founder of it, been disappointed of a set- and that without revelation man would tlement in the church of Scotland. But never have entertained an idea of his the Bereans in answer to this charge existence.-2. With regard to faith in appeal not only to Mr. Barclay's doc- Christ, and assurance of salvation trine, uniformly preached in the church through his merits, they differ from alof Fettercairn, and many other places most all other sects whatsoever. These in that neighbourhood, for fourteen years they reckon inseparable, or rather the before that benefice became vacant, but same, because (say they) "God hath likewise to two different treatises, con- expressly declared, he that believeth taining the same doctrines, published shall be saved; and therefore it is not by him about ten or twelve years only absurd but impious, and in a manbefore that period. They admit, in-ner calling God a liar, for a man to say deed, that previous to May 1773, when the general assembly, by sustaining the king's presentation in favour of Mr. Foote, excluded Mr. Barclay from succeeding to the church of Fettercairn (notwithstanding the almost unanimous desire of the parishioners) the Bereans had not left the established church, or attempted to erect themselves into a distinct society; but they add, that this was by no means necessary on their part, until by the assembly's decision they were in danger of being not only deprived of his instructions, but of being scattered as sheep without a shepherd. And they add, that it was Mr. Barclay's open and public avowal, both from the pulpit and the press, of those peculiar sentiments, which now distinguish the Bereans, that was the first and principal, if not the only cause of the opposition set on foot against his settlement in Fettercairn.

The Bereans agree with the great majority of Christians respecting the doctrine of the Trinity, which they hold as a fundamental article; and they also agree in a great measure with the professed principles of both our established churches respecting predestination and election, though they allege that these doctrines are not consistently taught in either church. But they differ from the majority of all sects of Christians in various other important particulars, such as, 1. Respecting our knowledge of the Deity. Upon this subject they say, the majority of professed Christians stumble at the very threshold of revelation; and, by admitting the doctrine of natural religion, natural conscience, natural notices, &c. not founded upon revelation, or derived from it by tradition, they give up the cause of Christianity at once to the infidels; who may justly argue, as Mr. Paine in fact does in his Age of Reason, that there is no occasion for any revelation or word of God, if man can discover his nature and perfections from his works alone. But this the Bereans argue is beyond the natural powers of human reason; and therefore our knowledge of God is from revelation alone,

I believe the Gospel, but have doubts, nevertheless, of my own salvation." With regard to the various distinctions and definitions that have been given of different kinds of faith, they argue that there is nothing incomprehensible or obscure in the meaning of this word as used in Scripture; but that as faith, when applied to human testimony, signifies neither more nor less than the mere simple belief of that testimony as true, upon the authority of the testifier, so, when applied to the testimony of God, it signifies precisely "the belief of his testimony, and resting upon his veracity alone, without any kind of collateral support from concurrence of any other evidence or testimony whatever." And they insist that, as this faith is the gift of God alone, so the person to whom it is given is as conscious of possessing it as the being to whom God gives life is of being alive: and therefore he entertains no doubts either of his faith or his consequent salvation through the merits of Christ, who died and rose again for that purpose. In a word, they argue that the Gospel would not be what it is held forth to be, glad tidings of great joy, if it did not bring full personal assurance of eternal salvation to the believer; which assurance, they insist, is the present infallible privilege and portion of every individual believer of the Gospel.-3. Consistently with the above definition of faith, they say that the sin against the Holy Ghost, which has alarmed and puzzled so many in all ages, is nothing else but unbelief; and that the expression-"it shall not be forgiven neither in this world nor that which is to come,' means only that a person dying in infidelity would not be forgiven neither under the former dispensation by Moses (the then present dispensation, kingdom, or government of God,) nor under the Gospel dispensation, which, in respect of the Mosaic, was a kind of future world or kingdom to come.-4. The Bereans interpret a great part of the Old Testament prophecies, and in particular the whole of the Psalms, excepting such as are merely historical or lau

