Commentary on Ezekiel Chapters 1-20 John Calvin
JOHN CALVIN
and they enriched their work with valuable illustrations of the city and temple at Jerusalem. A full description of the work will be found in den Nachrichten von einer
Hallischen Bibliothek, part 8 page 18, and foll.
Amandi Polani A Polansdorf Commentaria in Ezechielem. Basileae, 1601, 4to; and 1608, 4to.
A digest of public lectures delivered in the old Academy at Basil.
Franc. Junh Commentaria in Ezechielem Prophetam. Genevae, 1609, fol.; and 1610, 8vo.
Jo. Maldonati Commentarii in Ezechielem. Moguntiae, 1611, small 4to.
This work, by a learned Jesuit, is very explanatory. The Latin translation is good, and the Jewish interpretations freely used. Many Hebrew words we have found well explained.
Gasper Sancth Commentarius in Ezechielem. Lugduni, 1612, 1619, fol.
Jac. Brandmulleri Commentarius in Ezechielem. Basil. 1621, 4to.
An Exposition of the Prophecy of Ezekiel. By GEORGE GREENHILL. London, 1645.
5 vols. 4to.
Doctrinal and practical lectures delivered to a congregation at Stepney by the writer, a member of the Westminster Assembly of Divines. Excellent of its kind, but not critical. Various editions, originally published at different times, from 1645 to 1658.
Jo. Cocceh Commentarius in Ezekielem. 1668, 4to.
4. Later Commentators.
George Calixti Scholae Propheticae ex Prelectionibus in…Ezekielem collectae.
Quedlinburgi, 1715, 4to.
Das Zeugniss Iesu aus dem Propheten Ezechiel durch den Geist der Weissagung dargethan von Wilhelm Petersen. Francofurti, 1719, 4to.
Jo. Frid. Starckh, V.D.M., Francofurtani, Commentarius in Prophetam
Ezechielem. Francof. ad Moen., 1731, 4to.
A laborious, useful, and practical Commentary.
George Costard Dissertationes H. Critico-Sacrae quarum prima explicata Ezech. ch. 13:18. Oxon. 1752, 8vo.
Ezechiel aufs Neue aus dem Hebraischen ubersetzt, und mit kurgen Anmerkungen fur unstudirte Leser begleitet von Joh. Carl. Volborth. Goett. 1787.
For an account of this work, see Eichhorn's Allgem. Biblioth. der Bib. Lit., volume
1, page 807.
An Attempt towards an Improved Version, a Metrical Arrangement, and an Explanation of the Prophet Ezekiel. By Wm. Newcome, D.D., Bishop of Waterford, and afterwards Archbishop of Armagh. Dublin, 1788, 4to.
This is an invaluable work: to the mere English reader of this Prophet. Tegg, in his edition of 1836, 1 volume 8vo, page 294, has rendered it very accessible: it is safe, sound, and judicious, with excellent notes. See also Eichhorn Bibl., volume 2, page
131; and J. D. Michaelis Neue orient. u. exeget. Bibli., pt. 6 page 87.
Hermanni Venema Lectiones Academicae ad Ezechielem. Part 1 usque ad cap.
21 Edidit. Jo. Hen. Verschuir. Leovard, 1790, 4to, 2 parts. See again, Eich. Bibl.,
EZEKIEL
volume 3, page 694.
Jo. Godofr Eichhorn die Biblischen Propheten, volume 2 and volume 3. Ezekielis
Vaticinia. Gotting. 1818, 1819.
The Temple of Ezekiel; viz., an Elucidation of the 40th and following Chapters. By Solomon Bennett, R.A., of Berlin. London, 1824. 4to.
Em. F. Rosenmuller's Scholia in Ezekielem. 2 vols. 8vo, 2d edition. 1826.
Lipsiae.
Invaluable. The Editor is much indebted to it for many references to other valuable works.
Havernick's Introduction to Ezekiel, translated from the German by the Revelation F.W. Gotch, M.A. See Kitto's Journal of Sacred Literature, No. 1, January 1848; also the Article ``Ezekiel'' --- Kitto's Cyclopaedia of Biblical Literature.
Ancient Versions and Codexes
A NOTICE OF THE
ANCIENT VERSIONS AND CODEXES
WHICH CONTAIN
EZEKIEL'S PROPHECIES.
The Arabic Version Of Ezekiel. It was made from the Septuagint, and is contained in the London Polyglot,,. It agrees throughout with that Greek text which exists in the Alexandrine Codex, now in the British Museum. It was executed from Hesychius's edition of the Septuagint, and is valuable for the comparison of cognate words and phrases with the Hebrew.
The Chaldee Version, said to have been made by Jonathan, the son of Uzziel, is found in the London Polyglott, and is praised in Buxtorf's Rabbinical Commentaries.
The Alexandrine Codex is esteemed the most ancient MS. existing, written probably in the fourth century, though some authorities place it much later. 622 The book of Ezekiel was translated for this version during the reign of Ptolemy Philometer. Of all the prophets, Jeremiah seems the best executed: then Amos, and Ezekiel, and Isaiah the worst of all, except Daniel. Edited by Jo. Ern. Grabe, 1707-1720. 4 vols. fol. Oxon.
The Codices Of Kennicott And De Rossi. Only some of them contain Ezekiel; that formerly belonging to the learned Reuchlin (No. 154) contains this Prophet, with a Targum also. The Codex Norimburgensis, (No. 198,) written about A.D. 1290, is noticed here only for the order in which Ezekiel is placed: it is neither that of the Masorites nor the Talmudists. Again, in Codex No. 224, the order is Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Isaiah.
The Codex Romanus Or Vaticanus is of great antiquity. A facsimile of this MS. was made for Dr. Grabe in 1704, and Horne has given an accurate specimen
622See Hart well Horne's Introduction, etc., volume 2, part 1 page 116, edit. 6th, where full information on this and kindred subjects is to be found.
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of Ezekiel, Ezekiel 1:1-3. This facsimile is at long the MSS. of the Bodleian Library.
Cardinal Anton. Carasa executed an edition under the auspices of Pope Sixtus V.
Rome, 1587. Fol.
The Syro. Estranghelae Version is a translation into Syriac of Origen's Hexaplar edition of the Septuagint A MS. exists in the Ambrosian Library at Milan. It contains
Scholia of the Greek and Syrian fathers, and various valuable annotations. Matth.
Norberg edited from it the Prophecies of Ezekiel and Jeremiah, in 1787, 4to, Londini
Gothorum; giving it the title of Codex Syriaco-Hexaplaris Ambrosiano-Mediolanensis.
See Eichhorn's account of it in his Allgem. Bib. der Bibl. Lit., volume 1 page 837, and foll.
The Vulgate Version needs mention here only to point out the differences in rendering Ezekiel between the editions of Sixtus 5. and Clement 8. In Ezekiel 14:22, the former has egredientur, which is correct, and the latter ingredientur
Among The Five Gothic Mss. discovered by Ang. Mai, in the Ambrosian Library at Milan, amidst the Codices Rescripti, the homilies of Gregory the Great on this Prophet were found written over various portions of St. Paul's Epistles. These homilies were executed before the eighth century.
