As to presenting Christ or Scripture. It is clear, if we love souls, we shall present Christ; so it was in the Apostles' preaching, though to Jews. They might start from, and reason on their Scriptures which they received. Scripture is what we teach from -- have our standard of truth in -- not what we teach as a subject, save where there is special occasion.
There is this difference between Paradise and the third heaven -- the former is the place of delights, the garden of delights with which God surrounds Himself, God's Paradise -- the other is approaching God Himself in the Holiest of all, where Christ is gone.
I use, but do not reduce myself to the mere import of the forms of speech of the day.
How beautifully in John 4 the Lord's perfection, in submission to His Father's will, opens out into the large sphere of blessing into which that submission introduced Him. He had been rejected in Judea -- a sore trial and sorrow to Him, as to the beloved people, and had taken His way where "He must needs go," "wearied with the way," and sat, as He was, on the well. Here grace flows forth -- such was the effect, in His perfect love, and rejection of promises in His Person, and then His "meat was to do the will of Him that sent Him." This opens, thereon, out for His heart into fields "already white for harvest." And it was more than Jewish promise -- it broke forth into life eternal, and, in point of fact, does take up all that was of God in the previous ways of His grace -- reaped what they had sown. We have other instances of this, as Matthew 11. Oh, for littleness, and lowliness of heart.
As regards the names of God, I quote the verses to put them together -- Genesis 7:1; Exodus 6:3 - 6; Matthew 5:48; 2 Corinthians 6:18; then Psalms 83:18; 91: 1, 2, et seq.; Genesis 14:19, 20; and Daniel 4:34.
It is a sorrowful circumstance that Martha does not weep at the Lord's coming to raise Lazarus; the very Jews do -- she does not. There is something sad about her state -- yet Jesus loved her.
It is remarkable, all through John, how the divine character of Jesus shines through, but never going out of the human, and place of receiving and obedience. If He and the Father are one, the Father who gives the sheep is greater than all. If He has power to lay down and to take again His life, He has received commandment from His Father; so everywhere.
It is interesting to compare the two characters of Mary who anointed Christ's head in Bethany, and Mary Magdalene, both so attached to the Lord, yet how different as to the way of it -- one sitting at His feet, the other rescued by His power from the full dominion of demons. The first does not, that I am aware of, appear after that blessed proof of her instructive understanding of the position of Christ -- to the other, who had nothing in the world but Christ, He first reveals Himself after His resurrection, and makes her the messenger of His grace to the disciples; no doubt, in this, she was a figure of the Jewish Remnant.
It is very simple, but important, to see that miracles do not necessarily imply the setting aside laws. Man produces previously unknown effects by them -- change them he cannot; surely God can. The only difference is that man uses the laws themselves, and force, to produce the effect -- God, the fiat of His will. God may act beyond laws, without setting aside any existing ones, because He can quicken and create. But the argument that there are laws, and God would not set aside His own, is perfectly without force.
I have found it necessary, in dealing with others, to distinguish between "sitting in heavenly places," and "entering into the holiest." They would have it, the latter did not apply -- we were always there. This is a mistake -- in Christ, we are sitting in heavenly places always. But we are, in Hebrews, always men on earth, not united to Christ as in Ephesians, but He, a Priest apart on high, and, our conscience being purged, we enter into the holiest boldly by a new and living way. It is another and very blessed thought.
It is well to remark that in John 14, the Spirit is sent by the Father on the intercession of the Son -- in chapter 15 by the Son from His place in glory, in the Father's name -- and in chapter 16 He is here below, Himself, in His own Person, acting.
With what deep feeling, in recollection, the Apostle Peter must have said, "Who, when he was reviled, reviled not again, when he suffered he threatened not, but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously"!
How exceedingly beautiful is the unfolding of affection in Christ in the beginning of Philippians! Though the Apostle, in writing to the Corinthians, could give God thanks for them, is it quite different from Philippians. He thanks God "always," and "for all the grace shewed to them" (1 Corinthians 1:4) and this is most lovely and instructive; but his heart cannot say "at every remembrance," nor can he say "with joy" (Philippians 1:3, 4). Oh! why are not Christians always so walking, that their affections and communion should be fresh and unhindered?
Besides our actual sins, there are two points of our state connected with our fall in Adam. Our alienation from God in nature and will, and our alienation from God in condition, place or standing -- both must be corrected; the former is by
having Christ for our life, being born again, but this does not in itself take us out of law -- the new nature feels the evil of the old, not only what we have done, but what we are. It is not merely we cannot say we have not sinned, but we cannot say we have no sin -- "I know that in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing"; the law is a mere means of discovering this, the remedy is not in dealing with it at all, but my place is altered -- in Christ not only I have a new nature, but I have died as in the old -- in Him I am not in the flesh at all, I am in Christ who has died and risen again. I have a new nature -- that must be -- but Christ having died and risen again, and I being in Him, I have a new place too. This is what Romans 7 and 8 teaches us. Baptism is not the sign of life-giving, but of change of place -- we arise out of death, but death is the main point here. I do not take verse 2 chapter 8 as an inferential "for"; verse I is the result of what goes before, and stands by itself, verse 2 begins an explanation of the "now" of the whole matter in life. The change of state, as previously the change of place or condition -- deliverance, not new life.
We must not confound palingenesia and anagennao; palingenesia is a change of state as Matthew 19, and used for a recovery of wealth when fortune has been lost. Anagennao is being born "again," so anablepo, anakainizo, etc., it has the sense of "up" often, but "again" or "back" -- the beginning of something new, with the sense of the contrary of what it was before, so analuo, anakampto, anakalupto, etc. The other sense is pretty much our use of "up"; see 1 Peter 1:3 - 23; Titus 3:5.
Covenant in no way implies two parties, but the contrary, i.e., in divine things; a mediator does, but there is an object of the covenant, assurance of blessing, and the circumstances of this object may require the interposition of a mediator, righteously to obtain for, qualify, and sustain them. Christ is properly the object of the Abrahamic covenant, but then, for the Church to come in, being guilty, there must be a mediator with God for that; they are brought into the covenant through
a mediator, but the covenant is not made with, or properly for them.
A covenant is a disposition of God, secured by His binding or obliging Himself; this -- man being a sinner -- must be by the meritorious death of the Covenanter. In the case of a man's covenant, it seems to me it was conventionally brought to the same point -- the authority of God being interposed, and the covenanter bound in this by the same sanction, quod nota.
Diatheke is the divine interpretation of b'rith (covenant) as to these matters, so that in the divine enquiry of it I have no need to search with anxiety for the root or meaning of b'rith (covenant) as to its ordinary human force.
Prophecy is direct when the people exist. It is addressed to the people because God cannot but own them, cannot but speak to and reprove them till there is no remedy. When He has said lo-ammi (not My people), then what the Jews call, as to several books Hagiographa (holy writings) khethubhim (writings) begins, as in Daniel; he says nothing to the people -- there was no people to say anything to. He is the depository for the people of the purposes of God as to them. But yet more, of what would befall the Gentiles, he could not address himself, properly speaking, to the Gentiles save in the first responsibility of the head, but he reveals and interprets dreams of God about them, and receives instructions himself as to what was to come, what the Gentile beasts would be, and what would befall his people. In the Apocalypse I find this same difference. To the Churches there is a direct address. The Spirit of God recognises the people, however low their state, but, after the Churches, not at all -- He talks about the beasts, gives their character and doings, the persecution of the saints, and the resulting position of the saints at the end, but addresses nothing to them. It is as if to them also, on the earth, it was lo-ammi; there is no people on earth to address. The Church is not found there -- this is remarkable; see Revelation 22:16; He testifies therein. "He that hath an ear is to hear what the Spirit saith to the Churches."
It is interesting also to remark, in a time of ruin and partial restoration, how we get the estimate of the ruin with full knowledge of God's ultimate manner of bringing in the final blessing, though owning clearly the present timeliness of service, and, on the other hand, the partial energy of restoration placing on the ground of responsibility, and revealing the circumstances, in connection with what was so restored, of the guilt that brought judgment, and the deliverance. But what I desire to remark is the two things we have to recognise -- the Daniel, and Haggai, and Zechariah position, intelligence, and service. The Lord make us capable.
The beginning of Isaiah is thus: --
Chapter 1, the judgment of Judah and Jerusalem, for their iniquity in general.
Chapter 2, their establishment as the head of nations, connected with the judgment of these last. Israel had been forsaken for their departure from Jehovah. This setting aside man, in his pride and pleasure, must be, for Jehovah judges (chapter 3) His own people.
Chapter 4, they are brought very low, but then there shall be a complete blessing, the glory being in Zion fully sanctified, though by judgment -- the Lord's presence being then openly over them, as the cloud in the wilderness. This is complete in itself.
In chapter 5 Jehovah enters into an immediate pleading with His vineyard. Christ is distinctly brought in. It is Jehovah, but addressed by the Spirit as the Well-Beloved, and having done all possible for it, and only had wild grapes, as Jehovah He gives it up to the wild boar out of the forest. The various causes, in the ways of Israel, are stated, and the progressive judgments of God detailed. This takes in all Israel, and is thus more historical. The anger of the Lord is kindled against His people, and His hand stretched out. They are smitten and cut off (verse 25), but His anger is still there. This, I think, brings in Babylon, and the kingdoms of the beast, and darkness falls upon them.
But this brings in (chapter 6) the revelation of Christ as Jehovah, and desolation rests on the Land, only the people are preserved in the Remnant or holy Seed. We then have Christ in connection with the house of David, but as Emmanuel -- God with His people -- the Virgin's Son. With this, the passing away of Israel and Syria, and the inroad of, not the Beast, but the Assyrian.
In chapter 7 this is discussed more fully. The Land being now Emmanuel's, He is to be the hope and trust of the Remnant. They were not to make conspiracies and seek help elsewhere, but make Jehovah their Sanctuary. Christ's first coming (Jehovah) is then brought in, His rejection, and the shutting up of good in the narrow circle of His disciples (chapter 8: 16 - 18). The nation are left in darkness, still it is not like what seemed less, for Messiah has come in, and, when the nation, in the last days, are in
their darkest hour, the full revelation of Messiah in delivering judgment breaks forth. All is here the last scene, from Christ's rejection to the judgment when He comes. Chapter 6 to chapter 9: 7, is thus a parenthesis, introducing the House of David, and Messiah. Then the history of Israel is resumed and taken up, as a whole, from the then attacks of Rezin and Pekah (which are the occasion of all this prophecy) and carried on to Babylon, but with the still outstretched hand to the Assyrian, whose judgment is stated; chapter 10: 33. Christ is revealed as the Heir of the House of David -- His character, and then peace in God's holy mountain, and full blessing on the people. Israel is all gathered, and all wars cease.
Chapter 12, the song arises, for Jehovah has done great things, and He dwells in the midst of Zion. This closes the opening of the prophecy. The question of Babylon is then taken up.
In what follows, after Babylon, the Assyrian having been introduced especially, from the end of chapter 17 (Damascus) the prophet looks out, in a remarkable manner, to the latter days (chapter 18 being the centre) though partially applicable to the present encouragement. There is a certain mingling of prophecies, which regard the then present time, to bring out a perfect testimony as regards the last day.
It is evident, as indeed it long ago struck me, that the destruction of Babylon, which God had specially set up as the golden head (though many historical successors) had to come in -- yet made epoch, because the Jews were delivered, and what God had set up judged, and indeed by one who was God's servant. The world and idolatry were judged. This, chapters 13 and 14 give us, and they go to the end, though the present coming judgment is also before the prophet's eyes. The day of the Lord was at hand, the prophet being rapt into the time to come. These two chapters are, in a certain sense, complete. We have Babylon judged -- the heaven and earth being shaken. The Assyrian destroyed on the mountains, and land of Jehovah, note, and then the country cleared of its internal possessors, and "Jehovah hath founded Zion."
Chapter 16 I should judge me-atz (from of old) (verse 13), to mean "from ancient days" -- His original, general purpose connected (verses 4, 5), with the establishment of the throne of the Son of David. But now is the more immediate judgment,
I suppose, by Nebuchadnezzar. "From the east," says Ezekiel, if it be the same time. No doubt chapter 15 begins with the impending judgment in view, but the prophetic mind passes on to God's counsels "from of old" (me-atz) returning then, in verse 14, to what was immediate.
Chapter 17 is proof how the object is the last days through present circumstances. Here the Assyrian, not Babylon, is the occasion -- the inroads of Shalmaneser, Sargon and Sennacherib, but especially Tiglath Pileser and Sennacherib. But Jacob is brought low at the same time; but in the Remnant there is deliverance and salvation in the lowest estate of Israel, but the Remnant looking to God. The nation judged for leaving Jehovah and trusting its own ways, the multitude of nations come up, but are destroyed. This seems clearly to introduce chapter 18, or the condition of Israel in that day -- the last days. Egypt comes in for present judgment, probably then by Sargon, but the prophecy evidently goes on thence to the last day.
Chapter 20. This gives the invasion of Sargon.
Chapter 21. My impression is that this chapter refers to present or more immediate times -- the then fall of Babylon. But we must remember that this was the judgment on the golden head set up by God, and the deliverance of Israel, and, in this sense, a characteristic event in its bearing. Seir is judged, but her judgment has also a special character -- she seems to have exulted in the destruction of Jerusalem, when taken by Nebuchadnezzar; see Obadiah and Psalm 137:7. Its final judgment will be directly from the Lord, see Isaiah 34:5, and Obadiah, where the Jews seem to take part, as well as the heathen; compare also Psalm 84. Arabia and Kedar come under present judgment, connected with the fall of Babylon.
Chapter 22. This is a remarkable chapter. It would seem to be (verses 1 - 14), the state of the city in Zedekiah's time, and its capture by Nebuchadnezzar, but the end of David's responsible family, and the setting up of the Gentiles, makes this of all importance. Jehovah had no longer a throne upon earth. It is the judgment of Jerusalem by the hand of the Gentiles. Along with this, we have a prophecy (verse 15 to the end) which clearly in its immediate reference, speaks of personages of Hezekiah's time. One is deposed, and another set up, alluding, I apprehend, to the last days -- verse 25 referring clearly to "that day" -- the last days. The setting aside of
Jerusalem would make one understand this, but the combination is remarkable.
Chapter 23. The judgment of Tyre is by Nebuchadnezzar, yet looks out beyond it, in verses 9 and 18. Up to this, it had long been the untouched power of commerce, and its pride. This was judged now, just as the natural pride of man was in Egypt.
Chapter 24. This chapter is a remarkable witness of this passing on from present to future, and final judgment. When Tyre was taken, after a long siege, by Nebuchadnezzar, the whole land was laid waste -- the Land of Canaan -- not merely Canaan, as in chapter 23: 11, but the Land. Hence it stretches out to a judgment on the whole earth; compare chapter 3: 1, connected with chapter 2, where the direct subject is Israel, the land, the people, and the priest, but it is connected with the judgment which casts Satan and his angels down, and judges all the kings of the earth, and Jehovah will reign in Zion -- the following chapters bringing in the full result; to the end of chapter 27, they celebrate the last days.
Chapter 25. This may have had its primary fulfilment in the fall of Babylon, but it is the setting aside of human power in favour of the needy. The darkness of this world will then be removed, and the resurrection take place, and the rebuke of His people be removed. This is celebrated then in a prophetic way, in which the Lord's ways are unfolded, and His people called upon to hide themselves for a little moment.
Chapter 26: 19 is in contrast with verse 14. They have wholly perished, but Israel is renewed on the principle of resurrection, as the "sure mercies of David" are cited by the Apostle as a proof of it. Israel has wrought no deliverance, their restoration is power in resurrection. At the same time it is the time of the definite judgment of this world.
Chapter 27. Satan's power amongst men (viewed here as exercised in the hands of the Gentiles) is set aside, and Israel, though chastised, is purged and blessed; compare Psalm 74. But it is full judgment on Israel. This closes the inward history. The Gentiles judged are those amongst whom Israel had been in captivity -- the Beast.
The subsequent chapters take up the last Assyrian inroad. What went before was the prophetic earth, which took the place of Israel or was part of the Land, with just an allusion to the Assyrian in the latter day. Now this latter is the object. God
has ordered all His plans, and deals with His harvest with discretion. Here this Assyrian takes Jerusalem, which is in league with death and hell, in contrast with the Tried Stone laid in Zion, which enables the Remnant to wait. Jehovah does His strange work, and (chapter 28: 22) it is kalah v'necharatzah (a judgment of destruction determined upon), the decreed consumption of her, remarked on.
Chapter 29. In this chapter, Jerusalem is not taken, but the multitude of nations disappear, who have surrounded and brought her low. The moral ground of the judgment is stated -- the darkness of heart they had got into, though they had the word, then all totally changed -- the deaf hear the words of the Book -- the external power of evil and malice against the feeble just is done away, and Jacob shall now never be ashamed, and spiritual intelligence is their portion. The Assyrian is still the main person.
Chapter 30. This is also the case in this chapter. God's people's reliance on other strength than His is then judged. They were a shame to themselves in their uselessness to the world. But the judgment is much more the Lord's. The nation is wholly broken up -- it is as a broken vessel, of which not a potsherd is left. Two faults are here -- first trusting on fleshly strength, and then slighting God's word. Jehovah rises up, in His own rights over it all, to bless His people. Adversity is there, but the Lord gives His word and guidance, and these come in in full blessing. The full judgment of the Lord, coming in glory, is then revealed, and it is joy for the delivered. The Assyrian and the king are judged by power. The voice of the Lord beats down the Assyrian, and Tophet is prepared for both. Verse 18 is very striking; see Psalm 94:12, 13. In the Psalm it is more Antichrist, or the Beast, than the Assyrian, but the principle is brought out. The Lord leaves full play to chastisement, that pride and self-will may be abased -- waits till this is fully carried out (only gives the word, verses 20, 21) and this, that He may be gracious, and in His own way and that is fully. This principle is striking in this part of the prophecy.
Chapter 31. Helper and helped shall both fall down together, i.e., man's strength and the Lord's people leaning upon it -- for Jehovah will come down and fight for Mount Zion. And the Assyrian, always the "enemy" here, shall be beaten down.
Chapter 32. This chapter, the end of which first led me to see a new dispensation, leads us, after the fall of the Assyrian, to the King enquiring in righteousness, "Who cares for the poor?" Misery would rest on the Jews, till the Spirit was poured out on them, then they would have peace, when judgment would come on the multitude of the Gentiles, and the city be seen laid low. Then peace would be there.
Chapter 33. The Assyrian (or Gog) is then openly challenged. The Lord arises to take His place, and fills Jerusalem with righteousness and peace. The Remnant are preserved and blessed, when Jehovah takes matters into His own hand, and Zion is the seat of peace and blessing. King-Messiah, is there, and security. They are not shut up. The pride of man is wholly brought low.
Chapter 34 continues another part of the same but in connection with the Assyrian. It gives the connection of Idumaea and the Assyrian (compare Psalm 83) and records the terrible judgment which will take place in that land, always hostile to Judaea.
Chapter 35 is the blessing which follows for Israel.
This closes the divine history of the prophecy. Then we have (with the resurrection) the present events which gave the peg on which the prophecy hangs -- Sennacherib's invasion. The latter part of the prophecy is the account of the Lord's dealings with Israel (restoring them, and crowning them with glory) in respect of idolatry, and Babylon, and in respect of Christ, with the full results. How simply the folly of ignorance, is the complaint of rationalists that the second part of it is not woes or burdens like the first!
Chapters 40 to 48 go together. Chapter 40: 1 - 8 is, however, introduction. Jerusalem has been sufficiently chastised, and the Lord speaks to her heart. But that is accompanied by this solemn truth -- "All flesh is grass." The people, God's own people according to the flesh, come under this designation -- "the people are grass." That withers, but this does not hinder their full blessing, only it must be known, "God's word abides for ever," and that is what secures the promises and their accomplishment. This is the introduction. The general statement is then taken up. He that bringeth good tidings to Zion and Jerusalem (for so I am disposed to take it+) is to
+See marginal reading.
announce, with energy, God Himself "to the cities of Judah." He "will come with strong hand," with His reward, "shall feed his flock like a shepherd." Then comes the contrast between Jehovah and idols. Princes shall be brought to nothing. He is the Creator of the heavens. Why does Israel distrust Him? The strongest shall faint -- "those that wait on Jehovah shall renew their strength." This is the general thesis.
He then begins, naming the object only descriptively, with Cyrus. He breaks up the nations which serve idols, but Israel is Jehovah's servant, and shall, in the strength of his Redeemer, thrash the nations. The Lord shall refresh the poor and needy -- where all was waste, beauty and blessing shall spring up, and the hand of the Lord be thus seen, and the nothingness of idols proved. This goes on from Cyrus to full deliverance.
Chapter 42 consequently introduces Christ, meek and unknown till He set judgment in the earth, and the isles wait for His law. He was to be a covenant to the people and a light to the nations; so Simeon. Jehovah is thus to be everywhere praised. He rises up now, having long holden His peace, and brings blind Israel by a way they know not, and the idols shall be ashamed -- for Israel is blind and deaf, none so much so. He would magnify His Law and make it honourable. But Israel was robbed and spoiled -- Jehovah, for that was the cause, had given them up for their disobedience, and His anger had been poured out upon them. But now all was changed. Israel was redeemed called by His name -- His; and He would preserve them through every danger, and bring them out from every place, for Jehovah had created them for His glory. He challenges the nations to say what He was doing. But Israel had been a witness of His ways, when there was no strange God there. For their sakes, Babylon would be judged by Him who was the Redeemer of Israel -- the Creator, who brought in new things for His glory. The Lord then pleads with Israel, the people He had formed for Himself. But Israel had not served Him, but, on the contrary, wearied Him with their iniquities. He forgave them for His own sake. He had profaned, and given Jacob to the curse. But now He would refresh, and deliver, and calls to Jacob His servant, and His chosen to assure him of it. They should spring up as willows by the watercourses. He then takes up the controversy as to idolatry -- the great subject of this portion of the Book -- renews the promises to Israel, as his Redeemer -- He who can
do all things, He who formed Israel for Himself, and then calls Cyrus, by name, to perform His pleasure in rebuilding Jerusalem.
The destruction of Babylon is the setting aside the Gentile power which held Israel captive. It is the suppression of idolatry, so that the whole principle of full deliverance is brought forward with the strongest testimony of the place Israel holds, and sovereign grace in Him who can do all things, and who loves and forgives His people. We are beyond the question of the Assyrian here. It is the establishment of Jerusalem by the power of God -- Babylon being destroyed and idolatry put down.
Chapter 46 continues as to Cyrus. He is called by name for Israel's sake. Light, darkness, peace, and evil were His work, and the blessing of Israel is in God's creative power. His word and promise were not in vain. He was the one only God. But His word went also out to the nations. Every knee should bow to Him, and Israel be justified before the Lord. The gods of Babylon fail before the judgment of God -- nor would God delay the deliverance of Zion.
Chapter 47. The judgment of Babylon who had gladly oppressed God's people, when His hand was upon them, is fully stated.
Chapter 48. The Spirit then pleads with Jacob. God had foretold, lest they should say it was their idol. He had done it at once, lest they should say in human wisdom "I knew them"; but their neck was as brass. God would deliver them for His own name sake. He would judge Babylon. But if Israel had hearkened, his peace would have been as a river. But Jehovah would now deliver, refresh, and guide, only there would be "no peace for the wicked."
This closes the first prophecy to the heart of Israel; the subjects -- Jehovah, the one God -- Israel, His elect people, and servant, formed for His praise -- Babylon and idolatry, their oppressors -- Cyrus, their present deliverer, but future deliverance, and Christ Himself, looked forward to, and no wicked allowed, no peace for them. Jehovah and Israel, Babylon and idolatry, are in contrast. Cyrus the present instrument? but Jehovah who had judged Israel for their evil would redeem, and bless now for His own sake.
This general judgment and result having been unfolded, Messiah, Christ, must now be more distinctly brought forth, and Israel's relationship with Him.
Chapter 49 begins the second part of the prophecy. Israel is he in whom God will be glorified. The immediate portion closes at the end of chapter 57, and with the repetition of the last words of chapter 48, "There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked."
But if Israel is to be the seat and vessel of Jehovah's glory, Messiah must at once come in. But He comes in first, with the confession that, perfect as it was with God, His labour has been in vain with Israel. The answer of the Oracle of God is, it is a light thing to restore the preserved of Jacob, He should be a light to the Gentiles, Jehovah's salvation to the end of the earth. In verse 7 the ultimate purpose of God on earth is gone on to. Kings shall own Him -- Israel shall be delivered -- Zion, never forgotten, will be established in full favour in glory, delivered from the hands of the mighty, and kings and queens become her nursing fathers and mothers. And all flesh would know Jehovah was Israel's Saviour, and where and why was her divorce. And thus He fully enters into the sufferings and work of Christ.
Chapter 50. Here Jehovah, with no diminished power to save, came, yea called, but there was none to answer. Was His humiliation a motive, when He had come into it, to know how to speak a word in season to him that was weary? Wondrous and touching word! Blessedly submissive -- the Lord would vindicate Him! Those who feared the Lord and were in darkness were to wait on Him. Those who kindled their own sparks would lie down in sorrow. This passes on to the latter day, which chapter 51 then takes up in the most beautiful way -- the appeal of God to the Remnant, and, in the midst of it, the appeal of the Remnant to God, and the promise of full deliverance and judgment of the enemy, and then chapter 52 continues, by calling Zion to clothe herself with glory. To the end of verse 14, this deliverance is spoken of. Thus we have the full final deliverance of Israel. In verse 15 in a beautiful progress, we have not the history of rejection, as in chapter 50, but the Lord's mind as to Christ. Messiah is introduced in glory, but as the rejected and despised One, One esteemed the smitten One, but the atonement, wrought in His work, now owned, and thus blessing would come even on the transgressors,
and Himself have the glory spoken of before, in verse 13. But the consequence is, he passes directly, as usually in the prophets, to the last days, when its effect in Israel will be accomplished; and the Church is passed over, only chapter 54 recognises that more children have been born to desolate Jerusalem than to the married wife. And peace, now restored to Israel, shall abide for ever -- never to be taken from her; and her peace shall be great -- no enemy shall prevail against her.
Chapter 55 is the call to repentance, but an invitation in grace, so that in principle whoever thirst can come. Promises are established in resurrection. Christ is witness to, and a leader of the various peoples. Pardon is abundant, for God's thoughts are above ours, and His Word is infallible in producing its results.
Chapter 56 goes, evidently, beyond promise to Israel. It passes on to the last days, and, while assuring the blessing to the Remnant, passes it on to the Gentile. His house shall be "a house of prayer for all nations," i.e., those who have taken hold of Jehovah's covenant. Hence, clearly, Christ could speak of the blood of the new covenant as "shed for many." Here it goes on, no doubt, to the new state of things, but the foundation of it was laid in the Cross. Verses 9 - 12 are the condition of the nation and their teachers, not the Remnant
Chapter 57 goes on to what seems forgetfulness, on God's part, in the latter days. The righteous perishes, but this does not awaken the careless -- they mock at the righteous, going on with their idols. Their wickedness is then rehearsed. Jehovah defies their confidences, and declares that those that trust in Him shall possess the Land. He had smitten, but now would heal; but "for the wicked" there would be "no peace."
Chapter 58. Pleading with the ungodly is resumed, for chapter 57 closes one section -- their false and formal self-righteousness judged. On a true and upright return of heart to righteousness and God's ways, blessing would flow in as a river, and Jehovah's blessing on His people.
Chapter 59. His arm was not shortened, nor His ear heavy, but their iniquities had separated them from Him, and their evil state is exposed. From verses 9 to 15 is confession, and then God arises in His own strength, when all is at the very worst, destroys their enemies and acts in the power of the new covenant which is to be for ever. Then follows, in view of the full blessing, and the result of the latter day, a whole
development of all that took place connected with Christianity. It begins with putting Jerusalem in glory, as its thesis. But the state of the people is gone into, and the details of judgment and final deliverance, the elect Remnant being the first immediate object. This is the third part more specially connected with the second, as Christ's second coming is with the first -- the Remnant taking His character.
