V. Christ In The Prophets

“The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.”—Rev. 19:10.

1. General View of Prophecy

Before we consider the prophetical books one by one it may be well to take a general view of prophecy as a whole.

Definition of Prophecy, The Bible itself furnishes us with an authoritative definition of the office and function of the prophet. “The Lord said unto Moses, See, I have made thee a god to Pharaoh; and Aaron thy brother shall be thy prophet.” “And thou shalt put words in his mouth” (Exod. 7:1, 4:15). No statement could be clearer than this. By Divine appointment Moses was to be in the place of God to Pharaoh, and Aaron was to act as the prophet of Moses, receiving from him the message, and delivering it to the king (Moorehead).

Importance of Prophecy. As Prophecy holds so important a place and occupies so large a part of God’s revealed will, about a third of the whole Bible, how important it is that we should give it our earnest attention, and seek by the help of the Holy Spirit to understand its meaning. “Hebrew prophecy will be acknowledged by most to be a perfectly unique phenomenon in the history of religions” (Dr. Orr).

Prophecy is God’s revelation of His plans to His children. It was given, not for a merely temporary use, but for all ages and for all people. Paul says concerning it, “Whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning; that we, through patience and comfort of the Scriptures, might have hope” (Romans 15:4). Prophecy can only come from God, for He alone knows the end from the beginning. Christ said to His disciples, “I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of My Father I have made known unto you” (John 15:15). Abraham was called the “friend of God”; and when God was about to destroy Sodom, He said, “Shall I hide from Abraham the thing that I do?” In studying the prophetical books we should realise that God is condescending to reveal to us His purposes. “Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but He revealeth His secret unto His servants the prophets” (Amos 3:7). There are three elements in the message of the prophets (Dr. Campbell Morgan).

1. The Prophets bore a message to their own age. Their standpoint was always the sovereignty of God. Whether they spoke with the voice of thunder or with the tenderness of love, they spoke in God’s name and with His authority. Their protest against things that were contrary to His will was without compromise and absolutely fearless of consequences. Their one object was the glory of Jehovah; the failure of Israel to glorify God before the surrounding nations filled them with sorrow. And through everything their conviction is evident that in the end God will be victorious, and His purpose will be accomplished.

2. The Prophets predicted future events. A very large proportion of the message of the prophets was predictive. The main outline of prophecy is: the failure of God’s chosen people, and God’s judgment upon them; God’s judgment on the surrounding nations; the coming of the Messiah and His rejection; His coming in glory, and the restoration of the chosen people; finally, the fact that Messiah’s kingdom must ultimately be established over the whole earth.

“The element of prediction in Scripture has been lately undervalued, and under the specious plea that the moral and spiritual, the ethical element in the prophets, is the chief thing. This is a confusion of ideas. All prediction in Scripture is ethical, or rather spiritual, because it refers to the kingdom of God, and to its centre—Christ. But the spiritual element is intimately connected with the facts, the continued manifestations and gifts of God unto His people.”⁴¹

3. The prophetic books contain a living message to our own age. The eternal principles of right and wrong are as applicable to our own times as to the times of the prophets. The rebuking of sin and the appeal to God’s honour and glory are full of teaching for today. The prophets mainly denounced idolatry, the guilt and folly of worshipping stocks and stones, objects of men’s own manufacture, and all the moral evils connected with it. Throughout the hundreds of millions of Christendom today idolatry, in the worship of images and pictures, still survives—to which is added the God-dishonouring worship of
the wafer bread in the Mass as God Himself!

Prophecy had its Origin in Man’s Need. Man’s fall called forth the first promise of the Great Deliverer in the person of the seed of the woman. Israel’s bondage resulted in the call of Moses. Samuel was raised up at the time of Israel’s rejection of God to be their glorious King. The idolatry of the kings of Israel called forth the prophecies of Elijah and Elisha. It was when Israel was apostatising from God by idolatry that the great galaxy of prophets appeared, uttered their solemn warnings, and made their passionate appeals. Peter speaks of the “more sure word of prophecy,” and compares it to “a lamp shining in a dark place” (2 Peter 1:19); and often it shone the brightest when the darkness was most intense.⁴²

Prophecy distinct from Soothsaying. Prophecy is utterly distinct from divination and soothsaying. According to Scripture, it does not spring from any power of the human mind or spirit. Its origin is always traced to the supernatural working of the Spirit of God on the spirit of the prophet: “As He spake by the mouth of His holy prophets, which have been since the world began” (Luke 1:70). The prophets disclaim any part in the origination of their messages. Even the words in which the message is conveyed they ascribe to God. They invariably preface their message with some such words as these: “Thus saith the Lord,” “The Word of the Lord came unto me,” etc. The language of the Apostle Peter is final on the subject: “Knowing this first, that all written prophecy came not of [men’s] own disclosure; for prophecy was not borne [in] in old time by the will of man, but holy men of God spake as they were borne [along] by the Holy Spirit” (2 Peter 1:21). God said to Jeremiah, “Behold, I have put My words in thy mouth” (1:9); and to Ezekiel, “Thou shalt speak My word unto them” (2:7). The soothsayer and false prophet spoke out of their own hearts (Jer. 14:14, 23:16).

Divination, moreover, professes to give prediction on all kinds of subjects and things without any reference to the Divine government or God’s purposes of grace. It knows nothing of Christ, and cares nothing for Him. “It has no moral root and subserves no wider moral purpose, but is the result of a mere curious prying into the future” (Dr. Orr).

Prophecy, on the other hand, is never introduced as a mere wonder, or on its own account, but always in connection with, and with a direct bearing upon, the kingdom of God. It announces nothing but what is in some way connected with His purpose of redemption. The object and centre of all prophecy is the Lord Jesus Christ and His salvation. “Of which salvation the prophets have inquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you: searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow. Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things, which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the Gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; which things the angels desire to look into” (1 Peter 1:10-13; Acts 26:22, 23).

Perspective of Prophecy. In foretelling future events the prophet resembles a traveller viewing a mountain range from afar. The perspective of the range is much foreshortened; it appears as one ridge of hills. But as he gets nearer he sees range behind range. Peaks which appeared from afar to be at the same distance from him are perhaps miles behind each other. So it is with prophecy. The prophet sees the future in perspective. He cannot tell the immense distances of time which separate one event from another. Christ’s first coming in humiliation and His second coming in glory are often seen as if they were one event. He does not realise the ages that should elapse before the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ. There is no such thing as time with Him who is the King of Eternity, and with whom one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. In His presence it is but natural that the prophet should lose the sense of time and see things in the light of eternity.

The Interpreter of Prophecy. It is evident that the prophets did not always understand the message themselves. We see this from the passage already quoted (1 Peter 1:10-13); also from various other passages (Dan. 7:28, 8:15-27, 10:7-15; Rev. 1:17, 7:13, 14, 17:6). It follows from this that the very words must have been given them. Prophecy is an unimpeachable evidence of the inspiration of the Bible.

To understand prophecy we must follow the principle of interpretation always implied in the New Testament—that the Bible is an organic unity and Christ is its centre. We also need to depend continually on the Spirit of God who inspired prophecy, to be to us its Interpreter. It is a common saying that history is the expounder of prophecy, and that we must await its fulfilment to understand it. This view confounds the interpretation with the confirmation. If prophecy can only be understood after it is fulfilled, how can it be a lamp shining in a dark place for our guidance 1 Prophecy is intended for all God’s people. But all cannot know the world’s history; hence history is not its only interpreter.

Moreover our Saviour censured His disciples for not having understood from the prophets the things that were to happen to Him. “0 fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken: ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into His glory? And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself” (Luke 24:25-27). In like manner His second coming has been clearly foretold, and we shall be deserving of the same censure if we are not watching for it. “Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of Man cometh” (Matt. 24:42, 44).

Our Lord also shows that the Jewish nation ought to have recognised Him from the study of their own prophets. “Saying, If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things that belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes… . They shall not leave in thee one stone upon another; because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation” (Luke 19:42, 44). As Stephen said: “Ye stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost: as your fathers did, so do ye. “Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted? and they have slain them which showed before of the coming of the Just One; of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers” (Acts 7:51, 52). Paul also said: “They that dwell at Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they knew Him not, nor yet the voices of the prophets which are read every Sabbath day, they have fulfilled them in condemning Him.” “Beware therefore, lest that come upon you, which is spoken of in the prophets; Behold, ye despisers, and wonder, and perish: for I work a work in your days, a work which ye shall in no wise believe, though a man declare it unto you” (Acts 13:27, 40, 41. See 2 Peter 3).

Coincidence an impossible Explanation of Prophecy. Those who say that the correspondence of prophecy with its fulfilment is due to accidental coincidence have surely not studied the law of simple and compound probability. When a simple prediction is made, about which there is but one feature, it may or may not prove true; there is therefore one chance in two of its being fulfilled. But if a second feature is introduced in the prediction, the region of compound probability is entered. Each prediction has a half chance of fulfilment, the two combined have only a quarter chance, i.e. there is one chance in four that both predictions will be verified. Every new feature added makes the fraction of probability smaller. The various events prophesied in the Scriptures, whether it be the destiny of the surrounding nations or of the Jewish people, are given with a precision and variety of detail which reduce the probability of their fulfilment to a minimum. The prophecies concerning Christ Himself, above all others, are so definite, and such a number of distinct features are given, that the probability of fulfilment apart from Divine foreknowledge, and as a matter of accidental coincidence, is reduced to a fraction too small for figures to represent.⁴³

Fulfilled prophecy is one of the greatest miracles the world has seen. And these fulfilled prophecies are woven into the text of the Scriptures throughout.

Instances of Fulfilled Prophecy. The whole work of Redemption was outlined in that first brief prediction which Adam heard from the voice of God Himself. “Noah sketched in three inspired sentences the great features of human history.” The tenth chapter of Genesis contains a summary of the distribution of the race which is in perfect accord with the latest theories of ethnology.