Dissertations
DISSERTATIONS
ON IMPORTANT SUBJECTS,
TREATED OF IN THESE LECTURES.
1 --- On The Cherubim Ezekiel 1:1.
2 --- Calvinus Judaizans An Orthodoxus?
3 --- Calvin's Severity Towards The Jews
4 --- The Figurative Expressions Of Ezekiel
5 --- On Eating The Roll {α} Ezekiel 3:1. The Great Rushing {β} Ezekiel 3:12
On Tel-Abib {γ} Ezekiel 3:12.
6 --- Jerusalem Painted On A Brick {α} Ezekiel 4:1 The Three Hundred And Ninety
Days {β} Ezekiel 4:5.
7 --- The Septuagint Order Ezekiel 7:3-13.
8 --- The Image Of Jealousy Ezekiel 8:1-14.
9 --- The Man In The Linen Garment Ezekiel 9:2.
10 --- The Coals Scattered Over The City Ezekiel 10:2.
11 --- The Five-And-Twenty Evil Counsellors Ezekiel 11:1.
12 --- The False Prophets {α} Ezekiel 13:1. On The Principle Of Accommodation.
{Β} On The Phrase Prostituerunt Deum {γ} Ezekiel 13:19.
13 --- Israel An Adulteress {α} Ezekiel 16:1 Captive Israel And Papal Rome.
Ezekiel 16:20. On The Word Nephesh, Soul {γ} Ezekiel 16:27 The Primitive Church
And The New Testament {δ} Ezekiel 16:61.
14 --- The Great Eagle {α} Ezekiel 17:3 The Lofty Branch Of The Tall Cedar.
Ezekiel 17:22
15 --- The Eating Sour Grapes {α} Ezekiel 18:1. Usury And Interest. {β} Ezekiel
18:8. Perplexing And Thorny Questions {γ} Ezekiel 18:20
16 --- The Sabbath A Sacrament And A Mystery. Ezekiel 20:13, 14.
Dissertation First.
EZEKIEL
ON THE CHERUBIM.
THE Visions recorded in the first and tenth chapters of this Prophet have received much illustration, and yet remain involved in great obscurity. It seems desirable to supply some information, even at the risk of being tedious and minute. The living creatures of the first chapter are called in the ninth and tenth --- cherubim. The derivation of the word is a point of some importance. Castell, in his elaborate Lex.
Hept., connects it with the Chaldee root {,}כרבkereb, signifying ``to plough,'' and quotes Ezekiel 1:10, where ``an ox'' occurs, ``a strong animal, of great labor, especially in ploughing; and being used for the expiation of sins, becomes a type of Christ, who is there perhaps to be understood; for as the ox is the leader of the herd, so Christ is the head of the faithful.'' Josephus says they were animals never seen by any one. (Antiq., lib. 3. chapter 6, and lib. 8 chapter 2.) The Arabic root of the same three letters, kereb, signifies anxiety and oppressive labor, anxit animum, invertit aratio terram; while the cognate forms of the Syriac signify ploughing and laborious effort. ``The most probable,'' says Gesenius, ``among the many derivations of this word which have been proposed, is that from the Syriac, potens magnus fortis.'' Professor Lee writes, in evident despair, ``It would be idle to offer anything on the etymology: nothing satisfactory having yet been discovered. Castell, Simonis, Gesenius, etc., may be consulted by those who wish to see what has been said on this subject.'' The cherubic form has been fully portrayed by our Commentator; and by engravings in the Cyclopcedia of Biblical Literature we are enabled to compare
Egyptian and Persian winged symbols with those of the Hebrews. A sculptured basrelief of a winged human figure as it existed before the time of Moses, and placed by the Egyptians over their sacred arcs, is worthy of comparison with the descriptions of Scripture. The Persian bas-relief at Moung-Aub, is a human figure arrayed in an embroidered robe, ``with such quadruple wings as the vision of Ezekiel ascribes to the cherubim, with the addition of ample horns, the well-known symbols of regal power.'' The opinions of divines relative to their design and signification are very diversified. Among the ancients Philo supposed them to signify the two hemispheres, the flaming sword showing the motion of the planets, and the lion and the man being Leo and Aquarius, the signs of the Zodiac. Irenaeus (Adv. Heres. 3:11) treats them as emblems of the four elements, the four quarters of the globe, the four gospels, and the four covenants. Tertullian (Apolog. cap. 47.) referred them to the torrid zone, while Justin Martyr treats Ezekiel's figures as relating to Nebuchadnezzar eating grass like the ox, with his hand like a lion's, and his nails like the claws of a bird, (Quaest. et Respons. 44, page 325, edit. Heidelbergae, 1593;) and that they were consolatory to the captive Israelites by setting before them the prospect of their own return, and their oppressor's downfall. The analogy to the four gospels, as presented to us by Irenaeus, is peculiarly ingenious, and worthy of perusal. Spencer, in his Ritual Observances of the Hebrews, has ingeniously explained their form and description. (Lib. 3. Dissert. 5 cap. 3. and 4 section 2.) Grotius considers them to represent ``the properties of God, and his actions towards his people,'' (Annot. in Vet. Test.;) and Doederlin, while conceding the praise of ingenuity to the conjectures of his author, yet treats his speculations as the abortion rather than the legitimate
JOHN CALVIN
offspring of a luxuriant fancy. (Vogel's edit. Grot. continued by Doeder., volume 2 page 247.) Further information as to the views of ancient writers has been collected by Rosenmuller, on Ezekiel 1:10, edit. see. Lipsiae, 1826. The translation of Houbigant may be consulted, and Spencer on the Laws and Ritual of the Hebrews, lib. 3.
Dissert. 5, chapter 1, and folk The various readings on which different translations are founded are rendered very accessible to the English reader by the simple and comprehensive notes of Archbishop Newcome.
It is interesting to observe the way in which the learned Jesuit Maldonatus comments on this first: chapter. He interprets the four visions separately first, the tempest; next, the figure of the four animals; the third, the form of the wheels; and the fourth, the firmament., and the man sitting on the throne. He objects to the allegorical interpretation of Origen and in school, and considers that the tempest signifies the calamities which the Chaldaeans caused to the Jews and their city. By the whirlwind, the nearness of the calamities is pointed out; and by the north wind, its rapidity and destructive force. Some, he says, refer it to Babylon, making it symbolize the manners of the Chaldaeans, which were rough and boisterous. The great cloud seems to him to signify the army of the king of Babylon; and the fire, his wrath and fury: the surrounding brightness is an indication of the divine majesty, and the amber color is an image of God himself. Jerome takes the amber as a symbol of pity, since amber has an attractive power, and by placing it in connection with the army of the king of Babylon, it implies that God directed every event concerning the captivity. Gregory and others interpret the amber of Christ.