Note in chapter 60, when the lighting up of Jerusalem is come, and the glory of the Lord enlightens her, darkness covers the Land, and gross darkness the different peoples (l'-ummim). Then her light gathers them all to itself. This chapter is the description of the glory. The Gentiles are subservient to this glory, and the days of her mourning are ended, her people all righteous, and they will be blessed and mighty without return of evil, at least her sun going down. Thus chapters 58 and 59 are the time previous to the Lord's appearing, i.e., His pleadings with the people then. Chapter 60 is the effect of that appearing, chapter 59: 16 being the turning point. Chapter 61 brings in, evidently, Messiah and the full blessing, under Him, which goes on to chapter 62. Then chapter 63 takes up "the day of vengeance of our God." Chapter 60 brings in the sovereign re-establishment of Jerusalem in glory, fruit of God's own sovereign power and good pleasure.
Chapters 61 and 62 show the part of Christ, come in blessing, from His first to His second coming -- His interest in Jerusalem.
Chapter 63, bringing in the vengeance, pleads with the people, and the Remnant with Jehovah, for the great body of the people will be objects of the vengeance -- the carcase will be there. The judgment of the peoples, and enemies of Israel is in verses 1 - 6. Then come the ways of God in goodness, and of the people (verses 8 - 10). It is the Spirit of grace in the people (the Remnant) which now recalls it. It turns into the most earnest pleading in faith (verse 15), but passes into the fullest confession, and places the people in Jehovah's hands, as clay in the hands of the potter, and recalls the utter desolation of what, after all, was Jehovah's, if it was His people's, to the end of chapter 64. All this is very beautiful.
Then (chapter 65) comes the answer of Jehovah. But note the appeal to God is for the people as a whole; God separates and judges the people (so in Sodom). Then God's answer introduces the finding of the Gentiles, and God's patient but useless appeal to the Jews, quoted by the Apostle, and, giving
the character of the Jews of old and in the last days, intervenes for the Remnant, sparing because of them, but judging the people, taking them in their own ways and for their own doings, and makes the difference (as Malachi says) between those that sought the Lord, and the rebellious and idolatrous sinners. But, though saving and blessing the Remnant, it is really on the principle of a new creation, as all blessing must be, yet it is accomplished promises to Israel; but when, as a responsible nation, they are judged, verse 17 states, absolutely, the fact of new Creation. Verse 18 takes up, I conceive, the principle as now characterising God's dealings with Jerusalem. Hence we have no setting aside anything. At the end of the millennium, the wicked who rebel are destroyed. How the rest pass into final blessing is not said. It may be as men suppose Adam would have done, had he not sinned. But it is not the substitution of another state of things, setting aside this, though it may merge into better things, just as Christ's reign as Son of man does.
Then comes the millennial state, often noticed; compare chapter 11 of more extent, and chapter 25 which adds resurrection too, as well as the blessing of the Gentiles. This thought of creation characterises this part of the revelation, although physically it is not come yet. For us, at that time too, it will be the new Creation, and never pass away at all, but merge in what is eternal, though the reign over the earth will be given up, so as we have seen as to the earth, though the difference may be greater. The Jewish state is the fruit of sovereign power, not of dealing with responsibility, and a state God has produced for Himself for His praise. Hence in chapter 66 when the Jews shall have built the Temple, it is sufficient to say (for they seek to restore the old things, and as a beloved people on that footing) "All those things have been, saith Jehovah." But they, the Remnant, are to rejoice in that which Jehovah creates; the restoration of the old is utterly rejected. Then comes the new birth of the people, in the Remnant, and Jerusalem becomes their joy. Jehovah pleads in judgment with all flesh, idolaters and rebels (Jews and Gentiles are thrown together, but especially Jews) and then those that escape bring in the scattered Remnant from afar, and they will remain before Jehovah, His privileged priests and servants -- the carcases of the rebels being there, a witness of judgment, for this is judgment. Chapters 61 and 62 is simple blessing from
Messiah's coming, first and last, but, as we have seen from chapter 63, we have to do with judgment and new Creation.
The Lord looks to the heart and not to formal worship and sacrifice, so in the Lord's testimony. It is "the poor in spirit" (chapter 66: 2) -- the same words spoken of Moses in Numbers 11, and Christ's first blessing in Matthew 5.
Then there is another word in chapter 61: 10, 11, and in chapter 62, "righteousness." That the Lord is their righteousness, as ours, is clear. The prophet says, speaking in the person of the people and Jerusalem, "He hath covered me with the robe of righteousness." Then "the Lord Jehovah will cause righteousness and praise to spring forth before all nations."
In chapter 61, Jerusalem's righteousness goes forth. What is righteousness? In verse 10 it seems to be full acceptance according to the mind of God, in a righteous way, as the best robe with the prodigal. So Abel had testimony that he was righteous from his offering. We are the righteousness of God, accepted and acceptable according to God's own mind, what He is -- Christ being the ground, in Him only it is known and manifested. But this favour is not only realised, but reflected and manifested in fruits and the manifest state of soul of those enjoying it.
And here I remark that a place in this righteousness can never be had till it is submitted to, i.e., that a man has, consciously, no ground at all to meet God -- self is wholly condemned, and sovereign grace alone accepts through Christ; "grace reigns through righteousness." Hence it never is, when the soul is not brought, emptied of self, and judging evil, into the practical reflex of it in the state of the soul. Christ is precious to God, but the honour (time) is for us also. Hence, essentially, the state answers to it; hence the righteousness shines forth -- Jerusalem is right in all her thoughts; she judges evil as God does -- in God's favour, as He does towards her -- reflects it in her state and condition. And so with us, only in a higher and heavenly way. The righteousness is wholly Christ, but we are "accepted in the Beloved"; but He is in us, all to us, and manifested in us. Here, it will be publicly manifested, only when they see will they have it, and be seen in it. We know it is ours in a heavenly way. It will be manifested when we appear in glory; so Philippians 3. Still, by the power of the Spirit, it ought to be shown out now and this is
just the assurance of salvation, and its fruits. Only when Christ appears will they know -- we now by the Holy Ghost, while He is within, which gives all to us -- a full heavenly character, and we shall be glorified with Him then. Only the nations will recognise the rightness of the exaltation of God's people, the people whom He has blessed. For Jehovah, and Christ's glory, will be owned. For righteousness, as I have long ago said, is God's consistency with Himself -- He being essentially right. Ours would be consistency with the measure of our place before Him. But He has been perfectly glorified in Christ, and in respect of it, though in perfect holiness, yea, by it in obedience. Then this, i.e., Christ, is our righteousness. Hence God's, the necessary result as displayed in the creature, according to Christ, i.e., as He has entered into it as Man.
As to Edom, there are several points distinctly stated, and, after being made very small, the great judgment falls on the heathen there, and the existence and remembrance of Edom is utterly extinguished. It is stamped with the character of Gentile apostasy, as opposed to Israel, and relentless. It would seem rather that the destruction of Damascus preceded this, and thus the nations, in part at least, found themselves there gathered for destruction.
First, what happens as to Edom is the day of the Lord's vengeance on the heathen, and deliverance of Zion; see Isaiah 34:1, 2, 6, 8, also chapter 63: 4, and 3, context; see also Psalm 83.
Second. It is the day of "all the heathen." For this, and also for the first, see Obadiah 15, and 16, 17; and for the second, see Isaiah 34:2, already cited, also chapter 63.
Third. When the warnings are given of coming judgments (in Jerusalem) Edom treats it with scorn, i.e., when in the midst of sorrow in Jerusalem. The Spirit of God's own testimony is there for the Remnant -- the pride of Edom scorns it (Isaiah 21) and is treated with holy judgment and rebuke, yet in mercy. "Watchman, what of the night? Watchman, what of the night?" says Edom. "The morning cometh" for the faithful, says the answer of faith, "and also the night" for the scorners. "If ye will enquire, enquire ye." The answer of God is here, "Return, come." The answer is magnificent.
Fourth. Edom escapes out of the hand of Antichrist; Daniel 11.
Fifth. The heathen are employed by the Lord to make Edom small; Jeremiah 49:14, 15, and Obadiah 1 - 3.
Sixth. She is found in the confederacy against the Lord's "hidden ones," and thus is ripe for destruction; Psalm 83.
Seventh. She is filled with relentless hatred against the Jews, showing thus her iniquity; Ezekiel 35:5, 11, 12; Obadiah 10 - 14; Amos 1:11, and Ezekiel 25:12.
Eighth. Israel shall be the means of subduing them, when taken up by the Lord; Obadiah 18; Ezekiel 25:14, and Isaiah 11.
Ninth. The destruction of Edom is total, final, and irretrievable; Ezekiel 25:12, 13; chapter 35, all of it, especially verses 9, 14. Obadiah 5, 18, Jeremiah 49:13 - 18, etc., Isaiah 34:9, et seq., also the absence of passages in Jeremiah 49, like chapter 48: 47; chapter 49: 39, etc. Obadiah 21; Ezekiel 35; Isaiah 63 and 34, and other passages, show these things result at the end, and at the Lord's coming.
This chapter ends a division. It is a distinct condemnation of the moral state, then redemption by judgment.
Some find that the direction in Isaiah was to sit still, and the Lord would deliver -- in Jeremiah, that whoever went out to the Chaldaeans would save his life. We need spiritual discernment to apply (for there is our part -- not to reveal) or understand the testimony, and revelation of the Lord.
-- 27. What is the meaning of this? How we pass over Scriptures! Is the b' ("through"; A.V. "with") the means or the character? I have no doubt that Christ's death alone redeems (that is not the question) there alone mishpat (judgment) and tz'adakah (righteousness) are fulfilled for God, but are these general here, as the character of what must be where there is deliverance or redemption, or, as they are produced practically wherever redemption, are they merely characteristic of a supposed redemption wrought of God independently of them, as in the people? This last is only true redemption, but in the former case (for it was only the death of Christ which proved that nothing else would do, and that death must come in, not righteousness in life) it would be while stating the characteristic fact, still leaving it open to man's responsibility to meet the exigency of God's claims on him, only adding mercy which could forgive on repentance. We know it could not be so, and that, from the beginning, God knew Christ's death alone could meet it, and glorified Himself thus; but there would be the dealing with man in government, adding mercy for his full probation supposed. This was formally given to Israel in Exodus 34:6, 7. John the Baptist, and Christ on the earth, brought this to a crisis, and the full truth of what man is was brought out on the Cross. Man would often take the ground of Exodus 34 now, but it is ground tried and could come to nothing -- not to speak of the absolute truth of the Cross.
This verse then would remain true, as characteristic at all events, but is it put as still probationary here, i.e., that left open here as probation? In chapter 49 et seq., we get the result clearly and definitely stated. But this probationary process it will be well to watch through Isaiah. It is, after the Cross, the
denial of man's real state, from infidelity to Wesleyanism, though the latter may be guarded individually by individually owning its need.
-- 31. What is the force of poalo (the maker of it)? Is it poalo or po-°lo (his work)? In sense, "his work"; or, in general, the active man who works? "Maker of it" is difficult -- maker of what?
This gives the assemblage of the nations to Jerusalem restored, with its consequences in all the earth -- the effect of the manifestation of the majesty and day of the Lord on the pride of man.
-- 2. Akharith hay-ya-mim (the last days) is general, the end of the days, i.e., of Israel's history under its responsibility, leading in grace to the coming of Messiah, and Messiah Himself in His dealings with Israel in respect of that responsibility, not, I suppose, as finally reigning in glory. But it includes the elevation of Jerusalem to this state of glory -- the whole process, till it be fulfilled; so Hebrews 1. I do not think Akharey-ken in Joel 2:28 (chapter 3: 1 in the Hebrew) is "afterwards," but "thereupon," and refers to the whole statement from verse 17 to 27. Hence Peter (Acts 2:17) justly and exactly "in the last days," not eschate ton hemeron touton (the last of these days); it is more general. And note, all these dealings are connected with man's responsibility, i.e., Israel's -- the manifestation of Jesus, and the then blessing, on power in grace.
-- 9. "Humbleth himself." Query as to this. It is reflective, or practically passive. Has shaphel this sense? Shaphel really means "he is low."
The Lord judges Jerusalem, giving her up to judicial misery, but then "the Branch of the Lord" shall come forth -- the residue shall be holy, and the glory of the Lord there.
This chapter had appeared separate, but I doubt if it be not part of the whole prophecy ensuing -- chapters 6, 7 and 8, down to verse 20 inclusive, being in parenthesis. This parenthesis
gives, not the instruction as to evil and chastisement by external enemies, but the special instruction as to the glory of Christ, and the judicial blindness of the people. The seed of David connected with the Remnant -- thereon desolation of the Assyrian. The Land being withal Immanuel's -- but these waters of Siloah being rejected, the waters of the Assyrian mount to the neck. The Lord Himself is the only refuge, the true Prophet, and the children are for signs. The law being sealed up among the disciples, the Spirit waits for a manifestation, in favour of Jacob, of Him who "hides his face." Meanwhile the law and the testimony are the means of judgment to Israel.
Having introduced this account of the glory of Christ, the judicial blindness of Israel, the Remnant, Immanuel the Child -- this feeble fountain despised, Jehovah, the Hope of the Remnant, a Sanctuary and yet a snare -- the testimony is sealed up among the disciples, waiting for the Lord who "hides his face" -- the law and the testimony, the means of judgment. The prophet resumes the general course again as to the nations, which he had spoken of as brought up against Jerusalem and the Land, showing that the introduction of Messiah, of whom had been mention in the parenthesis, changes all. For, though the darkness and the dimness be infinitely greater, and they "driven to darkness," than in preceding trials, yet they that walked in it had seen great light. The yoke was broken completely, and the government set on the shoulders of the Child that was to be born to them -- no end should be of His blessing on the throne of David. The link of the mind of the prophecy is in chapters 5: 30 and 8: 22. The parenthesis introduces Messiah for its effect on this trouble, showing His rejection, and the truth among the disciples of the great prophet, but then Israel in utter darkness thereon, but the great light not less true in the end. There seems to me to be solid ground for this course of the chapters, and judging the Spirit's mind to be this in the connection.
Note also in these parenthetic chapters, Emmanuel is given as "a sign," and as a sign in grace. The house of David had not only wearied men, but had wearied God also. Ahaz, feeling the proximity of God, shrinks, under the form of piety, from the offered sign, and God takes up the matter in grace as to Messiah, but in the revelation of judgment. All the subjects
of fear of Ahaz were nothing at all, but the wickedness of Israel would bring in the Assyrian as the "rod of indignation." All this applied to Judah, for Israel was object of fear, and had been already sentenced, but then this is to engraft the judgments of the latter day on the rejection of Messiah. Chapter 7: 16, connects itself more historically with verse 9. Then, in chapter 8, "the children" are added to the sign to "both the houses of Israel." The resumption of the prophecy in verse 21 terminates in chapter 9: 7, but this identifies itself much more with Judah and the throne of David, though that affects the whole nation, from verse 8. It is more historical for Israel, and, after the miseries of Israel, the Assyrian who had overrun Samaria and menaced Jerusalem, and who was "the rod of indignation," is put in contrast with the Rod of the stem of Jesse, and the effect of the manifestation of the glory of Messiah, the Lord Jesus, is shown.
Note the Rod of Jesse, and Branch out of his roots for Israel, and the Root of Jesse for the Gentiles. In the beginning of the Apocalypse He is the "Root of Jesse" only -- He has not taken His earthly throne as Son of David -- at the end He is Root and Offspring, taking both places.
The recovery of the dispersed is spoken of, after the glory of the rest, and the ensign of the people. Both in chapters 8 and 10, the Spirit reaches out to the latter days, and to the Assyrian of that day. This explains, in a measure, the linking of these passages, because it was necessary to bring in the episode of Messiah as sign (just like the little book in Revelation 10 and 11), to complete the history, and to give the ground of the dealings of God with Israel, and especially Judah, whether in mercy and sovereignty, or in judgment. Chapters 5 and 9, though it reach to Israel, are specially occupied with Judah, though Judah affects the whole land the moment Israel is out of the way, as in the time of the Lord, not then more Galilee, as it is said, than Samaria which was a thing apart. From chapter 9, the "anger not turned away," is generalised historically again; it had commenced specially as to Judah and Jerusalem, in chapter 5: 25. Now it recommences with Ephraim and Samaria. Chapter 12 evidently terminates the prophecy. The Lord is in Zion, and His greatness manifested there.
Recurrence to this quite makes me think it clears up the prophecy much, as to its order.
It is evident chapter 5 is the moral, legal, national guilt of Israel, as the following chapter is their sin as regards Christ, both more fully developed after chapter 40. But then in this chapter (5), while the present state of desolation is noticed, yet that is declared not to be the close of judgment. But then he does not continue it, as a present thing, as in chapter 9 from verse 8, and following up to the Assyrian, which closes it, but brings in, in general, the inroad of the nations, bringing in darkness and desolation. But it would apply to the Chaldaean invasion, as well as to any other, not captivity. It is judgment on the Land, and it is purposely not particularised, only the nations from afar are brought up by Jehovah against it. But it would rather apply to the Chaldaeans, and on to the Romans, though as desolating the Land. And, whatever the patience of God, the next chapter goes on to their time. Chapter 9, as I have said, gives detail from the then immediately succeeding time, on to the Assyrian, who closes judgment; chapter 10: 5-25. Chapter 6 is evidently not the law, but a revelation of Jehovah. In chapter 5 Israel is an object of judgment -- the whole "vineyard in the fruitful hill." In chapter 7 it is the house of David, Judah, and Jerusalem, and Israel is the enemy with Rezin. It is equally clear that Jehovah, in chapter 6 and in chapter 8: 13, et seq., is Christ. I suppose the same is intimated in chapter 5: 1, but there as having originally planted Israel, not as coming to it revealing Himself, for that is chapters 6 and 8; yet in chapter 8 coming as Man, the Stone of stumbling.
In chapter 5 present judgment, and the darkening of the Land go together -- in chapters 7 and 8, Christ and final deliverance. But note, in chapter 5 there is no deliverance -- Israel is guilty as brought out by Jehovah, and under the law -- in Christ, however much greater the sin, there is.
Note, too, in what follows, Israel is always viewed as God's people not finally delivered from judgment, till the Assyrian is destroyed, but from Rezin and Pekah -- is always viewed as God's people with whom He was dealing, and this, after all, is a comfort, and the full power of evil against them is therefore full deliverance. Nor is Babylon seen at all, until she is seen in judgment. Chapter 14 carries it on to the end -- the Assyrian without, and Philistia within, being judged after the head of the Babylonish Gentiles, and then the rest in connection with Israel.
The general mission of Isaiah shows a blessed state, and great preparedness of heart in the prophet. The vision was of the Lord in His holy character. The burning Seraphim were then celebrating it, lowly but exalting Jehovah. The prophet has the fullest sense of this, both for himself and the state of the people. No haste to go but a sense of what he was, and of what the people were, in presence of a holy yet evidently a known God. "Woe is me, I am undone, for I am a man of unclean lips, and dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips, and I have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." The effect was subjective, and that was all -- the deepest and truest place. But the moment his lips are cleansed by the coal from the altar, and Jehovah says "Whom shall I send, and who shall go for us," he offers himself -- "Here am I, send me." This is very beautiful. We are apt to run (I admit the difference of the Gospel) in haste, as soon as interested, and then to shrink before the carelessness or opposition of the world. Here he does not stir till the Lord has fitted him, and calls; then he is His ready servant. Here, consequently, we get the largest scope of prophecy -- the fullest scheme of the counsels and intentions of God, in connection with His plans as to His people and His glory.
-- 1. "The Lord," so in verses 8 and 11, but in verse 5 it is "the Lord of hosts."
-- 6. The veils do not come into question here. I suppose it was from the brazen altar.
-- 12, 13. The language of these verses is remarkable, and much stronger than one would suppose; I am not sure that I understand it fully. "And the Lord have removed far" (as in anger or displeasure, as in other places His face) "the Adam" (eth ha Adam) "and hath multiplied forsakings" (derelictions) "in the midst of the Land" or "earth." It seems to identify the dealings of God in the Land with the whole earth, and His actings on man. The Adam (God made eth ha Adam "in his image, after his likeness" -- so as a dream, when one awaketh, shall He despise his image) for then shall all the question between God, and man in power and presumption, be centred there; compare Luke 2:14, for now He, in whom He is well pleased, is on high, rejected of the world, and we are in Him, but the whole world lieth in wickedness. This may be pursued,
for the sons are accepted in the Beloved, but, save in mystery in Him, the ha Adam is set aside. "In the midst" (rokhav, breadth) but yet "in it," i.e., I suppose, the Land, there shall be a tenth, a Remnant, and it shall return, and shall be for burning -- as Lebanon shall not be sufficient to burn -- "shall be to be consumed" for fuel; for her iniquity shall be purged by the Spirit of judgment and the Spirit of burning, and, as the teil-tree or oak, whose root or trunk remains in casting their leaves, so the holy seed shall be the root thereof; compare Romans 11, which is just drawn in Spirit from this, quoad that part of the image.
The translators seem to have been misled by the apparent subject matter, but it seems strange they should have gone from so simple a word as l'va-er (eaten; strictly "consumed by burning") though it mean also consumption by browsing. Further we may observe as to this, in application, it is the Spirit of Christ testifying according to the righteousness of judgment, of which fire is the symbol, for even the Remnant shall pass through the fire, but He (who has indeed passed through, so as to bear their iniquities) shall be with them. Thence the word s'raphim (burners), here only, I believe, used. One of the burners came, and touched with a coal from off the altar (typifying the consumption of sin) -- the altar of burnt offering -- his lips, and he spoke accordingly. He bore about the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus might be manifest in his mortal body. Compare the whole of chapter 27, as we have already referred to the Spirit of judgment and Spirit of burning, ba-ar (he consumed).
The Seraphim I conceive to be the agency of the power of God, according to His character, but here towards the Remnant, for every man's work shall be tried by fire; accordingly when the Lord tries the Churches His eyes are as a flame of fire. The Cherubim were the agency of God; as see observations elsewhere on Revelation. Thus he was qualified to testify, according to this, to the Jews, the special objects of the one and the other. This, accordingly, became accomplished when the Lord Jesus Christ came into the world (amongst the Jews) gathering the wheat and burning up the chaff, etc., for judgment, that they which see might be made blind. But He came for judgment because He came not for judgment, for so it is with man thus left to himself.
Note, the saint takes the message without knowing what it
is, for it is of God, and the primary character of the prophet is direct association of mind with Him -- it is a trust on the part of God, in which the prophet is separated into His interest from all others. That interest may indeed be the Church, or it may be the judgment of the Churches -- but that is another question; it is always God. I have sometimes thought this was the meaning of "Lovest thou me more than these?" "Can you act for me, independent even of your tie to these?" I am sure the principle is necessary for efficient service for Christ in the Church.
This chapter specially puts the prophet in his prophetic place, and is deeply interesting as describing it. The prophetic place begins where the Church is withered, as it were. It is the presence of the Spirit of Christ, cognisant, by the knowledge of God's burning judgment, of what the Church ought to be, sensible in all perfect sympathy, as dwelling amongst it, of its state and necessity, and withal of the mind of God toward it, and knowing, therefore being, itself, as a word formed on the standard of God's holiness towards it, the development and depository of His mind towards it. We find it then thus exhibited. It is therefore the mind of God toward the Church, as so cognisant, and the mind of the Church towards God, both in their perfectness as in Romans 8. Here therefore it is exhibited especially in that word, "Lord, how long?" For it knows, experimentally, the mind of God towards His Church in favour, and rests on that.
This chapter is the installation of the prophet in his office. To the end of verse 12, from the beginning of verse 7, is a substantive prophecy; what follows is detail. Verses 7 - 13 is the Covenant of David, in Christ, as failed in se.
-- 16. "The land, before whose two kings thou art in fear, shall be forsaken."
-- 22. The ma-uph (dimness) of this verse, and mu-aph (dimness) of chapter 9: 1 (in the Hebrew 8:23) and khoshech (darkness) are to be connected, which, I think, clears the sense, specially when the plain application, or exposition, of
Matthew be taken, in which, I take it, is a strict application according to the sense of the Spirit, in the prophet, in the passage.
-- 3. "Thou hast multiplied the nation, increased the joy to it."
-- 6. Up to this, chastisement; now, judgment, but as it is the intervention of God, it is the deliverance of His people, but in a remnant.
-- 20 - 27. Nothing can be more distinct than the elements of the prophecy here, and its bearing is equally important -- the Remnant, the calah v'nekheratzah (A.V., a consumption even determined) of the last days -- the judgment of the great enemy; in this, the indignation ceasing. It is a deliverance, like Egypt, only Israel has been purged by judgment. Chapter 4: 4, and the anointing has taken its effect, so that it is secure and stable. How rationalists are to be pitied! And Lowth is not much better, indeed never to be trusted. No doubt in Hezekiah's time it cast its shadow before, compare verse 5. Chapter 11 must be read as the same prophecy, i.e., from chapter 10: 25 to 11: 6.
This chapter follows the chastisements of Israel as such, and final judgment of the Assyrian, the enemy, as we have seen, of old of Israel and Judah when owned -- and is the blessing of Judah and Zion as such, when the Root of Jesse shall be there. Chapter 24 is after the judgment of the different nations, only Jews and Land come in amongst them, as chapters 18 and 24. Hence we have general judgment and general blessing, "the hosts on high," "the kings of the earth" verses 21, 22) and then the Lord reigns in Mount Zion. Rebellious power is brought down according to God's counsels -- blessings for all are in Mount Zion. The evil of darkness over the Gentiles will be then taken away, death is swallowed up in victory for the heavenly people, and the reproach taken off His people everywhere. Israel then meets God with joy, and their own
land is subdued under them. Chapter 26 sings the song of these judgments, and their course, and that of the people's and Jews' hearts. The power of the Gentiles is not reviewed, of His people it is, but it is Jehovah's not the people's work, and those that have ears to hear are invited to hide themselves for a little moment, till the indignation be over, for Jehovah is coming out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity. Chapter 27 depicts this dealing with the power of evil, and with Israel which He keeps and gathers, but chastises as a people of no understanding.
-- 10. From this verse, Joel 2:10 and 31; chapter 3: 15; Matthew 24:29; Ezekiel 32:7, and Amos 8:9, I gather the following. The darkening of the sun is not Gog but Antichrist. The tribulation is under Antichrist before Gog, or the Northern army comes up. The people called up against the Jews (apparently, as in unbelief and connected with Antichrist) is Gog or the Northern army. This, and not Antichrist, is the terrible day of the Lord. The agency of the saints is connected with this; see Joel, etc. The sun is put out before this, apparently as in Daniel 11, end. Antichrist is not, properly, the indignation -- that is when Gog, or the Assyrian, comes up, and wholly ceases in their destruction; compare Ezekiel 38, 39, and Isaiah 10. It would rather appear that the destruction of Antichrist is connected with the agency of the saints. The sun shall be dark before them, and so the terrible day of the Lord. Antichrist is called "the king," "Lucifer," in the Old Testament scriptures. The Jews against Gog, or the Assyrian, as Zechariah 9, and other passages of scripture.
The chapters from 13 to 21 inclusive are remarkable -- a perfect confusion as to the events from which they are drawn, that there may be instruction for the fulness of prophecy to come. First, Babylon and Israel contrasted -- the world judged in Babylon, therefore for it generally (verse 11) and the Lord choosing yet Israel, and "set them in their own land," not Judah there (Antichrist viewed herein) but Babylon put before the Assyrian, which we know was long after, and the Assyrian destroyed, in history, first -- here, afterwards on the mountains. This purposed on the whole earth, and then, afterwards, the
land cleared, Philistia -- Zion then viewed as founded. This is a complete scene in itself; there are other details, however, that are general and complete for Israel and the Land.
