed from design, but that which an idea previously existed in the mind of a designer. If, then, things came into being without ideas, they came without design, and consequently without a designing cause. This is the conclusion which the Jewish legislator sets aside, by representing Jehovah as planning this fair system of things before he actually produced it."
Critique of John Bellamy's Bible translation.
In writing of creation, Moses refuted pagan philosophies of eternalism and cosmogonies that assumed only natural causes or actions of inert matter and chance, by describing God as deliberately planning heavens and earth in his mind, then directing the making of it.
11-14: "The advocates of atheism endeavoured to throw a veil over the evidences of design in the works of nature, as proving, if admitted, a designing cause, and that by denying all previous ideas or models of material things in the supreme mind. ... The Jewish lawgiver had to defeat this philosophical craft: and he has done it in a manner truly admirable. He first places a spiritual author at the head of the creation; then represents him, before he beings to create, as previously forming models of all the things to be created: next he exhibits him as moving to and fro over the surface of the deep, in order to survey, as it were, where and how to begin his projected plan. In a step further, we see him issue his commands to the ministers that surround his throne, to carry his plans into effect, conformably to models placed in their hands. Immediately after the execution, he views the work, and pronounces on its merit."
20-22: "The phrase *after his kind* is repeated in connexion with all the creatures which God commanded to be made: it is therefore manifest that it has some definite and important meaning. When one thing is said to be done *after* another, we mean that it is done in imitation of it, that it is done in conformity to it, the thing imitated being a pattern or model, prior in point of time to the copy or imitation. But the kinds of things were not yet in existence; they could not therefore, in the sense of *kinds*, be the standards of the things to be created. ... The meaning of Moses, however, is clear and consistent. According to his representation, the creator, as a necessary step to render his words conformable to his design, first drew a plan of the whole in his own mind. This plan consisted of *general ideas*, intended to serve as models for the several classes of things to be carried into effect. As the creator designed things to be formed in classes or kinds agreeable to given models, it was natural in Moses to designate the kinds of copies by the very same name which designates the originals in the mind of God. Moreover, the classes of things called kinds, now actually existing in nature, prior to our conceptions, become themselves prototypes of those general conceptions which we call *ideas*: and thus it is, that the same word in Hebrew, when applied to things in the divine mind, meant *models*; when applied to the class of things, signifies *kinds*; to ourselves, denotes *ideas*; and yet retains the same radical signification. ...
"The atheistical philosophers, considering the phenomena of nature as the result of matter and motion, rejected the doctrine of ideas or models; while Moses and his followers insisted on them as inseparable from the existence of a supreme intelligence; for this obvious reason, that nothing can proceed from design, but that which an idea previously existed in the mind of a designer. If, then, things came into being without ideas, they came without design, and consequently without a designing cause. This is the conclusion which the Jewish legislator sets aside, by representing Jehovah as planning this fair system of things before he actually produced it."