[Footnote 2:  Comp. pp. 38-40, supra.]

Again Dr. Hodge cites the incident of Elisha at Dothan[1] as if in illustration of the rightfulness of deception under certain circumstances.  But in this case it was concealment of facts that might properly be concealed, and not the deception of enemies as enemies, that Elisha compassed.  The Syrians wanted to find Elisha.  Their eyes were blinded, so that they did not recognize him when in his presence.  In order to teach them a lesson, Elisha told the Syrians that they could not find him, or the city which was his home, by their own seeking; but if they would follow him he would bring them to the man whom they sought.  They followed him, and he showed himself to them.  When their eyes were opened in Samaria he would not suffer them to be harmed, but had them treated as guests, and sent back safely to their king.

[Footnote 1:  Kings 6:  14-20.]

Having cited these three cases, no one of which can fairly be made to apply to the argument he is pursuing, Dr. Hodge complacently remarks:  “Examples of this kind of deception are numerous in the Old Testament.  Some of them are simply recorded facts, without anything to indicate how they were regarded in the sight of God; but others, as in the cases above cited, received either directly or by implication the divine sanction.”

But Dr. Hodge goes even farther than this.  He ventures to suggest that Jesus Christ deceived his disciples by intimating what was not true as to his purpose, in more than one instance.  “Of our blessed Lord himself it is said in Luke 24:28, ’He made as though [Greek:  prosepoieito]—­he made a show of:  he would have gone further.’  He so acted as to make the impression on the two disciples that it was his purpose to continue his journey. (Comp.  Mark 6:  48.)"[1] This suggestion of Dr. Hodge’s would have been rebuked by even Richard Rothe, and would have shocked August Dorner.  Would Dr. Hodge deny that Jesus could have had it in his mind to “go further,” or to have “passed by” his disciples, if they would not ask him to stop?  And if this were a possibility, is it fair to intimate that a purpose of deception was in his mind, when there is nothing in the text that makes that a necessary conclusion?  Dr. Hodge, indeed, adds the suggestion that “many theologians do not admit that the fact recorded in Luke 24:28 [which he cites as an illustration of justifiable deception by our Lord] involved any intentional deception;” but this fact does not deter him from putting it forward in this light.

[Footnote 1:  When Jesus came walking on the sea, toward his disciples in their tempest-tossed boat, “he would have passed them by;” but their cry of fear drew him toward them.]