An Amicable Controversy with a Jewish Rabbi, on The Messiah's Coming Part 9

_The burden of the word of the Lord upon Israel, saith the Lord, which stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth the foundations of the earth, and formeth the spirit of man within him._

There, the burden of the prophecy was laid on the Gentiles, but the admonition meant for the benefit of Israel, to whom it was addressed; here, the burden is upon Israel, but the admonition expressly intended for all nations, "_all the people round about_;" and of such was the new Jerusalem, which is the subject of this chapter, chiefly composed after the overthrow of their idolatry and their conversion to Christianity. This appears to be the spiritual warfare here intended, namely, the successful progress of the Gospel against Paganism.

_Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the nations round about, and upon Judah it shall be in the siege against Jerusalem._

Upon Judah is the burden of the prophecy chiefly imposed, for to Judah was first committed the task of promulgating the Gospel. The Apostles, and also the disciples of our Lord were all Jews, they were the founders of this city. "_A cup of trembling_," must not be here understood to signify an example by punishment inflicted, but as the Jew renders it, "_a cup of astonishment_," or confusion to all nations; or, as it is next termed, "_a burden-stone_," to crush its enemies; and such has been the Gospel of Christ, as the prophecy declares.

_In that day, will I make Jerusalem a burden-stone for all people; all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it._

The people, here spiritually signifies their false religion, which was to be abolished; and Jerusalem is here understood to mean Christianity, or true religion, which was triumphant. Confusion is then denounced against its enemies, while Divine protection and support are promised to the house of Judah, who received Christ.

_In that day, saith the Lord, I will smite every horse with astonishment, and his rider with madness, but I will open mine eyes upon the house of Judah, and will smite every horse of the people with blindness._

The blind rage of the heathen and the infatuated frenzy with which they strove to extinguish the light of the Gospel, are here clearly foreshewn; but the spiritual Jerusalem resisted all their efforts. And when the lineal Israelites abandoned their city, its gates were thrown open to the Gentiles, who entered and repeopled it, and became thenceforward "Israelites by adoption." The new Jerusalem being Christianity, its inhabitants must mean the Christians; and who were they, after the Jews rejected Christianity, but the Gentile converts? Accordingly, they are so styled in the next verse, as contradistinguished from the first Jewish converts, who are called the governors of Judah, being the founders and builders of the spiritual city.

_And the governors of Judah shall say in their hearts, The inhabitants of Jerusalem shall be my strength, in the Lord of hosts their G.o.d._

The fitness of the expression, _Inhabitants of Jerusalem_, to symbolize the Gentile converts, further appears in the fact, that the original inhabitants of the city, who were never expelled, were Gentiles. _The governors of Judah_ can signify no other than the apostles and disciples of our Lord, the first teachers of Christianity, or the founders of the new City. These, when the Jews were no longer willing to hear them, turned their attention to the Gentiles, and directed all their efforts to effect their conversion. As the strength of a city lies in its inhabitants, so the hope of strengthening theirs, from that time, rested in gaining over the Gentiles: "_The Governors of Judah say in their hearts, The inhabitants of Jerusalem shall be my strength in the Lord of hosts their G.o.d._" Does not this mean in the Lord of hosts _becoming_ their G.o.d? That is, in his becoming the G.o.d of the Gentiles by their conversion to Christianity?

The extraordinary success of the apostles and disciples, in converting the Gentiles and repeopling the city, is foreshewn in the next verse.

_In that day will I make the governors of Judah like an hearth of fire among the wood, and like a torch of fire in a sheaf, and they shall devour all the nations round about on the right hand and on the left, and Jerusalem shall be inhabited again in her own place, even in Jerusalem._

If the spiritual Jerusalem be Christianity, it was certainly the Gentiles who repeopled this city, when the Jews deserted it. But still it was not deserted by all the Jews, for the first Christians were Jews, as emphatically expressed in the next verse.

