An Amicable Controversy with a Jewish Rabbi, on The Messiah's Coming Part 2

_Rejoice greatly, daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem; behold thy King shall come unto thee, just and having salvation; lowly and riding upon an a.s.s, even a colt the foal of an a.s.s._

The manner of the Messiah's coming being here so plainly foretold, and his character so distinctly described, we wonder how the Jew can deny that this was all fulfilled in the person of Christ. The reason is simply this; he disbelieves the facts. The books in which they are recorded, are of no authority in his estimation; he challenges their testimony on grounds too numerous to be discussed here. To answer his objections, every disagreement between the writers of the New Testament must first be reconciled; a task which appears to him to have hitherto failed with all who have attempted it. But this is not the only objection he has to urge.

He charges the Christian with perverting the sense of prophecy; and this verse furnishes him with an instance. Thus, the Hebrew word rendered, "_having salvation_," is really the past participle of the verb "to save,"

literally "_being saved_;" and that too followed by the emphatical p.r.o.noun _himself_, "being saved himself." Surely this point might be safely conceded by the Christian, who admits that Christ "was the first fruits of them that slept;" the first who rose from the dead, to everlasting life; and that through him we become partakers in that resurrection.

The peaceful nature of his kingdom, the partic.i.p.ation of the heathen in its blessings, and the boundless extent of its dominion are next declared:

_And he will cut off the chariot from Ephraim, and the horse from Jerusalem, and the battle bow shall be cut off; and he shall speak peace to the heathen; and his dominion shall be from the sea even to the sea, and from the river to the ends of the earth._

The Christian reader will find no difficulty in the interpretation of the verse which follows.

_As for thee, by the blood of thy covenant, I have sent forth thy prisoners from the pit wherein is no water._

The Messiah is spoken of throughout; who then but the Messiah can be apostrophised in the words, "_As for thee?_" Then follows "_by the blood of thy covenant_." What blood but the blood of Christ? What covenant, but that sealed by his blood, can be alluded to? "_I have sent thy prisoners forth._" What prisoners, but those who were in the bondage of sin? "_from the pit wherein is no water_." What pit, but the darkness of idolatry, which had none of the waters of life? Surely this is a most clear and distinct intimation of the sacrifice of the Messiah, and of the benefits thereby conferred upon mankind in the redemption of the heathen world from the darkness of idolatry; thus opening the way to immortality, to the whole human race.

But the Messiah here appears to be promised to the Gentiles, having been previously promised to the Jews; were then these promises retracted? By no means. To the Jews he was promised, and to them he came, exclusively addressing himself to the house of Israel. Nor was it till after the majority of that nation had rejected and crucified him, that the calling of the Gentiles took place. The blessings he offered being refused by the former, appears to have been the immediate cause of their being given to the latter. Accordingly this seems to be the purport of the next verse, which intimates that there was some reason why these blessings could not be directly and unconditionally transferred to the Gentiles.

_Return ye to the strong hold, my prisoners, wait thou unto the day I declare, that I will repay thee double_; that is, wait for the day when these blessings will become yours, through the Jews' refusal of them.

Nor yet was the Messiah rejected by all the Jews; for the apostles were Jews; the disciples were Jews; by Jews was the Gospel preached and propagated; and to the Jews belongs the honour of the first triumph of true religion over Paganism, and what is more, over the pa.s.sions and worldly propensities of man; and this triumphant progress of the Gospel seems to be the victory intimated in the verse which follows; wherein the reason is at the same time a.s.signed why Christ did not address himself to the Gentiles.

_For I have bent Judah for me, filled the bow Ephraim; and raised up thy sons, O Zion, against thy sons, O Greece; and made thee as the sword of a mighty man._

The triumphs of Judas Maccabeus, generally supposed to be here foretold, cannot be the victories alluded to; for Ephraim, or the ten tribes, here declared as bearing a part in them, had already gone into captivity, and bore no share whatever in these subsequent wars of Judah. The true meaning appears to be that Judah was destined to have the honour of first establishing the Messiah's kingdom, as promised from the beginning.

How then could Ephraim, or the ten tribes, it may be asked, bear a part in the triumphs of the Gospel, having previously gone into captivity? The prophecy does not distinctly say so; if we keep to the letter, it is only said that Ephraim as well as Judah was prepared and marshalled for the spiritual conflict: the triumph is declared to _Zion_ over _Greece_; that is, to true religion over Pagan idolatry; and in this warfare, though not in the wars of Judas Maccabeus, Ephraim did bear a part; for it is not to the apostolic age alone that we must look for the accomplishment of the great scheme of Providence for man's redemption. This was only one act in the great drama; which began under the Old Covenant, and is not yet finally completed under the New. In the former, or the Old Covenant, all the tribes of Israel bore their share, Ephraim as well as Judah; and the warfare not being finally concluded, who shall say but Ephraim may again appear, and bear a further part in it?

