PART IV. NOTICE O F Ꭰ Ꭱ . CARSON'S SECOND REPLY. CHAPTER I. § 71. State of the Controversy. THOSE who have read what precedes, will remember that Dr. Carson spoke of my proposal to derive evidence from the Fathers, that Barrio means to purify, as follows: "Proof from the Fathers, that Barrila signifies to purify! As well might he profess to find in them proof for the existence of railroads and steam coaches. There is no such proof; there is not an instance in all the Fathers in which the word or any of its derivatives are so used. Without exception, they use the word always for immersion." He says this as a scholar, professing to be "acquainted with the Fathers." Of the value of the testimony of the Fathers, he spoke as follows: They knew the meaning of the language which they spoke." p. 472. "The sense in which it (Barri2w) was used by the apostles must have been known most assuredly to all that either heard them or read their writings. Το suppose that persons who spoke the Greek language might understand their words in a sense different from that in which they used them would be to charge the Scripture as not being a revelation." p. 473. Here then, in this long debated controversy, was an issue finally presented which involved a final, absolute, and irrevocable decision of the question. The Fathers were infallible witnesses. They have testified explicitly, and abundantly. Dr. Carson says that always, without exception, they testify for immersion. I assert with equal confidence that they testify in favor of the sense purification. From this issue I do not intend to be turned aside by Dr. Carson's innumerable and irrelevant personal attacks. It is of no great consequence to the church, or to the world, whether 1 have or have "not a head for the philosophy of language," on which grave point Dr. Carson gives us his opinion-p. 436. At least, if a Greek Father expressly defines Barriga as meaning to purify, I can understand it, and quote it for the benefit of Dr. Carson and his disciples-and it is incumbent on them to show that the Father in question does not so define Barril, or to give up the controversy. No question can be brought to an issue more direct, or more easily decided. The whole subject lies in a nut-shell. From this issue I do not mean to turn aside to the right hand nor to the left. What then are the facts in the case? They are these: I brought forward, not from one, but from many Fathers, not merely one, but multitudinous testimonies, as explicit, and as direct as possible, that Sariw means to purify. I will mention a few of the items. 1. I quoted from Basil an express and formal definition of the word Sanrioua, as meaning purification. In this definition he was professedly explaining the meaning of the word used by John in the days of Christ, and with reference to the institution of baptism. Evidence more unequivocal of the correctness of my position cannot be conceived. See § 55. 2. I had asserted that Barrio was also used in the sense of xalagiw to denote sacrificial purification or the remission of sins. This assertion Dr. Carson ridiculed. In proof of its truth I quoted a comment of Athanasius on the words of John, in which he affirms that his words, he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, mean xadagiõi iμãs, he shall purify you, that is, as he explains it, forgive your sins. § 55. 3. I quoted from the Lexicon of Zonaras written in Greek, his native tongue, a definition of Barrioμa as meaning the remission of sins by water and the Spirit-which perfectly coincides with Athanasius. The same lexicon also gives to ẞárioμa the other sense of xabagigw, i. e. moral purification. § 55. 4. I quoted from Proclus a passage variously and beautifully illustrating and confirming the same sense; in this John is represented as using Barria in the sense to purify, to acquit, in stating to Christ the reasons of his reluctance to baptize him. § 54. How can I, a sinner, says he, purify, i. e. absolve my judge? 5. I quoted a passage from Ambrose on Jewish and heathen baptisms, in which, because their washings do not remit sins, he denies to them the name of baptisms, and says that they are merely layacra. Of course he must use the word in the same sense as Athanasius, Zonaras, and Proclus. § 53. 6. I quoted from Ambrose a passage in which he calls sprinkling a baptism, § 61. Also another passage from the same Father, in which he speaks of a person sprinkled with blood as baptized according to the law, § 53. Here the sense purified is plainly demanded. 7. I quoted a passage from Cyril of Alexandria, in which he speaks of sprinkling the unclean with the ashes of a heifer, as a baptism-thus showing how he understood διάφοροι βαπτισμός, in Heb. ix. 10, and BarTICóuevos arò vexgoû in Sirach xxxiv. 