filled the throne of Judah, to the days of that Restorer,* who had been promised to our first parents and the patriarchs; to him who was removed from earthly and mortal decay, as the passages in the Psalms imply; to him, in short, whom he mentions as Adonai and Jehovah. Nor, when we consider the analogy which subsists between the names of Shiloh and Solomon, will it appear strange, that the latter should have been rendered prophetically typical of the former. From this increased knowledge, and this still further restriction of the line from which the Messiah should spring, the prophetic enunciations took a determinate character, and not unfrequently mentioned him as David, in ages when David had long been gathered to his fathers.

The Psalms, which had this relation, are divided by this writer into two classes; the first describing the Messiah's glory and dominion under figures taken from the earthly theocracy, the second depicting his passion. Although it is not our plan to enter on the scholia, beyond their general character, we will remark, that Hengstenberg has written much and determined little on the difference between and owμa de Karnρriow μo in the fortieth Psalm. Schoettgen endeavours to show from the Hexapla, that the present Septuagint reading is corrupt, and that ria originally stood for owua; and Ludovicus Cappellus says, σῶμα δὲ κατηρτίσω μοι-in Hebræo autem est, aures perforâsti mihi, hoc est, mancipâsti me tibi in perpetuum, nempe juxta legem, quæ est Exod. xxi. 6. Videntur autem LXX. scripsisse, owμa de μe kaτηpriow oo, hoc est mancipásti me tibi; nam owμa Græcis interdum mancipium significat, unde illud,

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σώματα πολλὰ τρέφειν, καὶ δώματα πολλὰ γεραίρειν. This conjecture is, however, overstrained. The existence of aures in the Vulgate renders it, indeed, probable that ria was the original reading of the LXX; and Lambert Bos supposes that the preceding 0λnoas having been joined to the word in the continua series of MSS., the true reading thus stood,

would easily have arisen, the T and I having been resolved to M by a careless transcriber, and the other C added by way of correction by the Librarius. This Hengstenberg has not noticed, contenting himself with affirming, that the sense of the Hebrew and Greek is the same; but as a literal translation would have been barbarous in Greek, that the LXX. and author of the Epistle to the Hebrews modified the expression, as we now find it.

התהב or השהב The common Samaritan name of the Messiah was *

the Restorer, which Gesenius has interpreted Conversor.

Without resorting to Schoettgen's mere guess respecting the word, which the LXX. might have read for 7, Karnpriow, in its application to ria, or bra, with reference to the particular law in the Psalmist's mind, was consistently employed.

The book of Psalms forms a distinguishing epoch in the history of prophecy: the divinity of the Messiah, his passion, and his everlasting priesthood were first brought to light by them; whilst the universal extension of his salvation to the Gentile world, and the final subjugation of his enemies were more clearly and accurately detailed. In them we in a great measure see the groundwork of subsequent prophecies, the foundation on which the glorious superstructure was raised. Although the oracular revelation of the Divine purposes began with Samuel after the anarchical times of the Judges (for we can hardly otherwise call them), no express prophecies of that period have been preserved to us. The book of Psalms, at least those of which David was the author, fill up the chasm between this period and the splendid burst of divine light which broke forth in the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah: yet, reading the Psalms with critical care, we cannot doubt that those oracles which have not reached us were fraught with descriptions of the fulfilment of the primitive promise. The early vicissitudes of David's life-especially during his persecution by Saul, his wars and his victories, the rending of the sceptre from Benjamin and the everlasting assignment of it to Judah, though in a spiritual sense-were pre-eminently fitted to render his reign the Augustan period, as it were, of prophecy: for though Isaiah was more brilliant, Micah, Zachariah and Malachi more particularizing, still in the predictions of David may be found the rudiments of those which they uttered. the nation was not sufficiently elevated in mind to conceive a Messiah divine and glorious, yet suffering and atoning for sins, the prophecies relating to these doctrines were frequently admixed with individual and national histories; yet so advanced in some points beyond any thing that could have been applicable to these, that the diligent student of the Scriptures might have perceived their scope. As God never left the world without a witness of himself, so he never left the Jews without a witness of his Son. We may conceive how the prophets might have described the Messiah in his glory, but we cannot conceive how, without a divine revelation, they could have imagined him in his humiliation, passion, death, and re-exaltation to glory; how they could have specified the mode of that death; how they could have formed any idea of his vicarious office. It is absurd to infer that they argued to these things from the alternately depressed and exalted state of the national affairs; and almost as absurd to pronounce, that they arrived at these conclusions from the mere types of the Levitical law. Jeremiah's exact definition of the