_The Lord shall save the tents of Judah first, that the glory of the house of David, and the glory of the inhabitants of Jerusalem do not magnify themselves against Judah._

The salvation of Judah here spoken of must be salvation through Christ; but if Judah signify the first Jewish converts to Christianity, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem mean those from the gentile nations, who are _the house of David_, here spoken of, and cla.s.sed with the inhabitants of Jerusalem, as receiving their salvation subsequently to that of Judah? The house of David must surely mean those of the Hebrew nations, who did not at first receive Christ along with the house of Judah, but subsequently; or, the prophecy being still prospective, those who shall hereafter embrace Christianity must be also included. To this the Jew may probably answer: How can a Christian believe that the house of David, the very house from which Christ came, still remains unredeemed? I answer, that we are nowhere a.s.sured that all of his own family believed in him; still less the whole house of David, of which they were only a branch. To the fact, whether any of that family be still left among the unredeemed of Israel, let the Jew answer. If not, then where is their expected Messiah to come from? But if there be such, then have these not yet received the salvation which is through Christ; and as far as they are concerned, the words of the prophecy yet remain to be fulfilled, however it may have received its fulfilment in regard to others. When it shall please G.o.d to remove the veil which is before their eyes, and to restore the spiritual strength which they have lost, then will the following words be accomplished in them also, as it was to Judah in the apostolic age.

_In that day shall the Lord defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and he that is feeble among them, at that day shall be as David, and the house of David shall be as G.o.d, as the Angel of the Lord before them._

The esteem and veneration with which the primitive Christians, and particularly the apostles, would be regarded for their purity and holiness, and for their spiritual strength, notwithstanding that they were designedly chosen from the lowest and most illiterate cla.s.s of men, is here emphatically foretold. Their consequent success in preaching the gospel is next declared; the nations being destroyed, figuratively signifies their false religion being overthrown.

_And it shall come to pa.s.s in that day, saith the Lord, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come up against Jerusalem._

The next verse, which foretels _the pouring out of the Spirit_, so closely resembles the prophecy of Joel, of which St. Peter gave the interpretation on the memorable day of Pentecost; and at the same time, coupled the application with a reproach to the Jews for having crucified Christ (Acts ii.), that the Christian can hardly fail to see that they refer to the same event, though not here restricted to that particular day, as appears from "_the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem_" being mentioned; nor was the gift of the Spirit confined to the day of Pentecost, but continued to all on whom the apostles laid their hands.

_And I will pour out upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplication; and they shall look to me for him whom they pierced, and they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his only son; and be in bitterness for him as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn._

The most solemn fast almost universally observed throughout Christendom, in commemoration of Christ's crucifixion, is manifestly the event which was here foretold, at least four centuries before its fulfilment. The prospect of its receiving a more evident accomplishment at any future period, seems to be rendered hopeless by the enumeration of the different families that follows, all such distinctions being now lost among the present race of Jews.

_And in that day there shall be a great mourning in Jerusalem, as the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddon;_

_And the land shall mourn every family apart, the family of the house of David apart, and their wives apart; the family of the house of Nathan apart, and their wives apart;_

_The family of the house of Levi apart, and their wives apart; the family of the house of s.h.i.+mei apart, and their wives apart;_

_All the families that remain, every family apart, and their wives apart._

If any thing more be intended by this emphatical repet.i.tion of the families mourning apart, beyond the strong expression of the depth of their grief, and the sincerity of their repentance, may it not be to convince the unbelieving Jews of the hopelessness of a more literal fulfilment after the loss of their genealogies?

NOTES TO CHAPTER XII.

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

_When they shall be in the siege both against Judah and against Jerusalem._

Such is the translation in our version, a sense which can in no way be extorted from the words of the text, as every Hebraist must be well aware.

The Jew, by inserting the relative _who_, as understood after the word Judah, renders the pa.s.sage thus,

_And also upon Judah, who shall be in the siege against Jerusalem._

This is certainly no violation of the text, as the relative p.r.o.noun is often understood in Hebrew. But still I hold it to be a rule not to insert a relative unless the sense requires it, and I see no such necessity here, as either of the preceding nominatives, namely, _the burden of the prophecy_, or _the cup of trembling_, may govern the verb _shall be_, and thus we have, as I have rendered it, _and also upon Judah it shall be, in the __ siege against Jerusalem_; by which I understand _the burden shall_ be upon Judah also.

Verse 3. :???? ?? ?????? ??? ????? ??? ?????

_I will make Jerusalem a burden stone for all people._

Here the Jew may probably ask, How can Jerusalem, in the spiritual sense, as signifying true religion, become a burden stone, or a cup of confusion to the heathen? I answer, in every way. In the first place, by frustrating, as it did, all their efforts to suppress and extinguish it;-in the next place, by its opposing and outraging all their worldly feelings, condemning their pride, and teaching humility, requiring them to receive their religion from one whom they despised as the most degraded of human beings, a crucified malefactor;-and, lastly, by stultifying all their previous notions, enjoining the restraint and control of the pa.s.sions, instead of which their religion sanctified their indulgence as an act of devotion. Thus was Christianity, in every way, a cup of confusion, and a stumbling-stone to the heathen nations.