“To Abraham was revealed the history of the descendants of his two sons Ishmael and Isaac; the four hundred years’ affliction of his posterity; the blessing of all nations through his seed, etc. Abraham, Jacob, and Moses, all saw Christ’s day and were glad; Isaiah and Jeremiah revealed not only the proximate judgments and deliverances of Israel, but also incarnation and atonement. The visions of Daniel present not only a comprehensive, but an orderly and consecutive prophetic narrative of leading events from his own day to the end of all things: a miniature universal history. The fall of Belshazzar; the rise of Cyrus, his conquests, the greatness of his empire; his successors, Cambyses, Smerdis, and Darius; the character, power, and conduct of Xerxes; the marvellous exploits of Alexander the Great, his sudden death, and the division of his empire; the reigns of the Ptolemies and Seleucidse; the character and conquests of the Roman Empire; the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus; the decay and division of the Roman Empire; the rise of the papacy and its career; its cruel persecutions of God’s saints;—all this and much more is foretold by the man greatly beloved. The ‘ burdens’ of the later prophets concern Syria, Egypt, Edom, Tyre, Sidon, Moab, Philistia, Kedar, Elam, Babylon, Gog and Magog, besides Judah and Ephraim.”⁴⁴

Fulfilment of Prophecy in the Jewish Nation. In an earlier chapter (p. 34) we touched upon the remarkable fulfilments of prophecy with regard to the Jewish nation. Let us now look a little more particularly into the prophecies regarding that nation which have already been fulfilled.

1. Their rejection of Christ foretold. “He is despised and rejected of men … despised, and we esteemed Him not” (Isa. 53:1-3); “The stone which the builders refused” (Ps. 118:22). “One whom man despiseth—whom the nation abhorreth” (Isa. 49:7).

2. Their rejection of Christ to be long continued. The prophet asks how long the doom of blindness is to rest upon Israel. “Till the land become utterly waste, and the Lord have removed men far away” (Isa. 6:9-12). And Paul tells us that it is “until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in” (Rom. 11:25). The Jew confirms by his very rejection the claims which he scorns.

3. The Romans to be used in the chastisement of Israel. “The Lord shall bring a nation against thee from far, from the end of the earth, as the eagle flieth; a nation whose tongue thou shalt not understand: a nation of fierce countenance” (Deut. 28:49, 50. See also Jer. 5:15). How literally the Romans fulfilled the details of this prediction! Instead of being one of the surrounding nations which had so often been used to chastise Israel, they came from far. Instead of the close similarity of the language of the surrounding nations with the Hebrew tongue, the language of the Romans was entirely foreign. The Roman eagle was their well-known ensign. They are “a nation of fierce countenance, which shall not regard the person of the old, nor show favour to the young.” The merciless cruelty of the Romans at the time of the fall of Jerusalem is beyond words to describe.

4. They were to be taken lack to Egypt in ships. “And the Lord shall bring thee into Egypt again with ships” (Deut. 28:68). Of those saved at Jerusalem, all who were over seventeen years of age were sent to labour in the Egyptian mines, where prisoners were kept at work day and night without intermission, till they fell down and died.

5. The cities of Israel were to he besieged. “He shall besiege thee in all thy gates, throughout all thy land, which the Lord thy God hath given thee” (Deut. 28:52). The conquest of the land of Israel by the Romans, in contrast to previous wars, was almost entirely a war of sieges.

6. The method of attack. “Until thy high and fenced walls come down, wherein thou trustedst.” The strongest walls fell down before the terrors of the Roman battering-ram.

7. The extremities of famine. “Thou shalt eat of the flesh of thy sons and thy daughters” (Deut. 28:53; Jer. 19:9) Literally fulfilled in the Siege of Jerusalem.

8. They should be left few in number. “Ye shall be left few in number … and ye shall be plucked from off the land” (Deut. 28:62, 63). “The whole land shall be desolate” (Jer. 4:27). Many hundreds of thousands were slain during the war, besides those who perished by famine, disease, and fire, and besides multitudes carried away captive.

9. Their universal dispersion. “And the Lord shall scatter thee among all peoples, from the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth” (Deut. 28:64 and Hosea 9:17). The Jew is found in every land today from North to South, from East to West.

10. They should be preserved as a nation. “And yet for all that, when they be in the land of their enemies, I will not destroy them utterly” (Lev. 26:44; Jer. 30:11, 46:28). “Massacred by thousands, yet springing up again from their undying stock, the Jews appear at all times and in all regions. Their perpetuity, their national immortality, is at once the most curious problem to the political inquirer; to the religious man a subject of profound and awful admiration.”⁴⁵

11. Separateness. “The people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations” (Num. 23:9). “That which cometh into your minds shall not be at all; in that ye say we will be as the nations, to serve wood and stone.” Neither their own proclivities to idolatry, nor pressure and persecution from without have ever prevailed, since the Babylonian Captivity, to make them give up the faith of their fathers or become as the nations among whom they lived.

12. They should have no rest. “And among these nations shalt thou find no ease, and there shall be no rest for the sole of thy foot… Thy life shall hang in doubt before thee; and thou shalt fear day and night, and shalt have none assurance of thy life” (Deut. 28:65-67; Amos 9:4). How literally these words have been fulfilled in the terrible massacres of the Jews down to our own day?

13. They should be deprived of central government and temple. “For the Children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a sacrifice” (Hos. 3:4). These words have been fulfilled in spite of the strenuous efforts of the Jews to maintain among themselves some central authority.⁴⁶

The following verse says: “Afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the Lord their God, and David their King; and shall come with fear unto the Lord and to His goodness in the latter days” (Hos. 3:5). How can we doubt that His word, which has been so literally fulfilled in the past in judgment, will be equally fulfilled in the future in mercy? God expressly tells us that it shall be so. “Hear the word of the Lord, O ye nations. He that scattered Israel will gather him, and keep him, as a shepherd doth his flock” (Jer. 31:10). “For thus saith the Lord God: Behold, I, even I, will both search My sheep, and seek them out. As a shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered: so will I seek out My sheep, and will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day. And I will bring them out from the people, and gather them from the countries, and will bring them to their own land, and feed them upon the mountains of Israel, by the rivers, and in all the inhabited places of the country. And I will set up One Shepherd over them, and He shall feed them, even My Servant David; He shall feed them, and He shall be their Shepherd” (Ezek. 34:11-13, 23. See also Jer. 30:3).

Fulfilment of Prophecy in surrounding Nations—Tyre (Ezek. 26:7-11). After describing the vengeance which the king of Babylon should inflict upon Tyre, the prophet proceeds: “And they (i.e. ‘many nations,’ ver. 3) shall lay thy stones and thy timber and thy dust in the midst of the waters, and thou shalt be built no more.” Previous to the fall of their ancient city the Tyrians had removed the bulk of their treasures to an island in their possession half a mile from the shore. No attempt was made to rebuild the old city after the Babylonian army had retired, but the ruins still stood. Then Alexander came, and because the citizens would not hand over their city to him he resolved to build a solid causeway through the sea and take it. Every vestige of the ancient city was pulled down and laid in the midst of the sea, and so great was the demand for material that even the very dust seems to have been scraped from the ancient site. Though centuries had rolled away after the word was spoken, the word was literally fulfilled. The city has never been rebuilt; the site remains today without even a mound to mark it.

Sidon. Of the neighbouring city of Sidon a different fate is predicted (Ezek. 28:20-23): “Behold, I am against thee, O Zidon; and I will be glorified in the midst of thee: and they shall know that I am the Lord, when I shall have executed judgments in her. For I will send into her pestilence, and blood in her streets; and the wounded shall fall in the midst of her, with the sword upon her on every side.” No doom of extinction is pronounced against Sidon, but she is to suffer fearful slaughter. This has been abundantly fulfilled in every commotion which has troubled that unhappy land. Under the Persians 40,000 citizens set fire to their homes and perished rather than submit. Again and again blood has flowed in her streets, even as lately as 1840, when the place was captured by Admiral Napier. But Sidon still remains, possessing even now about 10,000 inhabitants.

If the prophecies concerning Tyre and Sidon had been reversed, how complete would have been the refutation of Ezekiel’s claim to speak the word of the Lord!⁴⁷

Fulfilment of Prophecy in Christ. We have already, in a former section, “The Testimony of the Scripture to Christ,” as well as in each succeeding section, traced many of the prophecies which have been so abundantly fulfilled in the life and death and resurrection and ascension of our Redeemer. “The Testimony of Jesus is the Spirit of Prophecy.” “In the volume of the Book it is written of Me.” There is only one Book, and only one Person to whom these words point. A perfect picture of the Messiah who was to come is traced for us in all its details in the prophecies of the Old Testament. A perfect picture of His life is given in the historic records of the New. Place these two portraits one over the other and they correspond exactly. There can have been no collusion between the writers, for they are separated from each other by the silence of four hundred years. The Old Testament gives a portrait of the mysterious coming One, the New of One who had actually come. The hand that drew them both must have been Divine. This irresistible conclusion is a double one—it leads us to accept the prophetic Scriptures as inspired, and to accept the historic Christ, towards whom all these rays converge, as a Divine person (Dr. Pierson).

“When a lock and key are well-fitted, a fair presumption arises, even though they be of a simple character, that they were made for each other. If they are complex in their form, that presumption is considerably strengthened. But if the lock is composed of such strange and curious parts as to baffle the skill of the cleverest mechanic, if it is absolutely novel and peculiar, differing from everything which was before seen in the world—if no key in the universe will enter it except one, and by that one it is so easily and exactly fitted that a child may open it, then, indeed, are we absolutely certain that the lock and the key were made by the same master-hand, and they belong to each other. No less curiously diversified, no less hidden from the wisdom of man, no less novel and peculiar, are the prophecies contained in the Old Testament respecting Jesus Christ. No less easy, no less exact, is the manner in which they are fitted by the Gospel history. Who, then, can doubt that God was the author of these predictions, of the events by which they were fulfilled, and of the religion with which they are both inseparably connected?” (J. J. Gurney).

2. Isaiah

There is something in the prophecy of Isaiah which makes it stand out from all the other books of the Old Testament. We are awe-stricken at the power and majesty of Jehovah, and yet our hearts sink into rest at the almightiness of a God who, in the same breath, says that He will gather the lambs with His arm, and carry them in His bosom, and yet hath measured the oceans in the hollow of His hand. Nowhere do the judgments of the Most High peal forth with a louder thunder. Nowhere do His consolations breathe more tenderly than when He bends down to say: “As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you.” Nowhere is His glorious salvation more fully set forth than through him whom Jerome has well named the Evangelical Prophet.

The Vision of Glory. The secret of this unique power in the book lies in Isaiah’s vision in the Temple. “I saw the Lord,” he says. It was this sight of the Lord that changed everything for the prophet. Henceforth he saw everything in the light of that glory. “Have not I seen the Lord?” Paul cried; and the sight of that Just One made him a minister and a witness, both to the Jews and Gentiles, of what he had seen and heard. From the Gospel of John it is manifest that it was the Eternal Son of God whom Isaiah saw, for he connects the hardness of heart of the Jews in not believing on Christ with the word of the Lord to Isaiah in the closing verses of this sixth chapter, and adds: “These things said Esaias, when he saw His glory, and spake of Him” (John 12:37-41).