The Second Vision he considers more difficult; he first gives the views of other interpreters, and then brings forward his own formed divino beneficio, meditando, legendo, orando. Origen (Hom. 1. in Ezekiel) takes the four living creatures for the four affections of man's nature: the man representing the reasoning faculty, the lion the inflammable passions, the ox concupiscence, and the eagle, as it soars upwards, the divine spirit, within us. St. Ambrose (Lib. 3. de virinibus) refers them to prudence, fortitude, temperance, and justice. Jerome and Gregory understand them of the four evangelists; and the details respecting the wheels, the wings, and the sparks of fire, are consistently interpreted. Catina Syrius refers them to the camp of Israel in the desert: the face of a man meaning all Israel, that of a lion the tribe of Judea, that of an ox the tribe of Levi, and that of an eagle God looking down from above, and taking vengeance on the people. Theodoret (Comment. in loc.) considers them to represent the majesty and glory of God resident in these cherubim. It appears that in his day the opinion of Jerome was most popular; and it was necessary to give many reasons why the four evangelists were not signified by this vision. Philosophical interpreters also existed, no unworthy predecessors of the German rationalists. They supposed all things indiscriminately signified by these representatives of animated nature, while some preferred the changes of the events of providence to the manifestations of external nature. His own opinion he records as follows: that the cherubim represent four heathen kingdoms, Chaldean, Assyrian, Egyptian, and Tyrian. He supposes them placed under the firmament, and under the sapphire throne, to indicate the supreme power of the Almighty over all
EZEKIEL
things. The wings are the human guards by which kings protect themselves; the hands represent human industry, strength, and labor; the fire indicates the Spirit of God in kings; and the various motions forwards and backwards show the changes in governments and the perturbations of empires, all under the control of a supreme governor. This scheme is well fortified by passages of Scripture, and has the merit of great exactness and ingenuity. 623
We now turn to a very different interpreter --- Oecolampadius. His comments of this chapter is essentially spiritual. He sees in it a representation of God judging the world through Christ. The great truths of revelation he sees obscurely shadowed forth under carnal and Jewish images; and he is anxious to point out the spiritual reign of Christ as promulgated by these outward and visible representations of God's glory.
He refers these visions, first of all, to the Jews and their captivity; but he claims for them the office of tangibly illustrating the abiding glory of the universal assembly of the faithful. ``The universal Church,'' he says, ``has three parts' first, its head is Hasmal, represented as an old man seated on a throne next, animals, the just or living members, are those more perfect in the Church, adorned with a variety of gifts' the wheels are the weaker and more ordinary members, which belong to the body, and form the common herd of believers, who belong to the more solid parts of the Church, since they are under the influence of the same Spirit, although they have not attained that fullness of which St. Paul speaks, and have not drunk into the peculiar and interior spirit of the Gospel.'' 624 He then confesses the great difficulty of ascertaining the correct interpretation' he rejects all Jewish comments, and approves of the spiritualizing method of referring it to the coming kingdom of Christ. The whirlwind, for instance, he asserts to be a figure of the devastation which preceded Christ's first coming, and shall also signalize his second adventthe great cloud expresses God's judgments on the world, and the fire the process of trial through which all things are to pass. Hasmal he regards as the name of an angel or fiery living one speaking, and blames Jerome for following the Septuagint, and translating it electrum.
This spiritually-minded reformer has furnished a valuable exposition of the mystery contained in the vision recorded in the tenth chapter, which is worthy of notice.
The likeness of a man upon the throne he assumes to be our Savior, whose reign is supreme ``in the consciences of his elect.'' Most properly is he called Hasmal, ``quod de eo admirabunda taciturnitate, et per cogitationes arcanas magnifica loquamur, opus dei in illo admirantes.'' The cherubim are beneath him, because he is adored by angels, and has spirits for his messengers and attendants. The firmament, he says, is grace offered through Christ, which strengthens the hearts of the elect by being infused with in them. The living creatures, their wheels and machinery for motion, represent the progress of the Church, suffering as yet under corruption, but waiting and groaning for the redemption of the body. In each living creature all qualities are bound together; for the four faces represent the spiritual endowments of advancing Christians; the same animal is a man in judgment, a lion in patient
623Maldon. in Ezekiel 1, etc., edit. Moguntiae 1611. Here the reader may see the Jewish comments of Rabb. David, Solomon, and the Chaldee paraphrast; also R. Moses, lib. 3, cap. 6.
624Comment. in om. lib. Proph., page 5, Ez., Genev. 1558.
JOHN CALVIN
endurance, a calf in usefulness and guileless sincerity, and an eagle in prompt and cheerful obedience to its lord the wings are faith and divine love, which veil the face, which is conscience, and of this there are four kinds corresponding Lo the human, the leonine, the infantile, and the aquiline appearances. ``It is the property of a good conscience to by raised upwards towards God when confirmed in grace, and, forgetful of thing's past to be more and more anxious to reach the firmament of grace.'' The hands under each wing represent those good works by which living faith and active love manifest their divine power; while the wheels signify the inferior members of the Church, who, though not attaining to the same righteous standard, are animated by a similar spirit. The feet being straight and equable, and turning easily and constantly in all directions, are said to signify the messengers of God proclaiming' his salvation throughout the world, and ``bearing'' all things to all men, that they may bring many profitably to Christ.'' The sound produced by the motion of the wings means the fame of salvation arriving at, distant regions; and when the Prophet hears the voice exhorting the wheels, it seems to him to say, ``O wheels, follow with alacrity the spirit of the living creature within you; let; nothing; delay you; let nothing tear you from the fourfold figure, which is the body of Christ; for if you cleave to this, even in its lowest part, you shall be raised up together with it.'' The motion of each animal, in the direction of its face, signifies every Christian acting according to his conscience; and although there are differences of gifts, and each exercises his own independently, yet all follow one common leader, being animated by a common spirit. Thus the companion of Zuingle spiritualizes the passage with much consistency and at great length, affording a singular example of the method of throwing the light of matured Christian experience upon a scene so exclusively
Jewish. To enable us to decide whether the view of Calvin or Ecolampadius is the correct one, we must state some general principles, which will be found in the following section.
Dissertation Second.
CALVINUS JUDAIZANS AN ORTHODOXUS?
was the title of a work published at Wittemberg, A.D. 1595, by AEgidius Hunnius. It contained a sharp censure for applying to the temporal state and circumstances of the Jews those prophecies which were supposed to refer spiritually to the Christian Church. The year, however, did not pass away before David
Pareus replied, under the title of ``Calvinus Orthodoxus.'' And all who have perused his comments on this Prophet must vindicate him from the charge of favoring Judaism, and applaud him for wisely neglecting all allegorical significations and mystical expositions. While it will be impossible to discuss the whole question of prophetic interpretation, it will be necessary to state some general views by which we ought to be guided.
The prophecies of the Old Testament were in many instances a divinely provided introduction to the events of the New. In them we may see the outlines of the process by which God was ever educating man for ultimate restoration to His image.
They contain a suggestive method of destruction by palpable signs and. wonders, which addressed the soul through their influence on the senses. Their value to the
EZEKIEL
Jew was very different from that to the Christian. To the former they were the highest revelation attainable, while for us they do not reveal a single attribute or purpose of Deity which is not more fully made known through the Gospel dispensation. The Hebrew visions stand to us in the relation of porch to temple, and of dawn to day.