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period of the Babylonian captivity, and Daniel's seventy weeks, are proofs never to be refuted, that prophecy was dictated by the Spirit of God. Another extraordinary evidence of this assertion is, that prophecy did not proceed in clearness after the days of Isaiah; he had as distinct notions of the Messiah as Malachi; and the oracles which he and Micah pronounced, had nicer traits of Christ's character and life, than those which Jeremiah and Ezekiel uttered. Therefore, as the latter prophets were nearer to the period when that fulness of time, on which the completion of their oracles depended, was about to arrive, if the comparatively earlier prophets were more distinct, we must perforce impute their particular perspicuity not to prophetic studies, in which case the later prophets would probably have been the most clear, but to the influence of divine inspiration. The argument is good, and we fear not any assault which neologicorationalists may make upon it. Our religion is founded on a rock, and we dread not the waves, which vent their boisterous rage against it.

The prophets under Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, were Hosea, Amos, Isaiah, Micah, and Joel, too, in all probability. Those who were before and during the Babylonian exile, were Zephaniah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel; those after it, Haggai, Zachariah, and Malachi. But, after this succession of the prophets, it will be necessary to show, in proof that the assertions of the writers of the New Testament were supported by those of the Old, that they promulgated the divinity of the Messiah.

It is clear that Christ appealed to the Old Testament in substantiation of this doctrine, in his polemical discourses with the Scribes, Pharisees, and Sadducees. In Matt. xxii. 41, sqq. he cited to the Pharisees, who expected a merely human Messiah, the 110th Psalm, where the only object of the citation could have been, the evidence that his divinity had been predicted. Unless the prophets had been aware of his combined divine and human natures, names, properties, and actions assignable to God alone would not either have been joined in their writings with descriptions of his humanity, nor would there have been that antithesis between the human and the divine, which we sometimes discover in passages which related to him. In the second Psalm the Messiah is called the Son of God in a proper, not in a figurative sense; in the 45th he is openly denominated God; and in the 110th, Adonai, who was David's Lord and God. So Isaiah, in one place, with reference to his humanity, names him the Branch from the root of Jesse; in another, with reference to his Divinity, the Branch of Jehovah: as man, he announces him to be about to be born of a virgin; as God, he declares him to be Immanuel. Nor can we disapprove of Hengstenberg's amplification of the title,-Deus in terrâ,-the man become God. Following up the revelation, the prophet surnames him ; him, whose being

and actions are elevated beyond the ordinary course of nature; , the Mighty God; with other cognomina, which could not have been applied to a human being;—yet, that he was a human being, the words, "for unto us a child is born," are positive evidences. Omnipotence, eternity, the future judgment, the reception of all nations into his church are ascribed to him, amidst epithets and figures, which are solely attributable to the Most High.

Micah, too, particularizes his birth at Bethlehem, but in the same context asserts his pre-existence. Hosea, Daniel, Zachariah, and Malachi also abound with passages, from whence similar doctrines may be inferred. These, compared with the many parts in which the Angel of Jehovah is emphatically introduced, the one participant of the Divine name (