Isaiah saw the Lord as King of Glory, he heard the seraphim calling one to another, “Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of Hosts: the whole earth is full of His glory.” We can trace the effect of what he then saw and heard throughout his entire prophecy:—

1. An overwhelming sense of sin and God’s judgment.

2. An all-pervading sense of God’s power and holiness.

3. A clear vision of Christ and His salvation, and of His ultimate universal dominion.

Let us briefly trace these three thoughts through the book:—

1. The sight of God’s glory brought to Isaiah the Conviction of his own sinfulness and need, and made him cry: “Woe is me! for I am undone.” It wrung from him the Confession, “I am a man of unclean lips.” This brokenness of heart was very precious to the Lord, as Isaiah understood when he said that the High and Holy One would dwell with the humble and contrite heart (ch. 57:15). His Confession was immediately followed by Cleansing. The flying seraph caused a live coal to touch his lips, and his sin was purged. That live coal was taken from off the altar of burnt sacrifice. Cleansing can only rest upon the blood of atonement. To the question, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” the cleansed soul was immediately ready to respond: “Here am I; send me.” Here was Consecration. Then came the Lord’s Commission, “Go.” This should be the history of every messenger of the Lord A personal sight of the Saviour, a personal interview with the Lord of Glory, contrition, brokenness of heart, cleansed lips, consecration, and a definite personal commission. The lips that are filled with the Lord’s messages should be jealously guarded from evil speaking by the Lord’s own garrison (Ps. 141:3). They should be burnt lips; not filled with excellency of speech in any thought of pleasing man with their eloquence, but declaring the testimony of God; determined not to know anything save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. The scorners of Isaiah’s day complained of the simplicity of his reiterated message, precept upon precept, line upon line, as if they were little children, and the Lord’s message came to them as through stammering lips.

Sin and Judgment. The date of Isaiah’s vision was “the year that King Uzziah died.” Uzziah had been one of the best kings Jerusalem had ever seen. For fifty years he had reigned with justice and judgment. But his heart seems to have been lifted up with pride, and, for daring to usurp the priestly office, he was smitten with leprosy, and dwelt an outcast in a separate house. The sense of this sin and of the defilement of leprosy seems to have been weighing heavily on Isaiah’s heart, from the way he connects his vision with the year of Uzziah’s death. “I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips.” It is not only his own sin, of which he gets a sight as he sees the Lord’s glory, but the sin of his king, of his people, of his nation.

Possibly this vision was the commencement of Isaiah’s work as a prophet, and it may be that in this sixth chapter he goes back in thought to his first call. Henceforth he denounces sin with unflinching boldness. It is a message of judgment to his own people that the Lord entrusts to him in his first commission. “The vision of Isaiah, the son of Amos, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.” Thus commences the first chapter, and he proceeds to lay bare the natural corruption and depravity of the human heart in its rebellion and revolt against God. “The whole head is sick,” the centre of all power of thought; “the whole heart is faint,” the centre of all the power of will and affection; “no soundness from sole of foot to crown of head,” corruption showing in the outward life. He dwells on the sin of hypocrisy—on drawing near to God with the lips while the heart is far from Him—and the life full of cruelty to others, and then he makes his earnest appeal for repentance: “Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before Mine eyes; cease to do evil; learn to do well; seek judgment; relieve the oppressed; judge the fatherless; plead for the widow” (1:16, 17).

He who learned in the presence of God to cry “Woe is me” is now sent to proclaim Woe to others. “Woe to their soul, for they have rewarded evil unto themselves”; “Woe to the wicked” (3:9, 11); “Woe to the covetous” (5:8); “Woe to the drunkards” (5:11, 22, 28:1); “Woe to the self-righteous” (5:20, 21); “Woe to those that oppress the poor” (10:1, 2); “Woe to Jerusalem” (29:1); “Woe to the rebellious children” (30:1); “Woe to him that striveth with his Maker” (45:9). Isaiah shows God’s people how their sins have hidden His face from them, and how they have rebelled and vexed His Holy Spirit (59:2-15, 63:10). He tells them that their very righteousnesses are as filthy rags (64:6, 7). He proclaims the plumb-line of God’s righteousness, and that His hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies (28:17). With scathing words he rebukes the vain and careless women for their haughtiness of mien and the excesses of their attire (3:16, 32:9). He speaks in clear terms about the sin of spiritualism (8:19, 20), and the blessing on those who keep the Sabbath from polluting it; not doing their own way, nor finding their own pleasure, nor speaking their own words on the Lord’s holy day (56:2, 58:13, 14). In how many of these things God’s warning is just as applicable to this twentieth century as it was when Isaiah first uttered it.

Idolatry. The crowning sin against which Isaiah denounces God’s judgment is the sin of Idolatry. The book is full of this subject from beginning to end. In the second chapter the land is pictured as full of idols, rich and poor uniting together in their worship (2:18-20). But God’s promise follows that He will utterly abolish the idols, and that men shall cast them to the moles and to the bats. This promise is repeated in other words again and again (see 10:11, 17:7, 8, 27:9, 31:7). Chapters 40, 41, 44, and 46 contain the most vivid descriptions of the making of idols. The rich man is described as lavishing gold out of the bag and weighing silver in the balance, and hiring a goldsmith to make him a god. The goldsmith is pictured at work: melting the gold in the fire, holding it with his tongs, fashioning it with his hammer on the anvil, smoothing it, graving it with a tool casting silver chains for it, fixing it in its place so that it cannot be moved.

Then the poor man’s action is described. He cannot afford to pay a goldsmith to make him an idol of gold, so he chooses a good sound tree—anything from the stately cedar to the common ash—and sets a carpenter to work to carve him an image of wood. The carpenter takes his rule, he marks out the form with red ochre, and works it with a sharp tool, and carves it according to the beauty of the human form, and then it is set up in the home to be worshipped. The chips that are left over are gathered together to make a fire to cook food by, or for warmth—so commonplace is the origin of this god!

The sin of idolatry is charged home to God’s own people. “A people that provoketh Me to anger continually to My face; that sacrificeth in gardens … which have burned incense upon the mountains, and blasphemed Me upon the hills” (65:3-7). “Enflaming yourselves with idols under every green tree, slaying the children in the valleys under the cliffs of the rocks. Among the smooth stones of the stream is thy portion” (57:5, 6). Idolatry was Israel’s besetting sin before the Captivity—a sin from which they have been completely delivered, as a nation, ever since that time.

In denouncing the whole system of idolatry, Jehovah draws the contrast with Himself, and this brings us to the second part of the effect of the vision upon Isaiah. It produced in him

2. An all-pervading sense of God’s power and holiness. Nowhere does this come out more forcibly than in the contrast God puts in his mouth between Himself and the idols. With the opening promise that the idols shall be utterly abolished is the corresponding promise that the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day. Again comes the contrast that, instead of a man looking to the images which his fingers have made, he shall look to the One who made him. The account of the making of the idols in the fortieth chapter is set off against the glorious description of God as the Creator of all things. The Creator of the ends of the earth, of the mountains and the seas; the Creator and sustainer of the heavenly host, before whom the inhabitants of the earth are as grasshoppers, and all flesh as grass. The description of the Lord’s power in creation in these chapters is not surpassed in any other part of the Bible.

The scientific accuracy of chapter 40 is marvellous. Verse 12: “Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of His hand?” The figure is that God held the water in the hollow of His hand, and saw to it that the exact quantity was there, and then placed it in its earthy bed. Science tells us the same thing. We have the exact quantity we require to produce the right amount of rain to make the earth fruitful. “And meted out heaven with the span?” The extent of the atmosphere was fixed by the Creator, and is exactly proportioned for us to breathe without difficulty. “And comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure?” The soil on the earth’s surface has been measured and spread out to prepare the world for the abode of man. “And weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance?” The height of the mountains on every coast is in direct proportion to the depth of the sea which beats upon the shore. “It is He who sitteth upon the circle of the earth.” That word khug, translated “circle,” does not mean a circle drawn upon a plane surface. It means an arch or sphere. It occurs in two other places, where it refers to the vault of heaven, and here it teaches us the true form of the earth. “That stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain.” The word dole, here translated “curtain,” does not mean curtain at all; it means “thinness”; and no better word could be used to describe the ether which modern science assures us is the element in which all the heavenly bodies move. It is matter in its most attenuated form, it has never been seen or weighed, yet scientists are assured of its existence. “God stretched out the heaven as thinness.”⁴⁸

The forty-first chapter contains a solemn challenge from God to the false gods to declare future events as a proof of their right to be worshipped. This Divine challenge is renewed again and again (see 42:9, 44:7, 8, 43:9, 10, 48:3-5).

The forty-sixth chapter contains the striking contrast between the idols of Babylon that have to be borne upon men’s shoulders, and the Almighty God carrying His children, not only as lambs, but to their old age and hoar hairs, in His fatherly arms.

The Holy One of Israel. The Divine title, “The Holy One of Israel,” is almost peculiar to Isaiah, being used elsewhere only in three Psalms (71, 78, 79), twice in Jeremiah (50, 51), and in 2 Kings 19:22, where Isaiah is the speaker. Twenty-three times he uses it in this book as if it were the reflection on his inmost soul of the vision he saw when he heard the seraphim crying one to another, “Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of Hosts”; the name is stamped upon the book throughout, from the first chapter to the sixtieth, as if it were Isaiah’s peculiar prophetic signature.

There is an intimation of the revelation of the Trinity in the question, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?” The personality of God the Holy Spirit is clearly brought out in the Book of Isaiah (see 11:2, 42:1, 44:3, 48:16, 59:21, 61:1, 63:10, 11, 14). As we have already seen, John identifies the Jehovah, God of Hosts, of this vision with Christ Jesus the Lord. The Divinity of the Messiah is elsewhere manifest in the book. This brings us to the third effect of the vision upon Isaiah, and at the same time to the great central theme of the whole book.

3. A clear vision of Christ and His salvation and of His ultimate universal dominion. The Key-note of the book is Salvation. Isaiah’s own name means “Salvation is of Jehovah”; and it forms the subject of the book from the blessed invitation in chapter 1: “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow,” to the similar promise in 43:25 and 44:22: “I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins; return unto Me; for I have redeemed thee.”