They are to the Christian a divine first lesson-book, and contain a series of condescending instructions suited to a low stage of religious and mental life. They were specially appropriate to the people to whom they were bestowed, and of a structure and material in accordance with the dispensation to which they ministered. They were prefigurative and preformative throughout. They were preparatory and thus far excellent, but not ``chiefest of all'' because not permanent. Like the scaffolding, the growing blade, the finished portrait, they fail in comparison with the stately building, the ripened corn, the living person. Now Calvin avoids the extremes of the merely literal system and of the mystical allegories of the double sense. The former system treats the Old Testament as if it were all written at the same time, and every part of it addressed equally to all men. It excepts the ceremonial observances, and then considers that every sentence is reconcilable with all the rest by a spiritual process of traditionary reasoning. It is sternly opposed to all discrimination between the records of different eras; it admits of nothing gradual, variable, or local. Of the latter system we have an excellent example in the quotation just made from the comparison of Zuingle. He sees Christ and justification by faith everywhere. Not only must Hasmal --- a mere color --- be an emblem of the Son of God, but all who cannot receive this are branded as unenlightened. The truths which he has received through the gospel are so vividly impressed upon his soul and so thoroughly leaven his spirit, that he sees everything scriptural by this bright light of his inner man. His deficiency is of judgment, not of grace. The question thought not to be, what series of Christian doctrine can be grafted upon the cherubic emblem, but what truths it was intended to convey to the soul of the Prophet and the people, --- surely not those of the Augsburgh Confession of Faith. We have to guard against a twofold error: on the one hand, a merely critical and rationalistic interpretation which never proceeds beyond the surface; and, on the other, against a fanciful exposition of figurative language, as if in every case the doctrines, the graces, and the experiences of the New
Covenant were intended to be revealed to Hebrew prophets.
Apposite, indeed, was the exclamation of the Jew, when he said of Ezekiel, ``Doth he not speak parables?'' He had to take a the and draw a city upon it; to shave his head, and divide the her into three significant parts; and the Jew might fairly ask, How is all this to benefit his soul? It could only do so by appealing to the spiritual principle in man's soul. As the Prophet must eat the roll, so we must to comprehend the meaning of divine emblems, that they may become to us the bread of life. There is a husk around many a spiritual fruit, and often times a stone within it, which seems devoid of nutriment; but still this is the way in which it pleases our heavenly
Father to nourish us. All signs, emblems, and sacraments of any true religion are beneficial to us only when we spiritually perceive their inward and animating grace.
All that is outward in form and ceremony and machinery is only the vehicle, not the substance, of our support as God's children, and our growth in his likeness. This
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foundation truth must be laid firmly as a basis for every portion of the superstructure.
The carnal mind never did and never can comprehend the things of the Spirit of God.
The power of understanding the meaning must come from the same Deity who sends the vision. On this broad rock of truth we may build every sound interpretation of all the figurative language of Scripture. This principle we may gather from the way in which the early Christian writers explain the symbols of Holy Writ. St. Chrysostom, for instance, treats clearly the lesson we should learn from the seraph's taking the coal from the altar and touching the Prophet's lips with its hallowed fire. 625 St.
Ambrose seems scarcely satisfied with the image --- bread of life: he must ``eat life.'' ``Whoso then,'' says he, ``eateth life cannot die. How should he die whose food is life?'' 626 ``and this bread,'' he adds, ``is the remission of sins.'' St. Augustine speaks of ``angels feeding on the eternal word,'' and of ``men eating angels' food.'' 627 Language like this implies the struggle of the spiritual mind to express itself fully through the medium of carnal language; and what were the Shechinnah and the Seraphim, the Urim and the Thummim, the live goat and the slain goat, but symbols receiving all their significance from the Divine truths which they conveyed to the soul? The worship of the one God through the appointed Mediator was ever the same in its hidden essence, and ever must be, while it is ever varying in its, form, according to the divers needs of our frail humanity. It is flexible exceedingly to the eye and the ear, and unchangeable only in its living spirit. All nature, organic and inorganic, has been used to illustrate it and communicate it, but this never has made, nor can make, the unseen visible. Still the question will recur, Where must we draw the line between the human and the divine in these prophetic visions? No man can draw such a line with accuracy except for himself. Let all who doubt this assertion try to divide mind from matter in the living man. Many have attempted it, and their failures remain to mark the narrow lib, its of their knowledge and the assumed regions of their ignorance. The matured Christian instincts of the cultivate worshipper will be every man's best guide under the promised teaching of the Holy Spirit. An infallible interpreter is not for us in the flesh; the interpreting Spirit must dwell within us, otherwise we shall see nothing but the outward aspect of the gorgeous vision. The inspiration within must harmonize with that without, which is not verbal but ideal.
The heaven-wrought ideas of the Hebrew Prophets protect themselves.
We do not require either a verbal or literal theopneustia: the truths themselves by their own imperishableness defeat the mortality of the language with which they are associated. They reverberate and percolate through all the pages of the mighty record; they hide themselves obscurely in one chapter only to emerge more clearly in another; they diverge in one book only to recombine in another; so that to the sympathizing soul Scripture is ever a self-sufficing interpreter. Hence we are not careful to defend Calvin's interpretations as faultless: theology as a science has advanced rapidly during three hundred years; and while some of his expositions have become antiquated, we still uphold him as ``orthodoxus.'' The law of development operates
625Hom. 5 section 3, and compare the Litany of St. James, Ass. Cod. Lit. 5:56. 626In Psalm 118. Lit. 18, sec. 28, 48. 627In Psalm 33 En. 1 section 6, and Psalm 78:26.
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in the moral as well as in the physical universe. ``Draw a cordon sanitaire,'' says a modern reviewer, ``against dandelion or thistle-down, and see if the armies of earth would suffice to interrupt this process of radiation, which yet is but the distribution of weeds. The secret implications of the truth have escaped at a thousand points in vast arches above our heads, rising high above the garden wall, and have sown the earth with memorials of the mystery which they envelop.'' 628
A second principle which we must bear in mind is, that every prophetic revelation was expressly adapted to the capacity of its original recipients. The extrinsic agency is always transitory. We of later generations learn enough if we profit by the latent and permanent essence. Hence the interpretation of the cherubim by the four evangelists is utterly untenable: and all such suppositions are indexes of a state of mind wholly incompetent to unfold prophetic mysteries. The very occurrence of hundreds of crude guesses like this, implies the necessity of submitting the prophetic emblems to some general laws of exposition. The highest criticism and the profoundest scholarship should be applied to them, that we may at once ignore all traditions which are proved to be corruptions. These prophecies presuppose a moral responsibility in the people to whom they were addressed; and hence they were fitted to awaken this feeling when dormant, to frighten it when morbidly perverted, and to animate it when righteously sensitive. Calvin's assertion that the living creatures and the wheels imply that God by his angels guides the physical motions of the earth, the air, and the sea, (Ezekiel 1:21,) is altogether untenable. Revelation does not teach anything which human philosophy can discover. It manifests its whole aim and essence to be moral, lying in that region of our nature which is under the sway of the conscience, and the will rather than of the intellect. These emblematic visions appeal to the affections and aspirations of soul, to the energies of reverence and faith, of wonder and of love. They have to do with what is infinite and unseen, the immeasurable and the unattainable. Hence they are rather divine agencies for quickening, stimulating, and directing man's highest nature. They assist us towards attaining a true idea of God, they show us our own insignificant vileness and littleness, and suggest the possibility of an atonement of these two. They stir up our attention to the threatenings and the promises of an Invisible Person, which can influence us only by being believed, and enforce the commands of ineffable wisdom, which can benefit us only by being obeyed. They present to our thoughts the idea of condescending mediation, the infinitely holy condescending to purify and to abide with the morally unclean. They may further imply the general providence over the chosen race, as well as the special guidance of individuals; the molding into its preordained shape all their future history, and yet not sensibly controlling the will of agents left responsible for their every action. No discoveries of science can ever interfere with such an interpretation as this, and those who adopt it need never fear the necessity for changing it when the progress of physical knowledge must lead us to alter our views of other interpretations. It, belongs to a region of our nature completely separable from that which comprehends either the niceties of language, or the laws of the physical universe. There is a wide gulf, deep and impassable, 628Review of "Vindication of Protestant Principles." — Tait's Mag. page 758. 1847.
