piring description of the word of God in the previous verse and
the tender language of the verse that follows. Is the word a living,
energising power? The High-priest too is living and powerful, great and
dwelling above the heavens. Does the word pierce to our innermost being?
The High-priest sympathises with our weaknesses, or, in the beautiful
paraphrase of the English Version, "is touched with a feeling of our
infirmities." Does the word judge? The High-priest can be equitable,
inasmuch as He has been tempted like as we are tempted, and that without
sin.[67]

On the last-mentioned point much might be said. He was tempted to sin,
but withstood the temptation. He had true and complete humanity, and
human nature, as such and alone, is capable of sin. Shall we, therefore,
admit that Jesus was capable of sin? But He was Son of God. Christ was
Man, but not a human Person. He was a Divine Person, and therefore
absolutely and eternally incapable of sin; for sin is the act and
property of a person, not of a mere nature apart from the persons who
have that nature. Having assumed humanity, the Divine person of the Son
of God was truly tempted, like as we are. He felt the power of the
temptation, which appealed in every case, not to a sinful lust, but to a
sinless want and natural desire. But to have yielded to Satan and
satisfied a sinless appetite at his suggestion would have been a sin. It
would argue want of faith in God. Moreover, He strove against the
tempter with the weapons of prayer and the word of God. He conquered by
His faith. Far from lessening the force of the trial, His being Son of
God rendered His humanity capable of being tempted to the very utmost
limit of all temptation. We dare not say that mere man would certainly
have yielded to the sore trials that beset Jesus. But we do say that
mere man would never have felt the temptation so keenly. Neither did His
Divine greatness lessen His sympathy. Holy men have a wellspring of pity
in their hearts, to which ordinary men are total strangers. The
infinitely holy Son of God had infinite pity. These are the sources of
His power to succour the tempted,--the reality of His temptations as He
was Son of man, the intensity of them as He was Son of God, and the
compassion of One Who was both Son of God and Son of man.

Our author is wont to break off suddenly and intersperse his arguments
with affectionate words of exhortation. He does so here. It is still the
same urgent