Peace, the effect of righteousness, the result of salvation, in like manner runs as a silver thread throughout the chapters from the Prince of Peace in 9:6, 7, to the proclamation of peace in 57:19, and peace as a river in 48:18 and 66:12.

The universal spread of Messiah’s Kingdom was foreshadowed in the vision in the words of the seraphim, “The whole earth is full of His glory.” The truth finds expression throughout the book. In 2:2 all nations shall flow to the mountain of the house of the Lord, which is to be established in the top of the mountains; in 11:9, “The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea”; and in the last chapter we have the declaring of His glory among the Gentiles.

The Messiah. The glorious salvation of this book centres round a Person, the Coming One, the promised Messiah. There is something very remarkable in the way in which He fills the vision of the prophet; a certain abruptness with which the prophecies about Him are introduced, as if to arrest attention. It is so in the sign which God promised to give in the birth of a Divine Person from a human virgin. The promise in chapter 7 is blended with the promise in chapter 9, and in the two prophecies we get a picture of the Child which was to be. He is identified with our race, for He is “a child born, a son given.” He is to be of the family of David. But He is much more: His birth is to be supernatural. He is to be Divine, “God with us”—Immanuel; “Wonderful,” the name by which God revealed Himself to Manoah and his wife; “Counsellor,” corresponding with the Wisdom of Proverbs, He who of God is “made unto us Wisdom”; “The Mighty God,”—the word for God, El, links this verse to the name Immanuel; “The Everlasting Father” or “Father of Eternity,” which is equivalent to “the author of everlasting salvation” of Heb. 5:7; “The Prince of Peace,” the name foreshadowed in the priestly King of Salem, and in Solomon, the Peaceful One.

All these predictions have met and been fulfilled only in one event, the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ, our Saviour, of whom the angel said to Mary, “That holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.” “Unto us a child is born” were the words of Isaiah. “To you is born this day, in the city of David, a Saviour,” was the word of the angel to the shepherds. “His name shall be called the Mighty God, the Prince of Peace,” prophesied Isaiah. And the multitude of the heavenly host took up the refrain, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.” “The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwelt in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined,” ran the prophecy. “Mine eyes have seen Thy salvation,” said the aged Simeon; “a light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of Thy people Israel.”

Once more abruptly comes the prophecy: “There shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots” (11:1). “The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord.” This description of the Messiah in the eleventh chapter corresponds perfectly with the description in the sixty-first, which our Lord applied to Himself in His first sermon in the synagogue of Nazareth. “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me.” In both descriptions the result of that anointing is the same, making Him the Friend of the poor and the meek and the oppressed. Our Lord stopped in His reading at the proclamation of mercy and applied it to Himself. He did not go on to read of judgment; for at His first coming He came not to condemn the world, but to save it (John 3:17). Both these passages in Isaiah speak as certainly of judgment as of blessing; for Christ is coming again to judge the world, as He said, His Father “hath given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man.” “Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation” (5:27-29).

Chapter 28 gives us the precious Corner-Stone. Chapter 32 tells of a King reigning in righteousness; of a Man being as a hiding-place, as the shadow of a great Bock in a weary land—the Rock of Ages of chapter 26:4 (margin).

The Servant of Jehovah. From chapter 42 to 52 the Messiah is set before us as the Servant of Jehovah: “Behold My Servant.” Some of these verses have a preliminary reference to Cyrus, whom the Lord revealed to Isaiah as the future deliverer of His people. But many of the expressions look forward to a greater Deliverer who was to come, and to a greater deliverance than from Babylon. The words used to describe the glorious gathering to Jerusalem would be altogether out of place as a description of the return of the remnant under the decree of Cyrus. Many of the words used of the Servant of the Lord in whom He could delight can only describe the one great Deliverer. The blessings which are to extend to all nations through God’s chosen people Israel, point forward to “the time of their receiving again,” as Paul shows us in Romans 11, where he quotes from this book (Isa. 66:22).

In chapter 49 we begin to see the suffering Messiah. The One whom man despiseth, whom the nation abhorreth, yet who shall be worshipped of kings, and given for a covenant to the people. The sufferings deepen in the next chapter. He who is given “the tongue of him that is taught” is not rebellious. He gives His back to the smiters, He hides not His face from shame and from spitting. In chapter 52 we see again the Servant of the Lord, His visage marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men. We see Him sprinkling many nations.

This brings us to the fifty-third chapter, the most perfect picture of our suffering Saviour in all the Old Testament Scriptures. Seven times we are told He has borne our sins: (1) Wounded for our transgressions; (2) Bruised for our iniquities; (3) The Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all; (4) For the transgression of My people was the stroke upon Him; (5) Thou shalt make His soul an offering for sin; (6) He shall bear their iniquities; (7) He bare the sin of many.

How marvellously this prophecy has been fulfilled in all its details will be seen by a study of the corresponding verses from the New Testament.

Isaiah 53 as Fulfilled by Christ

Ver. 1. “Who hath believed our report?	John 12:37. Yet they believed not on Him.
To whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?	Luke 10:21. Thou hast revealed them unto babes.
Ver. 2. He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant.	John 15:1. I am the true Vine.
And as a root out of a dry ground.	Isa. 11:1. A rod out of the stem of Jesse, a Branch shall grow out of his roots.
He hath no form nor comeliness.	Isa. 52:14. His visage was so marred more than any man.
And when we shall see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him.	1 Cor. 2:14. The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God.
Ver. 3. He is despised.	Matt. 27:29. They mocked Him.
And rejected of men.	John 18:40. Not this Man, but Barabbas.
A Man of Sorrows.	Mark 14:32. My soul is exceeding sorrowful unto death.
And acquainted with grief.	John 11:35. Jesus wept.
And we hid as it were our faces from Him.	John 5:40. Ye will not come to Me that ye might have life.
He was despised, and we esteemed Him not.	1 Cor. 1:23. Unto the Jews a stumbling-block, and unto the Greeks foolishness.
Ver. 4. Surely He hath borne our griefs.	Heb. 4:15. Touched with the feeling of our infirmities.
And carried our sorrows.	John 11:38. Jesus again groaning in Himself, cometh to the grave.
Yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted.	Luke 23:35. Let Him save Himself, if He be the Christ, the Chosen of God.
Ver. 5. He was wounded for our transgressions.	1 Pet. 3:18. Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the Just for the unjust.
He was bruised for our iniquities.	John 19:1. Pilate took Jesus and scourged Him.
The chastisement of our peace was upon Him.	Col. 1:20. Having made peace through the blood of His Cross.
And with His stripes we are healed.	Heb. 10:10. Sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
Ver. 6. All we, like sheep, have gone astray.	Rom. 3:23. All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.
We have turned every one to his own way.	Phil. 2:21. All seek their own, not the things which are Jesus Christ’s.
And the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.	2 Cor. 5:21. He hath made Him to be sin for us.
Ver. 7. He was oppressed.	Luke 22:44. Being in an agony He prayed more earnestly.
And He was afflicted.	John 19:5. Wearing the crown of thorns.
Yet He opened not His mouth.	1 Peter 2:23. When He suffered He threatened not.
He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter.	Matt. 27:31. And led Him away to crucify Him.
And as a sheep before her hearers is dumb, so He opened not His mouth.	Matt. 27:14. He answered him to never a word.
Ver, 8, He was taken from prison and from judgment.	John 18:24. Now Annas had sent Him bound unto Caiaphas.
And His manner of life who shall declare.49	John 18:20, 21. I spake openly to the world … ask them that heard Me … behold they know what I said.
For He was cut off out of the land of the living.	Acts 2:23. By wicked hands crucified and slain.
For the transgression of My people was He smitten.	John 11:51, 52. That Jesus should die for that nation.
Ver. 9. His grave was appointed with the wicked, but it was [viz. His grave was] with the rich in His death.50	Matt. 27:57-60. A rich man named Joseph … begged the body of Jesus, and laid it in his own new tomb.
Because He had done no violence.	1 Peter 2:22. Who did no sin.
Neither was any deceit in His mouth.	1 Peter 2:22. Neither was guile found in His mouth.
Ver. 10. Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him, He hath put Him to grief.	Rom. 8:32. He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all.
When Thou shalt make His soul an offering for sin.	John 3:16. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.
He shall see His seed.	John 3:16. That whosoever believeth in Him should not perish.
He shall prolong His days.	John 3:16. But have everlasting life.
The pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand.	John 17:4. I have glorified Thee on the earth: I have finished the work which Thou gavest Me to do.
Ver. 11. He shall see of the travail of His soul, and shall be satisfied.	Heb. 3:2. Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the Cross.
By His knowledge shall My righteous Servant justify many.	John 17:8. This is life eternal, that they might know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ.
For He shall bear their iniquities.	1 Pet. 2:24. His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree.
Ver. 12. Therefore will I divide Him a portion with the great.	Phil. 2:9. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted Him.
And He shall divide the spoil with the strong.	Col. 2:15. Having spoiled principalities and powers. Heb. 3:2. Appointed heir of all things.
Because He hath poured out His soul unto death.	John 1:15. I lay down My life for the sheep.
And He was numbered with the transgressors.	Mark 15:27. And with Him they crucify two thieves.
And He bare the sin of many.	Heb. 9:28. Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many.
And made intercession for transgressors.	Luke 23:34. Father, forgive them. Heb. 7:25. Ever liveth to make intercession for us.

Atonement. “In His death” in the Hebrew is in the plural, “in His deaths,” possibly “the plural of majesty,” signifying “His great death,” that great atoning death which was a sacrifice for sin. Or it may shadow forth the truth that “if one died for all, then all died.” His death represented the great multitudes for whom He died. From that moment in the prophetic record the song of triumph begins, as we traced it in the twenty-second Psalm, as we may trace it in Phil, ii., which descends step by step in humiliation till “death, even the death of the Cross,” is reached, and then bursts forth in an ever-ascending scale of triumph, till it reaches “the glory of God the Father.” Thus it is in this chapter. The future triumph is revealed; the satisfaction of the soul of the Redeemer in the spoil that He has won; the great multitude who have been redeemed to everlasting life through His death.

The next chapter breaks forth afresh into a description of the glorious future. Then follows the Gospel invitation in chapter 55—“Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters—in which we can see our Saviour standing on the last great day of the feast, and saying, “If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink.”