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between the moral and the intellectual departments of our nature. The imperfect state of physical science at the time of the Reformation is a sufficient apology for the mistakes of reformers; but their ignorance is not pardonable in us. We need not Judaize, and yet we may be apt scholars in all Hebrew lore, and orthodox interpreters of the Sacred Word of the Most high.
Dissertation Third.
CALVIN'S SEVERITY TOWARDS THE JEWS.
IN addition to the charge of Judaizing, our author has been accused of dwelling too copiously on our Prophet's severity towards the Jews. And if we can read the signs of the times in modern publications, there is reason to fear that various delusions are abroad on this subject. There are those who treat the Jews as in the present day, so peculiarly favored by God, that they invest them with the halo of a special sanctity. Reverencing as Christians thought the designs of the Almighty in past ages, they entertain far too exalted ideas of the personal holiness of the agents by whom those designs were accomplished. Old Testament characters are too often treated as ``saints,'' when they have few moral or religious qualities which entitle them to that sacred appellation. And regarding the people as a body, it is scarcely possible to find anywhere worse specimens of moral culture. If we estimate responsibility according to the amount of light and guidance and privilege, then, indeed, Tyre and Sidon were far less culpable than Hebron and Jerusalem. How opposite, for instance, is their history to what might have been expected from reading the book of Deuteronomy. Instead of binding their written law ``as frontlets between their eyes,'' no ancient nation were so careless of its sacred books. The Hindus cling tenaciously to their shasters, while Israel utterly neglected their Mosaic code. One would have supposed that they would have been superstitiously careful of the five books of their inspired leaders. Why should they not have multiplied copies of them? Why not have constituted the Levites the authorized guardians and expounders of them? From the time of Joshua to David there is no notice of the existence of any sacred books which now belong to us: and more than this, reference is made to other records not now existing. And after Solomon's temple was solemnly dedicated, how soon ten of the tribes relapsed into the grossest idolatry; and even in Judea, how remarkable is the occurrence in Josiah's time. The very priests seem to have been ignorant of the existence of a written copy of the law. The unexpected discovery of one has such an effect upon the king and the people, that it led to a thorough restoration of the national worship; and you, we find a command that every king should write for himself a copy of the law from that preserved by the priests. Both kings and priests seem to have neglected their duty; and even the prophets do not charge them with this crime among others. The loss of the original autographs is never mentioned; nor have we the slightest hint of what became of the second original of the two stonetables. During the short period of their captivity they lost their spoken language and the characters in which it was written, so that on their return they were obliged to read Hebrew through an interpreter. Was not this an unmatched instance of want of reverence for the will of Jehovah? When a nation could act with such deliberate carelessness and irreverence in various epochs, can we be surprised at their falling
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into the grossest depths of immoral profanity? When the divine records have been thus despised, all folly and all wickedness is possible for such a people, and both are generated with a fearful rapidity. How different, then, is their real history from what one might expect of a people chosen by the Almighty as his earthly representatives of religion before the heathen! They were miraculously trained to typify and receive the Messiah, and yet they constantly appear to be frustrating the very purpose of their choice. If we speak of the mass of the nation, they seem in every respect to have thrown away their privileges, and to have sudiously incurred God's anger, and to have determined to brave his vengeance. Under such a view of the ancient people, no language of Calvin's can be too strong; and it is only to obviate the consequences of modern erroneous suppositions that it becomes necessary to defend him. In stimulating the compassion of the Christian Church towards the salvation of Jews at present existing, the most fallacious views are sometimes presented of their past history and their loveliness in God's sight. To be beloved for their fathers' sake by no means implies ally innate moral loveliness in the conduct of those fathers; and every erroneous view of Jewish history, and every false interpretation of Jewish prophecy, does but Judaize the Christian Church, and prevent it from going onwards to perfection, by keeping it in trammels to either exploded prejudices or to unwise innovations. False views of the Jewish history are now so very common, that they naturally create a distaste for that emphatic condemnation of their conduct which prevails through these Lectures.
Dissertation Fourth.
ON THE FIGURATIVE EXPRESSIONS OF EZEKIEL.
THE most cursory observers of Ezekiel's peculiarities must notice the highly figurative character of his visions. The princes of Israel are whelps, their mother a lioness.
A great eagle comes down with one fell swoop upon the mountains of Lebanon, and plucks off the topmost boughs of its lofty cedars. Here we have to connect what logicians call the protasis with the Apodosis, and out of the sensible similitude to ascertain the mystical explanation. The canon laid down by Glasse is of constant utility: --- ``In parabolis, si integre accipiantur, tria, sunt: radix, cortex, et medulla sive fructus. Radix est scopus in quem tendit parabola. Cortex est similitudo sensibilis, quae adhibetur, et suo sensu literali constat. Medulla seu fructus est sensus parabolae mysticus, seu ipsa res ad quam parabolae fit accommodatio, seu quae per similitudinem propositam significatur.'' Philologia Sacra, lib. 2 pars. 1 tr. 2, sect.