Then we have Moab, which was destroyed by Babylon, is called to send the lamb to the daughter of Zion, and, at the end, a date of three years given. Then Damascus, which was carried captive by Assyria, and, at the close, the destruction of the Assyrian; still verses 7 and 4, the glory of Jacob made them but regard to God. Then we have a nation entirely beyond the limits of the nations in question, beyond the Nile and Euphrates, who take an interest in the Jews, but the Jews are left an entire prey in the midst of the nations. Then Egypt, given into the hand of a cruel king, smitten and healed -- Judah a terror to Egypt, and Egypt, Assyria and Israel all one. God will send them a great Saviour. Then as a further detail, the Assyrian seizes on Egypt. Then, no help from Assyria. Then, under the term of "the desert of the sea," the fall of Babylon by Elam and Media -- the incredulity of Dumah judged, and Arabia. Then the fall of Jerusalem by Persia and Media -- the rulers fled, then found in her bound. Yet the circumstances of the time of Hezekiah, evidently referred to, even persons' names, yet so as to bring out all the glory of the house of David on One who replaces another who has no right there, or whose right the land disallows. In that day, as to the events from which the prophecies flow, they are all extraordinarily jumbled together; as to those to which they tend they cast a perfect light. Tyre and the land (ha-aretz, the earth), present more difficulty, and though of express force, I should feel of wider character.
It is evident that chapters 13 to 26 take up the present state of things universally in the world, as the subject of judgment, and God's dealings as long as Israel was a testimony, were supportable, i.e., that God's judgment could be displayed in it in the midst of the nations. There was no word of judging all alike, as from without, but, when Israel (or Judah) had to be judged, then the consequences of evil must come judicially on all around. The world in general was on the footing of dispersion, whatever changes in detail had taken place. The grand question was, what was Israel's faith when the world rose up against it in the Assyrian? God saved them then, but their iniquity was such, they were not to be purged till they died. So that they were then found guilty for judgment, though God
raised up Hezekiah, and, in His then external government, could deliver the city; but in the internal, by the testimony of the prophet, they are declared wholly guilty. Hence, they are given up to the reign of Manasseh, which brought the judgment, being spared during Hezekiah's reign, having with him humbled themselves. How perfect is God's government, as are all His ways!
Then these chapters deal with the world as it is, and pass the line of judgment over it all around, and then pass over to the next thing -- God's interference to bring about His order and blessing, which is really the next thing after the breaking up the order and existence of nations, among which His people had a place. He despised the rod of His Son, as every tree. The bounds of the people had been set according to the number of the children of Israel, and, hence, the whole system fell together.
But there was another thing to be considered -- that which was the instrument of judgment. Hence the judgment, and captivity of Babylon itself, and its rebellious head too, is introduced, and Babylon was outside the dispersion before it, and a principle apart. It was union by the violence of the mighty hunter, and Babel the beginning of his kingdom. (The Assyrian is another power we will speak of afterwards.) Hence Babylon stands out distinct. It was the instrument of judgment on all then, but then for the bringing in of God's judgment. It has to be judged, along with the rest, for God's people are in captivity there. As to details, therefore, we find first, this grand, absorbing power judged alone, and the audacious and blasphemous rebellion of its chief noted, calling down the judgment by which Israel is delivered. (Then the Assyrian falls on the mountains, and Palestine cleared by the Lord.) This is the complete scene of the results at the end.
Then comes the then present breaking up of the subsisting system of which Nebuchadnezzar was, historically, the instrument, passing even over, as we have said, to the last days. God interferes in that day, for that was the true power of judgment. Taking occasion from Damascus (through which quarter consequently, I suppose, the attack will take place) we have the inroad of the nations against Judah (but Jacob is as gleanings left only) to their own destruction, as in Zechariah. Sennacherib is partly an example -- I say "partly," because it was not he that took Damascus.
Also in chapter 18, we have the additional element, that Israel shall be brought back by some extraordinary intervention of a nation (I have a strong notion it is England) who takes them up, but, having planted them in their own land, they become a prey there of the nations. Still they are brought as, and being, a present to the Lord of Hosts. Then, chapter 21, we have historically Babylon itself taken, and then the daughter of His people spoiled. At the same time the key of the house of David taken from the confident and proud ruler, who is put to shame, and placed in the hands of Him who is chosen of God. Chapter 24 gives the total desolation of the Land, but hence of the earth, and of the world, as that in which alone, as we have seen, hangs the possibility of earthly blessing and stability -- the central system of an owned earth in government, and indeed all will be concentrated there in that day, all the nations of the earth; see chapter 26: 9, and compare Revelation 14. The judgment on this occasion reaches to the heavenly powers as well as "the kings of the earth upon the earth." "The Lord of hosts shall reign" -- this evidently changes all.
This is giving mercy to Israel in the destruction of the Assyrian, compare chapters 15, 16, Micah, and the subjection of all Philistia. Note, in remarking on Babylon, the different things which are assembled in that prophecy.
The subjection of Moab seems to be, according to the statement of the Psalm, the work of Messiah, after the destruction of the adversary, in whose exaltation Israel has rejoiced, or at least was joined with the Assyrian. They are called on to receive the outcasts during the oppression of Antichrist, anticipating his destruction, or showing their folly in not owning it by his destruction.
-- 8. Meaz (A.V., "since") seems to mean "from of old."
-- 13 and 14 seem to have a special application.
I do not see how it is possible, in all this part of Isaiah, from chapter 13 and even before, not to see that the Spirit of God is taking up the great plan of God, and speaking of future coming events, but taking hold of present ones as an occasion,
and that connected with the government of God then, which will be fully displayed at the end.
Note Damascus was taken by the king of Assyria in the reign of Ahaz; but all this is evidently in the latter days. Moab, however, suffers first from the heathen.
We have here the circumstances of the restoration of the Jews, in connection with a protecting nation out of the limits of ancient Jewish associations.
This chapter is full of deep interest. The "swift messengers" (mal'akhim kallim); I have not yet entirely assured myself of what they were. I take the statement to be literal as regards its actual fulfilment. The "rivers of Cush" I take to be not only the Nile but the Euphrates, as if he should say, "I am now speaking of a land or people beyond those in point of distance, which now are the extremities of and affect the Jewish land and people."+Yet a people which is to have extensive empire of influential subjection, and intimately connected with the Jews in their dealings in that day, when Israel is developed in their full history and character, the last act being then accomplished, a people long deferred, as He saith -- true, in the Remnant. "Shall not God avenge his own elect, which cry day and night unto him, though he bear long with them? Yea, He will avenge them speedily." And it is the character of prophecy to say "How long?" "How long, O Lord, for ever shall thy fury," etc. And the want of faith in the Jewish people is described by "none to say, How long?" Here then is the sense of m'musshak (drawn out, scattered). It is the same word as "Hope long deferred." A people continually, insultingly, ill-treated, whose hair is plucked off -- the same word, passive for active, as "I gave my cheeks to those that plucked off the hair," where our Lord is describing His Jewish humiliation -- a people terrible (no-ra) to be revered, wondered at, or feared, from existence forward for ever, i.e., from the time the Lord made them a people; true, in principle, in the beginning, in fact from the time here finally spoken of, commonly translated "from this out" -- a nation (now not mentioned as a
+Me-e-ver l' (beyond) is always, as far as I see, "on the other side of"; it is a use of me-e-ver, in relative place to.
people because dealt with on general moral principles, and, indeed, judged accordingly) a nation, which has had "line upon line," first by presenting the measure and righteousness of God's judgments, in testimony, if they would hear, and then, "hear or forbear," it came upon them as the exact measure of God's judgments, and such, I apprehend, is the force of chapter 28: 13. The Word, as I find it, is ever a measuring line, and, as the strictness and perfectness of God's judgments must be familiar to readers of Scripture attentively, I understand it still as a line or measure in Psalm 19:4, and this use of it, is what, I believe, the Spirit of God refers to in Paul, when he speaks of the metron tou kanonos (the measure of the rule, 2 Corinthians 10:13) which ho theos metrou (the God of measure) hath distributed, so I should be rather inclined to read it "had distributed" or "allotted" to him, to a nation then measured, measured, i.e., by the judgments of God (accomplishing His word which they would not receive in truth, and therefore they found here in judgment, as He saith, "Judgment will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet") trodden down, or under foot. Compare chapters 63 and 64, where this is all made the subject of supplication, and much answer given in chapter 65 as regards Christ.
-- 2 and 7. "Whose land the rivers" -- I sometimes thought this might mean "above mentioned," but these were only characteristic of the rest, and it is used, I imagine, generally. The nations have made Jacob a prey, as, during the times of the Gentiles, they can have been to one another, but, whoever was dominant, they were subject until this time. They were a prey twice; some might use them well, as the Persians did, still they were a prey, and soon out of their hands -- "have made a prey" or "spoiled."
The rest of the chapter describes the Lord's dealing, in that day, as done as a summons and witness to all nations. He then explains the dealings as regards the Jews, when the previous dealing, resulting in their being brought, and their offerings accepted, recognised in all their previous character, is over.
We have, here, Egypt, in dissension, given up to a tyrant, and in the terror of Judah, in the blessing of Israel.
This is an episode as to Egypt, to wit, the inroad and success of the Assyrian.
Babylon is taken. Idumaea slights the warning. Arabia is judged.
Jerusalem is taken, and Eliakim replaces Shebna, or Christ Antichrist.
This chapter is not a distinct burthen. It is the Land, and therewith as the earth, of which it is become the centre, the world, and the manifestation of the Lord's glory in Jerusalem.
-- 4. This verse seems to preclude the confining it to the Land, for, I suppose, te-vel (the world) is never used but in the one sense, generically. So the Spirit in the Apocalypse, 16: 14 (Revelation 16:14), though leaning, as here, on the principal point to which the other was subordinate; so chapter 34: 6.
This is a celebration of the glory and blessedness, and what belongs to that day, the proud enemy, Moab being subdued under the Lord.
-- 9 and 21. "The inhabitants of the earth"; compare Apocalypse 3: 10 (Revelation 3:10), "Them that dwell upon earth." Note the difference, too, between 2 Peter 2:9, where the comparison is with Noah and Lot, who passed through the tribulation, and
Apocalypse 3: 10 (Revelation 3:10). In Peter, we have rhuesthai ek peirasmou (deliver from temptation) and in the Apocalypse tereso ek tes horas tou peirasmou (I will keep from the hour of temptation). The difference is evident, and confirms the force of this latter, as interpreted, for the deliverance of the faithful Remnant; quod nota.
This chapter specially belongs to Judah, and the circumstances connected with that, before the indignation be overpast.
-- 4. The voice of the vineyard would be, "I have no wall; oh, that I had for myself briars and thorns"! This chapter takes up Israel on the destruction of Leviathan, and, connected with the last verses of the former chapter, closes with the gathering of the scattered gleanings abroad.
The double inroad of the nations. First, Ephraim is assailed by the Assyrian, etc., and overwhelmed, yet it was in the day of the Lord's deliverance. At this time scornful men, dwelt at Jerusalem, who said that the scourge would not reach them. But it should overflow the hiding place, and they should be trodden down by it.
There is "a consumption determined upon the whole land," yet unhappy and ignorant Zion the Lord loveth, and, when the learned cannot read His mind because he is unlearned, the Lord knows the thoughts He thinks towards them -- thoughts of peace and not of evil -- to give them an expected end. Jerusalem, or Zion the lion of God, shall be brought perfectly low, but the Lord shall fight against all the nations, and "they shall be as a dream when one awaketh" and according to His everlasting covenant, "Jacob shall not be ashamed, neither shall his face now wax pale."
-- 3. We find here details. They seek for help from Egypt in that day, when "in returning and quietness" should have been their strength; therefore the Lord would leave them to
the strength of their enemies. But He will wait till they have tasted all this, and then be gracious Himself, for the destruction of the Assyrian shall be the joy of a Remnant. Tophet is also prepared for the king.
-- 12. "This word" refers, I suppose, to verses 6 and 7.
-- 18. Compare chapters 8: 17, and 18: 4. Indeed it is the whole history as chapter 6, and originally at Sinai; Exodus 33:19. God must retreat into His own sovereignty to spare, though He punish according to our responsibility in government or in righteousness. And faith, founded on righteousness, waits for Him -- or even in hope through grace, where divine righteousness is not yet known.
-- 20. It would seem from this verse (of those chapters which enter into the detail of Israel in the latter day) that though fed and nourished with affliction, yet they shall leave their teachers, in spite of all who shall guide them in the way.
-- 33. "For the king also it is prepared." "The king" is mentioned three times in prophecy; here, in chapter 57: 9, and in Daniel 11.
ISAIAH 31 and 32
We have here a special introduction of the circumstances of the change of dispensation -- the first chapter which, by the grace of my God, opened my ignorant eyes to this serious and all-important subject -- things important to us. The Lord is wise, though He is not looked to. The Lord shall fight for Zion, and the Assyrian shall fall, but not by "a mighty man." Then the King, reigning in righteousness, is introduced -- His righteous character -- and the manifestation of villainy as vile. The city forsaken, Jerusalem trodden down, till the Spirit be poured out on the Jews. Note the synchronism, and a total change of dispensation -- all before should be but as an uncultivated fruit, and so it is. Still, blessing should be universal on Jew and Gentile; the city only should be brought low, and the Gentile fruit judged.
This (the King being now introduced) is the judgment of the Assyrian. In his latter approach he spoiled, but had not been spoiled -- the circumstances of Zion -- the detail of all that
had passed, or allusion to it, but the Lord arises. The Remnant are preserved, they see "the King in his beauty," and have their portion now, even to the end of the Land. The Assyrian could not prevail, nor strengthen "his mast"; how could he pass the Lord as a defence? Then there is a great judgment on the nations which has place in Idumaea. It is the day of the Lord's vengeance. His recompenses for Zion. Then the universal joy, and consequence of blessing. Antichrist has nothing to do with all this. The only place he can be supposed to be mentioned is, if it be, where it is added, "Yea, also for the king it is prepared" (gam-hu lammelek). Otherwise it is the historic connection between Israel, Zion, the inroad of the nations, Egypt, the Lord, the Assyrian, the King, and the full joy thereon -- their complete deliverance and security -- and, in a word, everlasting joy upon their heads, seeing "the King in his beauty," possessing the Land, the desert blossoming, and holiness their way.
I also gather from this, that Edom and Bozrah in chapter 63, is not the destruction of Antichrist, but that which is spoken of in these chapters, the nations there, after the former had passed, by the coming of Christ with all His saints, from the scene. The controversy with the nations when Zion is taken up -- the prostrate, because disobedient, lion of God.
The second part of Isaiah begins by the proclamation, of the herald who precedes the Lord, that "All flesh is grass," and that "the people," even the people of the God "is grass." Man and Israel are withered and profitless, but this does not change the certainty of hope, because the Word of Israel's God endures for ever. Then Zion is the scene of blessing -- God's strength in judgment, the means -- and He will care for His flock. Then His Almighty supremacy is unfolded, in contrast with idols. Israel should remember that He "fainteth not, neither is weary."
He reduces to silence all the heathen and their idols, sending forth the instrument of His power to execute His purpose. Israel had nothing then to fear.
Next, Christ is His Servant in lowliness, and shall be in power. He shall unfailingly accomplish all His purposes. Thus Jehovah will "lead the blind," and who is blind as Israel,
having every opportunity and observing nothing? God will glorify His Law and ways, yet Israel is oppressed, for He hath sinned, but God has formed him for Himself -- he need not fear, He will deliver, and, in spite of all his failure, he is not to think of the old things, but to count on this faithfulness of delivering grace.
Thus, while making grass of man, God acts here in certain delivering grace in His faithful love to His people -- acts from His own unchangeable love and faithfulness. Christ, as His Servant, and the Elect One, is the great instrument of this. Israel had been rejected for sin -- there was "no peace for the wicked" -- but a Remnant would be saved. But, if chosen, they were chosen in "a furnace of affliction." It is grace, and God's own purpose, while sin is shown to be the cause of their condition. Christ, the elect Servant, is introduced -- Cyrus and Babylon are brought in, as the first grand sign of deliverance, after the evil and the judgment of the heathen and their idols. Chapter 49 begins, specifically, the case of Christ, and Israel's condition in respect of Him.
This chapter is comfort to Israel, as witness of the power of God. In general it is the comfort of Jerusalem -- thus the voice of the Baptist preparing the way of the Lord -- the manifestation of the sovereignty of Jehovah. Then the Spirit of prophecy declares "all flesh is grass"; consequently, all the Jewish system falls together, founded in flesh. The Law, also, was "weak through the flesh," "but the Word of our God," says the Spirit in the Jewish Remnant, "shall stand for ever." Then Zion, visited in blessing in the latter days, becomes the messenger of blessing to all the cities of Judah. Christ comes -- verse 12 begins His controversy of the nations, in which Israel was the witness of the unity and glory of Jehovah. But Jehovah has to vindicate it Himself.
-- 2. Nir 'tzah (is pardoned) is "discharged," satisfaction is made for it.
-- 3. Connect kol kore (voice of him that crieth) and verse 6, k'ra (cry). John's crying was bammid-var (in the wilderness), i.e., of the Jewish people. Our Lord came in the street, the city, but did not kara (cry out), though He suffered, for good reason, out of it.
-- 6. Note the use of khas'do (the goodliness thereof) -- its gracefulness, I suppose. It is doxa (glory) in the Septuagint.
-- 9. I do not know without examination, but I rather prefer "who bringest good tidings to Zion" -- "to Jerusalem."
-- 12. Tik-ken (meted out); the same word is used in verse 13 for "hath directed." "Heaven" -- the heavens -- what is this?
-- 27, 28. We see the appeal of Jehovah, in grace, against the incredulity of the people.
-- 31. "They that wait on the Lord" are distinguished.
Then the "King of Jacob" challenges the nations, and, by the hand of Cyrus (as an example) destroys the power of idolatry. He giveth "good tidings to Jerusalem."
This chapter is judgment on the islands (Gentile nations) by the instrument which God had appointed, as contrasted with Israel.
-- 2. "Righteousness," see margin. We have here, and in several other passages, a use of "righteousness" which illustrates and clears up its use in the New Testament, so that Gesenius translates it here and elsewhere "liberation, salus." It is the interference of God's power here, in consistency with His own character, and in grace towards His people, which therefore necessarily delivers them. "Who raised up righteousness from the east?" God acts to vindicate His own character, and power against evil. It is God's righteousness. Taking Cyrus as a primary fulfilment, God is obliged to vindicate His title against the pride of the heathen, and idols, and false gods. It is His righteousness, but thereby His people are delivered in grace. So, "My righteousness is near; my salvation is gone forth" (chapter 51: 5), and "shall be for ever" (verse 8). In chapter 45: 8, it is God publicly vindicating Himself as He is, so to speak, bound to do in the end, and so righteousness comes forth. So, I believe, "who have obtained like precious faith with us, through the righteousness of our God and Saviour." This connects itself with promises, where they are, because the fulfilment of them is a part of God's righteousness. Hence God fully establishing and vindicating all He is, in the Cross of Jesus, and the blessed Jesus offering Himself up that He might. We come in who, through grace, are quickened together with Him, to be the righteousness of God in Him. He is made unto us righteousness, but it is properly and
essentially the righteousness of God, not intrinsically in Him, but brought out into manifestation in that which is done, for so it is, and, here, so as to be the glory of God (which implies display) and salvation to those, however miserable, who come in on the principles on which it acts -- which are, indeed, for us by faith, and hence the reasoning of the Apostle in Romans, Galatians and elsewhere.
The Elect (Messiah) is introduced -- the Servant. Thus the Gentiles will wait upon God, and for the Elect's law. Jehovah's power will be manifested against the idols -- His, who had long time held His peace. He will manifest His glory to the confusion of all worshippers of idols in the deliverance of Israel, leading the blind. But who so blind as they who saw so many things, and yet not observing? Thus the Lord will magnify the Law. But Israel, robbed and spoiled, had been given up for sin as chastisement, but now the Lord, in sovereign grace (chapter 43) will redeem, and comfort, and declare them, and show, in His dealings with them, that they are His witnesses as of old. And now, also, they shall show forth all His praise, as, indeed, in His way with them, His praise has been shown. But, in fact, Israel had not sought God, but wearied Him with sin. But He, for His Name's sake, thus showing forth His praise in them, forgave them all.
This, and the following chapter give the place of Christ amongst Israel, and the work of God amongst them, notwithstanding their failure.
This chapter ends at verse 25. Grace is here eminent as God's praise.
Forgiveness and the Spirit to Israel, introducing Cyrus as the deliverer.
On pleading with Israel, the promise of the Spirit is added, which revivifies and encourages them to confess His name, and glory in Him, and thus again becomes the instrument of defiance to the idols, which are vanity, with all their followers.
Again the Lord is announced as having redeemed Jacob, and glorified Himself thus in Israel, who confounds diviners, and declares His purpose concerning Jerusalem, and now, of Cyrus as instrument of rebuilding the Temple.
Cyrus -- the testimony of God's purpose to Israel -- and Israel of His name.
-- 4. He has "surnamed" him, for His love to Jacob, "the servant" and "the elect." Observe here these two names, which confound Israel with Christ, Messiah.
The everlasting salvation of Israel is contrasted with the idols. The escaped of the nations are called on to recognise the hand of God who had foretold all this, and to look to Him as Saviour, for to Jehovah "every knee should bow." This we know also is Christ exalted over every power, and everlasting. Thus using Cyrus, as the expression of it, for those times when judgment had called Israel "not a people" -- Israel, elect, a servant, the witness of God against all false gods. If God upon the earth, as of old, eternal, and now, anew, of all His praise, Redeemer and Deliverer, acting in grace, and disposing of instruments as He would, as Almighty, proving it by the prophetic testimony, and the accomplishment of it in favour of His people, by the instruments He had chosen, Israel, the occasion and object, the means of all this display of glory (and that, in grace) is identified with Christ, as Elect Servant (chapter 42), but Israel in contrast with idols. But this Elect Servant is Jehovah withal, and thus, idols being set aside, every knee is to bow to Him. The nations who escape are called to own all this in Jacob, and looking on Him to be saved.
Babylon is then summoned on the scene by the prophetic Spirit, and all her fate told; first, in the person of her idols in contrast with Jehovah's faithfulness to Israel. They carried Babylon's helpless gods into captivity, but Jehovah carried, and bore Israel from youth to age. He had made, and would bear them when Moses himself, His faithful servant, failed, feeling they were not his own, his children. It is the contrast of Jehovah with His people, and the impotency of the idols
carried into captivity. Cyrus is yet the instrument of the specimen given of this. This, and the following chapter give the judgment on Babylon in similar testimony to chapter 45, i.e., the idolatrous power of the world. "All the world" is a question between Israel and Babylon.
It is not the idols now, but the pride of Babylon, who thought never to see sorrow.
These are the special dealings of God with Israel and the reasons for them.
We have the distinction of Israel -- who is unrighteous though making use of the Name of the Lord -- prophecy, the means of showing it was God's doing, making shame of idols. But Jehovah acts for His Name's sake. He spares, defers, refines Israel -- choosing her in "the furnace of affliction," shows Himself the only God, and executes judgment, doing His pleasure on Babylon. If Israel had been faithful, her peace would have flowed like a river. But Israel will prove, as well as Babylon, that Jehovah is faithful to His Name, that "there is no peace to the wicked, saith the Lord."
This was necessary in judging Babylon -- the judgment of Israel, chosen, and saved. Before chapter 45: 25, it was Israel justified, as a whole, in the Lord, and glorying in Him.
Up to this, the Lord's controversy with idolatry and Babylon, only Christ (chapter 42) necessarily brought in for blessing. From this, to the end of chapter 57, Christ, Himself, as rejected. We find here the whole plan and ways of God in government, as regards His rejection of Christ by Israel, i.e., the fact of Israel's not being then gathered.
Note how very distinctly we have first Israel, then the blessed Lord substituted for Israel when rejected by them, then, on resurrection, the condition of a new order of things,
available at present, but resulting in the re-establishment of Zion.
This is a full development of the work of Christ, with a testimony that the gifts and calling of God are without repentance. Israel is taken up as a witness, and the Spirit of Christ in them takes up the summons to the isles, and people from afar, to recognise the election of God in Israel, in whom He would be glorified. But then, necessarily, comes in not only the wickedness and idolatry of Israel, but their conduct as to Messiah. He takes up Israel according to this counsel of God, declared in His will, and purpose by the Spirit "in the volume of the Book," but has to declare that if so He has laboured in vain. Thereon the fuller revelation of God, as to His glory. It was a light thing to raise up Israel, He should be a light to the Gentiles, and God's salvation to the ends of the earth, which would be raised up and comforted in Him, scattered Israel brought back, and, notwithstanding all her fears, Jerusalem is blessed according to the immutable and tender love of God, for Jerusalem is the centre of all God's affections, in providence on earth; see Jeremiah and Zechariah. All would be subservient to her blessing.
-- 3. This verse requires attention. I apprehend the English translation neglects the Hebrew stops. I call Athnach+a stop. I should think De Wette added words to complete his translation. The question is, can asher-b'ka (literally, "whom in thee") be translated "Thou in whom"? "The Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my servant; Israel, thou art he in whom I will be glorified." De Wette translates it: "It is Israel in whom, through thee, I glorify myself," paying attention to Athnach. The English is: Thou art my servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified. This is the Hebrew: vay-yomer li av-di attah Yis-ra-el asher-b'ka eth pa-ar (And said to me, my servant, Thou, Israel, whom in thee I shall be glorified). I apprehend "In whom through thee" is surely not there. I am not sure that one is warranted in adding "Thou" (art he) "in whom." The importance lies in the question, who is "My servant," here, Israel or Christ the blessed Lord? It is clearly the transition point of Israel, and the Lord, Servant -- verse 4 makes that plain.
I am not far from suspecting that De Wette's is the right
+Athnach is one of the Hebrew accents.
sense, only that he has unwarrantably added "by thee," durch dich. Asher b'ka can hardly be an dem durch dich. Luther's is as the English. If I remember the French, it is in substance as De Wette, if not literally.
The Lord then demands why He had rejected her. He had come Himself, in Christ, to be in her sorrows, and with equal power to save, and had been rejected, found no man to call when He answered. The humiliation of Christ is most touchingly put forth. Thus the Remnant come to be distinguished, and Christ takes the place of Servant, and though, thereon, Israel was in darkness, and the Remnant, he who obeyed His voice should trust in the Lord -- how faithful, we have seen; those who kindled sparks for themselves would, of the Lord's hand, lie down in sorrow. All now hangs on this rejection of Christ, who speaks by His Spirit in the prophet, and presents Himself as Jehovah, but made a Servant in Israel.
Note this chapter contains the humiliation of Christ -- His place of subjection in contrast with His divinity. Chapter 53 contains the expiation He accomplished for the people, and for many, in contrast with the exaltation of the Servant, which is other than His being Jehovah, distinctly.
We have here the moral question, of the rejection of Israel by Jehovah, fully tried -- what Israel had done in rejecting Jehovah when He came in grace in Jesus, lowly for their sakes, the true character of the humbled Holy One clearly brought out. He is justified by Jehovah. To this is added the consequent exhortation to the Remnant in the latter days, who listen to His voice as the Servant of Jehovah.
Note -- the appeal is after the divorcement. This gives it a most important, and deeply interesting character of grace, not developed perhaps, but they are to stand in the name of the Lord, and stay upon their God after this. This is pure grace, resting on what God is.
It is reasoning with Israel upon the circumstances in which Christ's coming placed it -- first, the general fact of the rejection, then the nature of Christ's first coming, to the distinction of the Remnant.