Christ’s Reign. The closing chapters are full of the note of victory, but full also of the time of judgment by which Christ’s glorious millennial reign is to be ushered in. Israel having been gathered to their own land in unbelief, must undergo a time of awful tribulation; but when they see Him whom they have pierced (Zech. 12:10), returning in power and great glory, accompanied by His Church, to execute judgment upon the earth (Jude 14, 15), the veil of unbelief shall be taken away (2 Cor. 3:15, 16), and they shall receive Him as their Messiah, and He shall reign over them on the throne of His father David (Isa. 9:7, 16:5), and Jerusalem shall become a praise in the midst of the earth (62:7). During this reign Satan shall be bound (Isa. 24:21, 22; Rev. 20:1-3); universal peace shall be established among the nations (Isa. 2:4); the very fierceness of the animal creation shall be completely subdued (Isa. 65:25, 11:6-9). Human life shall be prolonged, as in the days before the flood (65:20-22); water shall once more be plentiful in the land of Palestine (30:23, 25, 41:18), and its deserts shall become fruitful as the garden of the Lord (51:3, 43:19, 20, 41:18, 19, 35:1, 2, 7). All Israel shall be saved with an everlasting salvation (45:17), and God’s purpose of blessing to the whole world through His own chosen people shall be fulfilled (Gen. 12:2, 3; Rom. 11:15; Isa. 2:2, 3, 66:12, 19; 60, 61, and 62).

Fulfilment of Prophecy in the History of Babylon. The predictions of the prophet Isaiah with regard to Babylon have been most remarkably fulfilled, both in its fall and subsequent desolation. The army which is to accomplish its fall is summoned from the mountains, from a distant land: Persia, no doubt, is meant (13:4). But Persia is not to act alone; Media is to join the mustering squadrons (13:17). The Lord of Hosts calls them to execute His judgments upon the guilty city (13:2, 3, 11, 19), and the earth trembles beneath the tread of marching men in response. In chapter 21:2 we are cold that it is the Medo-Persian army that is to capture the Chaldean capital. The steady advance of the hostile army, with its battalions of horses and asses and camels, is seen by the watchman (21:7). Herodotus tells us the Persian army had just such adjuncts as are here mentioned.

The fall of the city is to take place at the time of a feast (12:5; Dan. 5). It is declared that fear shall take possession of the doomed city; panic-stricken it shall make no defence (13:8). How exactly this was fulfilled, Daniel assures us. The consternation which seized the king on the night of Babylon’s assault is read in the graphic language of Dan. 5:6: “His knees smote one against another.” “On that night was Belshazzar, the king of the Chaldeans, slain.” The gates of Babylon were to be open for Cyrus’s entrance (45:1). History relates that on the night of the capture this actually occurred. Marching into the heart of the city by the river channel, which he had drained, Cyrus found the gate within the city, leading from the streets to the river, providentially left open in the general disorder occasioned by the great feast. Otherwise the army would have been shut up in the bed of the river, as in a trap, and destroyed. Finally, there is the sudden cry of the capture and overthrow: “Babylon is fallen, is fallen!” and her chief gods, Bel, Nebo, and Merodach, are for ever discredited (21:9, 46:1, 2). The absolute accuracy of the prediction is fully attested by the history of Babylon’s fall. It came about as here foretold.

The future condition of Babylon was also foretold. “It shall never be inhabited, neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation: neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there; neither shall the shepherds make their flocks to lie down there. But wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures; and ostriches shall dwell there, and satyrs shall dance there. And the wolves shall cry in their castles, and jackals in the pleasant palaces” (13:19-22). This exactly describes the unutterable desolation of Babylon. Not one human dwelling rests on the site of the ancient city. The Bedaween, though he pastures his flocks in the immediate neighbourhood, regards the ruins themselves with superstitious awe. The tents of the Arabs are freely pitched on the Chaldean plains, but not one of them is pitched amid the ruins of Babylon. Other ancient cities seldom become complete solitudes; their sites are marked by some village or group of huts or fold for flocks, but Babylon has ever been an exception.

Maundeville in the fourteenth century wrote: “It is all deserte, and full of dragons and grete serpentes.” It remains the same today. Owls start from the scanty thickets, lions make their dens in the buried dwelling-places, and the foul jackal skulks through the furrows. The surface is covered with shapeless heaps, and the foot sinks in loose dust and rubbish, exactly fulfilling the prediction: “Babylon shall become heaps” (Jer. 51:37). “Come and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon” (Isa. 47:1). The riches of the city seemed to bid defiance to the constant ravages of man, in fulfilment of the words, “All that spoil her shall be satisfied” (Jer. 50:10). “Her cities are a desolation, a dry land, and a wilderness, a land wherein no man dwelleth, neither doth any son of man pass thereby” (Jer. 51:43). In the time of its glory the country round the great city had been drained and irrigated at enormous cost, till it was unsurpassed for fertility. Now through centuries of neglect it has sunk back to its original state, “a stinking morass and a barren steppe”; a vast waste wilderness, with nothing but an occasional black Bedaween tent or a wandering camel here and there to mark the existence of man.

Analysis

The Book of Isaiah may be divided into three parts. The first part and the third are composed of most magnificent poetry. The beauty of the style is well reproduced in Bishop Lowth’s translation, which is worth careful study.

These two parts are, as it were, clasped together by the second portion, which is history, and mainly written in prose. Two chapters are connected with the first part of the book, and relate the story of the Assyrian invasion and its results; and two chapters are connected with the third part of the book, and tell of Hezekiah’s sickness and recovery, and the incident of the Babylonian ambassadors.

Part I. Chaps. 1-35

1. Chaps. 1-12. Reproofs mainly addressed to Judah and Jerusalem. Coming glory, chaps. 11 and 12.

2. Chaps. 13-23. Judgments on nations hostile to Judah, e.g. Babylon, Syria, Egypt, Tyre.

3. Chaps. 24-35. Judgment on the world, on Samaria and Judah. Sins provoking judgment. Assyrian invasion and destruction of Jerusalem. Coming glory, chap. 35.

Part II. Chaps. 36-39

1. Chaps. 36, 37. Assyrian invasion and results. (Closely connected with Part I.)

2. Chaps. 38, 39. Hezekiah’s sickness and recovery. Babylonian ambassadors. Babylonian Captivity foretold. (Closely connected with Part III.)

Part III. Chaps. 40-66

1. Chaps. 40-48. Comfort. Antithesis of Jehovah and idols, Israel and the nations. Section ends with knell of judgment: “There is no peace, saith the Lord, to the wicked.”

2. Chaps. 49-57. The Servant of Jehovah, Antithesis between sufferings of the Servant and the glory that should follow. Section ends with knell of judgment: “There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.”

3. Chaps. 58-66. Promised glory. Antithesis between the hypocrites and the faithful; between present sin and sorrow, and future holiness and blessedness. Section ends with still heavier note of judgment (66:24).

The Cross the Centre. The twenty-seven chapters of Part III constitute one grand Messianic poem, subdivided into three books. Each book consists of three sections of three chapters each, nearly corresponding with the divisions of our English Bible. Chap. 53 (with the last three verses of 52) is the middle chapter of the middle book of this great prophetic poem, the heart of the prophetic writings of the Old Testament. And the central verse of this central chapter enshrines the central truth of the Gospel:—

He was wounded for our transgressions,

He was bruised for our iniquities:

The chastisement of our peace was upon Him;

And with His stripes we are healed.

(Dr. Pierson.)

The Unity of Isaiah

A summary of the Book of Isaiah would hardly be complete without allusion to the question that has been raised of late years as to the duality or plurality of authorship. It is asked, “What difference does it make whether the prophecy is the work of one man or of two or of twenty?” On the surface it makes no difference—provided its inspiration is established. If we are sure the Spirit of God is speaking, the human channel matters little.

But it is just because we see that this question of inspiration is doubly involved that we feel it does matter.

1. In the first place, the denial of the unity of Isaiah has its root in an unwillingness to admit the supernatural power of prediction in prophecy.

2. In the second place, to maintain the denial of its unity sets aside the authority of the New Testament.

In considering this question we will lay aside for the time the foregoing division of the book into three parts, and speak of Isaiah 1 (chaps. 1-39) and Isaiah 2 (chaps. 40-46); the former written by Isaiah, the son of Amos, the latter supposed to have been written by some great Unknown Prophet during the time of the Babylonian Captivity.

Language. At first the supposed difference in language was assigned as the reason for doubting the unity of the book. But on the authority of great Hebrew scholars, with scarcely an exception, it is proved that there is no linguistic necessity for the theory of a dual or plural authorship. Indeed, the resemblance in style between Isaiah 1 and 2, we are told, is closer than that between either of them, and any other book of the Old Testament. The similarity between the two parts of the book is so striking that some who hold to the theory of two authors have come to the conclusion that the second Isaiah has imitated the style of the first!

When we consider the long period during which Isaiah himself tells us he used the prophetic gift—from the days of Uzziah to Hezekiah, probably sixty years—and the very varied matter of which he wrote, there is more than sufficient reason to account for any difference of style. “The second Isaiah employs words only known otherwise to the first Isaiah, of which the meaning was lost by Jeremiah’s time. The second Isaiah shows himself otherwise possessed of a scientific and technical vocabulary, which the first Isaiah only shares with him.”⁵¹

Professor Birks, in studying the words used in 1 and 2 Isaiah, and nowhere in the later prophets, finds the instances so numerous that he limits his examples to those beginning with the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet—the letter aleph— of which he cites forty.

Prediction. The reason for the denial of the unity of the authorship of Isaiah lies deeper than a question of language—it originated in the denial of the supernatural in prophecy. “Remove the great stumbling-block, the fact of prediction, and everything is in favour of its authenticity” (Dr. Payne Smith).

That the prophet should predict the fall of Babylon when it had not yet risen to its supremacy as a great world-power, and when Assyria was still the dreaded foe of the Jewish nation; that he should predict the deliverance from captivity before the people were carried captive; that he should foretell that deliverance should come from Medo-Persia when these two nations were still separate and insignificant; that he should call the deliverer by name⁵²—Cyrus—more than a hundred years before his birth,—these matters are stumbling-blocks to those who see in prophecy only the human intuition of a good man who has understanding of the times. But to the devout believer it is a confirmation of his faith in an almighty God who claims to inspire His prophets with the Holy Spirit.

In Isaiah 2 God Himself, through His prophet, appeals to the fulfilment of the earlier predictions as the ground for believing that the later predictions will be fulfilled (Isa. 48:3-5). This appeal would have no meaning if there were no earlier predictions to refer to. Among the predictions of Isaiah 1 were the invasion and destruction of Samaria by Sennacherib, his threatened invasion and the final deliverance of Jerusalem, and the prolongation of Hezekiah’s life.