5, canon 3: Lipsiae, 1725. It only is it necessary to ascertain the literal meaning of the figurative expression, but we must always proceed one step farther before we can profi, by the metaphor. The medulla --- the res ipsa --- is still to be discovered, and this alone it is which brings profit to the soul. We must not only comprehend the figure and its literal interpretation, but we must take one step beyond this, and comprehend what divines call the mystical sense. We may attain to the ``science of correspondences'' without adopting the fancies of Emmanuel Swedenborg; but what he diligently and erroneously thought we must endeavor to find. With VanMildert, in his Bampton Lectures, we use the word mystical in its true and classical rather than in its present and popular meaning; and though we have no special affection for the
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word: we contend earnestly with the lecturer for the idea which it expresses. This inner sense will not, from its very nature, be crippled by the details of the natural allegory. The very essence of spiritual thought is mobility and indefiniteness. The great master of Roman eloquence has wisely observed --- ``Non enim res tota toti rei necesse est similis sit: sed ad ipsum, ad quod conferetur, similitudinem habeat, oportet.'' 629 The same idea is expressed by Saurin in his Historical Discourses
--- ``Non seulement il n'est pas necessaire que chacun de leur membres ait une veu particuliere, qui se rapporte directement au but de celui qui la propose: il faut meme que ce but soit en quelque sort cache sous des images etrangeres destinees a l'enveloper.'' 630 As the correct elucidation of these points is of the greatest importance, every light which can be thrown on them has its value. Bishop Warburton, for instance, in the midst of his elaborate and in-digested paradoxes, is led to discuss the nature of types and symbols, visions and figures, and he treats them with clearness, precision, and ability. He lays the foundation for their use in the compound nature of man. He shows how the Egyptians, Mexicans, and Chinese, communicated ideas through the senses by signs, hieroglyphics, and picture-writing of all kinds. He quotes Ezekiel 31 as a striking instance of well-applied metaphor: ``for men,'' says he, ``so conversant in matters, still wanted sensible images to convey abstract ideas.'' 631 He adduces Ezekiel 24, as an instance of a parable purposely used ``to throw obscurity over the information,'' just as the tropical hieroglyphic was turned into the tropical symbol. He treats the ``dark saying'' of Ezekiel 17:2, as a riddle more involved than a parable; ``for the nature of God's dispensations required enigmas, and the genius of those times made them natural.'' The course of his argument leads him to comment at full length on the celebrated vision of the dry bones in Ezekiel 37, 632 and to discuss the logical value of the assertion, ``All words that are used in a figurative sense must be first understood in a literal.'' Perhaps it may be better to say, All figures of speech are intended to convey to the mind an image of something real, and they are useless to us unless we thus apprehend their literal meaning. But Warburton did not see the next step in the process of deriving spiritual destruction from the visions of the Holy Spirit of God. He was not spiritually enlightened, and failed to do more than expound the letter of Scripture. We need, besides this, the divine teaching of the Holy Spirit, that we may apprehend what Bishop Van Mildert calls, in his celebrated Bampton Lectures, the mystical sense.
importance'' says Bishop Horne, in his preface to the Psalms, ``of the mystical interpretation can hardly be called in question;'' ``without it, the spirit and power of many passages will almost wholly evaporate.'' The learned Rambach, in his Sacred
Hermeneutics, (page 81,) has adduced several instances in confirmation of these observations. The spiritual man only can thus pierce through the letter, and grasp the very marrow of God's word: the carnal mind is in this respect utterly blind, for these things are only spiritually discerned. The word mystical may seem fanatical to some, but, taken in its scholastic sense, it is easily appreciable by all who know anything
629M. T. Cicero ad Herennium. Edit. Bipont, volume 1 page 122. 630Volume 3. page 405. 631Div. Leg., lib. 4, section 4. 632Div. Leg., lib. 6 section 2.
EZEKIEL
of profound criticism. Rambach has justly laid it down --- ``Est regula theologorum, sensum mysticum non esse argumentativum.'' (Just. Hem. Sac., p. 72.) It appeals not so much to the intellect as to the conscience, not to the mental comprehension, but to the heaven-born life of the soul; and if this be wanting, all argument on the point is thrown away. The spiritual interpretation may be abused, like all other good things. Cocceius, for instance, affords a remarkable instance of this error, as well as some of the Puritan Divines; but no sensible man denies the value of a possession because some are foolish enough to misuse it. 633
On all sides we have to tread with the utmost caution, and may well listen to the voice of Jerome on Galatians 1. ``Nec putemus in verbis Scripturarum esse
Evangelium, sed in sensu. Non in superficie, sed in medulla: non in sermonum foliis, sed in radice rationis.'' But even this view, truthful as it seems, may be abused; for in our own day we find the anti-materialism of the universe denied. Who would suppose, that at the close of the first half of this nineteenth century we should hear of a publication, bearing' the ominous title, ``The Anti-Materialist: Denying the reality of Matter, and Vindicating' the Universality of Spirit?'' 634 If this were the whole title, it would not concern us here; but when it is added, ``proved chiefly by a reference to Holy Writ,'' with another sentence, implying that such speculations can settle the points in dispute between those who affirm and those who deny the orthodoxy of Established Churches, such assumptions cause us to sigh over the endless follies of our nature. Such reasoners first of all assume what is Holy Writ., and then apply their own previously-conceived notions to distort and derange it. The very title of such a work implies the greatest possible irreverence for the Divine Oracles; the most unjustifiable assumptions, and the most unfair contrasts. ``The universality of spirit'' is strictly and essentially co-existent with ``the reality of matter.'' Every word which we have uttered in this short epilogue is intended to uphold and illustrate such a proposition' it is only necessary to append to it, that through material existences
--- as trees, cities, food, and clothing --- we become capable of comprehending the wants, the nourishment, and the nature of our spiritual manhood. Suitable in every respect; is the judicious reasoning of Origen, which sixteen centuries have rather confirmed than confuted. ``If ever, in reading Holy Scripture, you encounter an idea which becomes to thee a stone of stumbling or a rock of offense, accuse only thyself: doubt not that this stone of stumbling and rock of offense has an important meaning: {νοήματα} --- food for thy mind. Begin by believing, and you shall soon find, under this imaginary source of offense, abundant utility.'' He then compares the skillful interpreter of Scripture to an intelligent botanist, knowing the different uses and properties of various plants, and shows how every ``holy and spiritual botanist of the word of God'' will find the virtue of the word, without esteeming the slightest portion of it either redundant or superfluous. 635 The preceding Lectures are a good illustration of the sagacious wisdom of these remarks.
633For Cocceius, see Mosheim, Ecc. Hist. Cent. 17 section 2, page 2; and for cautions against over spiritualizing, see Revelation J. J. Conybeare's Bampton Lectures for 1824; and Bishop Van Mildert's Bampton Lectures, page 241, and following.
634By John Dudley, Clerk. 1 volume 8vo. 635Hom. 39, in Jeremiah 44:22.
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Dissertation Fifth
{α}. ON EATING THE ROLL.
Chapter 3:1
This method of conveying destruction is peculiarly Oriental. Jarchi, for instance, writes: ``Parabolica est locutio, ac si dicat: attende aurem tuam et audi.'' The Septuagint translate, {}ספר-{,}מגלתmegleth-sepher, volumen libri by {λις} {βιβλίου}, which does not seem sufficiently accurate. Both Fuller, in his Miscell. S.S., book 2nd, chapter 10, and Vossius de Sept. Int. agree with Jerome in remarking the inaccuracy.
Pro involuto libro, he says, 70 capitulum libri transrulerunt; capitulum intelligamus exordium. The opinion of J. H. Maii, Jun., is preferred by Rosenmuller, viz., that, {,}מנלהmenleh, signifies the roller on which the volumes of the Ancients were rolled, as we learn from Maimonides, in his {,}ספר{ }תורהsepher-toreh, chapter 9:2, 14.
The writing on both sides was very uncommon the Greeks call it {ὀπισθόγραφον}, which is illustrated by Juvenal, Sat. 1:5, 6.
--- aut summi plene jam margine libri
Scriptus, et in tergo, necdum finitus Orestes?
The Chaldee paraphrast explains the sense of eating the roll correctly --- ``anima tua saturabitur;'' and in this way the Prophet was to be strengthened to become literally ``firm of forehead, and hard of heart,'' for contending with ``peoples deep of lip and heavy of tongue.'' This firmness is represented by the gem, {,}שמירshemir, which Bochart terms smiris, adamant according to Jerome, since the corresponding
Arabic word is samoor. See also Schindler's Lex. Pentag. col. 1897, and R. Sal. Jarchi in loc., who gives the view of the Jerusalem Targum.