Ex. xxiii. 21), and of the Divine nature, Dr. Hengstenberg has largely and luminously discussed; and the arguments which he has used to demonstrate, that a hypostatical distinction was made in the Hebrew scriptures, are very conclusive. In secondary proof that this distinction was understood from the most ancient times, he appeals to the theology of the Persians before the Mohammedan irruption into the empire; and as their religion approached more closely, than any other now known, to the patriarchal, we are bound to concede some degree of authority to the traces of parallelism which it displays. In this we find an equal distinction between Zervane Akerene, the invisible God and origin of all things; and Ormuzd, the head of the Amshaspands, who, as the first-begotten of creation, is the creator of all other created things, possesses a majesty equal to God, and makes divine communications to man. He appears in two different views: in the one, as created, as having his body and ferver (i. e. attendant spirit), and as proceeding from Zervane Akerene, like the other Amshaspands; in the other, he is described as the Almighty Creator of the heavens and the earth, as the Creator and God of the six remaining Amshaspands, over whom he is eternally exalted. These notions, Hengstenberg conceives, must have flowed from the manner, in which the be was understood; and as Orvazeshte-the mightily operating fire, the primordium of things-is depicted as the ground of union between Ormuzd and Zervane Akerene, he imagines this idea also to have proceeded from traditions circulated concerning the Holy Spirit. A strong argument in favour of this opinion is derivable from the Jewish traditions of the MALAK-YEHOVAH, as Metatron, the only intercessor between God and the world, and the imparter of all revelations. No one, who has read the very ancient book Zohar (where he is called the pillar of mediation,) and who has noticed the many attributes assigned to Metatron in the different rabbinical works, can justly doubt, that

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the various texts, which related to the Messiah, furnished the Jews with ideas of mediation, which they think proper to deny in their controversies with the Christians. We have no intention of wading through the rabbinical mass of fictions; but, to complete the analogy with the ancient Persians, we must remark, that there was a superior and an inferior Metatron, whose distinct grades nearly harmonized with those which we have cited. Thus, the doctrine seems to have been originally Jewish.

All the things which the Old Testament imputes to Jehovah and the Angel of Jehovah, the New imputes to Christ. The Jews are styled in the one, the heritage of Jehovah; in the other they are called Christ's own, to whom he came, but his own received him not. According to John xii. 41, Isaiah saw the glory of Christ, and spake of him; but in Isaiah's text Jehovah was he whom he saw, and of whom he spake. According to the Pentateuch, the Jews were led through the desert by the Angel of Jehovah, and tempted Jehovah. According to St. Paul, in 1 Cor. x. 9, they tempted Christ. The prophets professed to derive their oracles from Jehovah; but according to I Pet. i. 10, 11, they derived them from the Spirit of Christ, which was in them. According to Heb. xi. 26, Moses preferred reproach on Christ's account to all the treasures of Egypt; but, according to the Hebrew narrative, he endured it for the sake of Jehovah. According to Heb. xii. 26, Christ's voice at the delivery of the Law shook the earth: according to the Pentateuch, it was the voice of Jehovah. How, then, are these things to be reconciled? Simply and solely, because Christ himself was Jehovah: nor can a stronger proof be required, that such was the persuasion of the writers of the New Testament, than these passages, which have been brought into contrast. To the same effect all the early Fathers have written.†

Neological authors, however, affirm, that the Old Testament exhibits no evidence of a suffering and atoning Messiah, and

* The titles in Col. i. 15; Heb. i. 3; 2 Cor. iv. 4, are also given to Metatron in the Jewish writings. The following passage in Zohar according to Sommer's translation, "Metatron hic est, sicuti diximus, futurus ut conjungatur corpori (i. e. corpus humanum adsumat) in utero materno," with others quoted by Edzard from the Talmud, shows plainly, that as by Metatron the Messiah was intended, so the Jews occasionally read their Scriptures in the sense, which we attribute to them.

†The Fathers of the first synod at Antioch, in an epistle to Paul at Samosata, speaking of the Divine appearances to Abraham, Jacob, and Moses, refer them to Christ in these wordsὁ ἄγγελος τοῦ πατρὸς αὐτὸς Κύριος καὶ Θεὸς ὢν, μεγάλης βουλῇς ἀγγελος—κ.τ.λ. Justin Martyr, arguing against Trypho, asserts the same; and words to the same import are found in almost all the ecclesiastical works. Theodoret, too, expressly says, that he who appeared was ὁ μονογενὴς υἱὸς, ὁ μετ γάλης βουλῆς ἄγγελος.