And now God appeals to His people Israel to be His witnesses to the fulfilment of His predictions in chapters 40-66 (see 43:9, 10). He challenges the idols, the gods of the nations, to prove their right to be worshipped by foretelling future events (41:23, 42:7-9).

The mention of Cyrus by name is expressly declared to be a miracle, wrought in order that the whole world, from east to west, might know that Jehovah is the only God (45:4-6).

This is exactly the effect it had both upon the great world-conqueror himself and upon the people of Israel.

Josephus tells us that it was the reading of the prophecy of Isaiah concerning himself that led Cyrus to issue the decree: “Thus saith Cyrus king of Persia, All the kingdoms of the earth hath the Lord God of heaven given me; and He hath charged me to build Him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah” (2 Chron. 36:23). If the prophecy had only been written a few years before in Babylon, when his name was well known, and by a contemporary, is it credible that it would have so impressed the great conqueror as to lead him to take this step?

We have already touched upon the effect of Isaiah’s prophecy upon the Jews. They went down to Babylon with what seemed to be an ineradicable tendency to idolatry. They returned from it what they have remained to the present day, the most monotheistic of nations. No nation can pass through such a change as that except under some overpowering conviction. Such a conviction would be produced as they gradually watched the prophecies of Isaiah fulfilled to the letter, and realised that God had foreseen these events and had “declared this from ancient time” (45:21), and the heart of the nation would be turned for ever from idols unto the Holy One of Israel.

History. History, again, uniformly attributes the second part of the book to Isaiah. It is not known historically to have ever existed in a separate form. The conjunction of the two parts was certainly established as early as the days of Ezra. If the second part was written by a contemporary, or by a prophet of the immediately preceding age, Ezra must have known this. To ascribe either carelessness or deceit to Ezra would be contrary to all that is known of his character. The Septuagint translation, made 280 B.C., contains the whole book as the Book of Isaiah. The apocryphal Book of Ecclesiasticus, 200 B.C., says: “He (Esaias) saw by an excellent spirit what should come to pass at the last, and he comforted them that mourn in Zion; he showed what should come to pass for ever, and secret things or ever they came.”

In the face of the universal testimony of history, the burden of proof rests with those who deny the Isaianic origin of the second part. “The rules of ordinary criticism require us to accept Isaiah as the author until it is shown that he cannot have been so” (Sir Edward Strachey).

The New Testament. The witness of the New Testament is explicit and abundant. Isaiah is mentioned by name as the writer of this prophecy no less than twenty-one times. Of these, ten are in connection with passages contained in the first part of the prophecy, and eleven with passages from the second part. According to Westcott and Hort, the whole Book of Isaiah is quoted or referred to more than 210 times; chapters 40-66 more than 100 times.

With the New Testament writers the book is “the words of the prophet Isaiah, who spake by the Holy Spirit.” Matthew declares that the writer of chapter 42 was Isaiah (Matt. 12:17, 18). Luke testifies that chapter 53 was written by Isaiah (Acts 8:28-35), that chapter 66 was written by Isaiah (Luke 4:17). John in the same breath ascribes chapter 53 and chapter 6 to Isaiah by name (John 12:38-41). Paul ascribes chapter 53 and 65 to the same prophet (Rom. 10:16, 20). In every possible way the New Testament writers attribute the entire book to Isaiah, distinguishing between the “Book of Isaiah” and the “prophet Isaiah” who wrote the book (see Luke 4:17 and 3:4, etc.).

Unity or Purpose. The unity of thought and purpose throughout the book is a final testimony to the unity of authorship.

Professor Margoliouth, quoting Aristotle, tells us that a work of art should be so constructed that the removal of any part should cause the whole to fall to pieces, and says that if this rule be applied to Isaiah, we shall be disposed to find the unity of the works ascribed to that prophet brilliantly vindicated. It has been found impossible by those who would divide Isaiah to keep consistently to an early date for the whole of Isaiah I and to a late, or Babylonian, date for the whole of Isaiah 2. The fall of Babylon is predicted in Isaiah 13 and 14, to these and other portions of Isaiah I a late date has therefore been assigned.

The form of idolatry of which the Jewish nation is accused in chapter 57, as also that described in the earlier part of the book, is peculiar to Israel in her own land before the Captivity. The surroundings of that chapter are likewise the surroundings of Palestine; the high mountains, the rocky torrent-beds, and the smooth stones of the stream are foreign to the great alluvial plain of Babylon, and an earlier date is therefore assigned to this and other passages in Isaiah 2. This reduces both parts of this magnificent prophecy to a mere literary patchwork.

It is held by some that the Book of Isaiah is a collection of various writers put together for the sake of convenience. But in the parallel case of the Minor Prophets the name is carefully prefixed to each, even to those who only wrote one short chapter. The unity of thought and style is a strong argument against such a plurality of authorship, and the brilliance and power of the prophet make it most unlikely that he should be unknown, even by name. It was the custom of the Hebrew prophets to give their name at the commencement of their writings, and Isaiah is no exception to this (see 1:1). That this verse is not the preface to the first chapter only, or to any small portion of the book, is evident from the enumeration of the four kings during whose reigns he prophesied. It is evidently intended as a seal to the whole volume.

In the lines of thought which we have traced in studying Isaiah it will have been noticed that those lines were unbroken and that the references have been taken from each part of the book. Isaiah’s vision in the Temple when he received his call to the prophetic office formed a fit introduction to the whole prophecy. We have seen how the influence of that vision may be traced throughout in the impression he received of the holiness and majesty of God, imprinting the name of the Holy One of Israel on all his prophecies, as if to anticipate the difficulty now before us. The influence of the vision may be traced again in the catholicity of the Divine purpose toward the whole world.

Most of all the unity of the book may be seen in the central figure of the person of the Messiah, in His glorious work of redemption, and in His universal reign of righteousness. Salvation and Judgment, Peace the effect of Righteousness, the power and majesty of God in creation as contrasted with idols, the work of men’s hands,—these form the great themes of the prophet Isaiah, and are to be found flowing in unbroken connection throughout the entire volume of his writings.

3. Jeremiah

God chooses unlikely instruments to do His work. He chose the sensitive, shrinking Jeremiah for what seemed a hopeless mission, with the words: “Say not, I am a child: for on whatsoever errand I shall send thee thou shalt go, and whatsoever I shall command thee thou shalt speak. Be not afraid. I am with thee to deliver thee” (Jer. 1:7-9, R.V.). And Jeremiah proved worthy of the trust. Though his heart was wrung with the severe denunciations he had to give, and with the stubborn rejection of them by his people, though he often poured out his complaints to God, and even went so far as to say that he would not speak any more in His Name, yet we never once find him turning back from the path of duty. Imprisoned again and again, put in the stocks (20:2), lowered by ropes into a miry dungeon (38:6)—probably an empty cistern—mocked, derided (20:7), a man of strife and contention to the whole world (15:10), accused of treachery to his country (38:4), opposed by false prophets (23, 28), confronted by an angry people who clamoured for his life (26), carried, against his will, by his countrymen into Egypt (43:1-7),—under all these circumstances Jeremiah went steadily on delivering his message with unswerving fidelity for over forty years.

Jeremiah prophesied for eighteen years during the reign of Josiah, then during the reigns of the four kings of Judah till after the capture of Jerusalem and the end of the kingdom. He was thus about a hundred years later than the prophet Isaiah. His home was in the village of Anathoth, a few miles north of Jerusalem, and he was by birth a priest. It is possible, though not certain, that his father, Hilkiah, was the High Priest who discovered the book of the Law in the Temple during the reign of Josiah (see the Cambridge Bible for Schools). In any case the discovery had as marked an effect upon the ministry of the young prophet as upon the conduct of the young king. Jeremiah, no doubt, strengthened Josiah’s hands in his work of reform and against forming an alliance with Egypt. Though Jeremiah had many enemies, God gave him some true friends, from Josiah the king down to Ebed-melech the Ethiopian who rescued him from the dungeon.

Courage. Jeremiah’s fearlessness in the face of danger is shown most conspicuously in chapter 26, where the Lord sends him to give His message in the Temple court and admonishes him not to diminish a word. So incensed were the priests and the people, that they took him, saying: “Thou shalt surely die.” “As for me,” replied the prophet, “behold, I am in your hand; do with me as seemeth good and meet unto you: but know ye for certain, that, if ye put me to death, ye shall surely bring innocent blood upon yourselves: for of a truth the Lord hath sent me unto you, to speak all these words in your ears.”

Three great Events. There were three great events in the life of the prophet: (1) The battle of Megiddo, between Judah and Pharaoh Necho, where the good king Josiah was slain, and was deeply mourned by his people, Jeremiah writing a lament concerning him. (2) The battle of Carchemish, near the same spot, four years later, in the reign of Jehoiakim, who had become the vassal of Egypt. In this battle the Egyptians were wholly defeated by the Babylonian forces under Nebuchadnezzar, and it was followed by the first deportation of Jews to Babylon. (3) The third great event was the capture of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, the destruction of the city and the Temple, and the exile of the greater part of the remainder of the people to Babylon.

In such troublous times as these Jeremiah lived. The life of the nation from the time of Manasseh, the grandfather of Josiah, was corrupt in the extreme. The reforms of Josiah seemed only to touch it on the surface, and temporarily; after his death the nation sank back into the worst forms of idolatry and into every kind of iniquity. Jeremiah’s mission was to endeavour to turn his people back to their God. During the reign of Josiah he began to prophesy the dreadful calamity threatening them from the North, unless they would repent. Judah’s salvation was still possible, but each year her guilt became heavier and her doom more certain.

The Lord raised up Nebuchadnezzar to execute His judgment upon Judah. He gave him universal dominion, and even called him “My servant.” It was because God revealed this to Jeremiah that we find him advocating submission to Nebuchadnezzar, and it was for this that his people accused him of treachery. After the destruction of Jerusalem, Jeremiah was given his choice whether he would go to Babylon or remain with the remnant that were left in the land. He chose the latter. Days of darkness followed. Jeremiah exhorted his people to obey the voice of the Lord and remain in the land, and not flee into Egypt. But they refused to obey, and they carried Jeremiah with them into Egypt, where, tradition says, he was stoned to death.

