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THE name of God would for the faithful be amply sufficient to denote
the glory of His Divinity, but by adding "over all, God blessed," he
excludes a blasphemous and perverse interpretation of it, for fear that
some evil-disposed person to depreciate His absolute Divinity might quote
the fact that the word God is sometimes applied by grace in the Divine
economy temporarily to men, and thus apply it to God by unworthy
comparisons, as where God says to Moses: "I have given thee as a God to
Pharaoh," or in this passage: "I said ye are Gods," where it clearly
has the force of a title given by condescension. For as it says "I said,"
it is not a name showing power, so much as a title given by the speaker.
But that passage also, where it says: "I have given thee as a God to
Pharaoh," shows the power of the giver rather than the Divinity of him who
receives the title. For when it says: "I have given," it thereby certainly
indicates the power of God, who gave, and not the Divine nature, in the
person of the recipient. But when it is said of our God and Lord Jesus
Christ, "who is over all, God blessed for ever," the fact is at once proved
by the words, and the meaning of the words shown by the name given: because
in the case of the Son of God the name of God does not denote an adoption
by favour, but what is truly and really His nature.
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