-- 5. I do not apply the boring of the servant's ear with an awl to the "opening mine ear" (it is fixing the sign or symbol
of service, as receiving command, to the post, i.e., the master's house, i.e., marking the constancy of service) though they are both connected with the same subject. I should apply the boring of the ear of the servant (more especially, i.e., therein it was exhibited and fulfilled) to the Lord's willing subjection to death after He took upon Him the form of a Servant, and had identified Himself with His Master's wife's and children's interest (for His Master had given Him a wife and she was His Master's and His, and thus became the tie to the Master) "being found in fashion as a Man, he humbled himself," etc., being unwilling, even though He could (for He must have gone out without His wife) have gone out free -- He preferred to subject Himself for His and their sakes. It was love, and the accomplishment of love. The "opening the ear" is, I take it, submission, intelligent submission to His Father's will, not love after He was a Servant, such, I think, as chapters 40 and 52 express it, as saints, and our Lord throughout, especially in John's Gospel; so Matthew 12, but especially in His becoming a Servant. Therefore the Father saith "Behold my Servant"; so compare Isaiah 53, Hebrews 2, and John 12, Ka-ri-tha (Thou hast digged, Psalm 40) seems to make Him a Servant, "ears hast thou digged for me"; compare Ezekiel 16:3, 21, 35; Hebrew, verses 30, 29, 14, also Isaiah 51:1, for the word, "Thou hast formed me to be a Servant," was Israel as a witness, as we have seen Him to be the only faithful One actually of Israel, and therefore applicable in principle to Him, though spoken of literal Israel. The ear marked the servitude, as reception of command, "Thou hast formed a body for me," in which I am to be a Servant. And observe it is the Son, as before His incarnation, who says "Ears hast thou digged for me," and accordingly it was in His incarnation He took on Him the form of a Servant, as see Philippians 2. Then pa-thakh ("he opened," Isaiah 52:2) is generally subjection to servitude. "Behold, saith he, I am thy Servant." When the Lord Jesus had taken the glory (Christhood) upon Himself in behalf of man, man then being apostate, "it became him for whom are all things," etc., therefore, "though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience," therefore He had "the tongue of the learned and knew how," etc., therefore "Behold," "Consider him!" Yigel (he openeth, Job 36:10) He openeth their ear to discipline, instruction, and the like, to make the mind to understand. Thus, by faith in Christ Jesus
we are made to understand the Scriptures, it is an yigel ("He openeth") to us; so of any revelation of God's mind. It is connected, however, with willingness to obey, but concerns the communication of the matter of the obedience. It is the knowledge, the intelligence necessary to obedience -- the opposed to "closing the ear" that they should not hear the perception of the will, or at least the communication of God concerning it; so, the Lord, "He that hath ears to hear let hum hear."
To the end of verse 12 of chapter 52, we have progressive instructions to the Remnant, progressive summons of the Spirit of the help and glory of Zion, reckoned to be possessed by the Remnant as a nation. Verses 7 to 20 are the progressive, or double, interference of God.
The history of Israel, in the Remnant, is thus given, up to their full glory, to the end of chapter 52: 12. First, three addresses to the people, "Hearken unto me" (verses 1, 4, 7). Those who sought justice -- His people -- those who know justice. The Remnant thus distinguished and summoned, the Spirit takes up the appeal in the demand for the awakening of "the arm of the Lord" (verse 9), in power, which is another thing, but power is there. It was the Eternal that consoled them. They had forgotten Him. Had He gone to sleep and forgotten? He who neither slumbers nor sleeps, whose power is there -- now that Zion is awakened to know it -- calls on Zion to awake, for all was mercy now, to awake and clothe herself with beauty and glory, as Babylon had to come down and uncover herself of her false glory. For what were the peoples to oppress the people of the Lord? What had He here? The Lord had consoled His people, and made bare His holy arm in presence of the nations. They should go out from their captivity, and the Lord be their avant and arriere garde. Nothing can be more splendid or lovely than this allocution of the Spirit. It was not, indeed, for Jerusalem to cry what awoke the Lord -- it was for her to awake.
The first appeal to the people encourages weakness, by the recollection that Abraham was alone when the Lord blessed and multiplied him. The Lord would comfort Zion. The second recognises them as His people; hence the nations are
introduced -- Jehovah's righteousness near -- His salvation gone forth. And, though the heavens should vanish, His righteousness and salvation should be for ever. The third appeal, not to heed the reproach of men, for they were as a garment moth-eaten, but God's "righteousness shall be for ever," His "salvation from generation to generation."
The Lord, thus in relation with, and encouraging His people, awakens the cry that the Arm of the Lord "put on strength." Verse 12 is the answer of Jehovah, who demands how Israel should be afraid of a man, when He comforted her. He calls on Jerusalem to stand up in that, when she had no sons able to comfort her. He had pleaded her cause.
-- 15. Compare Jeremiah 31:35, and Job 26:12. "Dividing the sea" is not the Red Sea, but raising it into tumultuous waves. So in Job 7:5, he compares his skin to this -- it was split, and broken up, and rough -- rugosity -- and put away as bad; but compare chapter 26: 12.
Jerusalem becomes the holy city, secured from profanation, and He reasons with the insolence of her enemies as against Himself. All this hangs on allusion to their position in Babylon. This celebration of the deliverance of Zion, in connection with the Remnant become a people, demands a full explanation of what leads to it all, and Christ necessarily becomes the great subject. But this is introduced thus. In this account of the compassion of Jehovah for His people, and the glorifying of Jerusalem, He who had taken, and had alone title (from chapter 49: 4) to be called the Servant of Jehovah, necessarily would bear a great and conspicuous part. "Behold my Servant shall deal prudently, he shall be exalted," etc. But here another principle comes in. The humiliation of Christ served to distinguish, even to the end, the Remnant who listened to the voice of "His Servant." Here the exaltation of Christ is connected, through His humiliation and offering for sin, with the introduction of the Gentiles. "As many were astonished at thee" (for He becomes the Object of the Spirit's thoughts now) for "His visage so marred," "His form more than the sons; of men," "So shall he sprinkle many nations," and "that which kings had not heard, shall they consider." This introduces the following chapter.
From verse 13, to the end of the following chapter it is the exalted Servant, with the results of His first manifestation, and the mystery of His first reception fully developed.
In this chapter the Remnant recognise much more the true substitutory character of the sufferings of the rejected Christ, so that they were healed by that by which their sin was consummated. The first verses show their rejection of Him, now confessed as sin; full grace to the nations, and to the people, and to Jerusalem, is the result of this, but not governmental details.
This is the rejection of the report, and blindness of Israel to the arm of the Lord; compare chapter 51: 9. For such was Christ before men, for and amongst men, and, as the Remnant declare in the latter day, esteemed nought by the Jew. Yet it was as a vicarious Victim, as they now acknowledge, and, as we, blessed be the God of all grace, acknowledge beforehand, who first trusted (proelpikotas) in Christ.
-- 3. The "Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief" is the same as "surely he hath borne our griefs, and our sorrows he hath carried them" -- kho-li (grief) and mak'o-voth (sorrows). This we know from Matthew is applied to His healing their diseases and sicknesses. The Lord that healed them entered, as Man, into all the sorrows of which they had to be healed. Then came their thinking Him "stricken and smitten of God" -- the last word is that used elsewhere for "smiting" -- mukeh (smitten of). I think, the hu ("He," verse 5) does not give "yet He." It is much more emphatic. Kholayenu hu nasa (He hath borne our griefs) v'hu m'kholal, etc. (and He was wounded), etc. This gives the force of "and" (vav). He was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and He was wounded for their transgressions. They had esteemed the hand of God out against Himself, as under God's displeasure Himself, but "because of the transgression of my people" the stroke (nega, verse 8) was upon Him.
-- 6. This is the faith of Israel's Remnant in the latter day (as of us now). It was for the people, but not for that nation only, but being made an offering for sin, the stroke of Jehovah being upon Him, He should see of the travail of His soul, many should be justified, and thus and therefore He should be exalted. Thereon and thereafter, Jerusalem should be exalted,
and elect, recognising that she had had more children while she was a widow and deserted, than when a married wife. Now she should inherit the Gentiles, and Jehovah be her Husband -- being called as a woman deserted never to be rebuked any more; chapter 54: 9.
-- 10. "And Jehovah was pleased to bruise him, he put him to grief" (che-cheli). Thus the grief went on up to the Cross -- then comes in its full force. "If his soul shall make an offering for sin, Jehovah's pleasure shall prosper in his hand, and he shall see of the travail of his soul." "By his knowledge shall my righteous Servant lead many to righteousness, and he" (hu) "shall bear their iniquities."
-- 11. "Instruct many in righteousness" -- lead them into it -- "and shall bear their iniquities." I suspect the translation here is "by His knowledge" (of Jehovah, God, the Lord) "shall my righteous Servant teach righteousness to the mass" (many), "and their iniquities He shall bear." It is the word and work of the maskilim (strong ones) where the very same word is used. For "Turn many," read "turn the many."
-- 12. "He was reckoned among transgressors, and bore the sins of many, and supplicated for the transgressors." That the atonement is fully brought out is very clear -- that they were wrong in their estimate of it in unbelief, equally so -- that when stricken on the Cross, it was for the transgression of Jehovah's people is clear -- but, I think, from verse 4 we see, compared with Matthew, there was an entering into Israel's sorrows which went on to the Cross. The sorrows and grief were not merely the contradiction of sinners, for He bore them and carried theirs. That was added -- "they hid their faces from him" (if that be the sense) -- "He was cut off from the land of the living" -- but the stroke was on Him for the transgression of Jehovah's people. I get the fact -- their false estimate of it -- His taking their sorrow on Him -- their using this to turn away from Him -- and atonement.
The millennial glory of the Jewish Remnant, noticing the attempt against her.
-- 5. "The God of the whole earth," elohe kol ha-aretz; note this.
-- 13. All her children should be taught of the Lord.
-- 14, 15. No power shall be against her, though, indeed, they should gather together against her, but no more by the Lord.
The resurrection, security and blessedness of the new Jerusalem, founded on the resurrection of Christ, and therefore now received into the heart by faith, as fully noticed elsewhere.
Christ is here viewed as risen; see chapter 53: 10, and becomes a source of life to "everyone that thirsteth" -- calls in grace, establishes the sure mercies of David; see Acts 13:34. He is a Witness -- a Leader to the people. Nations shall run, that knew not, to Him, because the Lord, the Holy One of Israel, had glorified Him.
This it seems to me, however, speaks of Christ in His relationship with Israel, and therefore He adds, "If God" (as such, for it so was) "be glorified in him," the Son of man, "God shall also glorify him in himself, and shall straightway glorify him." But here it is resurrection and glory with Israel. We can introduce much more, but this grace, and call by grace, leads to summons to repentance, and "Seek the Lord while near," and the assurance, largeness, and certain accomplishment of the word of promise in blessing, so that this blessing should be to the Lord for a name -- He should be known by this.
He returns, therefore, in this chapter, specifically, to the Remnant in the latter day, but founded on the basis of grace in Christ, now known, and fully laid and declared in the midst of the sin of Israel, the blindness of her watchmen, i.e., blessing shown in taking away the righteous, the great iniquity of Israel going to the king, debasing herself to hell -- God's care of the humble and contrite, and in grace, having seen Israel's ways, He will heal, for He creates "the fruit of the lips." But, again, after Christ fully explained, we have the Remnant, and "no peace to the wicked"; see chapter 48: 22.
This, and the three following chapters, is God's view of what the Jewish Remnant would have been on His precepts,
and according to His plan, and what it was in and by its failure. The end of this, however, is in chapter 59, verse 15 to the end; and thereupon, in chapter 60 we enter into the fruit and power of His work in and for His own.
From chapter 49 to the end of this chapter, we have a complete development of the Messiah, but labouring in vain in Israel, object of much larger counsels -- thereon, His humiliation, death, exaltation, saving of many, glory of Israel, and, again, return to the Remnant. "Listen, O isles, unto me," is one of the keys in this, for, in fact, only in Christ can the isles be thus brought in, whether during the absence of Israel (lo-ammim) or when Israel also is gathered, as is supposed here, as to the prophetic import of this; for direct vicarious efficacy is supposed for them in chapter 53, yet warranting call to the Gentiles in virtue of the rights of Christ, "Though Israel be not gathered," quod nota, for here the ministry of Paul, and, after him, of this dispensation, comes in.
And note here, in passing, gifts are not merely Pentecostal, founded on the exaltation of Christ the Man, but connected with the unity of the Body with Christ. For Paul's commission was, distinctively, "Though Israel be not gathered." He became one "born out of due time," as though that was in him only. Peter was not so; he was as if the promises were accomplished, or accomplishing for the Remnant, before the exaltation of Israel among the Gentiles. He had his mission founded on this -- Messiah exalted, and the promise of Joel, before the day, accomplished. So, also, he proposes the return of Messiah. Hence it is evident that the mystery of the Church was a properly new revelation, not an accomplishment of promise, as all Peter's service. "God hath accomplished to us their children," as Paul says himself -- "according to the righteousness of God our Saviour."
We have another prophecy from this chapter to the end of chapter 60. It is properly the spirit of prophecy which speaks of the moral state of the people before Jehovah. If this had
not been their then state, it could not have been addressed then to them. So Paul uses it to convict the Jews, as such, but it treats of their latter end when again in their land, "while it is yet called today." Thus this chapter charges them with their sins, supposes profession and form of piety, with evil. Whereas, were it true in the Spirit of grace, and real love to the poor of the flock, they would have enjoyed the favour of the Lord, and He would have given them the heritage of Jacob their father.
The state of ruin (which, after all, in those days will be felt by all) is here accounted for. The Lord's arm was not shortened, His ear not heavy, but their iniquities had separated between Him and them.
In verse 12 the Spirit of prophecy becomes a Spirit of confession, and weighs in sorrow its extent, and so rises (verse 15) into the necessity of the Lord's intervention, for man there was none. Therefore His arm brought salvation, His righteousness sustained Him; compare chapter 51. Thus His glory became, in action, necessarily grace, though in the execution of judgment against the wicked. This makes the difference from glory in grace, in this dispensation. Thus the name of the Lord is known from the West, and His glory from the rising of the sun. The Gentiles will be judged.
The speciality of Jerusalem is then brought out in this deliverance. The enemy comes in like a flood -- the Spirit of the Lord lifts up a standard against him, quod nota, for here is a work of the Spirit before the Redeemer comes to Zion. Then the Redeemer comes. Thenceforth the Spirit in the prophet, and in Christ, for it was the Spirit of Christ in them, and the words which Jehovah had put in His mouth (for He whom Jehovah had sent, speaks the words of Jehovah) would not depart out of the mouth of Israel, the Remnant with whom Christ is here identified. The prophet being thus addressed, "nor from his seed" -- for such they are accounted, children God had given him, a seed who should serve Him, keeping the words of Jehovah, by Christ, for ever -- the Spirit upon them, and Christ's words in their mouth for ever -- this was their state.
We have here not the moral state only, but the glory of Jerusalem as to her own (verse 4) then as to the Gentiles, as to the Lord Himself, her glory, and that everlasting -- her people all righteous -- the branch of Jehovah's planting, that He might be glorified. She was the place of Jehovah's feet. His sanctuary would be established there, and all woods of cost brought for its embellishment, even from far. He Himself would be her Sun, her everlasting Light. Note it was to be her light. The Gentiles were to come to her rising. The comparison with Revelation 21:22, is evident in all its parts, but there there is no temple. It is not the place of God's feet -- He is the Temple there, and the Lamb.
Notice the difference between the heavenly Jerusalem (Revelation 21 and 22) and the Jewish, or earthly, given in this and the following chapter, not only in the difference of immediate glory, but the former is risen in glory (of righteousness and true holiness) -- all grace. Most blessed is the account! Read and study it yet! Also put together what is the portion in the city (Revelation 22) with what the city is. Grace and glory be unto Him who has given, and made it! (2 Corinthians 1:20). Nothing can be more blessed than the picture there (Revelation 21 and 22) of matured holiness in grace, and this brought out into accomplishment in itself, and then overflowing in grace towards others. The tincture of grace runs through it all. Adam was complete in that little sphere, so blessed, but then it ended; blessed as it was, there was no flowing out there. It was not the matured blessedness of communion -- unity with the fulness of God through grace. In Jerusalem there shall be display of glory, but glory suited to the dealing with them. Righteousness shall be its character. But the Church! The Church knows grace. My God, what hast Thou done in Christ, given in the Cross! What hast Thou given us in the revelation of Thyself! May the secret of God be in our souls! May He be our secret! And, my God, Thou knowest the rest, may I know it, have it! Oh! that I might, may be kept there, and that be kept with me, through grace! That is what I pray for, but I say, "Thy will be done." May the fulness and grace of Christ be exalted!
Here we have that which especially characterises this dispensation -- the Person and character of Him who is the great instrument whereby it is effected, and as were stated accordingly in His teachings, as well as His full manifestation with the fruits as dispensationally shown.
-- 10. Christ, in Spirit, speaks in the name of Jerusalem, and His people.
Christ takes up the character of messenger of glad tidings to Jerusalem, to Zion. He is anointed of the Lord Jehovah to this purpose, to comfort thus the mourners. We know that the Lord Jesus cites this up to "Acceptable year of the Lord." He could not yet say "The day of vengeance of our God." But without this distinction, yet made, which involved (as we shall see, further on) the judgment of the mass of the nation, and its new creation, all the results of this message, and interference in grace, are recounted, so as to make "righteousness and praise to spring forth before all nations." All will have seen that they are "the seed which Jehovah has blessed" -- these mourners, now more than comforted, instruments of praise.
In this chapter we have Christ's intercession, His putting the spirit of intercession in the watchmen on her walls (The Lord grant it to the Church -- His Church!) and the effect is declared, for He will not cease till all is accomplished, and He sets the watchmen in the same position.
-- 8. The oath of the Lord, now revealed, secures the blessing for ever, and this in face of the world.
Note here, there is a Remnant, having the Spirit of Christ viewed as a Jew, who are the Lord's remembrancers till He bless Zion fully.
This chapter calls out the special supplication of the Spirit, as in the prophet, for the Remnant, calling also upon those in whom the Spirit was to exercise this function, on the declaration of the Lord's promise associating it with the coming of Him who should come. In the list of mercied they are brought together -- the Remnant, people, city, and Messiah the Lord.
To verse 6, this chapter declares the manner of its accomplishment -- that He found none of the people ready to assist Him, and He trod the wine press of vengeance alone, on the infidel peoples; it would seem that it was of them, not including the Jews. There was ein-ish (no man) with Him, am-mim (of the peoples). So the LXX, kai ton ethnon ouk estin aner met'emou (and of the nations there is not a man with Me), and I think, the reason for their not being called go-im (nations) is evident. From verse 7, this naturally calls out the expression of the continuity of the Lord's love and kindness towards Israel, recapitulating the necessitude of the Lord's love, and calling for exercise of it upon the ground of its former manifestation, drawing out in chapter 64 the earnest intercession of the Remnant in Spirit, i.e., the Jews, with the Lord of its salvation.
-- 6. To the end of this verse we have the day of vengeance, in which Messiah, the Lord Jesus, executes vengeance in Bozrah against the peoples, according to chapter 61: 2 -- alone, amidst the peoples, in this work.
-- 7. This commences another subject -- the holy and humble expression of the Spirit of grace and truth in humiliation, acknowledging grace and owning their state and evil, and counting on the favour of God towards His people, while owning all their desert in evil. This goes on down to chapter 64: 12.
It is well to note the words "me," and "us," and "them," which are found in this address, showing the manner in which the Spirit of Christ identifies Him with, and yet speaks for and in the people. First, the Lord will count upon His people, for He saw and enters into their affliction. In chapter 63: 15, "Me," for He recognises this grace in confessing their infidelity, and will now confide in Jehovah, whatever their condition, and Christ can say "Me," and "them," and "the people of thy holiness" (verse 18), and therefore demand the intervention of God, notwithstanding the wickedness of the people, for none has known what awaits him who, in confidence works righteousness. Further they would be but as "clay in the hand of the potter" chapter 64: 8. And they present the sorrows of the
people, the "holy and beautiful house," "the holy cities," to the eyes of Him who had formerly delivered them Would He yet refrain Himself, yet hold His peace? But this appeal opens out the occasion for the Lord to reveal His definitive judgment, and His ways in general, and how His grace had acted.
Here we have a distinct revelation of the intermediate operation of God's grace, its reasons and principles. The application of the first two verses, though Paul might well feel willing to stop there, are too well known to need comment. We have then the contrast between the natural people of the Jews and God's elect, with the inheritance now to be fulfilled to these. The identification too would appear of the former with the spirit of infidelity manifested in the latter days, giving them the general corporate character, and their portion whose spirit and infidelity were thus and then manifested under the eye of the prophet, even in those days, and thus therefore applied to their consciences, for their rejection was now beginning.
We have then, first, grace to them "that sought him not," and that "asked not after him" -- a nation not named by His name. Inconceivable patience with a rebellious people that walked in the way of their own thoughts! Jehovah then declares His judgment, the judgment He is forced to execute on the iniquities of them and their fathers.
-- 8. Here the Remnant is separated. Jehovah acts in His name of might and majesty, and He brings forth out of Jacob and Judah (out of all this evil) for He is supreme, a Seed, an Inheritor, His elect, His servants. Here the names of Jesus are given, attached to the Remnant, and peace and security shall be for His people that have sought Him, for it is not now, as verse 1, for the Gentiles, though grace more wonderful yet, nevertheless, as to His people led to seek Him.
-- 11. He reverts to those whom He judges, and contrasts them with the servants, and, as a whole, they are entirely set aside, and His servants called by another name, and God's promises are thus accomplished, and an answer, beyond their thoughts, given to the demand; chapter 64. It was a new creation, and pure grace of the creating supremacy of God, but accomplished all His promises. To the end of chapter 65 this state of things is described -- the result of an entirely new
establishment and order in heaven and earth. It was a system of secure earthly blessing, and of judgment withal, so that evil was not permitted, God rejoicing in His people and joying in Jerusalem. The actual judgment which introduces it is given in the next chapter.
The forms of piety will be among the Jews -- the House, and sacrifices -- but the Lord rejects them all. He looks, in His elect, to a humble and contrite spirit that trembles at His Word. They were despised by those who abused His name, but, from the temple and city they trusted in, the Lord judges them, and Zion then brought forth her children, and was blessed and glorified. The Lord comes to do this (verse 15) -- assembles all nations -- pleads with all flesh, with "fire and sword" -- the slain are "the slain of the Lord."
The end of this chapter presented considerable difficulty -- to know who it was that escaped of them -- Jews or Gentiles? But there is an intentional mixing, or leaving of the confusion that they have made. I had not sufficiently regarded the persons addressed as "you." There is a residue distinct among the Jews, before the judgment, from the mass, and of the mass others are spared as a residue. But these last were all mingled together, and with the wicked Gentiles also. "Ye" and "your," all through the chapter, designate those who are spoken of as "trembling at God's word," while nothing was decided. Then it is said "your joy," "they shall be ashamed." Then the Lord "renders recompense to his enemies."
-- 13, 14. "Ye shall be comforted" -- "His servants," see chapter 65: 13. Also "indignation against his enemies."
-- 15, 16. All flesh is to be judged.
-- 17, 18. The character of the Jews who have turned away, and become enemies. They are known, and the Lord provides for His own glory (they were not witnesses to it, though they said, perhaps, "Let the Lord be glorified") all flesh should come and see it.
-- 19. They that are spared of the Jews, who were joined lo the Gentiles (for though two were in one bed, one should be taken and the other left) perhaps Gentiles also, seeing the judgment was on "all flesh," would go and declare the Lord's
glory among the Gentiles (but this was not, properly speaking, the faithful Remnant) and the Gentiles shall bring "your brethren."
-- 22, 23, 24. We have the contrast between the unbelieving Jews and the Remnant, shown again with the force of the terrible judgment of God. The contrast, all through, is between the Remnant and the unfaithful; the assembly of the nations comes in by the bye, to show to them, in judgment, the difference between the faithful and the other Jews -- those who mourned in Zion, and those who haughtily joined the Gentiles, and apostate, and despised them. And thus, while Israel failed to be witness, and, on the contrary, joined the Gentiles, and thus left nothing to the faithful who could not lift up the mass, but to mourn and tremble at God's word, God provides for His own glory, and makes the Gentile understand the difference in judging those who were joined to them, and setting up those who, desirous of His glory, were impeded by the evil from accomplishing it, or doing other than mourn. Their brethren were brought -- all flesh should come -- their "name" and "seed" should remain, and the rest should be an abhorring to all flesh; only some would have escaped to tell the tale of this judgment, and bring up the others scattered far and wide (brethren of the faithful), and cause the Gentiles to come up to see the glory of the Lord, and the distinguished blessing of this residue in Him -- the glory they had loved and desired. So, changing heaven for earth, will it be for the faithful Remnant who love the glory of Christ, and mourn, in the Church, as to the Church itself. "You" and "them" these, are the residue, and the other Jews. These other Jews join the Gentiles, and are mingled up in their evil, perhaps, though they have their own proper, and if Gentiles are spared of those with whom they are mingled, it is accidental and of grace by the bye. The Jews spared are forced to be the witnesses of the acceptance, and right judgment of those they had despised, but who are now comforted, and owned of the Lord -- the others, transgressors, were an abhorring to all. The Remnant in the Church, which is faithful, which has kept the word of God's patience, will be kept from the "hour of temptation which shall come," etc., and those "who call themselves Jews but are not" shall own that God had loved them -- this faithful Remnant.
This chapter is very instructive and solemn too, light being
thus shown on it; verses 6 - 16 are a sort of proclamation -- verse 17 resumes the question between "you" and "they." Verses 8 - 15 of chapter 65 give the revelation of the two classes among the people -- chapter 66 gives the consequences -- their state in general, and the Lord's ways having been given in answer to the appeal of chapters 63 and 64.
And now more particularly for the Assyrian.
The first general threat as judgment on Ahaz, Isaiah 7, is the Assyrian, verses 17 and 20. Immanuel is promised as the Hope of Israel, but the Assyrian is to come up -- days, such as had never previously visited the people. In chapter 8 this is opened out. The Land is treated as Immanuel's, but, inasmuch as the people despise "the waters of Shiloah which go softly, and rejoice in Rezin and Remaliah's son," the Assyrian reaches to the neck, and fills the breadth of Immanuel's land. And again the Remnant are called upon to trust in the Lord, who should be for a sanctuary, as for a stone of stumbling. Note also the way this identifies the Remnant, connected with Christ, and the whole history of the people of the Jews, and, with this, read 1 Peter 2:8, and compare Isaiah 28, and again 1 Peter 3:14, 15. And clearly in the end of this prophecy, Isaiah 9:6, we have the Messiah, Christ, recognised by and in Israel on the throne of David, and the glory to come.
But these chapters are important as showing that the Assyrian is the grand enemy whom God has in view, as coming against Israel or Immanuel's land as such. There may be a confederacy with which His people are to have nothing to do, and a covenant with hell perhaps, but the Assyrian is the enemy and scourge, temporally, of the land and people. The rest who are not disciples, a believing Remnant, will be in the state of chapter 8: 21. Further, it would seem clear that, though there has been a special accomplishment, as we have seen (but applied only to Jewish Christians, for the citations are Hebrews, and 1 Peter) yet that the Remnant are treated by Christ, according to the prophetic Spirit, which is the principle of His relationship with the Jews, until He be king (save that He is High Priest, hidden and unknown -- like Moses on the mountain -- now within the veil, while we know and are united to Him, the Church, the veil being rent, but upon their hearts). But the Remnant are treated, in that day, as His disciples, and the children, which God has given Him, for signs and wonders to both the houses of Israel. And while we have, as above, much higher privileges, and the Christian Jewish Remnant, also, still the passages could be applied to them, as being in a place which the latter-day Remnant will decidedly have also, in
which God will view them also, though if losing life here by suffering, surely to be rewarded with it then.