{β}. THE GREAT RUSHING.
Ezekiel 3:12.
The physical disturbances accompanying the prophetic visions are worthy of notice. It is impossible to reduce them to any class of natural phenomena. The Prophet is suddenly removed by the Spirit into the midst of the exiles; in extasi, says Rosenmuller --- ``the mind was separated from the body by a divine instinct.'' Oecolampadius considers that he seemed to be seized as by a wind,'' and ``thought he heard the voice of a great tumult'' ``The glory of the Lord,'' he adds, ``came out of its place, and left the temple and the people,'' ``and the Church and heavenly Jerusalem praise the Lord for this act of his grace.'' He then comments most spiritually on this removal of the visible glory from the natural temple, taking it as an instance of populus credentium, being at all times locus Dei. Maldonatus takes the same view when he writes, ``I seemed to be seized by the Spirit, or an angel, and. to be transferred to Jerusalem.'' He considers it too Rabbinical to treat the Spirit as if it were merely wind, and the voice only thunder, as R. David and Jonathan do. tie prefers the opinion of Jerome to that of the Jewish interpreters. R. Sal. Jarchi implies that the Spirit really raised him: ``Deus praecepit Spiritui ut eum portaret ad locum ubi Judaei exules degebant.'' As to the last word in this verse, {,}ממקומוmemkomo, it seems to refer to the place where the vision was seen: scil. personent ejus laudes per mundum universum, uti Malachi 1:5. If the whole scene is treated simply as a vision offered to the Prophet's mind through his senses, it becomes very intelligible and impressive.
EZEKIEL
{γ} ON TEL-ABIB.
Ezekiel 3:15.
We notice these words simply to caution the reader against over-allegorizing.
There can be no doubt that it is the name of a place; as, {,}תל{ }חרשאtel chersha, and {,}תל{ }מלחtel melech, in Ezra and Nehemiah. Syrian villages often have the name of tel, which simply means inn or mountain. Burckhardt (Travels in Syria, p. 149) observes this: but Jerome and Cocceius, who adopt the allegorizing system, are not content with this. The former takes the words for ``a heap of new fruits,'' which is symbolical of the state of the Israelites: the latter translates ``the time of new fruit;'' both interpretations being systematically erroneous. As the Chebar runs into the Euphrates from Mount Masius, the captives were situated up the river to the north of Babylon. A various reading, too, in this verse has been the source of some perplexity. The common text (chetib) has {,}ואשרvasher, derived from, {,}שראshera, habitavit, commoratus est; but some MSS. adopt {,}ואשבvasheb, ``and I sat'' (keri); according to Kennicott and De Rossi, ``etiam Hispanici, Soncinensis Bibliorum editio, Brixiensis et Complutensis.'' The Septuagint adopts the former reading; and Vogel, in his edit. of Capell. Crit. Sac., page 231, adopts the latter.
The sense will then be, ``And I dwelt, since they dwelt there, I even dwelt.'' Both Dathe and Rosenmuller reject this, and agree with Calvin's version. His critique on the word {,}שמםshemem, Ezekiel 3:15, is quite in accordance with the English version, and with foreign comments. Newcome paraphrases thus: ``Astonished at the commission with which I was entrusted; and affected by the overpowering splendor of the visions.'' The Chaldee has {,}שתקshethek, ``silent.'' Maldonatus adds, ``so that I could not speak for seven days.''
Dissertation Sixth.
{α} JERUSALEM PAINTED ON A BRICK.
Ezekiel 4:1
Bishop Warburton (book 4 section 4 of his Divine Legation) has ably discussed the Oriental and Egyptian methods of symbolical writing. He explains Ezekiel's method of hieroglyphics, volume 2, page 57, edit. 1837. Oecolampadius comments very practically on this exercise of the ars {σκιογραφίκη}. ``The Church is besieged by its enemies, because it is a despiser of God's word. Heretics erect the towers of human traditions, and oppose the tower and doctrine of David, since it is not defended by any shield. They set up human righteousness, and are not subject to that of God.''
The whole passage is worthy of perusal, and is in striking contrast with the sober and unimaginative comment of Calvin. The custom of writing on bricks is thus noticed by Pliny: ``Epigenes informs us that the Babylonians had inscribed their observations on the stars for 720 years on burnt bricks, coctilibus laterculis.'' Hist. Nat., book 8 section 57. The chief point of interest in this narrative is its visionary character. The best commentators agree that none of these actions were real the lying on the left side for 390 days was only in a vision. the left hand is supposed to refer to the ten tribes, as Samaria was situated to the left of Jerusalem. In the 4th verse, ``you shall bear the punishment of their iniquity,'' is correctly interpreted by Newcome, ``you shall presignify the punishment which they shall bear.'' This is the only sense which
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similar passages can have --- St. Paul having shown us, that the picture-writing of the Jewish law had its real fulfillment in the work of Messiah.
{β} THE THREE HUNDRED AND NINETY DAYS.
Ezekiel 4:5
There is a difference in the number of days between the Hebrew text and that of the Septuagint. The latter assigns but 190 days to the kingdom of Israel, and yet agrees with the Hebrew in assigning forty days to the kingdom of Judea. Theodoret, in his comment on the passage, explains the Septuagint as follows. Although in the reign of Rehoboam the people were divided, yet they are considered as one nation, being separate, and yet conjoined. When, therefore, the Prophet had assigned 150 days to Israel and 40 to Judea, he combines them again, and makes 190 days. These forty days represent the forty years which remained of the original seventy. Thirty years of captivity were now passed for Ezekiel began to prophesy in the thirtieth year of the captivity; and Jeremiah shows us, that in the thirty-seventh year of the captivity of Jeconiah, Evilad-marodach raised his head and led him from his prisonhouse in the first year of his reign. Then came Baltasar, and Darius the Mede; whence the forty days of Judea signify the forty remaining years and the 150 concerning Israel indicate the 150 years after the building of the city, and its becoming fined with inhabitants. This happened in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes, the son of Xerxes, in the time of Nehemiah. Beginning, then, at the fifth year of Jeconiah's captivity, we shall find it forty years to the first year of Cyrus the Persian, then twenty-nine years for the reign of Cyrus, seven for Cambyses, thirty-five for Darius Hystaspes, twenty for Xerxes, and nineteen for Artaxerxes, since in the next year the walls were built.
The Israelites participated in this return for though formerly destined from the tribe of Judea, they were afterwards united, and all inhabited their common metropolis together.
