which must have guaranteed in the minds of the Christians the certainty of the accomplishment of those parts which related to his second advent. The kingdom of the Messiah is represented by the prophets under figures taken from the Theocracy, in which persons and things are typically made to denote persons and things in the later economy. This still becomes an evidence, that the Mosaic dispensation was, in those times, accounted prefigurative of the Messiah. The Theocracy, in the times of the prophets, afforded a threefold foundation, on which the descriptions of the Messiah were raised. On the first, they represented him as a king, and attributed to him the name of David ;-on the second, as a prophet, in the fullest degree endowed with the Spirit of God-not merely as a prophet circumscribed within the narrow bounds of Palestine, but as a prophet who should teach, reprove, reward or punish all the nations of the earth;—on the third, they established his character as a high priest, who should actually perform that atonement for sins, which the high priest of the Old Testament only typically executed. Thus, his kingdom appears not as one torn and separated from the Theocracy, but as that which fulfilled it-that which resolved its "shadowy" import into the substance; and Jerusalem or Zion, accordingly, is in this sense used to denote it. In this point of view Joel predicted, that in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance; and both Isaiah and Micah, that out of Zion should go forth a law, -evidently not the Mosaic, even i Jehovah's Word (ú εvayyeλids λóyos, the gospel, as Theodoret says)-from Jerusalem. Thus, these two prophets, and Ezekiel, represent the elevation of the mount of the temple above that of all the mountains accounted sacred by the Gentiles; and the reception of the Gentiles into the christian church is described by Isaiah under the figure of their flocking to Mount Zion--by Jeremiah, as a vast enlargement of Jerusalem. Under varying figures, but all connected with the Theocracy, the other prophets depict the same event. The period which they select to compare with the glory of the Messiah, is the reign either of David or Solomon: the peace and unity of his time they describe in images expressive of the cessation of the division of the two kingdoms of Judah and Israel; and the enemies of the Messiah are called after the names of their enemies, such as Moab and Edom, or Magog, in Ezekiel. It is on these figurative expressions, that the later Jewish commentators and the expositors of the Neolo * The result of a comparison between the two Eusebius (Hist. Eccl. i. 3) sums up in these words: Ὡς τούτους ἅπαντας τὴν ἐπὶ τὸν ἀληθῆ Χριστὸν, τὸν ἔνθεον καὶ οὐράνιον Λόγον, ἀναφορὰν ἔχειν, μόνον ἀρχιερέα τῶν ὅλων, καὶ μόνον ἁπάσης τῆς κτίσεως βασιλέα, καὶ μόνον προφητῶν αρχιπροφήτην τοῦ Πατρὸς τυγχάνοντα. gical school have made their stand against the orthodox interpretation of the prophecies; we, therefore, have been somewhat diffuse in the preceding remarks, and shall now epitomize Dr. Hengstenberg's rules for criticizing prophecy. Since the prophets often represented events separated by a long interval, such as the weak beginning of the Messiah's kingdom, and its glorious end, as a continuum, we must carefully inquire if a prophecy has been entirely, or how far it has been, fulfilled. Here, the declarations of the New Testament, respecting the future development of the kingdom of God, will be of the greatest service to us; for the Apocalypse has incorporated the yet unfulfilled parts of the prophecies of the Old Testament, and describes the fulfilment of them as yet lying in futurity. But with respect to those parts of the prophecies which can be proved to have been already fulfilled-partly by the simple comparison of the prophecy with history, partly by the assertions of Christ and the apostles, we have a full right to make use of history for the purpose of separating the figurative from the real. Yet must we accurately distinguish between two questions-the first, what sense the prophets found in their prophecies? and the second, by what sense God intended them? Both questions would be proved distinct, if the evidence could be established that the prophets spoke in an ecstasis. In this manner, however, no answer can be found to the first question; nor is it very important; but in this manner the second can well be answered. The same God who opened to the prophets a view into futurity, afterwards produced the completion. The hermeneutical rule, that we must always seek the sense intended and seen by the author, is not hereby offended. The difference between us and the opposite party rather lies in the different reply to the question, Who is to be accounted the proper author of the prophecies? Our opponents insist on a human instrument: we raise ourselves to a divine cause. History conducts us to the right way of