BRICKWORK IN Egypt. When Johanan and the chief of the captains refused to obey the voice of the Lord by Jeremiah, and persisted in going down into Egypt with all the remnant of Judah—men, women, and children, including the King’s daughters—they came and dwelt at Tahpanhes. At the commandment of the Lord, Jeremiah took great stones and hid them under the large platform, or pavement of brickwork, at the entry of Pharaoh’s house in Tahpanhes, and prophesied that over these stones Nebuchadnezzar should one day set his throne and spread his royal pavilion. Dr. Flinders Petrie has discovered “the palace of the Jew’s daughter” at Tahpanhes. Tahpanhes seems to have been an old fort on the Syrian frontier, guarding the road to Egypt, and evidently a constant refuge for the Jews. In front of the fort is a large platform, or pavement of brickwork, suitable for outdoor business, such as loading goods, pitching tents, etc.—just what is now called a mastaba. Dr, Petrie says: “Now Jeremiah writes of the pavement (or brickwork) which is at the entry of Pharaoh’s house in Tahpanhes; this passage, which has been an unexplained stumbling-block to translators hitherto, is the exact description of the mastaba which I found, and this would be the most likely place for Nebuchadnezzar to pitch his royal tent as stated by Jeremiah.”⁵³

The Heart. “Jeremiah was, of all the prophets of the Old Testament, the supreme prophet of God to the human heart. In season and out of season, for a long lifetime, he laid siege to the hearts of his hearers. The cure of all your famines, he cried, and all your plagues and all your defeats and all your captivities—the cause and the cure of them all is in your own heart: in the heart of each inhabitant of Jerusalem and each captive in Babylon.”⁵⁴

“His ministry was one of admonition and antagonism. Against the whole land, against the kings of Judah, against the princes, against the priests, against the prophets was he to stand. He was to gird up his loins and arise, and speak all that God commanded him. He was to be the solitary fortress, the column of iron, the wall of brass, fearless, undismayed in any presence; the one grand, immoveable figure who pursued the apostatising people and rulers, delivering his message in the Temple court or the royal chamber or the street, whether they would hear or whether they would forbear. In consequence he was the prophet of unwelcome truths, hated of all, but feared as well by all. It was a mission requiring courage, faith, strength, will; a mission no weakling could fill, no coward would undertake. Jeremiah is one of the very great men of the world.”⁵⁵

To Jeremiah was committed the hopeless task of trying to bring back his people at the eleventh hour. He prophesied the seventy years’ servitude of the Jews to Babylon, urging them to settle down to the life of that city and to seek its peace. He prophesied as certainly the restoration of his people and the unalterable love of God to them. At the very time of the siege of Jerusalem, and from his prison cell, Jeremiah, at the bidding of the Lord, purchased a field from his cousin Hanameel as a proof that Israel should be restored to their land.

Prediction. Chapters 50 and 51 give us a picture of the whole of Babylon’s future. Those who deny the miracle of prophetic prediction for the same reason deny that these chapters were written by Jeremiah. They suppose them to have been written by a follower of the prophet, accustomed to use similar phraseology, and that he wrote them not long before the fall of Babylon. Against this theory we have the following facts:—(1) Even those who deny that Jeremiah was the author admit that the style of those two chapters presents all the characteristics of the special style of that prophet. (2) Those two chapters in particular are more carefully authenticated as being by Jeremiah than any other portion of the book: chapter 50 beginning with the words, “The word that the Lord spake against Babylon by Jeremiah the prophet,” and chapter 51 closing with, “Thus far are the words of Jeremiah.” To impugn their authorship is to impugn their honesty. (3) To place the prophecy at the time when Babylon was about to be taken by Cyrus does not do away with the miracle of prediction, for many of the details of the prophecy were not fulfilled for more than five centuries later. At the time of the conquest the walls were not thrown down; neither sower nor reaper was cut off from Babylon; she was not deserted of her population; and the utter desolation described in these two chapters did not take place at that time, but was fulfilled to the letter long years after.

Sacrifice. In Jeremiah 7:22, 23 we read, “I spake not unto your fathers, nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices: but this one thing I commanded them, Obey My Voice.” These words are not opposed to the history as contained in the Pentateuch, nor a proof, as some allege, that “the Levitical Code” was not in existence in Jeremiah’s day. This sentence is a figure of grammar, of frequent occurrence in both Old and New Testaments, as scholars have pointed out over and over again. The figure is this: That a negative followed, generally though not always, by an adversative particle (generally the conjunction “but”) is frequently not a negative at all, but a form of comparison. For instance, “For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings” (Hos. 6:6); “You sent me not hither, but God” (Gen. 45:8). These words of Joseph in no way deny the historical fact that it was his brethren who sent him. “Your murmurings are not against us, but against Jehovah” (Exod. 16:8). This only means more against Jehovah than against Moses and Aaron. So also, “They have not rejected thee, but have rejected Me” (1 Sam. 8:7), only means, it was more against Jehovah than against Samuel. “Receive my instruction, and not silver; and knowledge rather than choice gold” (Prov. 8:10). “Rend your heart and not your garments.”

In the New Testament this figure of grammar occurs over and over again. “Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life” (John 6:27). “In this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven” (Luke 10:20). “The word which ye hear is not Mine, but the Father’s which sent Me” (John 14:24). See also Matt. 6:19, 20; John 7:16; Col. 3:2, 22, 23, etc. etc. In all these places the negative is not a literal negative at all, but is a strong and striking form of the comparative. In this form, or figure, the negative does not exclude the thing denied, but only implies the prior claim of the thing set in opposition to it (Rev. James Neil).

The essence of the covenant He made with them at Sinai was obedience: “If ye will obey My voice, and keep My covenant, then ye shall be Mine own possession.” The appointment of the Levitical Law was a part of the obedience which formed the essence of the covenant.

A Type of Christ. Jeremiah was a true foreshadowing of Christ. It is hardly to be wondered at that some mistook the Man of Sorrows for the prophet of the broken heart (Matt. 16:14). He wept over his people as Jesus wept over them (9:1). His fearless rebuking of sin brought him reproach and rejection and suffering as it brought our Lord. He compares himself to a lamb or an ox brought to the slaughter (11:19).

The Messiah. Jeremiah does not unfold to us as much of the coming Messiah as Isaiah does, but we have glimpses of Christ as the Fountain of Living Waters (2:13), as the Great Physician (8:22), as the Good Shepherd (31:10, 23:4), as the Righteous Branch (23:5), as David the King (30:9), as the Redeemer (50:34), as the Lord our Righteousness (23:6). At the very time that David’s throne was imperilled, and justice and equity almost unknown, the prophet announced the coming of a King of the House of David, a righteous Branch, who should reign and prosper, and execute judgment and justice in the earth. “In His days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely; and this is His name whereby He shall be called, THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS”—Jehovah Tsidkenu. In this majestic name the Godhead of our Saviour is predicted, and, as a descendant of David, His humanity.

The New Covenant. God says by His servant that He will make a New Covenant with the House of Israel and with the House of Judah (31:31-37). In the New Testament this is distinctly applied to the Jews of the future (Rom. 11:26, 27; Heb. 8:8, 13). Christ is the Mediator of this better Covenant (Heb. 12:24). The prophecy points forward to His day, and includes, not the Jews only, but all who know Him as their Saviour and Mediator. It shows the spiritual nature of His kingdom, in which His Laws will be written on our minds to make us know them, and on our hearts to make us love them, and he will give us His Spirit to enable us to do them.

Backsliding. The grievous famine of chapter 14:1-9 may be applied spiritually, as a picture of the heart that has known the Saviour and has backslidden from Him. It is a parched land. No water, no rain, no grass, no herbage (R.V.). The Lord as a stranger in the land, “as a mighty man that cannot save.” How graphically this describes many a heart whose own sin and unbelief are “limiting the Holy One of Israel.” Jeremiah is the book for backsliders. It reveals the tenderness of the Lord’s love, and contains His gracious invitation to them, and their resolve with regard to Him: “Return, ye backsliding children, and I will heal your backslidings. Behold, we come unto Thee; for Thou art the Lord our God” (3:22).

Questions.—The book contains various questions, the answer to which can only be found in the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.

“How shall I pardon thee?” (Jer. 5:7; Eph. 1:7).

“How shall I put thee among the children?” (3:19; John 1:12).

“Is there no balm in Gilead? is there no Physician there?” (8:22; Matt. 11:12).

“Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots?” (13:23; Acts 8:37; 2 Peter 3:14).

“How wilt thou do in the swelling of Jordan!” (12:5; 1 Cor. 15:55-57).

“Where is the flock that was given thee, thy beautiful flock?” (13:20; Col. 1:28; Heb. 13:17).

Gospel Texts.—It contains likewise various texts which would supply subjects for Gospel sermons.

“What wilt thou say when He shall punish thee?” (13:21).

“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked” (17:9).

“Flee, save your lives, and be like the heath (juniper) in the wilderness” (48:6).

“My word is like a fire, and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces” (23:29).

“Break up your fallow ground” (4:3).

“Her sun is gone down while it is yet day” (15:9).

“I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil” (29:11).

“I have loved thee with an everlasting love; therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn thee” (31:3).

“Ye shall seek Me, and find Me, when ye shall search for Me with all your heart” (29:13).

“Ask for the old paths … and ye shall find rest for your souls” (6:16).

“They shall ask the way to Zion, with their faces thitherward” (50:5).

“My people have been lost sheep … they have forgotten their resting-place” (50:6).

“The time of their visitation” (8:7, 12).

“The harvest is past, the summer is ended and we are not saved” (8:20).

“There is nothing too hard for Thee” (32:17).

The Penknife. The Book of Jeremiah throws much light on the subject of inspiration. It is a helpful study to take one’s Bible, and beginning with the first verse to mark all the expressions which assert or imply that God spake by Jeremiah, such as, “Thus saith the Lord,” “The Lord said unto me,” “The word of the Lord came,” etc. Such expressions occur sometimes a dozen times in one chapter, and in them Jeremiah unhesitatingly claims inspiration.

As we read on a scene rises before us. We see Jeremiah in prison. The rulers have bound him that they may be no longer troubled by the word of the Lord. God tells him to take a roll and write in it all the words that He had spoken unto him from the days of Josiah unto that day. We can picture the prophet in the dimly lighted dungeon, with his faithful friend Baruch at his side, busily writing down the words on the roll as the prophet spoke them. “And Baruch wrote from the mouth of Jeremiah all the words of the Lord, which He had spoken unto him, upon a roll of a book. And Jeremiah commanded Baruch, saying, I am shut up; I cannot go into the house of the Lord; therefore go thou, and read in the roll, which thou hast written from my mouth, the words of the Lord, in the ears of the people, in the Lord’s House upon the fasting-day.” What Baruch holds in his hand, and what he reads in the ears of the princes, priests, and people, are “the words of the Lord.” The roll is long. It contains every prophecy which Jeremiah has uttered up to that time. But none of the words, many as they are, are given as his words. They are all of them God’s words.