But it is evident this prophecy takes in the whole, from the failure of the house of David in Ahaz, across Christianity owned as a Jewish Remnant, or a Jewish Remnant treated as Christ's disciples, on to the time when Christ is owned publicly by, and as born to, the Jewish nation. The law and the testimony is the rule, also remark, though amongst His disciples. Christ is the answer to the Assyrian. Chapter 6 to 9: 7, is all in parenthesis, chapter 6 being the judgment on the people in connection with the Lord's glory morally, and chapters 7, 8, and part of 9, the circumstances connected with the Land -- promises, the house of David, and its results. Note also chapter 8: 9, supposes the assembling of all the peoples.
In general, the present judgment is at the end of chapter 5. They have despised the law and the testimony, the Lord has smitten them, but this would not do, and He has brought the nations upon them. In general, verse 30 presents the condition specially set out at the end in chapter 8: 21, 22, etc. But it is resumed in detail in chapter 9: 8, and the history of the stretched-out arm begun with the nations, who commenced their inroads, though the house of David was there, Syrians, Philistines, etc., and all this is pursued again to the Assyrian.
Chapter 10. Up to this His anger is not turned away. But now the Assyrian is "the rod of his anger" (umatteh-hu, and it is a staff), i.e., "the staff that is in their hand which is mine indignation," or "the staff is in their hand, mine indignation." The hu (it) is demonstrative, including the mat (staff) substantive. God sends him against an hypocritical nation, but he boasts himself against Him that hews therewith, and the Lord judges him. Israel leans no more upon him that smote him. The Remnant returns to God (again applied, in Romans, to the Remnant of Israel of that day because they took the character of Remnant then fully). The people that dwelt in Zion were "not to be afraid of the Assyrian," though he lifted up his rod after the manner of Egypt (to wit at the Red Sea, I apprehend) but the indignation ceases, and the Lord's anger in their destruction. God's rod shall be upon him, after the manner of Egypt, too.
We have here, certainly, the last days, see verses 20, 21. At the same time an inroad of the Assyrian, of which God's people, which dwells in Zion is not to be afraid, and which is
terminated by a judgment on the Assyrian, in which the indignation is closed, for he had been the instrument of it. He uses His rod and His staff. In chapter 14, the Lord will yet "have mercy on Jacob." Jacob will have rest, triumph over Babylon, and her king fallen and destroyed. And the Lord will break the Assyrian in His land and on His mountains, that is the purpose purposed on all nations. Compare with this, Nahum 1:11, 14, specially for the identification, verse 13, and note the final character of this judgment, verses 12, 14 and 9, and also 5, 6, 7 and 8. We see how great and general the day is, though the Assyrian be finally the actor in it.
In general, it is the inroad threatened of God, but associated with or preceded by the nations coming up. But at the time that God shows Himself in favour of His people, though he reached even to the neck, it was the character of the Assyrian's inroad, historically, and typically, for in the threats we have read, it is identified with the final deliverance and the ending of the indignation. In Micah, we have a positive application of this to the Lord Jesus. In chapter 5: 4, 5, etc., after speaking of Babylon first, as in Isaiah 14, and spoken of the many nations who are now gathered against Zion, but whom the Lord gathers together as sheaves to the threshing-floor, the Assyrian is singled out, and put in relief; and, showing what had happened to Christ, and how they had been given up in consequence, so that we can have no doubt of its going beyond an historical statement as to Hezekiah. He is the Peace, when the Assyrian comes into the land; and study verse 4. Further the land of the Assyrian is itself attacked and wasted by the leaders of Israel.
We have then to consider Isaiah 28 and following chapters, which open much of the details of this subject. First, in chapter 28, we have Ephraim overflown, but "scornful men" dwelling at Jerusalem, who have "a covenant with death and hell." But they would be trodden down by "the scourge." It is perfectly clear this is not Hezekiah, for the circumstances are the contrary. Chapter 29, God "encamps against Ariel." There are mounts and forts (which Sennacherib was not allowed to make; see Isaiah 37:33) but the multitude of the strangers would be as small dust and chaff, and, of the nations that distress Ariel, as a "dream of a night vision." God visits from Heaven.
The same general truth is in Micah, only there Zion arises
and threshes. Yet, at this time, there is entire incapacity to know the mind of the Lord, or to understand the revelation He had given. Therefore He confounds the wise, and delivers Himself. Here, therefore, we have again the multitude of nations come up against Zion. The sure foundation having been laid there, and he that believeth not making haste, and complete and final deliverance would then be afforded. Jacob would no more wax thin.
Hitherto we have only had the multitude of nations, and the condition of Israel -- Ephraim overwhelmed -- Jerusalem in the hands of scornful men -- and the scourge passes through -- none that understands, save the Remnant always who believe in the Stone laid in Zion, quod nota.
In chapter 30, they go down for help into Egypt, and after the promise of all deliverance from the Lord, at the close of the most dismal circumstances and rebellion. It is "the Name of the Lord coming from far," to sift the nations, etc. And the Lord's glorious voice shall be heard, and the Assyrian is beaten down who smote with a rod, for the Lord's rod is upon him, as in chapter 10: 24 - 26. In chapter 31 they go down to Egypt -- in chapter 30 it was rather their state of mind, and the counsel they took -- here, the act. But all this shall fail -- helpers and holpen -- and the Lord shall be like a lion surrounded by shepherds. And then shall the Assyrian fall, the Lord's fire being in Zion, and His furnace in Jerusalem purifying the people, but consuming the enemies. Hereupon, in chapter 33, which seems to speak, but not definitely, of the same enemy (the nations are there) we have Zion delivered, and in chapter 39 the nations summoned, and a sacrifice offered in Idumaea, and all the chiefs brought down; compare chapter 63. It is not said that the Assyrian is there, but though he falls, he is said to flee from before Zion. If it be the Northern army, of Joel, he is driven eastward. All nations there, also, are gathered in connection with the Northern army. The same general truth of all nations is found in Zechariah and Zephaniah.
We have yet Psalm 83, where we find Edom and others -- Assur joined to cut off Israel from being a nation. In Zephaniah, of which there may have been a partial fulfilment in the conquests of Nebuchadnezzar, we find Assur destroyed, and Nineveh wasted, but this is in that land.
It remains to be enquired if the king of the North, of Daniel 11, be the Assyrian. He will plant his tabernacle, after
conquering Egypt, in Jerusalem, on tidings from east and north, and come to his end, none helping.
"Tophet is ordained of old." Speaking of the Assyrian, and the king also, they seemed, in general, to be judged together, i.e., nearly at the same time, and in the great uproar of nations, which the Lord quells. Compare, also Isaiah 21 and 22, where, after the taking of Babylon by Elam and Media, the daughter of His people also is spoiled, Elam bearing the quiver and Kir uncovering the shield, when the key of the house of David is laid on Hilkiah's shoulder, to be a glorious throne to His Father's house.
Isaiah 7, 8 and 9: 1 - 7 require a little more attention. We have the king of Assyria whom the Lord brings up; next, the family of David is despised, and the Lord makes Assyria flow over to the neck, filling the land. There is a general association of the peoples, who will be broken in pieces, but the Spirit of Christ warns His people against a confederacy. They are to sanctify the Lord Himself. He shall be a Sanctuary, but for a Stone of stumbling. The disciples are separated, and the Spirit of Christ in the Remnant waits on the Lord. He, and the children the Lord has given Him, are for a sign. There is darkness and trouble, but then great light, for a Son is born to them; compare Revelation 12. Here the subject is still the Assyrian, and the Son born. There are confederacies in Israel when the peoples come up. Hence, though Antichrist be not excluded from the troubles, the peoples, in general, and the Assyrian, are directly spoken of. We have perfectly the same elements, as elsewhere, as to this prophecy.
Note, also, it is the king of Assyria who takes prisoners the Egyptians and Ethiopians.
Note, further, as to the connection between Isaiah 5 and 10: 8, though Israel and Judah be distinguished, "all Israel" is the subject of the prophecy. In chapters 7, 8, on to 11: 7, we have the house of David parenthetically, in order to introduce the history of Christ, from the infidelity of Ahaz up, going through His rejection and the Remnant to His manifestation in glory, as the Son born to the people in chapter 9: 7 Chapter 6 is the special blinding of the people, in view of the glory of the Lord. Chapter 5: 30 connects, or resumes, with particular details based on the history of Ahaz in chapter 9: 8, going on to the end of chapter 12. The Assyrian and the confederacy of nations is judged, in view of the Son of David --
Immanuel; and the Remnant in Judah in chapter 8, in view of the people, and the public results of the manifestation of the Lord, in chapter 10.
I return to my earliest, though imperfect, thoughts as to the Assyrian first taking the city, and then, after Christ's coming in, being destroyed on the mountains of Israel. There may be difference of association involved in these two cases. Thus, in Psalm 83, we have Assur joining with Edom, Moab, etc. -- the nations surrounding Palestine. This is in the Book which speaks of the general lot of Israel. In Micah, Christ is the Peace when He comes into the Land. In general, the taking of Jerusalem is spoken of in connection with the assembly of the nations, as in Zechariah. The wish, in Psalm 83, will be accomplished, but the manner of it must be sought elsewhere. The judgment of Assur, and the judgment of Edom, are both connected with the judgment of the nations or peoples with Edom, it is clear, see Isaiah 63 and 34, and for the Assyrian, chapter 14. They are connected in a general way in chapter 30: 28, 31.
I conclude that Ezekiel 38, 39, and Isaiah 14:25 are the same. Both involve the judgment of all the nations. Probably also Isaiah 10:24 refers to the same period. I suppose, also, chapter 30: 28, 31. If we turn to Joel, we find the Northern army judged, and all nations too.
The question remains, who takes Jerusalem? This is connected also with the assembling of all nations; see Zechariah 14:2 and 12: 3. It is not the inroad of Gog, as such, for he falls on the open field. Yet the Assyrian is the "rod of God's anger" (and see chapter 31: 8), "and their staff his indignation." We may easily understand that the part of Assyria in this matter is kept out of sight, on account of the early historical application of it to Sennacherib.
It would seem that Jerusalem will be taken by the Northern army. Thus much at least -- the king of the North, who overflows and passes over, sets the tabernacle of his palaces in the glorious, holy mountain. Perhaps he had already made his inroad there; Daniel 11:40, etc. In Joel 2 and 3, they "run to and fro in the city." The Northern army is afterwards removed (chapter 2: 20), when they cry to God. I doubt that Jerusalem is taken after this. Then in Isaiah 28 (and hence to the end of chapter 35, is most important to read on this subject -- it is just the detail which is given of this part of
Israel's history) Ephraim is overflown. The covenant of the scornful men at Jerusalem, who rule there, do not fear, because their covenant is "with death and hell." Yet the scourge does reach to them, and they are trodden down by it. With this, the Foundation Stone in Zion is revealed, and "he that believeth shall not make haste." This is the Lord rising up to do His strange work; compare Zechariah 14, where the city is taken. The scene then is general. After this, the Lord brings all nations against Jerusalem, Isaiah 29, but to disperse and destroy them. The Lord will defend Jerusalem, Zechariah 12; Isaiah 31:4, 5; see also Micah 4:11, 12, and compare verse 12 with Isaiah 30:28.
In chapter 28 we have judgment by the storm not escaped -- the tried Foundation laid for the Remnant, but the storm reaching the proud rulers in Jerusalem. In chapter 29 Ariel is brought down, but the multitude of nations is swept away. In chapter 30 the nations are sifted with a sieve of vanity, and the Assyrian is beaten down which smote with a rod. In chapter 31 the Assyrian falls when the Lord defends Jerusalem; so, Zechariah 12, of the nations, but Jerusalem had first been taken. In Psalm 83 we find Assur confederate with all the surrounding nations. Edom helps (Obadiah 11, 12) when foreigners enter into the gates of Jacob, and cast lots on Jerusalem. The king of the North places the tabernacle of his palaces in the glorious, holy mountain between the seas. In Obadiah, the day of the Lord is near on all the heathen, when Edom has so acted at the capture of Jerusalem. Jehovah's feet standing on the Mount of Olives is of the highest interest here, in connection with what has been said as to the closing of the government of the nations when Israel was given up, and the grand system of the image (then instrument of judgment) took its place.
Then the glory of the Lord went there, and the vision disappears. Now the Lord resumes this government, only we find Him there as Man, because the glory has taken the form of Christ. It exists in His Person. This is distinct from the judgment of the beast and false prophet, for which He comes from heaven. Here, He returns into connection with the earth and Israel in judgment. It may be immediately after, but it is distinct. It is not yet "sitting between the Cherubim," nor yet "coming from heaven." This last is the introductory part, as it would seem from Psalm 50, for I apprehend, verses 3, 4,
and 5 are the progress towards verse 2. The nations, in general, known before the captivity, will besiege and take Jerusalem -- the Assyrian being confederate, and the chief power -- Gog, I suppose, behind. The Lord Jesus will then confound them, and destroy them utterly. Gog (who has Assur's land) will then perish on the mountains of Israel. A great slaughter of the confederate nations will take place in Idumaea. The Assyrian and confederates, I suppose, are as a mere screen to Gog, as instruments of whose ambition, also, they act. The king of the North overflows the countries in general, only Edom and Moab escape him, unless we return to the application of this to the wilful king. I suppose the Assyrian will have been for some time "the rod of judgment" on the nation (and be amongst the nations who take the city, if not in person, confederately) but at last, when he comes up, he falls by the judgment of God, and the Jews, being given power, smite the nations, and the destruction takes place also in Idumaea.
But it seems to me that the taking of Jerusalem, and the destruction which takes place there, is rather before the confederacy of Assyria and Edom, etc. Whatever may have been the instruments, Psalm 74 speaks largely of what is done there; so Psalm 79. It is in Psalm 83 that we get the confederacy which would cut them off from being a nation. The Assyrian, we have seen, will fall when the Lord appears in favour of Jerusalem. There may be a question raised if Psalm 74 is an enemy from without -- of Psalm 79 there can be no doubt. In Isaiah 33 we have the case of an unprovoked attack, or of the Assyrian under His influence, and then, consequently on this, the slaughter of Idumaea, and of other people there, I suppose. The question naturally rises, when does Gog come up? When is this peaceable state of Israel in the Land? First, it is before the final display of the Lord's glory, so as to make the heathen know that He is the Lord, the Holy One, in Israel. Only they are brought out of the nations, and dwelling peaceably, but it is God's land, and God's people, Isaiah 38:14, 16.
We must consider, I think, the attack of Gog as consequent upon the peace given to Israel in general, after their establishment by divine favour. This proves that God is amongst them. His being so has never hindered the folly of the nations. Then, Israel's sin, often allowed success -- now, they will learn what His presence in Israel is.
But there is another point. This concerns Israel and the Land, but there are attacks of the Assyrian which concern Zion; thus chapter 10: 24. So that there are the people relieved, and till this attack of the Assyrian, the indignation had not ceased, the Lord's hand was stretched out against them; so see verse 12. So in chapter 31 it is Jerusalem. Zechariah also speaks of Jerusalem, chapters 12, 14 and 9, only there he uses Ephraim also against Greece. It seems evident, from chapters 14 and 12, that the nations come up twice against Jerusalem. They take it the first time, which occasions the Lord's judgments, for His eye is ever there. The second time, He defends its inhabitants, and gives them power. Then it is the Assyrian falls, as also in Isaiah 10:24. Still he had been, up to that, God's rod of indignation against them.
In Isaiah 28, though passing through Ephraim (so that that is settled by Israel) Jerusalem is trodden down by the scourge, its rulers being scorners. In chapter 29 Jerusalem is besieged and brought low, but the multitude of nations is suddenly destroyed. But the people had no sense of divine things -- they were hypocrites. But a very little while, and all is changed, and the terrible one is brought low, and the scorner consumed. This is judgment within also. In chapter 30, both the Assyrian and the king are destroyed -- the Jews sought help in Egypt in vain. The Lord, for His Name's sake, now destroys the Assyrian who smote with a rod. In chapter 31, the Lord defends Jerusalem from his attack; note chapter 30: 20. Christ is, after this, set up, chapter 32. It would certainly appear, after this deliverance of Jerusalem, that the general deliverance remains yet to be accomplished. The thought of Idumaea, at the close, will be to take possession of the two countries; Ezekiel 35. We have seen them (Psalm 83) associated with Assur. From Obadiah, it appears that Edom (by whomsoever the taking of Jerusalem may have been accomplished -- perhaps Persia and Media, Isaiah 22) was one of the company. After this, the Assyrian is destroyed, and Jerusalem rescued. This confederacy of Edom turns against them; Obadiah 7.
If we suppose that Gog's destruction is not an instantaneous act on his coming up, the arrangement of facts would be easy Israel will certainly be subjected to the oppression of the Gentiles, after their return and apparent prosperity; Isaiah 18
and Psalm 107. When in this state, Russia in possession of Assyria, and so called in the former ante-captivity prophets, comes up to conquer the Land. Meanwhile wickedness prevails at Jerusalem, but there is a testimony. It is the time of the power of the West also. (At this period, save the Remnant, they are trodden down of the heathen. The body accepts, I suppose, Antichrist as a friend.) Jerusalem is taken, and Edom thinks to possess the Land. The scourge treads down at Jerusalem, in spite of the pride of the scornful men who dwell there, who have made lies their refuge. They are still the people of God's wrath, and the Assyrian is the rod of His indignation, and, iniquity being at the full, they are given up. At length the Lord interferes, and destroys, from heaven, the wickedness that rises up against that, and the scorners are consumed. Then, the Assyrian having seemingly all at his disposal, the Lord interferes as King in Zion, and defends it, and destroys the Assyrian, so that there is no more yoke.
Daniel 8 would present a difficulty. There, the Assyrian would seem to be a power of a somewhat different character. Query, if he be not the second beast in the Land. It is possible that he may be a power put forward by Gog in the ancient Assyria (see verse 24), who shall do all this, though Gog may come up too. The difficulty is in Ezekiel 38:17. Where is he spoken of? Compare Psalms 44, 46, 47 and 48, for the deliverance of Zion, and the consequences. The state of the city is in the Psalms which follow from Psalm 51. In Psalm 60 we see their position among the nations, and the lot of the neighbouring countries; see then Psalm 74 (another Book). They do not abandon Zion, though it be desolate. See Psalms 75 and 76, for the judgment, the covenant and Messiah -- Psalm 79, Jerusalem taken. Psalms 80, 81, 82 and 83 all refer to this; compare Psalm 85.
On re-reading this, there is no proof that the Assyrian takes the city -- it is taken by the nations.
Another important point to remember is, that the dealing with Israel, as to sin, to bring them in heart back in connection with Christ, is different from their deliverance by power. We have seen that in the history of David. He delivers and sets up the ark in Zion -- afterwards the altar in grace on Mount Moriah. The order of this, we must examine. The distinction is clear; so Psalm 130 comes in. His feet standing on Mount Olivet is in the connection, I judge, i.e., in power taking
Jehovah -- judgment, not to bring them to repentance by showing Himself to them. Zechariah 10 closes the public, royal deliverance (as Christ rode in, and was rejected, and then a deeper scene came in) and then, chapters 11 and 12, we have the moral rejection and repentance. It is to be doubted whether the repentance, i.e., on seeing, is not all after the deliverance by power. In Psalms 93 - 100 we have only deliverance by power. In Isaiah 50 - 53 we have the voice of God's servant listened to, righteousness sought after. The Lord, indignant, rescuing and setting up Zion, and making His people know His name -- His arm made bare, and all the ends of the earth seeing the salvation of Israel's God. But Israel's humiliation before the Cross is subsequent; so, see Psalms 20, 21 and 22 -- judgment in 20 and 21, expiation afterwards.
In Isaiah 59 we have the confession and state of things which brings in the intervention of the Lord; see also Deuteronomy 32. This would put the destruction in Bozrah before that, seeing which produces the repentance, or, at any rate, before the reflective repentance of Isaiah 53, which knows not deliverance, but forgiveness. On the latter, full blessing comes, as it seems, but the deliverance shuts out the unclean enemies; Isaiah 35:4, 9. It is with this coming and deliverance, answering to the cry of the ruin of the house, that Isaiah closes. But the cry there is not as to Him they have pierced, but on promises, and as being His people, acknowledging rebellion; see chapters 63 and 64. The answer is the distinction of the Remnant, and appearing in glory for judgment. This distinction, and the notice as to standing on the Mount of Olives, are the data acquired here. The details are noticed for enquiry.
In respect of Zechariah 9, it may be noticed that it has been already remarked that the Lord, in riding into Jerusalem, takes distinctly the Jehovah place, "The Lord hath need of him," and enters, and looks around. So that the deliverance would be by Him as Jehovah, yet as King and Son of Man. And such is the deliverance of Zechariah 9, as see verse 14. Only, of course, "Son of Man" is not seen here, because that goes much farther (see the extent of character taken in chapter 12: 1).
NOTE. -- it seems that be-in ... l signifies "between," and, in English, this makes a most material difference in Daniel 11:45, for, in this case, the person in question does not enter Jerusalem,
but remains without -- an element of the utmost consequence for determining who it is. But note it is yam-mim (seas) not yom (sea); in any case, l' is not properly "in."
Note. We may say Abraham was a son of God, i.e., he will have this title in the world to come, from Luke 20, where the Lord declares that in the resurrection they are children of God, being children of the resurrection, and, I suppose, this would apply to the Old Testament saints.
Though what is called "The eternal Sonship" be a vital truth, or we lose the Father sending the Son, and the Son creating, and we have no Father if we have no Son, so that it lies at the basis of all truth, yet in the historical presentation of Christianity the Son is always presented as down here in servant and manhood estate, as all through John, though in heaven and One with the Father. "This" -- this Person -- "is my beloved Son" -- He who was as Man there, yet there. In Matthew 3 the whole Trinity is revealed, and we may say for the first time fully. Wonderful grace it is! Hence "No! not the Son," has no difficulty.
Being born of God marks a new nature, and, as shown to us in John 3 the moral necessity of that new nature, from Christ's divine acquaintance with what heaven was. With man on earth, and flesh, there could be no link formed. He came from heaven, and, as Son of Man in heaven, He could say with absolute certainty, that is what must be, what is in a Son of Man that can be in heaven. But being raised (risen) with Him is something more, though it be that life, because it changes the position of the person, and implies the death of the old thing, the old man. Now this is not merely a new life, it is deliverance -- the whole condition is changed. Hence it is now revealed salvation. And hence, also, salvation is spoken of as come, and ready to come, because redemption is wrought, and we are partakers of the place and title, into which redemption brings us, in which a risen Redeemer is, and we in Him, but we wait the actual bringing into it which will be our own change or resurrection, for "we shall not all sleep," which is complete deliverance from the whole condition and scene in which we are in flesh -- the redemption of our body. We are in it, as in Spirit -- our "life is hid with Christ in God." We wait for it, as to actuality in our bodies.
In the Ephesians, though we get the divine nature and presence, without "now" or "then," holy and without blame before Him in love, yet we do not get "being born again," but "being quickened together with him," and "raised up together," putting "off the old man" and putting "on the new man." We are "risen with him," "created again," and the like. Christ, as in the world, spoke of being "born again," a new nature, for He was then, in life, the new thing, but had not wrought redemption. Therefore He says, "If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe if I tell you of heavenly things," and then goes on to the Cross. Hence He could speak of being "born again," but He could not say "reckon yourselves dead." Now, we do -- we say, "I am crucified with Christ," "Ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God," reckoning Christ dead and now risen again. We receive life in that way, i.e., as dead and risen again, and our place is in Christ thus risen. Thus we are "dead to sin," "crucified to the world," "dead to the Law." To the two former, it is having done with them -- the nature
and the sphere it belongs to and moves in, under Satan. In the last, the Law does not lose its authority, in itself, but we have died as to the nature to which it applies. We are not in the flesh. Hence, when it is only "born of God," we are in the condition of Romans 7 -- the new nature working inwardly, but leading to the discovery of the old and our weakness. When we know redemption, we are delivered and free. Hence it is when we have received "the truth, the gospel of our salvation," that we are sealed. In the beginning of Ephesians I, we have therefore, "before him," as well as "holy and without blame, in love"; and in the end, the same power has raised us up in Christ. The Holy Ghost has sealed us, as in the place where redemption sets us, and makes us have the consciousness of the salvation, of being saved, and is "the earnest of the inheritance." Also we have Him as "the Spirit of adoption."
I am more deeply convinced than ever, by renewed study of Romans and other scriptures, that the view I have insisted on, as to a new nature and place in resurrection, as contrasted with flesh under law, is not only true, but is the great fundamental point on which the Apostle Paul insists as distinguishing Christianity. That, while surely sins are expiated and put away, "all are under sin" is what he is dwelling upon, and that wholly as in flesh, and hence death and a new state come in, through grace, in Christ. Besides the blessed fact of putting away sins, this is the truth of the Romans -- righteousness being established by the obedience of Christ as such. But this, too, in contrast with law. Even as to convincing power, he does not say by the law is the knowledge "of sins," for conscience told that, but the knowledge "of sin." "All have sinned," is in the end of Romans 3; so in verses 12 - 16 is offences under law specially. Both "sins" and "sin" in chapter 4: 7, 8; so verse 25. In chapter 2: 12, is actual sinning, as in chapter 3: 23. From chapter 6, where death is applied, "sin" is the subject.
The details, I have given here, serve as reference, but only show the force of the Apostle's argument. It is well to note them specially. I add, when I have said above, Romans 6, it must be remembered that that is founded on the great truth that we must not look to law, which is individual, but beyond it to the two great heads, Adam and Christ -- one of sin, the other of righteousness and life. Only "for that all have sinned" comes in. In Galatians we have only chapter 3: 22, where all are "concluded under sin," where we have help to see what the force of "righteousness" (chapter 5: 21) is, in contrast with "sin."
It is clearer and clearer to me every day that the whole gist of the Apostle's teaching, especially in Romans, is that as the law was correlative with flesh, and so, we being sinful, a ministration not of deliverance but of death, we are brought in Christ into a new condition by the Spirit of life in Him, and that, this being by death, we are free in the new man according to the law of the Spirit of life. That deliverance is not by the law, but by having life in the power of the Spirit in contrast with flesh. The law came in by the bye, to bring clearly out
what flesh was, but that Spirit instead of flesh is true deliverance, Christ's death set aside the title of flesh. The whole of Romans 8 is the teaching of this. The new power of life -- the Spirit in the power of life -- has set me free from flesh and its law of evil, has put me into another existence and life. But that my conscience might be true, and God's righteousness maintained in it, God has condemned sin in the flesh, in a Sacrifice for sin, even the Cross. Thus, Spirit and flesh are fully contrasted, and the law has no place even with either, for judgment has come on flesh, not law which could make no hand of it, and then Spirit replaces flesh. This makes the "fors" of verses 2 and 3 quite plain, which are otherwise difficult, and the whole bearing of the teaching clear.
I think I have remarked that it is not, cannot be said we are love, though it be said we are "light in the Lord." Love must be sovereign and free in its nature, where true and right. As creatures we love with a motive, but this is another thing. But divine love must, in its nature, be free and sovereign. Hence, even in human affections, it is not said "Wives, love your husbands" -- it would, in Christian condition, be out of place. "Thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee" -- that is another thing; but to the husband it is said, "Husbands, love your wives." And though this be in a given relationship, yet it is from the higher position in kindness and grace, and towards the weaker vessel. Hence also we must add to brotherly kindness (philadelphia), love (agape) -- a higher principle which connects us with God.
With reference to remarks that have been made, I would say that there is a special work of the Holy Ghost before the second creation, and even in Christ, as on the first, though of a very different kind. All work on the creature in every shape, is immediately of the Holy Ghost. But all the movement (as in Luke 1) and in the forming of Christ in the womb of the Virgin herself was of the Holy Ghost, and so was the Apostle's work. I only refer to the introduction of it here, as a new kosmos (world) of beauty. It is still true as to the individual. All was in the womb till Christ's death and resurrection. I only refer to it generally as remarked by John Bellett. Christ's place in that most lovely picture of the pious Remnant was peculiar, but it is all connected with Christ and His birth in this world, even we may say Zacharias's.