Having declared the union of the Gentiles with the Jews, and their joint partic.i.p.ation in the blessings of the Messiah's kingdom, the prophecy goes on to promise the support and protection of Heaven, in terms alike applicable to both.

_And the Lord shall be seen over them, and his arrow shall go forth as the lightning; and the Lord G.o.d shall blow the trumpet, and shall go forth with whirlwinds of the south. And the Lord of hosts shall defend them, and they shall devour and subdue with sling-stones; and they shall drink as wine, and they shall be filled like bowls, like __ the corners of the altar._ (which were purposely so constructed as to receive the blood of the sacrifices).

That the whole of these expressions require to be taken figuratively and spiritually, no one conversant with scriptural and prophetic language can surely deny; or for a moment suppose that literal drunkenness and bloodshed are here intended.

Should any doubt remain that the Gentiles are included in these promises as well as the Jews, the next verse appears to decide the question.

_And the Lord their G.o.d shall save them in that day, as the flock of his people._

If the Jews be called his people, who but the Gentiles can be meant by the other? But this is followed by the direct declaration that all distinction between them is on the eve of its abolition.

_For the wall of separation is tottering over his land._

A remarkable and striking expression, but strangely perverted in our translation. Why the Jews have laboured to give a different turn to it, by seeking a more figurative and recondite meaning, we need be at no loss to conceive; nor why they apply these verses to themselves alone. See note to the translation of this verse.

But this view, which would limit the bounty of Heaven to a particular race, besides being at variance with the context, seems little calculated to call forth the feelings of adoration and praise with which this chapter concludes.

_For how great is his goodness, and how great is his beauty. Corn shall make the young men cheerful, and new wine the maids._

Corn, wine, &c. in prophetic language ever signify the food of spiritual knowledge, to be henceforth freely bestowed on all, Gentiles as well as Jews.

NOTES TO CHAPTER IX. HEBREW PUNCTUATION.

A Summary of the arguments for and against the antiquity and authority of the Vowel Points, is given at the beginning of the Second Vol. of Horne's Introduction to the Study of the Scriptures; from which the following considerations seem most ent.i.tled to selection. That the earliest traces of the points are to be found in the tenth century-that many of the oldest ma.n.u.scripts now extant are without them-that the copies of the Jewish Scriptures now used in the Synagogue and esteemed peculiarly sacred, are without them-that the Samaritan letters which were the same as the Hebrew before the captivity, are without them-and the Samaritan Pentateuch is without them-that there are no traces of them to be found in the shekels (coins) struck by the kings of Israel-that the fathers, particularly Origen and Jerome, who treat of the Hebrew p.r.o.nunciation, make no mention of them-that all the antient various readings of the Jews regard the letters only, not one of them relates to the vowel points-to which may be added, that there are five vowels in the Hebrew alphabet which are quite sufficient for reading the language, though they may not enable us to determine with precision the antient p.r.o.nunciation. "These considerations," says Mr. Horne, "have determined the majority of Hebrew scholars in the present day to reject their authority." Still we may admit their utility in fixing the p.r.o.nunciation, and perhaps also in facilitating the construction; but the main objection to them is, that by changing the vowels, they frequently alter the sense, as well as the sound, and that in pa.s.sages where a Jewish interpretation is particularly open to suspicion. Thus in prophecies relating to the Messiah, both their prejudices and their feelings unfit them for becoming guides to a Christian expositor.

Verse 1. :??? ??? ???? ???? ???? ????? ????? ?? ????? ??? ??? ??? ????

_The heavy burden of the word of the Lord in the land of Hadrach, and Damascus shall be the rest thereof; when the eyes of man, as of all the tribes of Israel, shall be towards the Lord._

These are the words of the translation in our Bible; but the sense of them I must acknowledge my inability to unravel. Of what Damascus is to be the rest, or what period is intimated by the adverb of time _when_, I am at a loss to discover. The separation of Hadrach and Damascus by the insertion of a comma between them, evidently owes its origin to the supposed necessity for rendering the word ????? (or ?????) _the rest thereof_. But if deriving it from ?? (or ??) or ??? (or ???) does not afford any intelligible sense, we are naturally led to seek another derivation; and we find one in the verb ??? (or ???) _to descend_ or _send down_, which without violating grammatical construction affords a meaning not only intelligible, but in perfect unison with the context. The Hemantiv ?

prefixed, gives the _thing sent down_, while the suffix ? _his_, evidently refers to _the Lord_ who sends the vision or denunciation. The English construction, of course, requires it should be rendered _his sending down_, that is, the Lord's denunciation, _against_ Hadrach and Damascus, as well as the other cities which are mentioned afterwards; for ? here rendered _in_, may with more propriety be rendered _against_ or _upon_.

The verb ??? (or ???) _to send down_, occurs in Joel iii. 11 and elsewhere: but the writer freely acknowledges that he has no authority for the participial noun with the Hemantiv ? prefixed to signify the thing sent down, or the act of sending down, as the sense seems to require here.

