local and inferior deities (ib. ch. III.) over whom Merodach ruled. Daniel's position was certainly a trying one, but he steadfastly asserted the true view of the Divine Nature, and God saw to it that Nebuchadnezzar should learn what is the true power and Godhead of the Most High, and what the humble relation of an earthly prince to the King of Heaven. This is the main thing. There is good ground for supposing that Theos and Zeus are only different forms of one primitive word which, like enough, was a name of the true God.* But when we consider the amount and grossness of the superstitions which befouled the latter word we need not wonder that the former should have been preferred. Yet does not Paul on Mar's Hill quote from an ode to Zeus as if it referred to the true God? There was little danger that his hearers would confound the Zeus of that ode with the Zeus of popular superstition while its sentiment could be safely referred to as descriptive of the true God.

Now the term Shangti can be disconnected from all idolatrous uses, which are indeed hardly a drop in a bucket as compared with the popular superstitions and stories about Zeus. It is the highest term or title known to the Chinese and how can we leave any idol in the undisputed possession of it? We must claim it for Him who is before all and over all. Especially is this the case if we understand the term as it is explained by the essayist above quoted. He fairly represents the sentiments of the native churches at Foochow, and even granting that he gives a vastly better meaning than it has in the classics, can it not legitimately be made to carry such a meaning? I think it can at least here in the Fuhkien province, and I believe that it can be made to fill the place, in our preaching, that Jehovah does in Moses and the Prophets.

SOME BRIEF REASONS FOR NOT USING LING IN
THE SENSE OF SPIRIT.

BY J. EDKINS, D.D.

ING is the "soul" and yvxn "soul" in Greek, is never used for the Holy Spirit in the New Testament. To use yvx7 for the Spirit of God would have wrought strange confusion in early Christian theology. Christian theology avoids saying that the Holy Spirit is the Soul of God. No Christian preacher ever says so in English. It During the civil war in the United States a turreted ironclad was built and named The Monitor, and then from this proper name, arose the use of the word monitor as a generic term to denote vessels of that class. We may suppose that in very ancient times God was known the progenitors of the Greeks as, say D-e-u. As his worship became corrupted and false deities were invented this word was applied to them as a generic term and thus had two distinct uses, which in time came to be distinguished by a difference in pronunciation. Max Muller, I believe claims that all languages show traces of a primitive monotheism.

would be well to avoid it also in Chinese for the same sort of reason. At the same time it should be borne in mind that Ling and Psyche differ greatly in some of their senses especially as the personification of the soul as Psyche was a favourite one with the Greek mind. In Mongol we avoid using sunis, "soul" for the Holy Spirit and take Dototgal, the great defect of which is that it is not colloquial, but there is no good word for spirit in the Mongol language.

2. Ling is not a person. It is an influence proceeding from persons or things. It is a living principle in them or an influence coming from them. In this sense the Holy Spirit may be called Shengling. He being an influence coming from above. It is the fact of the Holy Spirit coming down as an influence, that has made the phrase Sheng-ling at all acceptable to native Christians, but it is a misfortune that any of them should fail to see, with Roman Catholic Christians, and the majority of Protestant native Christians, that the word Ling being incapable of use as a person is fatal to its claims. Shen is a distinct person. A ling is not. Hence it is unsuitable for use in speaking of the Holy Spirit as a person. I have found that men trained in the use of Sheng-shen for the Holy Spirit have clearer views of the personality of the Spirit than those trained in the use of Shengling. One experienced native preacher who received his instruction in Christianity at Ningpo, told me recently in Peking, that he decidedly preferred Sheng-ling because it was less personal than Sheng-shen. My thought was that his theology was defective in regard to the personality, and that this was very much due to the defectiveness of Ling as a word for spirit. Perhaps other preachers may have more definite views than he on this thoelogical article, but his example is worth quoting as a warning on this subject. If we had no better word than ling I would use it, but shen being far better, ling should be reserved for its own proper uses.

3. When a numeral precedes pneuma in the Scripture, ling cannot be used. For example in Bridgman and Culbertson the in Rev. 1, 4, and 3, 1, is inadmissible. We must not write our Chinese in defiance of native usage. It should be which gives a perfectly correct sense. In our Peking mandarin New Testament, Drs Schereschewski and Blodget and Bishop Burdon have taken T'si-ling in the copies issued under their charge. In the case of all these three translators, I am safe in saying that their private preference is for shen in such cases. Unfortunately the existence of certain received canons of translation, requiring rigid consistency in the use of the words for God and Spirit, have reluctantly (as I believe) compelled these translators to this usage.

The instances and the like, where a number precedes ling,

are exceptional. Here there is an ellipse of the noun to which ling is an adjective. No one would say that ling here means "Spirit." It means living (beings.)

See in Zech. 6, 5, "four spirits" where Dr. S. has shen ling in the margin within the text, the Heb. being ruach.

The inconvenience of ling is very great in Rev. 5. 6, where the seven pneumata are sent out into all the earth. Only a bad canon of translation would allow ling to be here used in preference to shen.

In the vision of Eliphaz, Job, ch. 4, 15, ling is less suitable than shen;神,鬼,魂or物. No attempt should be made to force the use of ling here. A Chinese, left to himself, would choose perhaps one of the four words yau, mo, kwei, kwai here, but they all have a bad sense and hence the most judicious rendering is with shen.

4. The unsuitability of ling for spirit is shewn by the frequent adoption of kwei "demon" as a substitute for it by translators who avoid shen for "spirit." When rendering "unclean spirit" they prefer sie kwei and the like. So in the Peking version, Rev. 16, 13, "three unclean spirits like frogs," 'kwei' is used by the three Peking translators who avoid the employment of shen for other reasons.