There has been a question of hymns of worship to the Father, but it has raised a question in my mind how far hymns are suited worship to the Father. We sing about Jesus, in whom all unsearchable riches and grace and truth subsist and are come. But can we do that with the Father? I have some doubt of it. I have looked at some hymns addressed to the
Father, and after the first words, the hymns all speak of what we are and have got. I doubt that this was merely that the writer was not at the height needed for it. I hesitated as to the possibility of it before -- the character of these hymns tended to confirm the thought. In Colossians 3:16, they read theo (to God); still the heautous (yourselves) has a large place in the thoughts here and in Ephesians 4. But this will require more thought, and is a large and important subject. Divine relationships and the true character of worship, as well as the nature of hymns are involved in it.
Note, praise is different from worship. We may celebrate the excellency of some one without worshipping him; see Revelation 5:9, 10.
It is one of those striking facts which one overlooks, but which have their importance in the character and teaching of Scripture, that we have not even the word "justified" in the teaching of any of the Apostles but Paul, save the well-known corrective statements in James. Nor is "righteousness" used by them in what is called the forensic, i.e., judicial sense. We have Paul stating it too in Acts 13. In the gospel, we have "Wisdom justified of her children," "This man went down justified rather than the other" (Luke), "By thy words thou shalt be justified" (Matthew), "He willing to justify himself" (Luke), "Ye are they which justify yourselves," and "The publicans justified God." These are all in the Gospels, otherwise it is as I have said. So we have seen of the Church -- Christ naming it as His building -- the Acts historically as a fact in the world, and manifest -- else only in Paul.
Having often spoken of God's dwelling with us only in virtue of redemption, I was led to think of Christ's presence upon earth, and this really throws great light on His sojourn here. He did not dwell in the midst of any one. He came to represent God to men, and the Son of David, the Messiah to the Jews, but only that. It was not taking up His abode with us. That does belong to grace and redemption, Israel historically, and the saint and the Church by the Spirit. But He here presentatively, and alone. The Holy Ghost could
dwell and abide in the redeemed when He had accomplished His work and gone up. He was in the way with Israel to the Judge -- God was in Him reconciling the world, not imputing their trespasses. This was another thing than dwelling in it as an abode. Hence in John 1 "dwelt among us" is another word eskenose (tabernacled) amongst us, and even this applies, strictly, only to the Apostles. Still it implies that He was sufficiently there for the display of God revealed in grace, which is the capital point. But His Person was all alone, full of grace and truth, and declaring God; His place, even then was on the bosom of the Father.
It is interesting to see, as to God's way of dealing with us, that His explanations, answers to prayer, all His replies to us, go beyond the occasion of the demand. Thus, in Revelation 17, the whole relationship of the beast with the woman is unfolded when the woman's case is before us. In Daniel 7 we have the whole condition and place of the saints in the answer to the enquiry, what the fourth beast was. So in Psalm 132, the reply in each case goes beyond what is asked; compare verses 13 - 15 with verse 8, verse 16 with verse 9, and verses 17, 18 with verse 10. So in Matthew 13, the explanation of both tares, and wheat, and fishes goes into the results when what is spoken of in the parable itself is over.
One thing makes very clear and distinct the difference between the Body and the House. One could not speak of the "Body of God." Christ, the Glorified Man is the Head, and the Church is His Body. But the House is the House of God -- His temple or tabernacle.
More definitely as to Isaiah. The first four chapters are introductory. Jerusalem being judged, all the earth will smite it, and then the glory be over Jerusalem. Then in chapter 5 we have Israel judged as a responsible people in this world, according to the government of God in it, and, in the close of it, smiting within by Jehovah, and bringing on them enemies from without. Chapters 6 to 9: 7, take up the question of Christ as an introduced subject, as it historically was, into the midst of this history. He being introduced, we have first the general fact of the Assyrian over-running the whole land. Then Immanuel, as the seed in it -- a confederacy of nations, but the Remnant, who, associated with the Rejected Stone, wait for the Lord, delivered by the intervention of God in judgment -- and the Messiah-reign celebrated. In a word, though chapter 5 closes in itself, chapters 6 to 9: 7, come in parenthetically in connection with Christ, and chapter 9: 8 resumes the general history from the time of the prophecy. God's hand is stretched out still. Then the governmental dealing with the people is carried on to the Assyrian at the end, and the blessing of Jehovah in the midst of Zion. Chapter 13 begins Babylon, which is no part of the general history (i.e., of Israel -- God dealing with them as His people) because Judah was in captivity there. The only question is, Who is the king in chapter 8: 21? I suppose the evil king, only so noticed in Isaiah; see chapter 30: 33.
Note, in passing, chapter 7 as an instance of how literal facts are made to assimilate to typical circumstances, though they detail literal prophetic facts. We may remark how this pictures the rebellious people and the world within the limits of mystic Israel, setting up Antichrist in opposition; yet, I doubt not, literal fulfilment.
Chapter 21 seems to me to give us Babylon in its mystical character at the end, drawn it may be, as the prophecies ever are, from present circumstances. I note it, because we have the prophecy as to Babylon proper in chapter 14. This, too, goes on to the end, but gives the actual taking of the city there far more fully; still it goes to the end in the worldly history.
There are three great general facts which enter into this
prophecy which is not idias epiluseos (of its own particular interpretation) and which are used to complete the scene, while the final reference is to the latter day. The Assyrian (Israel being owned) Nebuchadnezzar, his inroad, setting up the beast, and times of the Gentiles. His destruction which leads on to the last days, and the restoration of Jerusalem. Chapters 13 and 14 take up Babylon, representing there the new formed power of one Gentile beast as a whole, and goes on to Jehovah's founding Zion. This was anticipatively represented by Cyrus s action.
Moab is then judged as all within the promised Land, and while the main prophecy goes on the establishment of the throne of David (Christ) making allusion to David's history, who sent his parents there, and also to the tribute paid to the kings of Israel, but also to the fugitives of Judah in the last days. The present fate of Moab is also announced, I suppose, from the hands of the Assyrian, but it may be from those of Nebuchadnezzar, as he hesitated whether he should first go against Jerusalem or Ammon, verse 14, but rather, I apprehend, the Assyrian.
Damascus and Ephraim, chapter 17, we know to have been the Assyrian, but the chapter goes on in the clearest way, to his doings in the last day. This introduces the general history of Israel in the last day expounded elsewhere.
In chapters 19 and 20 we have the judgment of Egypt, and its healing for full latter-day blessing. Here it is again the Assyrian; chapter 20: 4. We have then a mysterious Babylon -- the desert of the Sea -- and Edom, where we know the last judgments are to fall.
Chapter 21: 16 declares the then present judgment of Edom, as before of Moab. We have then Jerusalem itself judged, and Eliakim, he whom God shall raise up, substituted for Shebna, the false and judged holder of the key of the house of David, or who at least is over the house. Moab, Damascus which introduces, by the figure of Assyria, the inroad of the nations of the last day, come first -- they are the clearing of the promised Land. Then the condition of Israel on their return into the Land. Then we come to what is outside -- Egypt -- and it and the Assyrian are blessed with Israel. Then mystic Babylon, and Idumaea, the final judgment of Babylon and of the beast, and hostile power in Idumaea. Then the judgment of Jerusalem, but the house of David set up.
Tyre, I apprehend, represents the world, perhaps to be accomplished in this place -- its gain and merchandise consecrated to Jehovah, though it remain the world; chapter 24. Though it be the land as the sphere where all is brought to an issue, yet it takes in the earth, the known formed sphere, as all judged there. The then coming judgments are also noticed, as chapters 20, 21, and 16: 14.
Chapter 24 clearly unites the thought of the Land and of the earth. Thus in verse 5, we have, one cannot doubt, the Jew order of things, though it may extend further. In verse 16 we begin a series of verses which reach to a wider earth; in verse 17 we have the expression of Revelation, "them that dwell on the earth" katoikountas epi tes ges. Then in verse 18, though the Land is still the scene of judgment, yet "the earth" goes out to the wider sense; verse 21 is clearly so. But it always, I think, contains the sense of those that have had to say to God, and the revelations of His ways, and rejected, oppressed, opposed, or despised, apostatised from the revelation He has made of Himself. There is a wider scene called the world. The earth is a moral thing, "When thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness."
As regards the revelation of the Father's Name, and Sonship, Christ being on earth and afterwards, it is clear Christ did reveal the Father's Name, but there was nothing that really entered into the place of sons in the disciples. But more than this -- when Christ revealed the Father's Name, He Himself stood in the place of Son as a Man on earth, and it was only supposing the disciples had got hold of it, "Our Father, who art in heaven," the disciples being consciously on earth; for the highest form in which the Son made the Father known was with a Son on earth. In His Person it was the same thing, but His position was only of a Son on earth, with whom the disciples were associated, and, at the utmost, according to His then relationship as on earth, or they would have been above Him on earth, which is absurd.
But now the Son is gone, as Man, into the place of Sonship in glory in the Father's house -- the glory He had with Him as Son before the world was -- yet as Man there, as Son. With this we now are associated, His Father and our Father, His God and our God, and we are associated with Him as sons in heavenly places, according to the glory He had with the Father before the world was. This again connects the eternal purpose and heavenly glory. But now my object is to compare it with the earthly state of Sonship -- relation, which was of man on the earth, as such, with the Father in heaven (as in the Lord's prayer), is, as risen into the new condition into glory, entered, according to full purpose (the perfect thoughts of God in the heavenly relationship), into the Father's house as sons, according to immediate relationship with the divine nature.
This connects itself too with another point, the nature of atonement work, already alluded to elsewhere. We were under responsibility as men -- take the Law as a measure. Christ dies for us, bears our sins, and meets that responsibility for us. But the work of the Cross did more. He glorified God there. Hence our portion is with God according to His own nature, in our new one. One was represented by the brazen altar, the other by the blood on the mercy-seat.
I do not say the Father's Name is given up in the former sense, in the note above -- the walk on earth, and we cared for by a Holy Father, as so walking. But it now carries us further -- we enter as sons into the Father's house where Christ is entered.
"I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it, that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them." The relationship is, in se, the same, for it depends on the Person, but the condition is diverse. The Father loved the Son, and we learn it, and with it, as so loved, the joy He had in the world. But He takes us there, where He is, with Him, and we see Him in His glory as loved before the foundation of the world. And He declares to us the Father's Name as thus revealed, and now dwells in us that we may know it; hereafter, actually with Him in the glory, seeing Him as He is. The Person is shown even when down here -- they should have known Him as in the Father and the Father in Him. But the latter is dropped when He comes to the presence of the Spirit, and "I in you, and you in me" is substituted. The personal place unchanged -- "I in my Father," its display as on earth, dropped, and we in Him who is in the Father. When mere glory comes, on the other hand, the display only is spoken of -- "I in them, and thou in me." By this the world knows -- by the former the love is in us. This does not hinder the Father's gracious love to us, as walking down here, being exceedingly precious.
Note the expression "Throne of Grace," Hebrews 4:16. "Throne" is connected with government, and the principles and character of Him who governs. God deals in grace, and governs in grace, but He does so according to His own nature and character -- He governs. Israel, on Moses' intercession, was dealt with in grace, but that was not exactly a throne, and Israel was replaced under law. Here God governs a people who walk in this world, but, on the principles of grace, we come boldly to a throne of grace, to obtain mercy and seek grace to help in time of need. The Father takes a positive interest, as from his own heart, in the children, but an "Advocate with the Father" (1 John 2) is not simply "their Father" -- that would not do -- it is "the Father" "of whom ye say he is your God." The Son has revealed God, necessarily thus as Son. He Himself loves us because we have loved Christ, but it is a revelation of God the Father by the Son -- not in the way of a relationship with us, though that be true. But it is a much fuller revelation of God, and in a new way. A child has not an advocate exactly with his father, but "if any one sin, we have an advocate with the Father." We have communion with the Father and with the Son, but it is with God who is Light. On sinning and getting out of communion, the nature of the revelation is not changed to put me under Law and Jehovah, but restoration is needed according to its nature.
Remark, here, that in John, however high the privilege spoken of, the saint is always looked at as in this world.
Note, further, that in Hebrews 4, we have, at the end, three great and important principles for going through the wilderness -- the Word, the Priesthood, and the Throne. This is very instructive. The Word searches the thoughts and intents of the heart -- all that is working in the mind (desire) and will -- as the eye of God. The Priesthood sustains, in grace, in every infirmity and in difficulty and trial. The Throne is perfect grace, but it is a Throne -- absolute sovereign power, positive government though in grace, and according to the character and majesty of Him who sits there. We go there "boldly," for all is grace, and the great High Priest is for us with God.
Still the Throne rules according to its own principles, though I am sure to find mercy and help there, for He who sits there is sovereign goodness, and can bless righteously and graciously because of the Priest. Our privilege is to go there, but it acts as a throne when we do not, still in connection with the Priest.
Jeremiah gives the judgment of Jerusalem and the Jews in the Land. Ezekiel, the dealings of God with Israel banished, and it is disowning, and His glory leaving Jerusalem and the Temple. He takes the Gentiles, up to the first beast, and resumes them after the last beast, in connection with Israel Daniel takes up the beasts and their history, in connection with the saints and his nation, etc. The Apocalypse takes a further point, and herein connects itself also with Zechariah The Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, had been presented to the Jews in Jerusalem as Son of Man, and rejected, and as the Lamb, had taken the throne on high, and become the Lamb in the midst of the Throne. In this character He exercises the power by His Spirit -- the seven Spirits sent forth into all the earth, previous to His coming forth to exercise it, either as the King of kings or Lord of lords, or as the Root of David. Revelation 2 and 3 are His judgment of the Church on earth. Therefore the throne in heaven. He governs (by knowledge) the world before taking to Him His power Zechariah takes up Israel and the nations.
-- 36. "The living God" -- note this.
-- 26. This passage, I think, shows that the king of the North, Gog (the king of Sheshach, as I believe) has possession of the regions called "North" in Judaea, by virtue of the system of judgments which come thereon. It is not then his simple inherited possession. "The king of Sheshach" I take to be Gog, not in his original, natural position, but after his having in a great measure possessed himself of the earth, and then upon the putting out of Antichrist, being alone in the earth as against God -- the sun darkened, they that are drunken, drunken in the night, see Habakkuk 2 -- and so thus, indeed, the king of all the confusion; but it is in the night of his destruction. Of the activity of this, Nebuchadnezzar seems a type -- of its being confounded, Belshazzar. I have always thought Nebuchadnezzar,
as conquering, to be the type of the Assyrian of the latter day.
But it appears to me that there is a point here of new light breaking in -- the Gog, the Assyrian, becomes the representative of power over Babylon, when Antichrist is put out, and, though put out by God's mighty ones, he will think it is all to his dominion; see Joel, and the account of the Assyrian in Isaiah. Then, having come against the Jews, he will say, "Where is now their God," setting himself as "the man of the earth" against "the God of the earth," as the other against Antichrist -- for the earth is his sphere, power not infidelity and antichristianism, which is the distinctive point of the former. But Antichrist is in fact the inferior power. Isaiah 14:12, clearly, I think, applies to him, Antichrist, but the passage which I will go into here, seems to embrace a larger scope, and to open out this very position of the last king, as finding his destruction in having all drowned in his person, except the head who shall then see that their power is gone, "none shut up nor left."
We have observed, elsewhere, the distinctness of character in Antichrist and the king of Babylon in this point of view, i.e., the virtual headship of confusion, on the destruction of Antichrist, but who holds it in power (for in this God will vindicate it as between them) but who, then turning that power against God, as having all, touches not them, the Remnant but the apple of His eye. "The king of Babylon" is not, in my opinion, used of Antichrist, which is a most important point, and opens out the whole question, and reflects light on many others; compare the connection in Isaiah 14:22, 24, 25. Verse 13 shows the other's assumed dominion in his origin. He is not power but popular, the head "of" not "over," in his principles, as Buonaparte said, "I am the representative of the people"; consider also verse 29, et seq. Then Psalm 48:2, determines, I think, verse 13, and thus the whole matter is made plain. We have also, hence, a very definite understanding of Revelation 16 and 17 and the time of chapter 18: 21, confirming generally the view heretofore taken, the details not being there unfolded; see note on the passage now.
The bearing of this I feel to be sound and interesting, but there is not sufficient scope left for what passes between the destruction of Antichrist and the inroad of Gog, as in Zechariah for example, and Gog and the Assyrian are unduly identified.
-- 1. I suspect the fault is not in "Jehoiakim" in this verse, but in "Zedekiah" in verse 3 -- that it was in Jehoiakim's reign Jeremiah warned the Ammonites, etc. And he did the same, as to Judah, when Zedekiah was king; verse 12. But it is a matter of fact to be enquired into.
-- 18. It is deeply interesting to compare this verse with Genesis 20:7, and John 15:7. One sees that being a prophet, i.e., having the communication of the mind of God, places one in, and supposes that intimacy with Him which enables to ask and have of Him, and obtain. It produces and implies, in its nature, that kind of confidence, that claim in grace arising from intimacy, that possession of His mind which enables to intercede. Martha was sure Christ was in this position; she did not know, nor realise His intrinsic living power. And note, the Christian, so far as he values his place in Christ, is in this position, "If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done"; compare John 16:26, 27; see also 1 Corinthians 2:16.
-- 30. Note, whatever the inworking of grace, and however complete the forgiveness, the state of Israel in the millennium is one of strict law, only direct and personal.
-- 33, 34. I compare these verses, and verses 29, 30, with Isaiah 60:21, and chapter 65: 19, 20. Only here dying is for his sin -- judgment in this world. This would seem to be so in Isaiah 65:20.
-- 18. This is a prophecy of Scripture -- the spoken and the written -- the same thing. The Epistles were the same -- the "I, Tertius," represents Baruch. The form of inspiration was, however, different, and blessedly so. Not less inspiration, but more in the intelligence. We have the mind of Christ. The Holy Ghost, dwelling in the Church, enters into all its circumstances. The prophets studied their own prophecies. The New Testament is "We speak that we do know."
-- 28. God's judgments are not set aside by burning rolls of parchment.
-- 25. "Amon of No" (see margin). Is there any case of pakad (visit) with min (from) having the sense of cutting off? It is curious having el (to) with Amon, and al (upon) with Pharaoh. I am aware el is not usually placed with the name of a god. The Septuagint (i.e., Origen's text) seems to have read b'nah (her son) and to have left out el. Perhaps el has its force of "towards," "as far as," i.e., God's visitation of Egypt would reach as far as to cut off Ammon from Thebes; see Nahum 3:8, for minno Amon (than No Amon).
-- 40. Elohim -- used as to Sodom, and nowhere else.
In Isaiah 13 we have "the burden of Babylon," as it appears to me, the whole power of confusion -- Babel. Chapter 14: 25, includes the Assyrian, which was long before the rise, you may say, of Babel, in the literal history on which this is founded. Yet it is here identified with it, as the closing point of power -- the "ceasing of indignation." Hence we learn that it is in its full, real exhibition, and closing character that it is here spoken of. Consequently, all necessary to the antitypical circumstances are brought together. The burden is of Babel all through. Confusion is to be put out and confounded. Hence, first we have the army of "kingdoms of nations," with God's sanctified ones, His gibborim -- the Lord's host altogether. This is "the day of the Lord" at hand, and destruction from the Almighty; see the same thing, precisely, in Joel. The effect -- "the Land is laid desolate" -- the sun, moon, and stars, put out. The world (te-vel, whole earth) punished for its evil -- pride and haughtiness laid low. A man made more precious than fine gold. This implies the destruction of the army itself, also, dreadfully. The heavens shaken, and the earth removed -- a known symbol of the final judgment of the latter day, as in the Lord's hand. Here we have the full, antitypical character of the whole scene of the latter day, in its generic accomplishment -- its accomplishment in the world, in which the host of the Lord is gathered, but gathered into punishment because
of their arrogancy, saying "my hand," whereas the Lord led them up as "the rod of his anger." But the real instruments are not included in this, the gibborim -- the sanctified ones -- those whose pride is in His exaltation. That passage is complete.
Then we have the typical facts of the destruction of Babylon, as holding the Jews in bondage, in which Antichrist shall keep them, for it is their deliverance, rather Jerusalem's, from the Babylonians, which is then noted, and against them. "For the Lord will have mercy on Jacob," also note verse 2, the people (gomim) bring them to their place, who may be scattered, and, what has never been yet accomplished since Babylon, "they shall rule over their oppressors." Then, when Jacob has "rest," for this is the point of the second part from chapter 13: 17 to chapter 14: 1 (now the terrible day in which Gog is brought into destruction, evidently is past before "the rest") the arrogancy of the proud, the man of the earth is set aside. Hence, in celebrating the fall of the king of Babylon, it includes the whole scene of power of man assumed over the world. It is all one great crisis. Lucifer in this is Antichrist, and it will be found, in every particular, to be the counterpart of Christ, in his assumptions in all the characters of His glory. This was that which was the power of Babylon over the Jews. At the same time there is that which never got hold of Jerusalem, though it thought it got hold of it as a nest The Lord broke the Assyrian on his god -- the Lord's mountains, and the yoke is taken off. The Assyrian is the successor of Antichrist, in being alone in power, but does not take Jerusalem, though he oppressed the Land, which is therefore here spoken of. The fall of Antichrist sets Jerusalem free, and in fact the earth. The Assyrian, Gog, who has been brought up "with a hook in his nose," perishes, and the Land is cleared. Thus the whole scene is brought before us, giving, as the subject of the prophet's prophecy is Judah and Jerusalem, Babylon and its proper head, Antichrist, but, lest there should be mistake as to the whole scene, the Assyrian is introduced as destroyed under the circumstances which ensued thereon The order has been spoken of and gone into in another place.
-- 8 -- 59 -- 62. Note, as to Babylon, this makes it plain, whatever judgment may be as to ulterior facts, that the then testimony as to the then Babylon was a testimony as for ever. Zedekiah and Seraiah, and the testimony to be then read in
Babylon, clearly apply to the then existing Babylon, and Babylon was to be desolations for ever. I reject no ulterior instruction here. So chapter 25: 12, where, after giving the nations round about up to Nebuchadnezzar for perpetual desolations, at the end of seventy years He gives up the king, nation and land of the Chaldeans, and makes it a perpetual desolation. The destroying mountain is to be desolate for ever, see chapter 51: 26. These are all that are said. Thus of three, two are certainly ancient Babylon.
Then as to "from generation to generation" (Isaiah 13:20) "Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldees' excellency ... shall not be dwelt in from generation to generation"; see chapter 34: 10, 17, as to Idumaea, and chapter 51: 8, as to salvation, and Jeremiah 50:39, as to Babylon. I cannot doubt that Jeremiah 50 and 51 apply to ancient Babylon. Moreover, in the testimony given to Seraiah, it is said, "Thus shall Babylon sink, and shall not rise from the evil that I will bring upon her."
In reading this book one can only say: Wise people often confound themselves by their too great wisdom -- its narrow limits, or endless modifications always suppose it to exist. It is very natural that the unlearned, who have not confused themselves, should be surprised at the learned ignorance of those who have.
Chapter 2. "The deposits of peat in Denmark, varying in depth from ten to thirty feet, have been formed in hollows or depressions in the northern drift or boulder formation hereafter to be described." "Around the borders of the bogs, and at various depths in them, lie trunks of trees, especially of the Scotch fir, often three feet in diameter, which must have grown on the margin of the peat-mosses, and have frequently fallen into them. This tree is not now, nor has ever been in historical times, a native of the Danish Islands, and when introduced there has not thriven; yet it was evidently indigenous in the human period, for Steenstrup has taken out with his own hands a flint instrument from below a buried trunk of one of these pines." "The oak has now in its turn been almost superseded in Denmark by the common beech. Other trees, such as the white birch, characterise the lower part of the bogs, and disappear from the higher; while others again, like the aspen, occur at all levels, and still flourish in Denmark." "The capercailzie is also met with, and may, it is suggested, have fed on the buds of the Scotch fir in times when that tree flourished around the peat-bogs." "The minimum of time required for the formation of so much peat must, according to the estimate of Steenstrup, and other good authorities, have amounted to at least 4,000 years."
Flourishing around the peat-bogs may be, but in general it is not the case. The trees have formed the bog in great part. I distrust all these statements wholly as to the time of bogs being formed. In certain circumstances they form rapidly. But with all his desire for long dates, his authorities only go to
+The geological evidences of the Antiquity of Man, with remarks on theories of the origin of species by variation." By Sir Charles Lyell, F.R.S. Third edition, revised. London, John Murray, Albemarle Street, London, 1863.
4,000 years, and man does not reach to the bottom. The lowest part was probably formed before trees were there, and then trees helped to form the rest, like a cedar swamp. In Canada another kind of tree always grows when the first growth is cut down. Swamp and bog stuff, and a peculiar grass form bog earth, and then, if trees grew and fell, as they easily do in bogs, or when hewn, they rapidly form a mass of bog, some only being preserved sound. Now thus, on his own showing, the date is, on the shorter chronology, long since the flood.
As to the ancient Swiss dwellings, we get another fact. In Eastern, i.e., wild mountainous Switzerland beyond the plateau, there are only stone remains. Page 18. "During the dredging operations on the Lake of Zurich, they discovered a number of wooden piles deeply driven into the bed of the lake, and among them a great many hammers, axes, celts and other instruments. All these belonged to the Stone period with two exceptions, namely, an armlet of thin brass wire, and a small bronze hatchet." Now there may have very likely been a ruder contemporaneous class. Near Berne itself we get into the cold Alpine region. Denmark may have been put as far back in civilization, just as Britain in the time of the Roman conquest -- at least as to agriculture. Bronze instruments are not beyond Greek and Marseilles, i.e., long within the time of history.
Page 27. "The most elaborate calculation is that made by M. Morlot, respecting the delta of the Tinière, a torrent which flows into the Lake of Geneva, near Villeneuve. This small delta, to which the stream is annually making additions, is composed of gravel and sand. Its shape is that of a flattened cone, and its internal structure has of late been laid open to view in a railway cutting, one thousand feet long and thirty-two feet deep. Three layers of vegetable soil, each of which must at one time have formed the surface of the cone, have been cut through at different depths. This upper layer belonged to the Roman period, and contained Roman tiles and a coin. M. Morlot, assuming the Roman period to represent an antiquity of from sixteen to eighteen centuries, assigns to the Bronze age a date of between 3,000 and 4,000 years, and to the oldest layer, that of the Stone period, an age of from 5,000 to 7,000 years."
I feel some doubts as to la Tinière, as the Rhone fills that valley too, and it is alleged that part was lake in those early
times. Further, as vegetable soil is formed at three distinct heights, the dates, and even the formation itself, as alleged, are uncertain. It may easily, or more likely, have been special floods. That a tiny stream, like la Tinière, should have raised a delta thirty-two feet, I doubt very much. How came a delta to be a "flattened cone"? Why is the Roman period assumed to be that of Augustus? I suppose the coin said nothing. All this is excessively vague. The judgment is only between 5,000 and 7,000 years. So that, with the utmost desire to make it long, it comes to nothing, unless to prove that man is not ancient, even where man seeks to make him so.
Again, supposing the data correct, which again I doubt from what I have seen of Yverdon, and the rapidity of present increase, far more from throwing up sand than from the Orbe whose water is very clear -- but supposing the Bronze is 3,300 years old, we only get back to a date long since the Flood, at which period there was still the Stone period elsewhere.
As to la Tinière near Villeneuve, I now know what this little torrential rivulet is. Montreux not Ayn side of the station. But Lyell has taken a testimony in the most credulous way from Morlot. I have it from a member of the Lausanne Society that all rejected his view of the case. He stood alone. A skull, 8 mêtres deep, which he would put I forget how many thousands of years off, is deeply and distinctly stained with bronze or verdigris, the distinct proof of its bronze or copper date. It is now in the museum at Lausanne.