He therefore rests this construction solely on the ground of its being grammatically admissible, consonant to a.n.a.logy, and in accordance with the context, as affording a satisfactory meaning. Let those who are not satisfied with such reasons furnish a better solution of the difficulty.

In the next place, there is no necessity for rendering ?? (or ??) _when_, which more frequently signifies _for_; and when so rendered, it will be found to connect together the latter and the former part of the verse. For this, we only require to render the dative ?, as it frequently is rendered in Hebrew, as well as Greek and Latin, to denote _possession_; and the verse will run thus. _For the Lord's is_, or to the Lord belongs, _the eye of man_; to wit, the eye of the Seer, who receives the vision, _and all the tribes of Israel_, whom the vision chiefly concerns. Making the tribes a genitive case, by inserting _of_ before them, is wholly uncalled for by the text.

Verse 2. :??? ??? ???? ?? ?? ?????? ?? ???? ???

_And Hamath also shall border thereby, Tyrus and Sidon though it be very wise._

???? (or ????) _to set bounds to_, in the Hiphil, occurs in Exod. xix. 12 & 23.-It here appears to be the Huphal or pa.s.sive of Hiphil-signifying _to be bounded_, or _to be set bounds to_. It is only necessary to remark, that leaving aside the punctuation, the form of the future tense will be identical in both these voices. The sense as it stands is scarcely intelligible. What is meant by _border thereby_, it is not easy to conceive; but by discarding the points we readily obtain a meaning that is perfectly intelligible. ???? (or ????) may then be rendered in the pa.s.sive voice, instead of the active, and will signify _to be limited_, or _have bounds set to_; and ?? (or ??) _on_ or _to her_, which follows, accords with, and seems to demand its being so rendered. _And Hamath also shall have bounds set to her_; that is, her growing greatness shall be checked.

_Tyre, and also Sidon though she be very wise_, ???? (or ????), _wise_, no doubt, means here, _worldly wise_, or very subtle.

Verse 5. :??? ?????? ????? ???? ????? ??? ?????? ?? ????? ????

_Ashkalon shall see and fear, Gaza also, and she shall be very sorrowful, and Ekron for her expectation shall be ashamed._

????? (or ?????) may be derived either from ??? (or ???) _to be ashamed_, or from ??? (or ???) _to dry up_, and whither as a plant for want of moisture. The latter seems preferable here, but it is not very material to the sense.

Verse 6. :???? ???? ?????? ?????? ???? ??????

_A b.a.s.t.a.r.d shall dwell in Ashdod, and I will cut off the pride of the Philistines._

???? (or ????) may be rendered a _stranger_, as well as a _b.a.s.t.a.r.d_, a????e?e?? in the Septuagint, which renders the sense more obvious.

_And I will cut off the pride of the Philistines._ These denunciations appear chiefly directed against the Philistines, in whom pride, avarice, and ambition, are specified as the great offences. The delivery of Ashdod into the hands of a stranger is the judgment p.r.o.nounced against them in this verse, as the last means of their humiliation. But here the tone of the prophecy changes, and instead of further punishments, we find repeated promises of blessings and mercy; _he that is left shall be for our G.o.d, and as a Governor in Judah_,-and in the verse following-_He_ (the Messiah being manifestly meant here) _shall speak peace to the Heathen_.-Whence then this change? We are led to seek, and naturally expect to find, some ground for it. And accordingly the next verse unfolds the reason, and explains the occasion of this change in the counsel of Heaven; a change resting not on their own merits, but on Divine Mercy. For such a construction will this verse bear, quite as well as the one usually put upon it; and this construction is far more in unison with the context, than the received one.

Verse 7. :?????? ???? ???? ?????? ???? ???? ????? ??-??? ??????? ???? ????

_And I will take away his blood from out of his mouth, and his abominations from between his teeth, and he that is left, even he shall be for our G.o.d, and he shall be as a Governor in Judah, and Ekron as a Jebusite._

With scarcely any alteration in the translation, the words, even as they stand, admit of a very different acceptation from that in which they are commonly taken; and instead of being a figurative expression, borrowed from the rescuing its prey from the jaws of a lion; in which sense the Jews take it, as a promise to themselves of deliverance from their enemies; the words more literally taken, will convey the promise of mercy and redemption to the remaining Gentiles: whose sin and pollution are to be taken away, who are to be reclaimed to the worship of the true G.o.d, and admitted to a full partic.i.p.ation in all the blessings, promised to Israel by the coming of the Messiah.

The Gentiles were esteemed polluted by eating things unclean, which were prohibited to the Jews. Certain animals-things strangled-and the blood in particular were among the forbidden food. The new covenant removed this prohibition, thereby taking away the pollution from between his teeth, as it ceased to be a cause of pollution. The command given to St. Peter, Acts x. 14, to kill and eat, where all manner of food was presented to him, was expressly received by him as a command to preach the Gospel to the Gentiles, or to admit them into the Messiah's kingdom; and this admission was unaccompanied with any such prohibition, nor was it subsequently given.