interpretation. Thus, we might have considered probably, for example, the partition of the clothes, the piercing of the hands and feet, in Ps. xxii. as a mere imagery, had we not again discovered these individual traits in the history of Christ: thus, in Zach. ix., we might have deemed the Messiah riding on an ass a merely figurative denotation of his lowliness, humility, and peaceableness, had not the real history of the occurrence necessarily rendered a mere reference to these qualities a symbolizing affair. So also with respect to the thirty pieces of silver, in Zach. xi., and many more. Nor are criteria wanting to enable us to define the limits between the figurative and the real. We may recognise as figurative, those descriptions of futurity, in which there is a manifest reference to earlier events in the history of the Israelites. Here the general groundwork, which connects the occurrences of the future and of the past, is always to be abstracted: for example, when, in Isa. xi. 15, 16, God is stated as again designing to dry up the Red Sea, and to smite the Nile in its seven streams, that his people may go over dryshod, the real matter relates to the redemption of the covenanted people, which the prophet has expressed under the figure of the liberation from Egypt. In many other instances we are forced to admit a figurative composition, if we would not make the prophets contradict themselves. For instance, in those places where Christ is described as David, if we literally take the words, we must suppose that David will rise again; which will contradict those passages where the Messiah is called the Branch of David, or David's Son. If we would literally accept Jer. xxxiii. 18, respecting the continuance of the Levitical ordinances in the time of Christ, we shall directly be at variance with chap. xxxi. 31-33, where a new covenant is promised and described, and also with chap. iii. 16. Other passages contain inherent evidences that they are figurative. Thus, we cannot understand Malachi's prediction of Elijah as implying, as the Jews think, the reappearance of Elijah, but that of a prophet like to Elijah. This observation may be applied to several parts of Isaiah and Ezekiel. But, in separating the figure from the reality, we must not lose sight of the general character of each particular prophet. Occasionally a description will expressly draw our attention to the figure, and point to the fact which lies at the bottom of it. Thus, Zach. x. 11, in the words "he shall pass through the sea," shows his allusion to the miraculous passage of the Israelites; and, in the words "with affliction," discloses his meaning. In like manner, Ps. cx. cannot have referred to worldly wars, because it introduces the Messiah as a high priest; nor can Ps. xlv. have intimated earthly beauty, because it immediately represents it as the cause of the divine blessing. In those prophecies which are yet unfulfilled, the analogy of faith must determine the distinction between figure and fact; for, as the same Spirit spake in the prophets and the writers of the New Testament, no contradiction can exist between them. But, as the prophets and their cotemporaries were not always placed, by the criteria given, in a condition to separate from each other the figurative and the real; so we also, in the unaccomplished prophecies, are not always in a condition to make this separation with certainty. Here we must not indulge ourselves in determining the criteria. For, as history has shown, in that part of the prophecies which has been already fulfilled, that much was real, which without it would appear to be figurative,--and that another part, which would appear to be real, was only figurative, we must in many cases, in the parts yet unfulfilled, expect the solution only from history. Our readers will not, we are persuaded, regret these observa tions, nor deem them a merciless infliction on their patience; for in general they disclose a keenness of criticism, and certainly have the advantage of originality. We must, however, omit all examination of the remaining parts of the essay, and briefly notice the author's means of proof, that particular passages related to the Messiah and must bear in mind, that the difficulties, which were presented to the author in the treatment of his subject, were considerably increased by the infidel system of interpretation which was and is still prevalent in Germany,—the basis of which, in many instances, is that which is adopted by the Jews. Without a chapter, therefore, devoted to this especial purpose, the Scholia, notwithstanding the controversial remarks which are interspersed in them, would not have been complete. As positive grounds for the application of particular passages to Christ, Dr. Hengstenberg urges, that a prophecy is rightly referred to the Messiah, when it can be shown that the most special minutiæ in it find their perfect accomplishment