Page 29. "The old convent of St. Jean, founded 750 years ago, and built originally on the margin of the Lake of Bienne, is now at a considerable distance from the shore, and affords a measure of the rate of the gain of land in seven centuries and a half." "M. Morlot, after examining the ground, thinks it highly probable that the shape of the bottom on which the morass rests is uniform." The judging of the time without knowing the depth is most idle work. "M. Morlot thinks it highly probable"! It is, I should think, highly probable that as it advanced into the lake it grew deeper, and took much longer time to fill up. The vast morass, between Morat, Neuchâtel and Bienne lakes, certainly cannot be judged of even as being formed. There is no proof of its not being an abiding state from its mud and the nature of the ground. It is not a delta. It runs along Neuchâtel lake where no delta would naturally have been formed, and where the
Thièle runs out of Morat, not the Broye into it. The river goes round the hill of Veuilly, and a vast wide plain of moss, or sumpf, goes far into the Canton of Berne, then borders Neuchâtel and begins again towards Bienne lake, which I know less, though I have passed up the river in a boat -- thus
In result we have only the proof that man is not so very ancient. Besides if Bronze was 3,300 years old, in which we have Christianity and the Iron period, it is not very evident why 3,450 years should be for the Stone period, even to the earliest. Chamblon is not above thirty or forty miles from Pont de Thièle in the same valley, with the Lake of Neuchâtel between. So that the state of civilisation could not be very different.
Chapter 3, page 37. "The great aim of the criticisms has been to get rid of the supposed anomaly of finding burnt brick and pottery at depths and places which would give them
claim to an antiquity far exceeding that of the Roman domination in Egypt. For until the time of the Romans, it is said, no clay was burnt into bricks in the valley of the Nile. But a distinguished antiquary, Mr. S. Birch, assures me that this notion is altogether erroneous, and that he has under his charge in the British Museum, first, a small rectangular baked brick, which came from a Theban tomb, which bears the name of Thothmes, a superintendent of the granaries of the god Amen Ra, the style of art, inscription, and name, showing that it is as old as the 18th dynasty (about 1450 B.C.); secondly, a brick bearing an inscription, partly obliterated, but ending with the words 'of the temple of Amen Ra.' This brick, decidedly long anterior to the Roman dominion, is referred conjecturally, by Mr. Birch, to the 18th dynasty, or 1300 B.C. Sir Gardner Wilkinson has also in his possession pieces of mortar, which he took from each of the three great pyramids, in which bits of broken pottery and of burnt clay or brick are imbedded."
These data as to the Nile are altogether too vague to prove anything. A brick, 20 or 30 years off, proves not the date, but that the data afford no ground. For though bricks date back 1,400 years before Christ, yet if I find that date, and bricks not used in monuments of very much greater antiquity, it shows that what was not above 2,000 years before Christ may be at that depth, i.e., that the proofs are nil. Babel was made of bricks. So bricks are found in Lower Chaldaea, at any rate as old as Abraham, supposed Chedorlaomer -- say 2,000 years before Christ.
Page 40. "It is clear that the Ohio mound-builders had commercial intercourse with the natives of distant regions, for among the buried articles some are made of native copper from Lake Superior, and there are also found mica from the Alleghanies, sea-shells from the Gulf of Mexico, and obsidian from the Mexican mountains." "The extraordinary number of mounds implies a long period, during which a settled agricultural population had made considerable progress in civilisation, so as to acquire large temples for their religious rites, and extensive fortifications to protect them from their enemies."
Page 41. "When I visited Marietta in 1842, Dr. Hildreth took me to one of the mounds, and showed me where he had
seen a tree growing on it, the trunk of which when cut down displayed eight hundred rings of annual growth."
As to these mounds in Ohio and works in Lake Superior, first it is certain it was not the Stone period, but the metallic tool times, for they are found and copper mines. But further, these copper mine works are found under the same timber forests which are found in Ohio. The timber would only prove moreover, on his own showing, "one generation died out and diversity of species" then having grown up. Nor could it be said that the eight hundred rings were not of the first growth. It is true the first growth after cutting down is mainly of one kind, not however by any means absolutely so. But if the land had been kept cleared, it would not be necessarily so at all, but the contrary. So that all this argument proves will in Sir C. Lyell, and nothing more.
The Santos in Brazil, page 42, I may pass by, saving as remarking how little founded seemingly clear conclusions are.
Page 43. "In one part of the modern delta near New Orleans, a large excavation has been made for gas-works, where a succession of beds, almost wholly made up of vegetable matter, has been passed through, such as we now see forming in the cypress swamps of the neighbourhood ... . In this excavation, at the depth of sixteen feet from the surface, beneath four buried forests superimposed one upon another, the workmen are stated by Dr. Dowler to have found some charcoal and a human skeleton, the cranium of which is said to belong to the aboriginal type of the Red Indian race. Dr. Dowler ascribes to this skeleton an antiquity of 50,000 years." As to the delta of the Mississippi, we have only Dr. Dowler. If it was the Red Indian he is comparatively modern in America -- that is clear, as the Ohio mounds, etc., show. And the islands of mud and forest carried down by the Mississippi made their proofs of no weight whatever, no more than the "canoes of the Clyde."
Page 44. "Professor Agassiz has described a low portion of the peninsula of Florida as consisting of numerous reefs of coral gained gradually from the sea, ... and calculates that it has taken 135,000 years to form the southern half of this peninsula." Assuming the rate of advance in Florida is no ground to go on. We know not what upheavals may have been, or what has happened in the interval whatever it is. It is a mere guess, and the circumstances even do not appear.
In Scotland, it rather appears from Mr. Geikie's remarks on the Roman wall, that the marks of man must have been within sixteen or seventeen centuries, for then it was those parts were under water, which is confirmed by the facts relative to the Firth of Forth. He says, page 52, "Antiquaries have sometimes wondered that the Romans did not carry their wall further west than Chapel Hill; but Mr. Geikie now suggests, in explanation, that all the low land at present intervening between that point and the mouth of the Clyde, was, sixteen or seventeen centuries ago, washed by the tides at high water. The wall of Antonine, therefore, yields no evidence in favour of the land having remained stationary since the time of the Romans, but on the contrary, appears to indicate that since its erection the land has actually risen." "Alaterva, the chief Roman harbour, was on the southern coast of the Forth, where numerous coins, urns, sculptured stones, and the remnant of a harbour have been detected." "At Aithrie, near Stirling, were found two pieces of stags' horn, artificially cut, through one of which a hole, about an inch in diameter, had been perforated." But note, this goes further, for it tends to show an old stone period toward the same time. No doubt the older boats may have been buried before, but they are connected with the same tide-way, the same state of country and river. It is not a Stone-state at the same time in another place, which may be in Switzerland, and is at this moment. But the same general period and state of things includes both. The canoes were raised by a rise taking place since the time of the Romans. He says, page 48, "Mr. John Buchanan, a zealous antiquary, writing in 1855, informs us, that in the course of the eighty years preceding that date, no less than seventeen canoes had been dug out of the estuarine silt of the Clyde at Glasgow, and that he had personally inspected a large number of them before they were exhumed. Five of them lay buried in silt under the streets of Glasgow, one in a vertical position with the prow uppermost as if it had sunk in a storm. Twelve other canoes were found about a hundred yards back from the river, at the average depth of about nineteen feet from the surface of the soil, or seven feet above high-water mark; but a few of them were only four or five feet deep, and consequently more than twenty feet above sea-level. In one of the canoes, a beautifully polished celt or axe of green stone was found."
The only thing proved by these data is that they were sunk before the upheaval, perhaps at different times, but we have only a proof, as far as it goes, that in the time of Antonine it had not taken place. The boats might be of a date subsequent to the Romans, only it is to be supposed the different degrees of rudeness marked different dates. But it is just as probable that it took place by the introduction of Roman skill as not. Stags' horns were used for the whale harpoons. And the utmost effort of prolongation only brings the most ancient to 3,400, that is -- be it so -- the time of the Exodus! But we get another important point here. If this be so, the Stone implement things are not older, perhaps not half as old. Some were 20 feet above the now sea-level, and five feet in sand. Their covering of five feet cannot have taken centuries -- they would have rolled. The sand they are in was at the surface -- about the year 500 after Christ ("fifteen centuries before our era," he says) they were five feet under it. But we have no proof that they had been even 500 years there. But this is "the Stone-period"!
As regards stone hatchets, etc., consult Rawlinson's Ancient Monarchies, vol. 1, page 119, etc. -- the plainest proof of the near following of stone and bronze. It is exactly the same as in Europe, perhaps in the then extreme North more rude. And the Swiss remains at Pfahlbauten plainly prove the whole system, and even animals, in great part, to have come from the East.
His data as to Norway are without any solid foundation. In the north it takes "a century for five feet," he says. So he strikes a mean of two and a half feet and concludes 24,000 years. But who says that it was always equal, or always the same from north to south? He says, page 58, "The upward movement now in progress in parts of Norway and Sweden, extends throughout an area of 1,000 miles north and south, and for an unknown distance east and west, the amount of elevation always increasing as we proceed towards the North Cape, where it is said to equal five feet in a century. A mean rate of continuous vertical elevation of two and a half feet in a century would, I conceive, be a high average; yet even if this be assumed, it would require 24,000 years for parts of the sea coast of Norway to attain the height of 600 feet." All this is vague and uncertain to the last degree.
The caves in France confessedly prove nothing. With
Desnoyer's facts this goes really further. Sir C. Lyell says, page 62, "That such intermixtures have really taken place in some caverns, and that geologists have occasionally been deceived, and have assigned to one and the same period fossils which had really been introduced at successive times, will readily be conceded." Yes, indeed! But Dr. Schmerling's caves, near Liege, are alleged, but this is only more valid because it is alleged that the drainage system must have changed since the bones came there. They have been washed in, so that in themselves they give no evidence. He says, (page 73), "The great alterations which have taken place in the shape of the valley of the Meuse and some of its tributaries are often demonstrated by the abrupt manner in which the mouths of fossiliferous caverns open in the face of perpendicular precipices 200 feet or more in height above the present streams." "It is more than probable that the rate of change was once far more active than it is now in the basin of the Meuse. Some of the nearest volcanoes, namely, those of the lower Eifel about sixty miles to the eastward, seem to have been in eruption in post-pliocene times, and may perhaps have been connected and co-eval with repeated risings or sinkings of the land in the Liege district." Now this change of valley system is attributed to earthquakes and volcanoes -- when these were, we cannot tell -- supposing the Deluge had nothing to do with it.
As regards the skulls, it is simply evident that they prove nothing. The skulls are some as good, some less so, than ordinary European skulls. Page 65. "One skull, that of a young person, was embedded by the side of a mammoth's tooth. Another skull, that of an adult individual, was buried five feet deep with the tooth of a rhinoceros, several bones of a horse, and some of the reindeer," etc. The Australian gives the same differences living at the same time. All this is operose nihil agendo. It proves that Professor Huxley, in spite of facts, thinks that the monkey-like men are to be looked for farther before Elephas primigenius than that is from us. But he is a regular low Linnaeist. He says, page 89, "Finally, the comparatively large cranial capacity of the Naeanderthal skull, overlaid though it may be by pithecoid bony walls, and the completely human proportions of the accompanying limb-bones, together with the very fair development of the Engis skull, clearly indicate that the first traces of the primordial stock whence man has proceeded need no longer be sought, by
those who entertain any form of the doctrine of progressive development, in the newest tertiaries; but that they may be looked for in an epoch more distant from the age of the Elephas primigenius than that is from us." But it proves that skulls that are found prove nothing -- that like the Nile valley creatures, so man was the same.
He says, "The enormous extent of the time over which our knowledge of man now extends." But the proofs as yet go the other way. The only point made, not yet proved, is (Tournal and Christol, south of France) that the mammoth, etc., are found with human remains in undisturbed alluvium; page 59, "Whether the animals enumerated by M. Tournal might not all of them be referred to quadrupeds which are known to have been living in Europe in the historical period seems doubtful."
As regards the bog and peat, it is all idle to judge of the period it takes in the way it has been done. It is the fashion to make the time long. If there were no water it would not grow. If there were, and trees fell as was the case here, it would, I am satisfied, make a very deep mass in fifty years. Next, in the Somme valley, the present was pretty much scooped out. But we get similar deposits fifty feet higher with the same remains. So that geology is at fault here, and its conclusions are necessarily called in question. Page 94. "M. Boucher de Perthes styled these older stone tools antediluvian, because they came from the lowest beds of a series of ancient alluvial strata bordering the valley of the Somme, which geologists had termed diluvium." They were found with bones "twenty or thirty-five feet in depth, in repairing the fortifications of Abbeville." "Thirty miles from Abbeville he found precisely the same in rudeness of make, and the same in geological position, about ninety feet above the river," page 96.
In the Brixham cave the bones, etc., were all "floated in," and, it is stated, when the stream was very much higher. But the flood may very likely have scooped it out here. The only alleged fact is the finding of the "limb of a cave-bear" at Brixham, and a rhinoceros leg-bone near Abbeville, but the mammoth in Silurian is a proof that such may have been long preserved -- for ages -- and if so, the stream or flood, which filled the cave, may have brought it in in that state. The time of the extinction of the animals too remains unascertained. It
is certain their remains, at least of Elephas primigenius, with flesh, skin and hair, so as to be eaten, have been preserved to our days.
At Amiens the flints and bones were about 150 feet above the river at Abbeville -- the same strata as there, and the same remains. Now this throws all in doubt as to the whole theory of the formation and remains. How come they (the same) at such different altitudes? Could the alleged system of formation be true? The sea had never gained there. Geologists, we are told, have discussed which is most ancient at Abbeville. But if more ancient, how do the strata and contents prove a date when they are the same? This is tripped lightly over with "the history of the valley marking," etc.
The gravel where the molar of Elephas antiquus, if it be so, was found, was only supposed to be a continuation of the same deposit, and referred to human period because of so low a level. At St. Acheul, in this 150 feet high formation, it is not said what elephant's tooth was found, i.e., primigenius or antiquus -- the whole molar was primigenius. He says, "In the gravel, at Montiers, Mr. Prestwich and I found some flint knives. Some of these knives were taken from so low a level as to satisfy us that this great bed of gravel at Montiers, as well as that of the contiguous quarries of St. Roch, which seems to be a continuation of the same deposit, may be referred to the human period." "Among the elephant remains from St. Acheul, in M. Garnier's collection, Dr. Falconer recognised a molar of Elephas antiquus, the same species which has been already mentioned as having been found in the lower level gravels of St. Roch. Assuming the lower level gravel to be the newer, it follows that the Elephas antiquus and the hippopotamus of St. Roch continued to flourish long after the introduction of the mammoth, a well characterised tooth of which, as I before stated, was found at St. Acheul at the time of my visit in 1860" (page 143).
He says, "It is certain that ground-ice plays an active part every winter in giving motion to stones and gravel in beds of rivers in European Russia and Siberia. It appears that when in those countries the streams are reduced nearly to the freezing point, congelation begins frequently at the bottom; the reason being, according to Arago, that the current is slowest there. Fragments of such ice rising occasionally to the surface, bring up with them gravel, and even large stones."
At St. Acheul we have proofs of ice, so that the Siberian case applies directly. There is no proof, in the fact of their entering, that the legs, before referred to, might not have been washed in now. Their separation from the body proves partial previous dislocation -- it is probable that when it was cold on the Somme the gulf stream came by to melt, and it was cold at Brixham too -- if separated as now.
Further the flint instruments are the same as far as appears -- no progress, as elsewhere, according to Sir C. Lyell, for many, many thousands of years -- longer before the peat than after. Elephas antiquus is found on high as well as on low lands, but flints not above 100, i.e., 150 feet above sea level. But why not higher, if rain had been there, and they dropped in? "Ice-chisels, flint hatchets, and spear-heads may have slipped accidentally through holes in the ice, and inevitably swept away with gravel on the breaking up of ice in the spring"!
Chapter 9. The only remark I have to make as to the Seine and Oise, which is all vague enough is, that Elephas primigenius and Elephas antiquus and Bos moschatus are all found there -- that the latter still exists, and Elephas primigenius has been found with flesh, hair, etc., on, preserved in ice. So that the subsistence of man with them in itself proves nothing. The utmost is the negative evidence of Elephas ant. not having been generally found in late strata. But it is found with Elephas prim. and Bos mosch. Indeed, when human bones have not been found with El. Ant. but only with El. Prim., which proves nothing, the only ground of proof is the sameness of the deposit. But Sir C. Lyell admits so little examination has taken place, that they cannot "speculate with confidence" on the "sameness of date," page 152. Now this is everything. That the human bones and flint hatchets are there, is very possible -- they may probably be so -- but then it is not even said that El. Ant. was in either locality, nor have we any proof that gravel of the same kind is of the same date. Nay, according to Lyell himself, "sandpits in two adjoining fields, as at Brentford and Ilford, may be separated by thousands of years, yet the same deposit" (page 159) "each containing distinct species of elephant and rhinoceros." But note, these same distinct species are found in one deposit, as "near Chauny and Noyon, besides reindeer, horse, and the musk buffaloe." I only ask, what possible proof have we here of date, from deposit or animal remains?
But there are greater difficulties in the way of geological chronology. At Biddenham, two miles from Bedford, we have "higher level gravel, at Bedford lower level gravel." Both very long after the glacial period, both "boulder clay or drift, and Oolite have been cut through." But in the lower and newer we have Elephas ant., and in the higher and older (perhaps it is argued elsewhere, thousands of years, to make man date far back) Elephas prim. and different shells from the lower. Thus the ground taken, for relative dates, from position and remains is totally subverted, or the presence of these extinct mammalia, etc., proves nothing at all. All Sir C. Lyell says on this is, "But we have scarcely as yet sufficient data to enable us to determine the relative age of these strata."
Chapter 10, page 173. He says, "The discovery of the most importance, is the occurrence in a newly discovered cave in Glamorganshire, called Long Hole, of the remains of two species of rhinoceros, in an undisturbed deposit, in the lower part of which were some well-shaped flint knives, evidently of human workmanship. It is clear from their position that man was coeval with these two species." When he speaks of "undisturbed deposit" in the Long Hole cave, it is merely undisturbed in the cave. Nor does he say why "it is clear" that man was coeval. All has been washed in as far as is known at any rate in other caves, and it is not stated to be known in this. In this cave relative position proves nothing. This is "certainly" it is said, "coeval with man." Now, in the same account, the "marine shells strewed above," prove "submergence and subsequent upheaval," so that their undisturbed character is more than doubtful. It may have been quietly, as observed elsewhere, but the state of things is all left vague.
Again page 175. "No proofs seem yet to have been found of the existence of man at the period when the hippopotamus and Elephas ant. flourished at San Ciro. There is another cave called the Grotto di Maccagnone, which much resembles it in geological position, on the opposite or west side of the Bay of Palermo, near Carini. In the bottom of this cave a bone deposit like that of San Ciro occurs, and above it other materials reaching to the roof. In this upper and newer breccia Dr. Falconer discovered flint knives, bone splinters, bits of charcoal, burnt clay and other objects indicating human intervention, mingled with entire land shells, teeth of horses, coprolites of hyaena, and other bones, the whole agglutinated to one
another and to the roof," etc. Now in the Grotto di Maccagnone there is a bone deposit the same as San Ciro, where Elephas ant. occurs, and in a "newer breccia," as we are told, flint knives, charcoal, burnt clay, etc., are found. Heretofore Elephas ant. was found "coeval with man," i.e., with flint knives, etc. -- here they are posterior! And note, it is all washed in "tranquilly" it is said, which is strange, but be it so; but the dates of time are uncertain where the knives are in a subsequent formation.
Page 177. As to Sardinia all is too vague to ascertain what the facts are -- I do not even understand it. He says, "In the vegetable soil covering the upraised marine stratum, with the older works of art fragments of Roman pottery occur." Are the older works of art in the vegetable soil then? If so, all is confusion and uncertain. Assuming 21½ feet in a century is all supposition, without any ground whatever. It varies ad infinitum.
Page 183. The cavern of Aurignac proves absolutely nothing. He says, "It was almost filled with bones, among which were two entire skulls, which he recognised at once as human. The Mayor ascertained by counting the homologous bones that they must have formed parts of no less than seventeen skeletons of both sexes, and all ages; some so young that the ossification of some of the bones was incomplete. Scattered through the same ashes and earth were the bones of the following species of animals: cave-bear, brown bear, badger, polecat, cave-lion, wild cat, cave-hyena, wolf, fox, mammoth (two molars), rhinoceros, horse, ass, pig, stag, Irish deer, roebuck, reindeer, aurochs" (European bison). The animals that are there exist, some of them, now, as remarked already, formed with flesh, skin and hair on in ice. You have not even Elephas ant. No one can say the animals may not have been extinct in even historic times. But, though it looks like a burying place, all seems to me a little uncertain. There are seventeen persons, some infants, and about seventy animals, supposed eaten, some as big as elephants and aurochs, and a great depth of charcoal and cinders, and then the bones in some two feet of earth, not the debris of the rock. The style of sculpture is not met, as is evident. It is alleged that there is no proof that the persons buried at Abbeville, etc., had none. But if so, in the style of sculpture there is no proof of date.
M. Lartet speaks of the period of aurochs and finer instruments. He says "in the period of aurochs, a quadruped
which survived the reindeer in the south of France, there are bone instruments of a still more advanced state of the arts," but from twelve to fifteen aurochs were found in Aurignac. But another difficulty comes in which shows how utterly uncertain their dates and theories are. The aurochs in Switzerland, where there are no reindeer, abound in lake dwellings, so that here reindeer is before aurochs. But "reindeer are found in the Mount Salève" (Savoy, near Geneva), which is more ancient than lake-dwellings. In Aurignac we have plenty of both. But reindeer are "found exclusively at Savigné," with an "advanced state of art," and "still more advanced with aurochs at Massat"! "According to this view," says Lyell, page 191, "the mammalian fauna has undergone at least two fluctuations since the remains of some extinct quadrupeds were eaten and others buried at Aurignac." What does he mean? Did races re-appear after extinction? Who ever heard of that? Is it not a total uncertainty of data?
Chapter 11. We now come to "the fossil man of Denise comprising the remains of more than one skeleton, found in a volcanic breccia near the town of Le Puy-en-Velay, in Central France." Now the fossil man of Denise is "not beyond Elephas prim." so we have advanced nothing here. Besides the questionableness of the remains, for there was confessedly no rock of the kind in the place, it was alleged to be found by the person who pretended to have found it -- "A peasant related to us how he had dug out the specimen with his own hands and in his own vineyard, not far from the summit of the volcano. I employed a labourer to make under his directions some fresh excavations, but all without success."
It is admitted that the Natchez bone, on the bank of the Mississippi proves no more than Abbeville (page 203), and no one can say out of what strata it really came.
Chapter 12. "If the reader remembers what was stated as to the absence or extreme scarcity of human bones and works of art in all strata, whether marine or freshwater, even in those formed in the immediate proximity of land inhabited by millions of human beings, he will be prepared for the general dearth of human memorials in glacial formations. It is natural therefore to encounter a gap in the regular sequence of geological monuments bearing on the past history of Man, wherever we have proofs of glacial action having prevailed with intensity." Now there is no reason why there should be
any stoppage of the human remains by the glacial period, more than of animal remains. The abundance of reptile remains in the reptile age shows preservation of fragile fossils, or with Elephas meridionalis.
But the whole theory of glacial deposits, which I do not controvert, seems extremely obscure. "Moraines, or mounds of unstratified earth and stones," I can easily understand. Boulder stones, local patches of considerable size where the ice moves. But I read, as in connection with Biddenham gravel-pit, "the boulder clay extends for miles in all directions, and it seems to be 30 or 40 feet thick." How did ice bring this? I do not see at all why the Flood may not have formed often the new drainage system, by which for example the difference of age of the valley of Elephas merid. and Elephas prim. or ant. is proved by Lyell, and thus show the new drainage system where the traits are proved to be subsequent. In Cromer cliffs (page 213) the boulder clay is stated to be from "twenty to eighty feet in thickness." How did ice bring this?
Page 231. "In those regions where glaciers reach the sea, and where large masses of ice break off and float away, moraines may be transported to indefinite distances, and may be deposited on the bottom of the sea wherever the ice happens to melt. If the liquefaction take place when the berg has run aground and is stationary, and if there be no current, the heap of angular and rounded stones, mixed with sand and mud, may fall to the bottom in an unstratified form called 'till' in Scotland, and which has been shown to abound in the Norfolk cliffs." Note "The glacial furrows do not follow the present smaller furrows in Norway," etc. When and where were these formed? Along the Baltic there are "hundreds of miles of boulder." In Scotland the ice furrows follow the present drainage, "always," it is said, "principal but not minor." Why -- unless a great flood?
Page 250. "A single elephant's tusk was found in the unstratified drift of the Valley of the Forth in so fresh a state than an ivory turner purchased it and turned part of it into chessmen. The remainder still preserved in the Edinburgh museum shrunk considerably. This boulder clay, under the name of 'the old alluvial cover' is sometimes one hundred and sixty feet thick, and passes for no less than twenty-eight miles almost continuously through the Union Canal." Now what ice brought all this? Elephants' tusks found in it so
fresh as to be turned for ivory chessmen -- shrunk when in the Museum! "Deers' horns in six feet of clay under boulder"! All this is very unsatisfactory. Partial depositions and pushings by a glacier I understand, but twenty-eight miles is strange, reaching 160 feet deep by a glacier, and where did the elephant's tusk come from? Say it tumbled in -- when?
Page 264. "Mr. Jamieson after making several measurements with a spirit level, has been led to suspect a rise in the lowest shelf of the Parallel road in Glen Spean of one foot in a mile from west to east." If the parallel road rises, either it was not a lake or the county has risen.
Note, near Ballymena in 1863, four feet down in a bog, a roll of butter in a fibrous envelope, become somewhat like cheese in consistency, was found, and a flint arrow-head near it!
Note too "Marine shells were found in Wales, 1,392 feet above the sea, but drift of the same character 2,300 feet." If this was submergence, why no shells for the last 1,000 feet? "All the system of fauna and flora" is merely tacitly taking up Darwin's system. As to epochs or their length, all is absolutely conjectural. His 21½ feet in a century is gathered from present changes and, even so, questionable, but that analogy demonstratively wrong, because, where we have proofs of action from the same causes, they are incomparably greater in result, as the Alps, Pyrenees, Andes, Himalayas, etc. No such mountains are ever formed now, admitting sinking and rising. My impression is that there are rocks polished and striated on the Jura above Neuchatel. He says, page 272, "Above 2,500 feet the rocks are rough, and not smoothed as if by ice." Again "The Chilian Andes are overspread with recent marine shells, showing an upheaval of the land during a very modern period."
As to man we are not without data. We trace back his history and civilization to historical and traditional times, and now we are called on, by Sir C. Lyell, to believe that for, say 'thousands of centuries before,' he remained practically an unimproving animal, and this on data of the loosest kind.
Page 312. In his answer to Professor Ramsay, citing the Lake of Geneva, he says, "Had it been the work of ice, it would have been prolonged from the termination of the upper valley of the Rhone towards the Jura." This I question, for the mountains would have turned it -- Mount Pelifrier and the Jorat -- and to the right far higher and more massive ones.
The Gruyère mountains are left out in Sir C. Lyell's map, page 299. So on the left of the Rhone the mountains come into the Lake. They are so steep too that, unless in the valley where Valais and Savoy divide, I should doubt there being boulders at all till near Evian. This rather tends to make more points questionable. Sir C. Lyell surely did not know the ground.
Page 315. "At Dürnten, on the Lake of Zurich, many organic remains came to light. Among these are the teeth of Elephas ant., the wild bull and red deer." I cannot conceive what the proof of antiquity from Elephas ant. is, where existing animals, or animals existing within historic times are also found. It may have been the first to perish, but we have no proof when.
