Page:The Corner-Stone of the New Jerusalem.djvu/11

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the new jerusalem.
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of the New Jerusalem. It is quite different however from the doctrine which is generally believed and taught by the prevaling Church. We very much doubt whether one in a thousand of professing christians, ever thinks of Jesus and Jehovah as identically the same Being or Person. But is this doctrine true? This ought to be the important question. Is it the doctrine taught in the Holy Scripture? We will try it by this infallible standard.

It has sometimes been argued against the personal identity of Jesus and Jehovah, and in favor of a separate and distinct personality of the Father and the Son, that when they are mentioned together in the Word, they are usually connected by the conjunction and, as the Father and the Son, God and Christ, God and the Lamb. This, it is said, shows us that two distinct persons are evidently denoted by God and Christ; and that the names would not have been used together in this manner, if they were employed to designate one and the same person. It is argued that the nature of this connecting particle and is such, that it would not occur between proper names, unless these names referred to distinct and separate persons.

Every one, however, who is acquainted with the original languages of the Bible, knows that both the Hebrew and Greek word for and may also be,