and confirmation in the history of Christ, whilst anything similar is not merely not to be demonstrated in the history of any other person, but is in the highest degree improbable; or when traits are found, which, in the nature of things, cannot be fulfilled in the history of any other person. The first is found in Ps. xxii., where the criteria are most minutely discovered in the history of Christ, and in a manner which could not have been applied to David; and the second, in all those places where divine dignity is attributed to the subject. The preindication of Christ's vicarious and mediatorial office, of his atonement and glorification, in Isa. liii., is of this description; and that the apostles made use of this sort of proof, we see in Acts ii. 25-36; xiii. 34–36. Parallel passages likewise support the argument; and these are of two sorts. 1. We often find in later prophecies, in which the character of the Messiah is more distinctly stamped, a manifest reference to earlier, in which the Messiah is portrayed in the more general outline. Thus, Ezekiel (xxi. 27,) emphatically uses the words of Gen. xlix. 10, in a prediction which demonstrably relates to the Messiah. On this point we need not dwell, since Pareau has given many examples, p. 501, sqq. The weight of these two arguments will be still further increased, if it can be shown that a prophecy was applied to the Messiah by the more ancient Jews, whose exegetical views were not fixed by polemics with the Christians. When, for instance, they referred to the Messiah, Ps. xxii. and Isa. liii. the weight of evidence was considerably greater, than when they referred to him prophecies which mentioned him in his glory. But the examples are too well known to require a citation. The New Testament, however, takes the most important place among these grounds, by the explicit testimony which it affords to us: but here we must above all things distinguish, whether a passage of the Old Testament be explained by Christ, or by the apostles properly and exclusively respecting Christ. Very frequently this distinction is not difficult; but when a passage from the Old Testament has been quoted, we must not lay too certain a stress on such formularies as καθώς γέγραπται,καὶ ἐπληρώθη,τότε επληρώθη, ἵνα οι ὅπως πληρώθη; because they describe a great extent of meaning. Besides showing the proper fulfilment of a personal prophecy, they stand in the following cases:-1. Sometimes merely when a repetition of the type occurring in the history is denoted in the history of the antitype; here there is certainly in some measure a fulfilment in the proper sense, as far as the agreement in the circumstances of the type and of the antitype has been one ordained by God:-of which we have a very clear instance in Mark ix. 13, where the history of Elijah is treated as a prophecy of the history of his antitype, St. John the Baptist. Olshausen has rightly quoted in this light, John xix. 36, which is not taken (as many have conjectured) from Ps. xxxiv. 20, but from Exod. xii. 46, Numb. ix. 12; for in the Psalms only something similar, but in the Law a perfectly typical correspondence is found. Of the same nature, probably, is Matthew's (ii. 15) reference to Hosea xi. 1, 2. These formularies are likewise sometimes used, when a sentence of the Old Testament is indeed general in a proper sense, so that it can be applied to all the particular circumstances contained under it; yet so that the ideal circumstance comprised in the history of Christ, shall immediately appear as one that may be easily and naturally combined with the reality. Let the quotations from Psalm lxix. serve as examples. In all probability David here describes the circumstance of a pious man suffering for God's sake with relation to the ungodly, which ideal relative circumstance was in the fullest manner realized in that of Christ with relation to the traitor Judas. Thus, in John ii. 17; xv. 25, passages of this Psalm were correctly applied to Christ, and one in Acts i. 20 to Judas. There are various other parts of the New Testament to which this rule may be referred; and as the writers knew that the authors of the Old Testament were inspired, they were justified in this mode of quotation. 3. The sacred writers sometimes use these formularies when a sentence of the Old Testament does not indeed, in its individual definitiveness, but according to its fundamental idea, extend to the persons and events of the New Testament. Thus, in Matt. xiii. 14, Christ cited the words of Isaiah with reference to the unbelieving Jews of his time; which, however, refer immediately to the prophet's cotemporaries, as St. Paul, again quoting them in Acts xxviii. 25, expressly says.4. Sometimes these formularies are used where a sentence indeed directly and properly extends to the person to whom it is applied, yet in a wider and higher relation; of which the more contracted |