datory, to be typical or prophetical of || to any church on earth, or any number Jesus Christ, his sufferings, atonement, of churches or of Christians, whether mediation and kingdom; and they es- decided by a majority of votes, or by eem it a gross perversion of these unanimous voices. Neither do they think psalms and prophecies to apply them to themselves authorized, as a Christian the experiences of private Christians. church, to enquire into each other's poIn proof of this, they not only urge the litical opinions, any more than to exawords of the apostle, that no prophecy mine into each other's notions of philois of any private interpretation, but they sophy. They both recommend and pracinsist that the whole of the quotations tise, as a Christian duty, submission to from the ancient prophecies in the New lawful authority; but they do not think Testament, and particularly those from that a man by becoming a Christian, or the Psalms, are expressly applied to joining their society, is under any obliChrist. In this opinion many other gation by the rules of the Gospel to reclasses of protestants agree with them. nounce his right of private judgment -5. Of the absolute all-superintending upon matters of public or private imsovereignty of the Almighty, the Be-portance. Upon all such subjects they reans entertain the highest idea, as well as of the uninterrupted exertion thereof over all his works, in heaven, earth, and hell, however unsearchable by his creatures. A God without election, they argue, or choice in all his works, is a God without existence, a mere idol, a nonentity. And to deny God's election, purpose, and express will in all his works is to make him inferior to ourselves.

allow each other to think and act as each may see it his duty; and they require nothing more of the members than a uniform and steady profession of the apostolic faith, and a suitable walk and conversation.

For farther particulars of the doctrines of this sect, see the works of Messrs. Barclay, Nicol, Brooksbank, and M'Rae. See also Mr. A. McLean's Treatise on the Commission, first edition, p. 88. in which Mr. Barclay's notion of assurance is combated.

It is said that their doctrine has found converts in various places of Scotland, England, and America; and that they have congregations in Edinburgh, GlasAs to their practice and discipline, gow, Paisley, Stirling, Crieff, Dundee, they consider infant baptism as a divine Arbroath, Montrose, Fettercairn, Aberordinance, instituted in the roon of cir-deen, and other towns in Scotland, as cumcision; and think it absurd to sup-well as in London, and various places in pose that infants, who all agree are ad- England. missible to the kingdom of God in heaven, should, nevertheless, be incapable of being admitted into his visible church on earth. They commemorate the Lord's supper generally once a month; but as the words of the institution fix no particular period, they sometimes celebrate it oftener, and sometimes at more distant periods, as it may suit their general convenience. They meet every Lord's day for the purpose of preaching, praying, and exhorting to love and good works. With regard to admission and exclusion of members, their method is very simple: when any person, after hearing the Berean doctrines, professes his belief and assurance of the truths of the Gospel, and desires to be admitted into their communion, he is cheerfully received upon his profession, whatever may have been his former manner of life. But if such a one should afterwards draw back from his good profession or practice, they first admonish him, and, if that has no effect, they leave him to himself. They do not think that they have any power to deliver a backsliding brother to Satan; that text, and other similar passages, such as, "Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven," &c. they consider as restrict- BETHLEHEMITES, a sect called ed to the apostles, and to the inspired also Star-bearers, because they were testimony alone, and not to be extended || distinguished by a red star having five

BERENGARIANS, a denomination, in the eleventh century, which adhered to the opinions of Berengarius, who asserted that the bread and wine in the Lord's Supper are not really and essentially, but figuratively changed into the body and blood of Christ. His followers were divided in opinion as to the eucharist. Some allowed them to be changed in effect; others admitted a change in part; and others an entire change, with this restriction, that, to those who communicated unworthily, the elements were changed back again.