25. 8. I quoted from Tertullian a passage in which he speaks of the washings and sprinklings of the heathen as the devil's baptism, § 53. 9. I quoted a passage from Justin Martyr, in which he says, "be baptized, as to your soul, from anger, from covetousness, from envy, from hatred, and lo! your body is pure." Here the preposition aró demands the sense purify-no less than the antithesis, lo, your body is pure (xatagóv). 10. I argued from the use of the preposition diá after Barrilw, just as it is used after xalagiw. The sense immerse requires sic or εv. We say to purify by or with water-to immerse or dip into water. Nothing can more clearly show that Barrie has the sense of xalagiw, than its thus taking after it the preposition diά, and in Latin per, § 56, and § 64. 11. I quoted Basil, Eusebius of Cæsarea, Cyril of Alexandria, and others, to prove that the Fathers understood the verbs denoting to purify in Is. iv. 4, and Mal. iii. 1–3, in predictions of the coming of the Messiah, as equivalent in sense to Bauriw in the New Testament, as used by Christ and John. No evidence can exceed this in strength. 12. Dr. Carson denied and ridiculed my statement that in Jn. iii. 25, a question concerning purification was equivalent to a question concerning baptism. Against him I appealed to Chrysostom, Gregory of Nyssa, Cyril of Alexandria, and Theophylact, and quoted from Theophylact, an express recognition of Bárticμa as an equivalent of καθαρισμός. 13. I quoted the author of the opus imperfectum on Matthew, ascribed to Chrysostom-and showed that he calls purification by the word of Christ baptism by the word of Christ, referring to Christ's assertion, Now ye are clean xabagoí through the word that I have spoken unto you; also that he calls purification by trials, baptism by trials. 14. I quoted Theophylact, as thus expressing the idea that John was purified by putting his hand on the head of Christ: "John was baptized by putting his hand on the head of Christ." 15. I quoted Theophylact to prove that in Luke xi. 38, the purification expected of Christ was a washing of the hands, and that Barrison was used in the sense of purify. I quoted from the Apostolic Constitutions a proof that the same word as applied to couches, cups, &c., in Mark 7, means to purify. I mention these cases not as at all exhausting the argument, but as specimens to illustrate the nature, the variety, and the power of the proofs adduced by me. They are powerful not only in themselves, but, as a cumulative argument, of vast force. I have quoted not far from one hundred passages from the Fathers to sustain my views and they are from the Fathers of all ages-and they combine in one consistent and harmonious argument, and thus sustain each other with augmented power. It became Dr. Carson, of course, to meet and to answer this testimony, or else honestly and honorably to abandon his grounds. What then has he done? He has written a nominal reply of nine pages and a half, in which, whatever else he has done, he has not either answered or professed to answer, these quotations from the Fathers, nor indeed the great mass of my quotations from them. That is to say, he has not stated either the quotations, or their import, and then tried to show that they do not prove what I allege. Not only has he not done this, but what is more, he has not even attempted to do it. Just at this auspicious moment, he makes the happy discovery that, "To prove that the Fathers understood the word (Barri(w) as immersion in reference to the ordinance of baptism, at any length, would be totally unsuitable to his present work." p. 488. That is to say, although the great end of his work is to prove that Barrigw, as used in the ordinance by Christ, means to immerse, and although he asserts that the Fathers do infallibly prove it, yet it is totally unsuitable to the great end of his work, to prove at any length this assertion, although upon it his whole cause rests. Of what avail can it be now, for Dr. Carson to resort to offensive personal attacks upon my competency as a scholar, in the midst of such virtual and decisive confessions of entire defeat? Where was it ever heard of before, that a controversialist thought it totally unsuitable to prove his main position, at any length, by the strongest testimony conceivable, which lay before him in abundance, and devoted the greater part of a whole volume to testimony of little or no weight? If Dr. Carson had omitted the greater part of his prolix volume, as finally published by him, and fairly met and answered my quotations from the Fathers, and proved at great length that they testify as he asserts, he would |