High God. Nothing less than deity would suffice to qualify the mediator for such a position. Had Christ been merely a man, His death on the cross might have shown us His love and self-devotion and obedience to God's commands even to the last extremity, but it would not have revealed God's love or even His justice. For how would it have been just to let an innocent man suffer for the guilty? Or how would God's love have been manifested in devoting the best of men to ignominy, torture and death? But when we remember that there is only one God, that Christ has taught us that He and His Father are one, ¹ and that, as the New Testament says, 'God ² was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself,' then we can in some measure understand the mystery of the Atonement. God Himself in the person of His Word (كلمته) suffered for our sins, and Himself paid the debt due to His infinite justice. In this way His love, His justice and His mercy are alike manifested; and an appeal is made to the heart of every man in whom there still dwells even the least possibility of love and gratitude. Hence those who believe in Christ can say with His beloved disciple St. John: 'We ³ love, because he first loved us.' 'Herein ⁴ was the love of God manifested in us, that God hath sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for

our sins.' In this way, too, we learn that God does not stand aloof from our sorrows and sufferings, but that He himself has in Christ 'borne ¹ our griefs, and carried our sorrows.'

If our honoured readers desire to know in what sense the New Testament speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ as the Son of God (ابن الله), and to study more fully the doctrine of the atonement, he will find more detailed explanations of these matters in the Key of Mysteries and in the new and revised edition of the Balance of Truth. ² Here it will be sufficient to sum up the teaching of the holy Scriptures on the subject of salvation and remission of sins through belief in the Lord Jesus Christ and to explain how Christ has become to His true disciples 'wisdom ³ from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption.'

Christ is our righteousness because in mind and will and conduct He alone was without sin and fulfilled God's righteous law ⁴; and because He, the Word of God, by His sufferings and death offered Himself up freely and voluntarily for our sins and transgressions, that He might redeem us with His own blood. He is the spiritual Head of the human race, and therefore it is written in holy Scripture, 'As ⁵ in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be