By Dr. Arthur T. Pierson Beloved Minister and Writer, Now Deceased"
Note.—The following article is another of the unpublished m anuscripts left_ by Dr. Pierson, the first of which was printed in the May num ber of this magazine. By courtesy of his son, Delavan L. Pierson, of New York, we are fortunate in being' able to present this one bearing upon the disposition of carnal-m inded people to dis to rt the m eaning of Scripture to suit their own desires. He has taken for the tex t of the article, 2 P e ter 3:16.—Editor.
namely, the first adjective and the verb. The verb is peculiar and unique. It is from the word which in classic Greek means a machine, engine, crank used in shipbuild ing; or a press such as is used in the wine- vat; or a rack, an instrument of torture. The word therefore may express'~either of three forrns of perverting Scripture: the cramping of it by unnaturally limiting and narrowing down its meaning; the crushing, irreverent use of it, by which its symmetry of form is destroyed and its beauty trampled on; or the wrenching of it, giving, it a forced and perverted meaning or applica tion ; turning it violently around from its manifest purpose; so that like.a victim on a rack, it may be imagined as protesting by its very outcries against sUch tortuous The writers of the Bible do not deny, but rather acknowledge, that there are some matters hard to be understood. This is no objection to the Word of God, but rather and torturing exegesis! It is noticeable that:— 1.
'VEN the Holy Scriptures may be wrenched. The word means to roll or wind as on a windlass, to screw, to turn 'OH awry, to torture as .on a hence to pervert. The idea is doing violence .to the letter or spirit of the Word by a forced application or wrong constrUc- rack; tion. Instead of asking in a simple way, and with a teachable spirit, what does God teach, mahy a reader, interested in main taining jSome pet theory or justifying some pet sin or indulgence, wrests or wrenches the Scripture to suit his own purposes. Such is the striking and startling sugges tion of this fragment from the writings of Peter the Apostle. The three principal words in this passage in Peter, unlearned, unstable, wrest, are pe culiar to Peter, and to this Epistle, being found nowhere else in the New Testament. Two of them are found only in this verse;
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