CHAPTER 2
THE PROOF OF THE GOSPEL
Bk. IX. trust."
And we see how true it is that the Hght of our (d) Saviour, which rose from Jacob, that is from the Jews, has shone on all nations but Jacob, from whence it came forth.
And while this can be found in many prophecies, which say as it were to Christ Himself:
"Behold, I have set thee for a light to the Gentiles, for a covenant of thy race," it is especially obvious in the words of Balaam,, when he says :
" A man shall come from his seed, and shall rule many nations."
Whose seed but Israel's, as the context shews?
And thus our Saviour, the Word, as the prophecy foretold, ruling over the nations threw down the invisible noxious powers which had governed them so long, the spirits of evil, and the band of daemons, called figuratively here the princes of Moab, Seth, lidom, and (421) Esau.
The words :
" I will point to him, but not now, I liless him but he draws not near," which are obscure in the Septuagint, are more clearly rendered by Aquila :
" I shall see him, but not now ; I expect him, but he is not near."
And Symmachiis more plainly still says: "I see him but not near."
Balaam would speak thus of things revealed to him that would be accomplished a very long time after (b) his own days.
And so at the conclusion of two thousand years after his prediction they were fulfilled in our Saviour's
Coming among men.
CHAPTER
From Isaiah.
How the Lord resting in the Sacnd Body 7vhich He took from the Virgin will come to Egv/'t, is both Literally and L'lgitratively foretold, and that all the Sii/'erstition of (he Heathen will he destroyed at LLis Advent.
[I'as.sage quoted, Isa. xix. i.] I supposK that the reason why it is foretold that the Lord (•1) would come to l'>gypt is this: The Egyptians are said to have been the first to practise the errors of polytheism
Ch.
CHRIST IN EGYPT
and the demons, and to have introduced superstition to the rest of mankind, and to have been concerned more than others with the activities and meddling of the da-mons.
And Holy Scripture witnesses that they were the enemies of God's people from the very beginning, kn it is written that their ancient king confessed that he did not know the Lord, when he said : "I do not know the Lord, and I will not let Israel go."
So, then, it is because F.xod.v. 2.
Scripture wishes to shew the great marvel of the divine power of Christ that it foretells His going to Egypt, in (422) ])redicting that the Egyptians will undergo an extraordinary conversion, when it goes on to say: "And the Egyptians shall know the Lord, who before knew Him not, and shall pray to the Lord." and so on.
Above in the previous chapter Edom and Esau are called the inheritance of the subject of the prophecy, these names being used for strangers to Israel.
Here it is predicted of I'-gypt and its people that they will not acknowledge idols any more, (b) but the Lord revealed by the Jewish prophets.
Now if we cannot see this actually fulfilled before our eyes, we must not say that the Lord's coming to Egyjjt has taken place ; but if beyond all need of argument the truth is shewn by facts, and reveals clearly to the most unobservant the Egyptians rescued from hereditary superstition, and followers of the God of the prophets who foretold that this would take place, serving Him only, and greeting every (c) form of death for their duty to Him, to what else can we attribute it, but to the Lord coming to Egypt, as the prophecy before us predicted ?
It is, of course, possible that the prophecy from another point of view teaches in a figurative and disguised way about the earthly universe, into which it prophesies that the Lord will come on a light cloud, a figure ot the Humanity that He took of the Virgin and the Holy Spirit.
And that the idols of Egypt to be shaken, are the idols of (all) nations, while the vanquished Egyptians are all those (d) who were of old distracted by idolatry.
This may be so, yet when our Lord in bodily form was carried into I'-gypt, when Joseph arose in obedience to the oracle, and took Mary and the young Child, and went into Egypt, it is probable that the evil dcemons who dwelt there of old were greatly moved by His unspeakable power and might
; and