THE CONSTRUCTION OF SHEEPFOLDS 525

stand in the sense in which it there occurs; and when they want an expression of something for which it does not stand in the Bible, to use some other word. There is no compromise of religious opinion in this; it is simply proper respect for the Queen’s English.

3. The word occurs in the New Testament, as I said, a hundred and fourteen times.* In every one of those occurrences, it bears one and the same grand sense: that of a congregation or assembly of men. But it bears this sense under four different modifications, giving four separate meanings to the word. These are-

(I.) The entire Multitude of the Elect; otherwise called the Body of Christ; and sometimes the Bride, the Lamb’s Wife; including the Faithful in all ages;-Adam, and the children of Adam yet unborn.

In this sense it is used in Ephesians v. 25, 27, 32; Colossians i. 18; and several other passages.

(II.) The entire multitude of professing believers in Christ, existing on earth at a given moment; including false brethren, wolves in sheep’s clothing, goats and tares, as well as sheep and wheat, and other forms of bad fish with good in the net.

In this sense it is used in 1 Cor. x. 32, xv. 9; Galatians i. 13; 1 Tim. iii. 5, etc.

(III.) The multitude of professed believers, living in a certain city, place, or house. This is the most frequent sense in which the word occurs, as in Acts vii. 38, xiii. 1; 1 Cor. i. 2, xvi. 19, etc.

(IV.) Any assembly of men: as in Acts xix. 32, 41.

4. That in a hundred and twelve out of the hundred and fourteen texts, the word bears some one of these four meanings, is indisputable.† But there are two texts in

* I may, perhaps, have missed count of one or two occurrences of the word; but not, I think, in any important passages.

† The expression “House of God,” in 1 Tim. iii. 15, is shown to be used of the congregation by 1 Cor. iii. 16, 17.

I have not noticed the word knriakh (oikia), from which the German “Kirche,” the English “Church,” and the Scotch “Kirk” are derived, as it is not used with that signification in the New Testament.

[Version 0.04: March 2008]