Jerome also notices this difference of numbering, being surprised that the common reading in his day was 190 years; while the Hebrew text, and Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion, all read 390 years, and even those copies of the Septuagint which are not, vitiated. Some, he adds, compute it from the baptism of our Savior to the end of the world; others again from the destruction of Jerusalem, in the reign of Vespasian, to a period of prosperity for the once favored nation. The events of history have shown the fallacy of these computations. Ephrem, in his comments on this passage, speaks of the 430 years as beginning with the reign of Solomon, and as extending to the eleventh year of King Zedekiah. Jerome's method of computing this period is worthy of notice. He dates its commencement from the reign of Pekah, the son of Remaliah, (2 Kings 15:29,) and its close during the reign of Artaxerxes
Mnemon, who is the Ahasuerus of the book of Esther. He reckons the length of the reign of each thing in succession, and satisfies himself that he has computed the number which he finds it the prophets, since he reckons this historical period to consist of 389 years and four months. The sleeping on the right side for forty days he interprets, from Nebuchadnezzar's carrying away Jehoiakim to Babylon, to the first, year of the sway of Cyrus, under whom the Jews obtained their freedom. The writers on Biblical Chronology do not acquiesce in this computation. J. G. Frank commences
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the period with the revolt under Jeroboam, and concludes it with the destruction of Solomon's temple. Jeroboam's first year agrees with the year 3215 of the Jubilee period, and the destruction of the kingdom of Israel in 3470. ``If, therefore,'' says he, ``you add 390 years to 3214, the date of Jeroboam's revolt, you will obtain 3604
Jub. per., corresponding to the destruction of Solomon's temple.'' 636
The Hebrew commentators, R. Solomon and David, do not suppose that a time of punishment for sin is represented, but the time during which it was committed, and so they date the beginning of the period during the early judges, and close it in the reign of Hosea. (Ecolampadius adopts this comment with approval, but Maldonatus pronounces it to be erroneous, ``for the Prophet is not speaking of their sins, but of their punishment.'' Grotius supposes it to represent the time of God's patient endurance of the sins of the people. The settlement of this question depends upon the use of the phrase {,}נשא{ }עוןnasa ghon, to bear iniquity, or the punishment of iniquity. The word is used in both senses; it occurs in Genesis 4:13, and Genesis
19:15; Psalm 69:27, where the authorized version and the marginal readings imply that our translators were aware of the twofold use of the word. The idea of ``punishment'' seems most suitable here; and the adoption of this translation would cause us to neglect the Jewish interpretation, and to count the years forward from the times of Ezekiel, and to seek for the fulfillment of the prophecy in those events of Israel's history which were then future.
Dissertation Seventh.
THE SEPTUAGINT ORDER.
Ezekiel 7:3-13
These verses are much confused in the Septuagint, and this seems to have been the case in Jerome's time. The Greek Codexes of the Alexandrian version do not agree, as we find from Theodoret and the Arabic version. Theodoret and the Chaldee paraphrast follow the Hebrew order; and the latter, from {,}גיניgnini, ``my eye,'' puts {,}מימריmimri, ``my word,'' for the sake of avoiding ``these anthropomorphic phrases.'' The thirteenth verse evidently refers to the year of jubilee. Both Theodoret and the Vulgate translate correctly, and Jerome explains it satisfactorily. There is a difference in reading between the Hebrew and the Septuagint here also; the last clause is sufficiently important to note these differences. Jerome explains it thus'
proderit homini iniquitas sua, nec ei praebebit aliquam similitudinem.'' The translation of the Syriac is, ``et vir iniquitate sua non conservabit vitam suam;'' and of the Chaldee paraphrast, ``quisque sibi in peccatis suis sibi placet, et dum viri permanent, poenitentiam non apprehendent.'' The Syriac reading makes the sense as follows: ``Neither shall any strengthen his life by his iniquity.''
Dissertation Eighth.
THE IMAGE OF JEALOUSY.
Ezekiel 8:1-14
THE singularity of the Vision of this chapter renders it worthy of special notice.
It illustrates very strikingly the difference between the worship of Judaism and of the Gospel. The contrast is so remarkable, that every inference from it respecting
636See Nov. Syst. Chronol. Fund., lib. 1 chapter 4 section 92, page 165.
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Christian obligation must be most indirect. These ``visions of God'' occurred to the Prophet in the place of his captivity. Jerusalem and its temple, and its chambers of imagery, are all brought rapidly before his mind. Theodoret and Jerome maintain that the Prophet was not removed to Jerusalem, but that the scene was presented to his mind in a trance. Newcome continues the trance to the twenty-fourth verse of chapter 11, Ezekiel 11:24. The appearance of fire in the second verse (Ezekiel 8:2) is supposed by some to be better changed to ``man,'' by reading {,}אישaish, for {,}אשeesh, with various codexes of the Septuagint, the Complutensian edition of the Arabic version; but, in the second clause, {,}זהרzohar, signifies the brightness of a star, just as zoharat, in Arabic and Amharic, means the planet Venus. In the Complutensian and Aldine editions of the Septuagint it is translated ``breeze,'' or ``light air,'' according to the view of Theodotion. The best translation seems to be, to take the first clause as ``the appearance of a man,'' and the second as ``the appearance of brightness.''
This remarkable vision is a singular instance of the manner in which the Almighty instructed his prophets. The sixth year of (Ezekiel 8:1) is to be understood of the reign of Jeconiah. ``The appearance of fire'' thought most probably to be ``of a man;'' (Ezekiel 8:2) for {,}אשash, ``fire,'' may have been substituted for, {,}אוש aish, ``a man.'' The Septuagint, Theodoret, the Complutensian and Arabic versions, all take it so; but the De Rossi does not find it in any of the codexes; and only one of Kennicott's (No. 89) has {,}אושaish. Still the best, modern critics prefer it. Ezekiel
8:3. When the Prophet is taken by a lock of his hair, Kimchi supposes it to signify the violence by which the exiles of Judea would be treated; but all modern writers suppose that this was only a vision: {οὐ} {τοίνυν} {σωματικὴ} {ἦν} {μετάθεσις}
{οὐδὲ} {τῶν} {τὢς} {σαρκὸς} {ὀφθαλμῶν} {ἡ} {Θεωρία} ``there was no bodily change of place, nor any real view by the eyes of the flesh,'' says Theodoret. The first object presented to the visionary eye of the Prophet was an idolatrous image, metaphorically denominated ``jealousy,'' from the provocation which the idolatries of the people occasioned. The derivation of the word ``Tammuz'' (Ezekiel 8:14) is obscure. It is supposed to refer to Adonis, as worshipped by the Syrians. Lucian de Dea, Syria, volume 3, and Maerobii Saturnalia, chapter 21., illustrate this point; but what ``The Image of Jealousy,'' which rivaled Jehovah and provoked his anger, really was, cannot be determined; most probably it was a statue of Moloch or Baal.
Selden ``on the Syrian Deities'' enters at large on the subject. 637 The whole of this scenery Bishop Warburton pronounces to be Egyptian, and versed as he was in Egyptian antiquities, his judgment is deserving of notice. ``They contain.'' says he, ``a very lively and circumstantial description of the so celebrated mysteries of His and Osiris.'' 638 The rites were celebrated in a subterraneous place by the Sanhedrim or elders of Israel, and the paintings on the wall correspond with the descriptions of the mystic cells of Egypt. The woman ``weeping for Tammuz'' (Ezekiel 8:13) he treats as a Phoenician superstition, while the worship of ``the sun towards the east'' (Ezekiel
8:15) is a Persian custom. ``When the Prophet is bid to turn from the Egyptian to the 637Synt. 2 cap. 1 page 195. 638Div. Leg., lib. 4 section 6.