Directory_and_Chronicle_1850 — Page 393

18.50.

Defense of an Essay &r.

355

give us an account, in this letter, of the steps by which they were led to the adoption of the transferred term. They tell us p. 3, that on the reception of Mr. Weller's letter of the 20th Oct. 1849, “both parties. took up carefully, "first the consideration of the proposition thrown out by Mr Weller, to employ one term for false gods, and another or the same term modified for the true God," and in the next place considered “the employment of the transferred word Eloah, to be em- ployed in every instance in which the true God was intended, and Shin for false gods." These propositions were rejected “as unphilo- sophical." "For," they add, "in the First Commandment, in John X. 35, 1. Cor. VIII. 5, together with 1 Kings XV. 21, 27., it was felt that the same term ought to be used for God whether true or false, because the force of the passages mainly depends on the employment of the same term: this objection would apply to Sháng-shin also, if used for the true God, and Shin for false gods; and as there were many other passages of Scripture in which different terms could not be used, it was agreed that it would be better to use the same term throughout. pp. 4, 5."

After this they tell us, that, on a suggestion having been made, to put on the title page of the N. S an explanation of the sense in which Shin was used in said book, it occurred to them “that if shin could be used with a definition, so could Tí." Accordingly this proposition was submitted to their Chinese teachers, and upon being disapproved of by these teachers, the use of tí was abandoned by them, pp. 6,7. When urging the use of the transferred term, they tell us, "those Chinese who have become most familiar with our Scriptures and views of The- ology, being at the same time intelligent men and independent think- ers, frankly confess that they have not a term so generic, and capable of so wide an extension as the one we are seeking for," while the same Chinese "conceive that when foreigners have to introduce new ideas they must expect to bring with them new terms." p. 8. They make the proposal to transfer Eloah, therefore, not merely on the ground that the Chinese have no word answering to our word Gon, as main- tained by Dr. Bowring, but on the ground also that they have no gene- ric term for god in their language. I will however give the statement in their own words. "To the general strain of Dr. Bowring's remarks, there can be little or no objection. One idea not touched upon by him is that the Chinese language not only wants a proper term where- by to represent the perfections of the true God, but it wants also a generic, which, while it is capable of being used for the highest being of which they have any conception, includes all worshiped beings,