BERYLLIANS, so called from Beryllus, an Arabian, bishop of Bozarth, who flourished in the third century. He taught that Christ did not exist before Mary; but that a spirit issuing from God himself, and therefore superior to all human souls, as being a portion of the divine nature, was united to him at the time of his birth.

rays, which they wore on their breast, their synagogues every sabbath day: the in memory of the star which appeared number was fifty-four, because, in their to the wise men. Several authors have intercalated years, a month being then mentioned this order, but none of them added, there were fifty-four sabbaths: have told us their origin, nor where in other years they reduced them to their convents were situated; if we ex-fifty-two, by twice joining together two cept Matthew Paris, who says that, in short sections. Till the persecution of 1257, they obtained a settlement in Antiochus Epiphanes, they read only England, which was at Cambridge, in the law; but, the reading of it being Trumpington-street. then prohibited, they substituted in the BIBLE, the name applied by Chris-room of it fifty-four sections out of the tians by way of eminence, to the col-prophets; and when the reading of the lection of sacred writings, or the holy law was restored by the Maccabees, the Scriptures of the Old and New Testa

ments.

section which was read every sabbath out of the law served for their first lesson, and the section out of the prophets for their second. These sections were divided into verses; of which division, if Ezra was not the author, it was introduced not long after him, and seems to have been designed for the use of the Targumists, or Chaldee interpreters; for after the return of the Jews from the Baby lonish captivity, when the Hebrew language ceased to be their mother tongue, and the Chaldee grew into use instead of it, the custom was, that the law should be first read in the original Hebrew, and then interpreted to the

which purpose these shorter sections were very convenient.

I. BIBLE, ancient Divisions and Order of. After the return of the Jews from the Babylonish captivity. Ezra collected as many copies as he could of the sacred writings, and out of them all prepared a correct edition, arranging the several books in their proper order. These books he divided into three parts. I. The law. II. The prophets. III. The Hagiographia, i. e. the holy writings. I. The law, contains-1, Genesis;-2, Exodus;-3, Leviticus;-4, Numbers; -5, Deuteronomy. II. The writings of the prophets are-1, Joshua;-2, Judges, with Ruth;-3, Samuel;-4, Kings-people in the Chaldee language; for 5, Isaiah;-6, Jeremiah, with his Lamentations;-7, Ezekiel;-8, Daniel;9, The twelve minor prophets;-10, II. BIBLE, History of. It is thought Job-11, Ezra;-12, Nehemiah;-13, that Ezra published the Scriptures in Esther. III. The Hagiographia consists the Chaldee character, for, that lanof-1, The Psalms;-2, The Proverbs; guage being generally used among the -3, Ecclesiastes;-4, The Song of Jews, he thought proper to change the Solomon. This division was made for old Hebrew character for it, which hath the sake of reducing the number of the since that time been retained only by sacred books to the number of the let-the Samaritans, among whom it is preters in their alphabet, which amount to twenty-two. Afterwards the Jews reckoned twenty-four books in their canon of scripture; in disposing of which the law stood as in the former division, and the prophets were distributed into former and latter: the former prophets are Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings; the latter prophets are Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the twelve minor prophets. And the Hagiographia consists of the Psalms, the Proverbs, Job, the Song of Solomon, Ruth, the Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, Esther, Daniel, Ezra, the Chronicles. Under the name of Ezra they comprehend Nehemiah: this order hath not always been observed, but the variations from it are of no moment. The five books of the law are divided into forty-five sections. This division many of the Jews hold to have been appointed by Moses himself; but others, with more probability, ascribe it to Ezra. The design of this division was that one of these sections might be read in

served to this day. Prideaux is of opinion that Ezra made additions in several parts of the Bible, where any thing appeared necessary for illustrating, connecting, or completing the work; in which he appears to have been assisted by the same Spirit in which they were first written. Among such additions are to be reckoned the last chapter of Deuteronomy, wherein Moses seems to give an account of his own death and burial, and the succession of Joshua after him. To the same cause our learned author thinks are to be attributed many other interpolations in the Bible, which created difficulties and objections to the authenticity of the sacred text, no ways to be solved without allowing them. Ezra changed the names of several places which were grown obsolete, and, instead of them, put their new names by which they were then called in the text. Thus it is that Abraham is said to have pursued the kings who carried Lot away captive as far as Dan; whereas that

