In this volume the sole aim of the writer has been to
trace the unity of thought in one of the greatest and most difficult books of
the New Testament. He has endeavoured to picture his reader as a member of what
is known in the Sunday-schools of Wales as "the teachers'
class," a thoughtful Christian layman, who has no Greek, and desires only
to be assisted in his efforts to come at the real bearing and force of words
and to understand the connection of the sacred author's ideas. It may not be
unnecessary to add that this design by no means implies less labour or thought
on the part of the writer. But it does imply that the labour is veiled.
Criticism is rigidly excluded.
The writer has purposely refrained from discussing the
question of the authorship of the Epistle, simply because he has no new light
to throw on this standing enigma of the Church. He is convinced that St. Paul is neither the
actual author nor the originator of the treatise.
In case theological students may wish to consult the volume
when they study the Epistle to the Hebrews, they will find the Greek given at
the foot of the page, to serve as a catch-word, whenever any point of criticism
or of interpretation seems to the writer to deserve their attention.
T. C. E.
ABERYSTWYTH, April 12 Thessalonians,
1888.
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