Page 320. "According to M. Morlot, there was a period when the ice was in its greatest excess, when the glacier of the Rhone not only reached the Jura, but climbed to the height of 2,015 feet above the lake of Neuchâtel, and 3,450 above the sea, at which time the Alpine ice actually entered the French territory at some points, penetrating by certain gorges, as through the defile at Fort de l'Ecluse, among others. The geological formations are evidently due to the action of rivers, swollen by the melting ice, by which the materials of parts of the old moraines were rearranged and stratified, and left usually at considerable heights above the level of the present valley plains." Lyell's theory from M. Morlot here, leaves no room for the lake of Geneva having been formed. If the ground at Fort de l'Ecluse had risen, as he speaks of, then the lake might have been formed, or if the Alps subsided and it did not. But this does not answer his theory, because the subsidence was not a glacial but a melting period. Yet the hard rock of the Jura at Fort de l'Ecluse might have done this, as compared with the lake of Geneva!
To have men at the delta of la Tiniere, and a glacier at Morges is a mährchen (tale, legend). M. Morlot "supposes 10,000 years for the Tiniere delta," page 321. (There must be some blunder in chapter 2, where we have "age.") Is that duration of deposition? If so, it supposes men to be absolutely stationary for 7,000 years, or from 5,000 to 7,000 years. If it be duration, it is 9,800 or 12,000. He says "At the height of 150 feet above the lake, following up the course of the same torrent, we came to a more ancient delta, about ten times as
large, which is therefore supposed to be the monument of about ten times as many centuries, or 100,000 years ... and might perhaps correspond with the era when man and the Elephas prim. flourished together; but no human remains or works of art have as yet been found in deposits of this age"! Wherever can it be? I thought I knew the country. It is "ten times as thick" -- "the Roman the same," so that we have 98,200 years for two dates of men's progress, and if proportionately, and that is the assumption, 3 to 5, or 4 to 7, say 38,000 roughly, during which man "flourished with flint instruments of the rudest kind"! Only they have not been found! There is nothing like going far enough. If it be taken as one whole, not divided as the lower la Tinière, we have man 100,000 years in the same state, unimproved! How all history denies this, I need not say. Where such might be alleged of some thousand years, others have pushed them out.
I do not understand these "delta up to the Grande Eau." The Rhone valley has mountains descending, precipitously, right down into the morass of the plain of the river. Slight torrents tumble down the rocks. At Yvorne it first recedes -- perhaps the rise there is what he refers to. But no stream here has to do with "a delta near Villeneuve." I have no idea what he refers to.
Chapter 16. I doubt about the whole glacial theory, but the statements connected with "Loess" are absurd. He says "certain loamy deposits, commonly called 'Loess.' " "At the time of the greatest extension of the Swiss glaciers, the Lake of Constance, and all other great lakes, were filled with ice, so that gravel and mud could pass freely from the upper Alpine valley of the Rhine, to the lower region between Basle and the sea, and could always have passed without obstruction, even after the ice had melted." If the Lake of Constance was filled with ice, it is perfectly ridiculous to speak of gravel and mud travelling on the top of it, or on the bottom of it. It rolls off the hill-sides, and goes down with the glacier. That any one can see. But as to its going on below Basle, it is absurd. The water may carry mud, as to mud, "800 feet deep and upwards." The river would have been over Basle and all Alsace, and I know not where else! But "moraines" there could not have been. And note, not only "800 feet thick," but "1,600 high above the sea, covering the Kaisersthal"!
The subsidence of the Alps it was brought the mud below Basle, 1,600 feet above the level of the sea, i.e., the river Rhine must then have been more than 1,600 feet higher than now. This descends to about 600 feet around Brussels. He says, "The loess envelopes Hainault, Brabant, and Limburg like a mantle, everywhere uniform and homogeneous in character, filling up the lower depressions of the Ardennes, and passing thence into the north of France, though not crossing into England. It is found on high plateaus, 600 feet above some of the. rivers, such as the Marne; but as we go southwards and eastwards to the basin of the Seine, it diminishes in quantity, and finally thins out in those directions." "If we ascend the basin of the Neckar, we find that it is filled with loess of great thickness, far above its junction with the Rhine." What kind of waterfall then had it into the sea? It is 600 feet high near the Marne, crosses from Belgium to near Dunkirk, and does not come to England! It is not the first glacial period -- then it was "continuous land far out north and west," they say (chapter 14). If it had been the time of submergence, the sea would have flowed up the valleys. It is not the second continental state, for then the land was higher and stretched out farther than ever, and it is said the Thames ran into the Rhine, "Ireland, England, and the Continent being united, the Thames was a tributary of the Rhine," page 274.
In the last state, marine shells are found at, say 30 feet above the sea. But when was the loess deposited 1,600 feet high, and "far higher in Hungary"? The whole thing is incredible. Belgium, and on to Dunkirk was a "kind of delta," yet hundreds of feet high! And the Rhine has scooped out at least 800 feet while sinking continually at the mountain end. Where is the loess on lower ground there than the Kaisersthal over Switzerland and the borders of the Rhine? It is, as the French say, "a myth." Some other flood may have done it, gradually sinking in the present drainage system. But this system supposes the Rhine valley to have existed, and to have filled up 300 feet at Brussels and 1,600 feet at Kaisersthal. Yet, he says, "the upper valley of the Neckar has Neckar-mud," when Rhine mud was 1,600 feet high, and Danube mud vastly higher -- as if the Rhine mud would not have been there! He says "in the higher parts of the basin of the Danube, loess of the same character as that of the Rhine, attains a far greater elevation above the sea than any deposits of Rhenish loess."
They talk of levels, "grand oscillations in the level of the land -- changes analogous to those on which we have been led to speculate when endeavouring to solve the various problems presented by the glacial phenomena, to account for the nature and geological distribution of the loess." But the supposition is a regular descent from the Alps to Brussels and Dunkirk. There was no Rhine mud at Tübingen in the basin of the Neckar, but there was Rhine mud at Kaisersthal -- with the same drainage system; note, at Heidelberg it is 800 feet above the Neckar! "Southward and eastward of the Seine it thins out," query as to this. The Ganges is no case in point. Page 337. "The sediment thrown down by the Ganges had accumulated at a sufficient rate to prevent the sea from invading that region." It had subsided at the sea-end so that the mud conveyed has filled it up! Of this I see no proof, because if the sea had been that depth there it might gradually fill up, and the water be unfit for marine molluscs.
The loess I dismiss as a system of absurd theory, and far more like the Deluge than anything else. Hence also the "Maestrecht jaw, found 19 feet from the surface, and the Hocht remains of leaves, nuts, fresh-water shells and a human skull," as to which facts fail, as here, but which are avowedly of a much later date.
After all, they conjecture 4,000 to 7,000 years for even the Stone-period. He says, page 373, "An antiquity of 7,000 years at least must be assigned to the oldest of these remains. Between the newer or recent division of the Stone period and the older division, which has been called the Post-pliocene, there was evidently a vast interval of time -- a gap in the history of the past, into which many monuments of intermediate date will one day have to be intercalated. Of this kind are the cave in the South of France, in which M. Lartet has lately found bones of the reindeer, associated with works of art more advanced in style than those of St. Acheul or of Aurignac." This is all unintelligible. He intercalates between the recent and the older stone implements more advanced than those of Aurignac.
But to return, page 367, he says, "The numerous plants which are common to the temperate zones North and South of the equator have been referred by Mr. Darwin and Dr. Hooker to migrations, which took place along mountain chains running from North to South, during some of the colder phases of the glacial
epoch. Such an hypothesis enables us to dispense with the doctrine that the same species ever originated independently in two distinct and distant areas, if we admit the doctrine of the co-existence of meridional belts of warmer and colder climate, instead of the simultaneous prevalence of extreme cold both in the eastern and western hemisphere." The migration of plants and fauna is only Darwin-theory. Why may they not have been original in Great Britain? The fancy of a cold range across the equator, to have like plants in both tropics according to Dr. Hooker, is a mere dream.
As I have already suggested, they are obliged to suppose that the state of the arts remained stationary for almost indefinite periods, so that even the system of river drainage was wholly altered. But he is totally wrong, and Sir Geo. Cornewall Lewis too, as to his Assyrian and Egyptian dates. He says, "Taking into consideration all the evidence respecting the buildings and great works of Egypt extant in the time of Herodotus, we may come to the conclusion that there is no sufficient ground for placing them at a date anterior to the building of the temple of Solomon, or 1,012 B.C." Berosus goes much farther back, 2,234 B.C. This statement as to Egypt is ridiculous. It is useless to notice his ignorance of history in receiving Hanno by an Egyptian king, or refer to conjectural dates connected with it. Suffice it to say he contradicts himself as to dates and delta-remains both in chapter 3. There it is estimated, though these computations are really all nonsense, at 12,000 and 30,000 years, and the flint at 4,000 to 7,000 years, and on upwards. Yet the bones found with them are not found in the delta, and hence the deltas are much more modern, i.e., 12,000 to 30,000 more modern than 4,000 to 7,000 years and upwards. And this is science! He says, "Were we to assume the increase of Nile mud to six inches in a century, the burnt brick met with at a depth of sixty feet would be 12,000 years old. Another fragment was found seventy-two feet deep. Were we to take two and a half inches, it must have been buried more than 30,000 years ago." "Assuming the Roman period to represent an antiquity of from sixteen to eighteen centuries, M. Marlot assigns the oldest layer, that of the Stone-period, an age of from 5,000 to 7,000 years."
Chapter 20. "In pictures on the walls of ancient temples in Egypt, a thousand years or more before the Christian era, the negro and Caucasian physiognomies were portrayed as
faithfully, and in as strong contrast as if the likeness of their races had been taken yesterday. I have remarked upon the slight modification the negro has undergone, after having been transported from the tropics, and settled for more than two centuries in the temperate climate of Virginia." I do not see, if the negro do not change at all in a temperate climate, and that their physiognomy is exactly the same in Egyptian monuments as now alleged by these race settlers, what "lapse of time" can do. There must have been some other cause than change of climate and lapse of time. Yet he says, "So long as physiologists continued to believe that man had not existed on the earth above six thousand years, they might, with good reason, withhold their assent from the doctrine of a unity of origin of so many distinct races; but the difficulty becomes less and less, exactly in proportion as we enlarge our ideas of the lapse of time during which different communities may have spread slowly, and become isolated, each exposed for ages to a peculiar set of conditions, whether of temperature, or food, or danger, or ways of living." How long then did it take to make a rock pigeon a fantail or a pouter? It is always to be remembered that we have history, and tradition of men which gives the race an ordered history to a beginning, and these speculations are in the teeth of it; while their long dates there are facts to disprove -- such as trees in alleged strata of thousands of years, which prove they were laid there at once The whole thing is a decided failure.
Page 386. "But when they had gradually penetrated to remote regions by land or water -- drifted sometimes by storms and currents in canoes to an unknown shore -- barriers of mountains, deserts, or seas, which oppose no obstacle to mutual intercourse between civilised nations, would ensure the complete isolation for tens or thousands of centuries of tribes in a primitive state of barbarism." First, it is quite simple that what carried them there first, the obstacle having been no sufficient hindrance, would carry them there again. Next, it is contrary to fact, as it is perfectly well known that the pressure of nations was constant, onward, one after another. It is the history of man. Next it supposes that no part would grow civilised, and have means deliberately organised to overcome the obstacles. All the history we have, i.e., all the facts, as does common sense, refute this as having neither facts nor common sense for its foundation.
Page 388. "In the very outset of our enquiry, we are met with the difficulty of defining what we mean by the terms 'species' and 'race.' Lamarck proposed it should run thus: 'a species consists of individuals all resembling each other, and reproducing their like by generation, so long as the surrounding conditions do not undergo changes sufficient to cause their habits, characters, and forms to vary.' " The definition of "species" presents no difficulty to my mind. It is that which by regular propagation reproduces itself. How far varieties in a species may be the will of God, and so ordered in nature that they may multiply intermediate forms, is a mere matter of fact, or how far circumstances of climate, or other such, may modify or destroy a species. But where there is continuous reproduction I find a species or kind.
"All resembling each other" is really added to make confusion, because it is a question how far the resemblance is to go. Thus, should cows have horns or not? There may be constant unchangeable features, others seemingly as important, which are not. This is a matter to learn, but where the "seed is in itself, after its kind," I get a species OR race, i.e., the like produced by generation. All the rest, such as "varying their forms," as Lamarck does, throws it on what was changeable and uncertain, and is no criterion at all, so as to lose the form of the true part. It may be convenient for men's book-classification -- a mere arrangement for memory, and each student vary it -- but it has nothing to do with the reality of the matter, and hence, as we see, every man has his own arrangements. The progress IS, though not uniform, for the finest reptiles were first formed, and, I think, as perfect fishes, so as to upset Lamarck's notion, yet as a general idea between distinct races true; but "evolving" essentially false. He says, "There has been a progressive advance from brute intelligence to the reasoning powers of man. The improvement in the grade of being, had been slow and continuous, and the human race itself was at length evolved out of the most highly organised and endowed out of the inferior mammalia!" What he imagined is not much matter -- here is a sample of it, "By repeated acts of volition, animals might acquire new organs and attributes. In plants, which cannot exert a will of their own, certain subtle fluids or organising forces might operate so as to work out analogous effects"! He adds, "An indefinite lapse of ages."
Lamarck's believing in long periods makes amends, with Sir C. Lyell, for all his flaws -- the flaws being that proof is wholly wanting. But long time enough may do nobody knows what -- make, they tell us, a penguin's wing into a man's arm, that bird being a biped already! Why not? "Thirty or forty centuries are insignificant in the history of a species." How does he prove that? Because in more than that period, "thousands of centuries" if we are to believe Sir C. Lyell, "in the case of the reindeer, Elephas primigenius, and many living species," etc. But they have this significance according to Sir C. Lyell, that neither nature in all that period, nor art since it tried, has been able to produce two races, etc., or one new organ. Pretty strong significance of this at least -- that the whole theory neglects facts and is founded on notions!
When he says "Time not being allowed," he is simply denying his own statements, because if time was allowed there would be then the pliancy he denies and not fixity. Nor is this all, as he denies catastrophes as producing "great revolutions of the earth's crust, and its inhabitants." Time, if any time conceivable (for he calls the period, "almost indefinite") would do, has been allowed. Yet species are dying out rather than changing. He says, page 394, "The manner in which some species are now becoming scarce and dying out, one after another, appeared to me to favour the doctrine of fixity of specific character, showing the want of pliancy and capability of varying, which ensured their annihilation whenever changes adverse to their well-being occurred; time not being allowed for such a transformation as might be conceived capable of adapting them to the new circumstances, and of converting them into what naturalists would call new species."
Page 396. "The historical development of the forms and functions of organic life during successive epochs, seems to mark a gradual evolution of creative power, manifested by a gradual ascent towards a higher type of being." "We can scarcely doubt that we should have already traced back the evidence much farther had not our enquiries been arrested by the vast gap between the tertiary and secondary formation." What is this "vast gap between secondary and tertiary" species? How comes the gap, if all is "gradual."
"The mammalia next in antiquity were, for the most part, diminutive, the two largest not much exceeding our common
hedgehog and polecat in size, with one exception, the Stereognathus, which may have been a hoofed quadruped and placental, though, as we have only the lower jaw and teeth, and the molars are unlike any living type, such an opinion is hazarded with caution." After all, the discovered quadrupeds (unless perhaps Stereognathus, judged of from half a lower jaw with teeth unlike any) are low in proportion to their age. They are marsupials; so indeed I see he admits.
Page 405. "It may be thought almost paradoxical that writers who are most in favour of transmutation (Mr. C. Darwin, and Dr. J. Hooker, for example) are nevertheless among those who are most cautious in their mode of espousing the doctrine of progression."
The reason why Dr. Hooker and Mr. Darwin like transmutation and not progress is because there is nothing of God or of divine order in the former, and they fear the latter because there is order -- tends to show an Orderer; transmutation merely arbitrary secondary causes. The progressionist does not, as Sir C. Lyell sees, look for leaps, nor reject them, but he sees in nature order and so finds God, even when he does not think much about Him. He believes in the order, because in the main he finds it. He sees nothing in transmutation but what is low, base and casual. There is another thing, a truthfully constituted mind rejects in it -- the absence of proof, or rather the love of theory and man's mind against proofs which nature affords, as Sir C. Lyell admits. He says, "Transmutation, if adopted, will require us to hold that man himself has been derived by an unbroken line of descent from some one of the inferior animals."
Transmutation is a low, physical theory, forcing some feeble tendencies of nature in the face of the effect produced against it by what is universal else. Men see lusus naturae -- big leaves in rich ground, poor plants in poor ground, and special causes of all kinds producing natural consequences, modifying ordinary states. This may produce varieties. But they know very well, elms produce elms, and pigs produce pigs, so of all the evidence they have, as Sir C. Lyell admits, and his thousand-century theories only confirm it. Hence a sound mind, a healthful mind supposes such an order, grows into it as a part of his nature formed by what he lives in the midst of, and by which rightly he must be formed. He finds men theorising on species making, and theorising on thousands of centuries to give time
for his changes, which even so are belied by the facts possessed, even if there were thousands of centuries. Hence progressionists are indisposed to give up what has been formed in them by uniform evidence. The transmutationist wants to theorise, and the progress system makes folly of his theory, and he does not like it, that is all -- of course he does not. No progress leads the progressionist to change one animal into another -- that is transmutation. He holds to the truth of species because he sees and knows it is so. He believes it because it is written.
Page 410. "Lamarck, when speculating on the origin of the long neck of the giraffe, imagined that quadruped to have stretched himself up in order to reach the boughs of lofty trees, until by continued efforts, and longing to reach higher, he obtained an elongated neck. Mr. Darwin and Mr. Wallace simply suppose that, in a season of scarcity, a long-necked variety, having the advantage in this respect over most of the herd, as being able to browse on foliage out of their reach, survived them, and transmitted its peculiarity of cervical conformation to its successors." How perfectly ridiculous all this is about giraffes! Who ever heard there were once short-necked giraffes? Or how came it that we have not long-necked gnus or antelopes from the same cause? All this is trash.
Page 411. "Every naturalist admits that there is a general tendency in animals and plants to vary; but it is usually taken for granted, though we have no means of proving the assumption to be true, that there are certain limits beyond which each species cannot pass under any circumstances, or in any number of generations. Mr. Darwin and Mr. Wallace say that the opposite hypothesis, which assumes that every species is capable of varying indefinitely from its original type, is not a whit more arbitrary, and has this manifest claim to be preferred, that it will account for a multitude of phenomena which the ordinary theory is incapable of explaining." When it is said "it is no more arbitrary" to suppose it may vary and make a new species, than to suppose it may not, the answer is in the paragraph which follows, "Should we find that a variable species can no longer be made to vary," it is ordinary human deduction to say it cannot. It has been tried under all known circumstances and it does not. To assume, "it might under more favourable circumstances, or if more time were allowed" is more arbitrary. All existing proof is that it does not -- to assume it might is then more arbitrary than to believe
it will not. But hybridisation is a strong proof against it, because out of the deduced species there is no propagation. God has made a manifested barrier, allowing sufficient to show it cannot go beyond its kind so as to form a species. When it is said "community of descent is the hidden bond" -- naturalists looking for an unknown plan of creation -- I do not know what wise men are seeking after, but every simple one believes in genealogical descent making species, and it is plainly stated in Genesis 1.
We must not confound the ascertaining of species by marks and the facts of species by genealogy. The forms determining species are mere guesses of science, whereas true species genealogically has its own constancy -- it does not hybridise. Varieties may have been created, arise in many ways; forming species is another thing. Difference of forms is classification, not species. He says, page 439, "Among the fossils brought in 1858 by Mr. Hayden from the Niobrara valley in Nebraska, Dr. Leidy describes a rhinoceros so like the Asiatic species, that he at first referred it to the same, and, what is most singular, he remarks generally of the pliocene fauna of that part of North America, that it is far more related in character to the post-pliocene and recent fauna of Europe than to that now inhabiting the American continent." The fact of the pliocene fauna of Nebraska being more like the living European than American throws the whole matter into question -- does not finally prove against any system but makes all doubtful.
Page 440. "We have already seen that a large proportion of the living quadrupeds of Amoorland (34 out of 48) are specifically identified with those at present inhabiting the continent of Europe and the British Isles. We usually know nothing of the geographical varieties of the post-pliocene and pliocene species, least of all, those successive changes of form which they must have undergone in the pre-glacial epoch between the upper miocene and post-pliocene eras."
Page 443. "If mammalia vary, upon the whole, at a more rapid rate than animals lower in the scale of being, it must not be supposed that they can alter their habits and structures readily, or that they are convertible in short periods into new species. Mr. Darwin observes that bats might have made their way to distant islands by flight, for they are often ma with on the wing far out at sea. I have found it difficult to reconcile the antiquity of certain islands, such as those of the Madeiran
Archipelago, and those of still larger size in the Canaries, with the total absence of small indigenous quadrupeds." As to change of forms, and animals getting to islands I have no difficulty one way or another. The truth of species remains. No one doubts the existence of varieties, or that they may become more or less permanent.
Sir C. Lyell is superficial as a reasoner. Thus as to languages, Hindoos, etc., he says, quoting Professor Max Müller, page 455, "Latin itself, as well as Greek, Sanscrit, Zend (or Bactrian), Lithuanian, old Slavonic, Gothic, and Armenian are eight varieties of one common and more ancient type, and no one of them could have been the original from which the others were borrowed. They have all such an amount of mutual resemblance, as to point to a more ancient language, the Aryan, which was to them what Latin was to the six Romance languages. The people who spoke this unknown parent speech, of which so many other ancient tongues were offshoots, must have migrated at a remote era to widely separated regions of the old world, such as Northern Asia, Europe and India south of the Himalaya. The soundness of this Aryan hypothesis has been called in question on the ground that the Hindoos, Persians, Turks, Scandinavians, and other people referred to as having derived not only words but grammatical forms from an Aryan source, belong each of them to a distinct race, and all these races have, it is said, preserved their peculiar character unaltered from the earliest dawn of history and tradition." It is clear from all authorities they went to India and drove back the original inhabitants as far as the Deccan. In the south they are Turanian, in the north Aryan, save at the two extremities of the Himalayas. Persians are admittedly Zend through Pehlvi. Races are not the absolute question, as the modern Phoenicians preserved the Shemitic language of the former inhabitants but were Hamites. He says, "There can be no question that if we could trace back any set of cognate languages now existing to some common point of departure, they would converge and meet sooner in some era of the past than would the existing races of mankind; in other words, races change much more slowly than languages."
Page 469. "In our attempts to account for the origin of species, we find ourselves still sooner brought face to face with the working of a law of development of so high an order as to stand nearly in the same relation as the Deity Himself to man's
finite understanding, a law capable of adding new and powerful causes, such as the moral and intellectual faculties of the human race, to a system of nature which had gone on for millions of years without the intervention of any analogous cause. If we confound 'Variation' or 'Natural Selection' with such creational laws, we deify secondary causes or immeasurably exaggerate their influence."
It is well Sir Charles Lyell recognises a law wholly above variation. But I judge he is astray as to language, America and savage Africa apart, of which we really know nothing. The great body of the human race is clearly subdivided into Semitic, Turanian and Aryan. His conclusion from language to organs is a non sequitur. He says, "If mankind began their career in a rude state of society, their whole vocabulary would be limited to a few words, and if they then separated into several isolated communities, each of these would soon acquire an entirely distinct language, some roots being lost and others corrupted and transformed beyond the possibility of subsequent identification, so that it might be hopeless to expect to trace back the living and dead languages to one starting point. In like manner it may be said of species, that if those first formed were of very simple structure, and they began to vary and to lose some organs by disuse and acquire new ones by development, they might soon differ as much as so many distinctly created primordial types." But when he supposes the possibility of "older strata than Cambrian containing organic remains," it is unphilosophical, because we descend, he admits, according to, in the main, a progressive system from man to the lowest mollusc or foraminifera -- things long discussed whether plants or animals, i.e., to the lowest degree, i.e., it is to be supposed the bottom of animated life where it joins plants, page 442, "The foraminifera which exemplify the lowest stage of animal existence, being akin to sponges."
But he is very wide astray in saying "a law of development adds moral faculties." "Intellectual" -- be it so; but "moral," I deny, because then God comes in, and an wholly other ground of judging. The moment I get God, and moral questions involve man's relationship with Him, I am on other ground. Science is out of court -- it may prove a chimpanzee's hair to be like a man's, which is not the case -- I say "very well." Tell me that a soul was "development by selection,"
I say, "you are out of court, that is not a question of science. You are denying what I know to be divine."
Page 472. He says, speaking of progression, "It cannot be denied that a theory which establishes a connection between the absence of all relics of vertebrata in the oldest fossiliferous rocks, and the presence of Man's remains in the newest, which affords a more than plausible explanation of the successive appearance in strata of intermediate age of the fish, reptile, bird and mamimfer, has no ordinary claims to our favour as comprehending the largest number of positive and negative facts gathered from all parts of the globe, and extending over countless ages, that science has perhaps ever attempted to embrace in one grand generalisation." Generalisation and progression are well in a general way as an order in creation with variation added, but when "progress" means "derivation," and that beasts are derived from birds -- risum teneatis.
Page 474. "Linnaeus compared man and the apes, in the same manner as he compared these last with the carnivores, ruminants, rodents, or any other division of warm-blooded quadrupeds. After several modifications of his original scheme, he ended by placing man as one of the many genera in his order Primates, which embraced not only the apes and lemurs, but the bats also, as he found these last to be nearly allied to some of the lowest forms of the monkeys." Quoting from Professor Huxley, he says, "The gorilla's hand is clumsier, heavier, and has a thumb somewhat shorter in proportion than that of man; but no one has ever doubted its being a true hand. But the most cursory anatomical investigation at once proves, that the resemblance of the so-called 'hind-hand' to a true hand is only skin deep, and that, in all essential respects, the hind-limb of the gorilla is as truly terminated by a foot as that of man. The tarsal bones, in all important circumstances of number, disposition, and form, resemble those of man."
"The foot of Man is distinguished from his hand by --
"1. The arrangement of the tarsal bones.
"2. By having a short flexor and a short extensor-muscle of the digits.
"3. By possessing the muscle termed peronoeus longus."
"The hind-limb of the gorilla, therefore, ends in a true foot with a very movable great toe. It is a prehensile foot, if you will, but is in no sense a hand."
The whole of this reasoning on man and apes proves to me only the inclination of Sir C.PROPHECY
ISAIAH
EDOM
NOTES ON ISAIAH
ISAIAH 1
ISAIAH 2
ISAIAH 3 AND 4
ISAIAH 5
ISAIAH 6
ISAIAH 7
ISAIAH 8
ISAIAH 9
ISAIAH 10
ISAIAH 11
ISAIAH 13
ISAIAH 14
ISAIAH 17
ISAIAH 18
ISAIAH 19
ISAIAH 20
ISAIAH 21
ISAIAH 22
ISAIAH 23
ISAIAH 24
ISAIAH 25
ISAIAH 26
ISAIAH 27
ISAIAH 28, 29
ISAIAH 30
ISAIAH 33 - 35
ISAIAH 40
ISAIAH 41
ISAIAH 42
ISAIAH 43
ISAIAH 44
ISAIAH 45
ISAIAH 46
ISAIAH 47
ISAIAH 48
ISAIAH 49
ISAIAH 50
ISAIAH 51
ISAIAH 52
ISAIAH 53
ISAIAH 54
ISAIAH 55
ISAIAH 56
ISAIAH 57
ISAIAH 58
ISAIAH 59
ISAIAH 60
ISAIAH 61
ISAIAH 62
ISAIAH 63
ISAIAH 64
ISAIAH 65
ISAIAH 66
THE ASSYRIAN
BORN OF GOD
A NEW STATE
FRAGMENTS
FURTHER NOTE ON ISAIAH
THE FATHER'S NAME
THE THRONE OF GRACE
JEREMIAH
JEREMIAH 23
JEREMIAH 25
JEREMIAH 27
JEREMIAH 31
JEREMIAH 36
JEREMIAH 46
JEREMIAH 50
JEREMIAH 51
REMARKS ON THE "ANTIQUITY OF MAN"+