place in Moses's time was called Laish, || Langton, archbishop of Canterbury, in the name Dan being unknown till the the reigns of John and Henry III. "But Danites, long after the death of Moses, the true author of the invention was possessed themselves of it. The Jewish Hugo de Sancto Caro, commonly called canon of Scripture was then settled by Hugo Cardinalis, because he was the Ezra, yet not so but that several varia- first Dominican that ever was raised to tions have been made in it. Malachi, for the degree of cardinal. This Hugo flouinstance, could not be put in the Bible rished about A. D. 1240: he wrote a by him, since that prophet is allowed to comment on the Scriptures, and prohave lived after Ezra; nor could Nehe- jected the first concordance, which is miah be there, since that book mentions that of the vulgar Latin Bible. The aim (chap. xii. v. 22) Jaddua as high priest, of this work being for the more easy and Darius Codomanus as king of Per-finding out any word or passage in the sia, who were at least a hundred years Scriptures, he found it necessary to dilater than Ezra. It may be added, that, vide the book into sections, and the secin the first book of Chronicles, the ge- tions into subdivisions; for till that time nealogy of the sons of Zerubbabel is car- the vulgar Latin Bibles were without ried down for so many generations as any division at all. These sections are must necessarily bring it to the time of the chapters into which the Bible hath Alexander; and consequently this book, ever since been divided; but the subdior at least this part of it, could not be in vision of the chapters was not then into the canon in Ezra's days. It is probable verses, as it is now. Hugo's method of the two books of Chronicles, Ezra, Ne- subdividing them was by the letters A, hemiah, Esther, and Malachi, were B, C, D, E, F, G, placed in the margin, adopted into the Bible in the time of at an equal distance from each other, Simon the Just, the last of the men of according to the length of the chapters. the great synagogue. The Jews, at first, The subdivision of the chapters into were very reserved in communicating verses, as they now stand in our Bibles, their Scriptures to strangers; despising had its original from a famous Jewish and shunning the Gentiles, they would Rabbi, named Mordecai Nathan, about not disclose to them any of the treasures 1445. This rabbi, in imitation of Hugo concealed in the Bible. We may add, Cardinalis, drew up a concordance to that the people bordering on the Jews, the Hebrew Bible, for the use of the as the Egyptians, Phœnicians, Arabs, Jews. But though he followed Hugo &c. were not very curious to know the in his division of the books into chaplaws or history of a people, whom inters, he refined upon his inventions as their turn they hated and despised. to the subdivision, and contrived that Their first acquaintance with these by verses: this being found to be a books was not till after the several cap- much more convenient method, it has tivities of the Jews, when the singularity been ever since followed. And thus, as of the Hebrew laws and ceremonies in- the Jews borrowed the division of the duced several to desire a more particu-books of the Holy Scriptures into chaplar knowledge of them. Josephus seems surprised to find such slight footsteps of the Scripture history interspersed in the Egyptian, Chaldean, Phoenician, and Grecian history, and accounts for it hence; that the sacred books were not as yet translated into Greek, or other languages, and consequently not known IV. BIBLE, rejected Books of The to the writers of those nations. The apocryphal books of the Old Testafirst version of the Bible was that of the ment, according to the Romanists, are Septuagint into Greek, by order of that the book of Enoch (see Jude 14,) the patron of literature, Ptolemy Philadel-third and fourth books of Esdras, the phus; though some maintain that the whole was not then translated, but only the Pentateuch; between which and the other books in the Septuagint version, the critics find a great diversity in point of style and expression, as well as of accuracy.

III. BIBLE, modern Divisions of. The division of the Scriptures into chapters, as we at present have them, is of modern date. Some attribute it to Stephen

ters from the Christians, in like manner the Christians borrowed that of the chapters into verses from the Jews. The present order of the several books is almost the same (the Apocrypha excepted) as that made by the council of Trent.

third and fourth books of Maccabees, the prayer of Manassch, the Testament of the twelve Patriarchs, the Psalter of Solomon, and some other pieces of this nature. The apocryphal books of the New Testament are the epistle of St. Barnabas, the pretended epistle of St. Paul to the Laodiceans, several spurious Gospels, Acts of the Apostles, and Revelations; the book of Hermas, entitled the Shepherd;

Jesus Christ's letter to Abgarus; the epistles of St. Paul to Seneca, and several other pieces of the like nature; as may be seen in the collection of the apocryphal writings of the New Testament made by Fabricius. Protestants, while they agree with the Roman Catholics in rejecting all those as uncanonical, have also justly rejected the books of Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, and 1st and 2nd Maccabees.