In the Gospels the use of kwei for "evil spirits" is not very objec tionable. But its being so frequently resorted to by translators, who avoid the employment of shen, for "spirit" shews the unsuitability of ling to express the sense of pneuma, vɛvμа, and this is why I here refer to it. Such a phrase as 7, for unclean spirit is untenable, because Chinese idiom is against it. It should rather be pu kie chi shen which is correct in idiom and in theology. A translator would do better, if he objects to shen here, to use its dark co-ordinate

kwei. If he will do this he will at any rate secure the support of several living translators, while he will lose their suffrages if he proposes pu kie chi ling.

Probably those who use shen for "God" would improve their translations greatly by occasionally using shen also for "spirit." The idea that the same word may not be used in two senses had better be consigned to the waste paper basket. If the party who prefer shen for God, would in all passages where it is preferable to ling, also use it for "spirit," they would not only greatly improve the style of their versions, but also make a step towards harmony with that party who prefer Shang-ti for "God" and shen for "spirit." But more than this they will make a step towards harmony with the people of this country in their use of the word.

5. Ling need not be used for "spirit" although shen be used for "god." It is very convenient for such senses as "spiritual in "spiritual gifts," "spiritual house," "spiritual food" but it is

insufficient for the substantive πνενша. If shen be used both for god and for spirit it is in accordance with Chinese usage. This was felt by the Roman Catholics in compiling their Christian books. They give to the Chinese mythological personages the names that the Chinese give them. This is what, as Christian missionaries, we all ought to do. They also translated "spirit" by shen because shen is the right word in their opinion. Here too we should follow them for the reasons given above, 1, 2, 3, 4 and others.

How does the case now stand? Let Shang-ti or Tien-chu be used for God. Some prefer the latter, others like the foimer. For "gods," "false gods," as Diana, Jupiter, Mercury, "all the gods of the natives are idols" among the gods there is none like unto thee," "gods many, and lords many" let shen be used. In all this there is no reason why shen should not also be employed for spirit according to what, as Mr. Chalmers and Dr. Medhurst before him, have conclusively proved is its proper sense. To use shen for the Holy Spirit, for "the ministering spirits sent forth to minister to the heirs of salvation," "the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience," will be found to give a good and plain sense.

The Chinese view "spirits" and "gods" as one class, and God they know, in my opinion, by a term higher than both. If any of my brethren object to the statement that the Chinese know God I would say, that when Christian doctrine is explained to them they select Shang-ti as the term for God. The question of identity is not a question of philology, but of theology, and the origin of nations and of tradition. I have only to do with philology. Let us readily accept the situation and comform our phraseology to the usage of the Chinese language. The fact that the Chinese know gods and spirits by one term should prepare our minds for a similar usage.

The use of ling for "spirit," I understand to have been forced into currency, more by a mistaken view of the true way to solve the problem of terms, than by any conviction on the part of translators that it is in itself a suitable word. The very fact that it is commonly employed in the phrase "salvation of the soul," would be sufficient to restrain any translator from its use for spirit, were it not that he thinks that shen may not be used by him on account of its employment in the sense of gods.

Take Mr. Mateer's instance. The Fucheu essayists, we are told, misunderstood the phrase in John, 42, 24, "God is a Spirit," when shen in their motto was used for "spirit." One would have thought the statement below, "they that worship him must "worship him in spirit and in truth" would have kept them from error. Whether they thought it their duty to give all the senses of shen, or whether they

gave in their essays more of the Chinese notions in regard to the beings called shen, and less of the New Testament notions, we outsiders cannot judge without seeing the essays.

To meet the difficulty in this and other cases, I would suggest a note, or better an expanded rendering, to include the sense of incorporeity. If ling is to be used I would urge the addition of such a clause; as still more essential to perspicuity. In the use of both words a guard is needed against the adjective sense in John, 4, 24.

I feel that there is the more need at the present time of pressing the view that "spirits" and "gods" ought both to be rendered by shen, because the recent reprint of Bishop Boone's essay, shows that there are still some men living who believe in the validity of his argument, and further, because the idea that "gods" and "spirits" must not be rendered by the same term, underlies the pamphlet lately published by Bishop Russell. What we need at present is not this idea, but an emancipation from it. Bishop Russell has not attacked the crucial passages and his book bears, therefore, to my mind, the character of being not ad rem. Neither Elohim nor Theos have fundamentally the sense "spirit," as shen is shewn to have by the common antithesis, shen, hing, as in the phrase, hing che, shen chi tse, "the body is the soul's house." The best test

of Bishop Russell's theory will be found in applying it. Will the terms he advocates cover this ground in the various passages, and in each case convey a plain sense, and if they do not what in each case will he do? How will he meet the difficulty of translation in each instance? The term question is philological, and comparative mythology can do nothing to settle it.

I find the same fault with Bishop Burdon's publications. He has also gone into the region of comparative religions. He holds that Shangti cannot be God. I hold the converse, and believe that by the light of nature, assisted by tradition, the Chinese have always known God. But this view I regard as outside of the question as to what is the duty of the translator, who must proceed on philological principles alone. For teaching theology, for preaching, and for translation we may use Shangti without ever affirming that the Shangti of the Confucianists is the Christian's God. He who believes it may affirm it, but it is a matter of opinion, and the avoidance in translation of one term or another cannot reasonably be made, by any man, a matter of conscience, it being a matter of philology alone. The appeal to conscience is out of place.

6. The relative numbers of those missionaries and converts who use ling for "spirit," and those who use shen ought to form an argument in favour of shen. There is no reason why the early Roman Catholic