But against the spiritual exposition of the Old and New Jerusalem, as symbolizing the Old and New Covenant, the Jew may, perhaps, further object, that he was never taught to look for a New Covenant, and that he finds no intimation of it in the Prophets. This being a question of fact, rather than of reasoning, we must look to the Scriptures for the answer.

Without enumerating the many intimations of the sacrifices and ceremonies of the Old Covenant, not being _intrinsically_ acceptable to G.o.d, but of less estimation than the attributes of moral excellence, we find the following direct declarations of a New Covenant to be established at the Messiah's coming, who is symbolically styled, _My servant David_. Thus in Isa. lv. 3, we find, _Incline thine ear and come unto me; hear and your soul shall live; and I will make an everlasting covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David._ Ezekiel also says, chap. x.x.xiv. 24, _And I the Lord will be their G.o.d, and my servant David a prince among them; I the Lord have spoken it; and I will make with them a covenant of peace_, &c.

And again in chap. x.x.xvii. 26, he says, _Moreover, I will make a covenant of peace with them; it shall be an everlasting covenant with them; and I will place them and multiply them, and I will set my sanctuary in the midst of them for evermore._ But Jeremiah still more expressly declares the superseding of the Old, and the subst.i.tution of the New Covenant; while he describes the latter in terms equivalent to those used by Christ himself, "The kingdom of G.o.d is within you." Thus Jer. x.x.xi. 31, _Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a New Covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah. Not according to the Covenant that I made with their fathers, in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, which my Covenant they brake, although I was an husband to them, saith the Lord. But this shall be the Covenant that I will make with the house of Israel, After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts, and will be their G.o.d, and they shall be my people._

Here we have clear intimation of a new law superseding the old, the spiritual nature of the new being contrasted with the ceremonial of the old, by its being written in the heart; while the stress laid by all upon its everlasting duration, implies that the one preceding it was only meant to be temporary.

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

_And the Governors of Judah shall say in their hearts, the inhabitants of Jerusalem shall be my strength in the Lord of hosts their G.o.d._

"This text," says Dr. Blayney, "has been supposed corrupt, and many attempts made to amend it. But without any alteration, it well expresses the sentiments of the men of Judah, concerning the interest they had in the safety of Jerusalem and its inhabitants, on which their own safety and security depended in a great degree," &c. I fully agree with Dr. Blayney in the literal meaning of the words, which involves no difficulty; but in looking beyond the literal, to the symbolical and spiritual sense, considerable difficulty appears. A different solution from that I have offered at first occurred to me, which is this, that as _Judah_ means the earliest converts to Christianity, these being evidently contrasted with _the inhabitants of Jerusalem_, who were subsequently saved, the latter might mean the yet unconverted Jews. Upon this view, the anxiety of Christians for the conversion of the Jews, would appear to be the subject intimated in the verse before us; and as this idea may occur to others as it did to myself, I think it right to state my reasons for relinquis.h.i.+ng it. One objection to this view is, that in verse 10, the _unconverted Jews_, if they be the inhabitants of Jerusalem, would here mourn the crucified Saviour, which would be a complete solecism. Another objection is, that the abolition of idolatry in the next chapter, instead of being represented as opening the way for the admission of the Pagans to Christianity, which it certainly did, would then be represented as opening the way to the conversion of the Jews, which it certainly did not, but rather had a contrary effect, as history declares. And, lastly, upon this view, the corruption of Christianity, leading to the loss of the spiritual Jerusalem, mentioned at the beginning of chap. xiv., instead of being ascribed to the Gentile church, would thus appear to be the work of the Jews, either of those more recently converted to Christianity, or of those still unconverted, both of which would be alike unreasonable. Such are the reasons which led me to reject that view, and adopt the one proposed in the text. With respect to the house of David, as signifying the Jewish converts who embraced Christianity subsequent to the Apostolic age, those objections do not apply.

Verse 10. :?????? ??? ?? ??? ????

_And they shall look upon me whom they have pierced._

Blayney considers the ??? (or ???), as simply a preposition, not a compound of ?? with the affix p.r.o.noun ?, the antecedent to ??? (or ???), being understood, and renders the pa.s.sage thus, _They shall look towards him whom they pierced._

The Jew argues from the change of person, that our version cannot be right, and he renders it, _They shall look to me concerning him whom they pierced._

In whatever way the pa.s.sage be rendered, no doubt can remain in the mind of the Christian that Christ, who was pierced, is the person here alluded to; and this is the only point material to the present exposition. That the Jew should admit this, is not to be expected.