5. BIBLE, Georgian. The inhabitants of Georgia, in Asia, have long had a translation of the Bible in their ancient language; but that language having now become almost obsolete, and the Georgians in general being very ignorant, few of them can either read or understand it.

6. BIBLE, Gothic. It is generally said that Ulphilas, a Gothic bishop, who lived in the fourth century, made a version of the whole Bible, except the book of Kings, for the use of his countrymen; that book he omitted, because of the frequent mention of the wars therein, as fearing to inspire too much of the military genius into that people. We have nothing remaining of this version but the four Evangelists, printed in quarto, at Dort, in 1665, from a very ancient manuscript.

7. BIBLE, Grison. A translation of the Bible into the language of the Grisons, in Italy, was completed by Coir, and published in 1720.

V. BIBLE, Translations of. We have already mentioned the first translation of the Old Testament by the LXX. (§ 2.) Both Old and New Testaments were afterwards transiated into Latin by the primitive Christians; and while the Roman empire subsisted in Europe, the reading of the Scriptures in the Latin tongue, which was the universal language of that empire, prevailed every where; but since the face of affairs in Europe has been changed, and so many different monarchies erected upon the ruins of the Roman empire, 8. BIBLE, Icelandic. The inhabithe Latin tongue has by degrees growntants of Iceland have a version of the into disuse; whence has arisen a neces- Bible in their language, which was sity of translating the Bible into the re-translated by Thorlak, and published spective languages of each people; and in 1584. this has produced as many different versions of the Scriptures in the modern languages as there are different nations professing the Christian religion. Of the principal of these, as well as of some other ancient translations, and the earliest and most elegant printed editions, we shall now take notice in their order.

1. BIBLE, Armenian. There is a very ancient Armenian version of the whole Bible, done from the Greek of the LXX. by some of their doctors, about the time of Chrysostom. This was first printed entire, 1664, by one of their bishops at Amsterdam, in quarto, with the New Testament in octavo.

2. BIBLE, Bohemian. The Bohemians have a Bible translated by eight of their doctors, whom they had sent to the schools of Wirtemberg and Basil on purpose to study the original languages: it was printed in Moravia in

1539.

3. BIBLE, Croatian. A translation of the New Testament into the Croatian language was published by Faber Creim, and others, in 1562 and 1563.

9. BIBLE, Indian. A translation of the Bible into the North America Indian language, by Elliot, was published in quarto, at Cambridge, in 1685.

10. BIBLE, Irish. About the middle of the sixteenth century, Bedell, bishop of Kilmore, set on foot a translation of the Old Testament into the Irish language, the New Testament and the Liturgy having been before translated into that language: the bishop appointed one King to execute this work, who, not understanding the oriental languages, was obliged to translate it from the English. This work was received by Bedell, who, after having compared the Irish with the English translation, compared the latter with the Hebrew, the LXX. and the Italian version of Diodati. When it was finished, the bishop would have been himself at the charge of the impression; but his design was stopped, upon advice given to the lord lieutenant and archbishop of Canterbury, that it would seem a shameful thing for a nation to publish a Bible translated by such a despicable hand as King: however, the manuscript was not lost, for it went to press in 1685, and was afterwards published.

4. BIBLE, Gælic. A few years ago, a version of the Bible in the Gælic or Erse language was published at Edinburgh, where the Gospel is preached regularly in that language in two chapels, for the benefit of the natives of the || 24. Highlands.

11. BIBLE, King James's. See No. 12. BIBLE, Malabrian.

In 1711,