But this is not all. After Baruch had read the roll to the people, he was sent for by the Royal Council and commanded to read it to them. The great officials of Jerusalem said to Baruch, “Tell us now, How didst thou write all these words at his mouth? Then Baruch answered them, He pronounced all these words with his mouth, and I wrote them with ink in the book.” They afterwards brought the roll to the King. Here another scene rises before us. We are no longer in the dark dungeon, but in the winter palace of Jehoiakim, surrounded by all the magnificent luxury of an Eastern Court. When the monarch had heard three or four leaves of the roll he had heard enough. He asked for the roll, cut it in pieces with a penknife, and cast it into the fire that was upon the hearth. “It was his last chance, his last offer of mercy: as he threw the torn fragments of the roll on the fire he threw there, in symbol, his royal house, his doomed city, the Temple, and all the people of the land” (Speaker’s Commentary).

Jeremiah and Baruch were ordered to be taken, and would, no doubt, have been treated with like ferocity, “but the Lord hid them.” And now in their seclusion another task was set them. The Lord commanded Jeremiah to take another roll, and to write in it “all the words of the book which Jehoiakim king of Judah had burned in the fire; and there were added besides unto them, many like words.” Other words were added, but the body of the sacred book was word by word the same as the first.⁵⁶

Man may cut God’s Word to pieces with the penknife of his intellect. Like Jehoiakim he may cast his hope of salvation in the fire. But “the word of the Lord endureth forever” and by that word shall he be judged in the last day (1 Pet. 1:25; John 12:48).

“My Word—Fire.” The stern messages Jeremiah had to give were so foreign to his sensitive nature that it could only have been the deep conviction that they were the words of the Lord that enabled him to give utterance to them. Like Job he deplores the day of his birth; he sits alone because of the Lord’s hand; he complains that he is in derision daily; the word of the Lord was made a reproach unto him, for His sake he has suffered rebuke; cursed by every one, mocked, defamed, watched by all his familiars for his halting,—is it likely that Jeremiah would have gone on if he had not been certain that the Lord had commissioned him? As we have already seen, he contemplates speaking no more in the name of the Lord, “But,” he says, “His word was in my heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay.” With such a fire burning in his heart is it any wonder that the Lord’s promise was fulfilled, “Behold, I will make My words in thy mouth fire”? The Lord also promised him, “If thou take forth the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as My mouth.” “Thy words were found,” he says to the Lord, “and I did eat them; and Thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart.” In his prayers to God, Jeremiah reveals the secret workings of his heart. He was emphatically a man of prayer, a man who understood the meaning of communion with his God.

4. Lamentations

“The City of the Great King.” “How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people! how is she a widow that was great among the nations! and princess among the provinces, how is it she became tributary!’ So bursts forth the elaborate dirge of which the oldest Jewish tradition tells us that ‘after the captivity of Israel and the desolation of Jerusalem, Jeremiah sat down and wept, and lamented his lamentation over Jerusalem.’ In the face of a rocky hill, on the western side of the city, the local belief has placed ‘the grotto of Jeremiah.’ There in that fixed attitude of grief, which Michael Angelo has immortalised, the prophet may well be supposed to have mourned the fall of his country.”⁵⁷

The desolation of the city by the Chaldean army is described by Jeremiah in his Book of Lamentations with all the vividness of an eye-witness.

Six hundred years have passed, and now from the opposite or eastern side of the city a procession of rejoicing children with a lowly King winds up the slopes of the Mount of Olives. A sudden bend in the road brings the city of Jerusalem full upon the view. The sight of that proud city in the morning sunlight, with the marble pinnacles and gilded roofs of the Temple, brought such a mighty rush of compassion to the soul of our Saviour that He wept aloud. “If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things that belong unto thy peace!”—and there sorrow interrupted the sentence, and, when He found voice to continue, He could only add, “but now they are hid from thine eyes. For the days shall come upon thee, that thine enemies shall cast a trench about thee … and they shall not leave one stone upon another; because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation.”⁵⁸

The weeping prophet was a type of the weeping Saviour. The one had foretold the destruction of the city by the Chaldeans, the other by the Romans.

Judgment for Sin. Throughout the Book of Lamentations, Jeremiah points out plainly that the judgment that has come upon the city is on account of her sin. The Key-note of the book is Destruction. It contains five Laments corresponding with the five chapters. Each Lament is arranged in acrostic form, every verse beginning with one of the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet, except that in the fifth Lament, though it contains the right number of stanzas, the acrostic form disappears. Moreover, in the third or middle Lament—the climax of the poem—each initial letter is repeated three times.

Lament I. In the first part of this Lament the prophet speaks, and describes the city as a woman bereft of her husband and children. In the second Zion speaks, and bewails her misery. She acknowledges that her punishment is from the Lord, and confesses “The Lord is righteous; I have rebelled.”

Lament II. is spoken by the prophet. A remarkable description of the ruin of Jerusalem.

Lament III. The prophet speaks, but makes the miseries of the people his own. Out of the midst of the misery he stays himself upon the Lord’s faithfulness and His unfailing compassion, and asserts unhesitatingly that “He doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men” (3:33).

Lament IV. The prophet again describes the fearful judgments which have befallen Jerusalem.

Lament V. The Jewish people speak and make confession, and appeal to God for forgiveness and deliverance.

“No Rest.” In chapter 1 we have the description of desolation. No rest; no pasture; no Comforter (ver. 3, 6, 9). Such is the desolation of every soul that is without Christ.

Without Christ.

Chap. 1:3. No Rest.

Chap. 1:6. No Pasture.

Chap. 1:9. No Comforter.

With Christ.

Matt. 11:28. I will give you rest.

Ps. 23:2. Green pastures.

John 14:16. Another Comforter.

Calvary. Jeremiah weeping over the city reminds us of our Lord. There are several verses, moreover, which seem to be a foreshadowing of Calvary: “Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by? behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto My sorrow” (1:12). Again: “All that pass by clap their hands at thee; they hiss and wag their head” (2:15, 16; Matt. 27:39); “All thine enemies have opened their mouth against thee” (2:16; Ps. 22:13); “He shutteth out my prayer” (3:8; Matt. 27:46); “I was a derision to all my people, and their song every day” (3:14; Ps. 69:12); “ The wormwood and the gall” (3:19; Ps. 69:21); “He giveth his cheek to him that smiteth him: he is filled with reproach” (3:30; Isa. 50:6; Ps. 69:20).

In the verse “For the sins of her prophets, and the iniquities of her priests, that have shed the blood of the just in the midst of her,” we are reminded, first, of our Lord’s own words: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee”; and, secondly, of Peter’s words of accusation to the people of Jerusalem: “Ye denied the Holy One and the Just, and killed the Prince of Life.”

5. Ezekiel

The Lord set Jeremiah to be an iron pillar in the land of Judah. In the same way He set Ezekiel for a pillar among his own captive people by the river Chebar, in the land of the Chaldeans, and told him that as an adamant, harder than flint, had He made his forehead (3:9). Strength characterised the ministry of the prophet whose name means “God will strengthen.” For a time Jeremiah and Ezekiel were contemporary; for the latter began his prophecy in the fifth year of Jehoiakim’s captivity and prosecuted it for twenty-two years at least (1:2, 29:17). He took up the theme of Jeremiah concerning the future of his people and developed it.

“A Sanctuary.” Like Jeremiah, Ezekiel was a priest as well as a prophet, and in all probability the “thirtieth year” of which he speaks in the first verse was the thirtieth year of his own age—the age when the priests entered upon their sacred duties. God withdrew His presence from His sanctuary at Jerusalem, and His chosen people were henceforth represented by the captives in Babylon. To these He promised to be “as a little sanctuary” in the land of their captivity, indicating that He would not confine His glory to any particular spot. Ezekiel was called to be a sort of ministering priest to his people in this spiritual sanctuary.

This book may be divided into three parts:—Part I., chaps. 1-24. Testimonies from God against Israel in general and against Jerusalem in particular.

Part II., chaps. 25-32. Judgments denounced against surrounding nations.

Part III., chaps. 33-48. The subject of Israel is resumed, and their restoration and blessing foretold.

Ezekiel himself divides his prophecies into fourteen parts, which may be traced by his prefixing the date to each. The main object of his message seems to be to comfort the exiles in their desolation, to fortify them against the idolatry by which they were surrounded, and to inspire them with the glorious prospect the future held in store for them if, with true hearts, they would turn to their God. His wealth of imagery imparts a singular beauty to his prophecies. They glow with life and action and brilliant colouring, and for this very reason are more difficult to understand. But with the assurance that “whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning,” we may count on the Holy Spirit to unfold their teaching to our understanding.

Vision of the Cherubim. Ezekiel stands out as a man entirely abandoned to God’s use. To prepare him for service the Lord granted him a double vision. In the vision of the cherubim Ezekiel saw four living creatures which were absolutely at God’s disposal. “They went every one straight forward: whither the Spirit was to go, they went; and they turned not when they went” (1:12). Such unswerving following the Lord expected from His prophet, and such He expects from us. The lion, the strongest animal; the ox, the most enduring; the eagle, the highest soaring; man made in the image of God,—these four bring before us the highest forms of natural life. These four living ones, with their wings and their wheels full of eyes, moving with the symmetry of one organism, and the rapidity of lightning in the midst of “the enfolding fire,” give us a picture of God’s will perfectly executed, as His redeemed saints will be enabled to fulfil it when they see Him as He is, and as they should aim at fulfilling it here below.

Vision of the Lord. We have not far to seek to find “Christ in Ezekiel.” The prophet beholds Him in vision in the very first chapter. For surely the “Man” upon the throne can be none other than the only-begotten Son, the representative of the invisible God. We recognise in this vision the prophetic announcement of the Holy Incarnation. The details of the vision seen by the captive on the banks of the Chebar correspond minutely with the details of the vision of the captive in the isle called Patmos. Over eighty points of contact may be found between the two books. As there is no doubt who is designated by John, we cannot but recognise in the vision of Ezekiel the Glory of God in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. Ezekiel saw “a throne as an appearance of a sapphire stone, and the likeness as the appearance of a Man above upon it.” John saw “a throne set in heaven, and One sat on the throne.” They both saw the rainbow, the token of the covenant; they both saw “the terrible crystal” of the purity of God’s presence, which nothing can evade. To Ezekiel it appeared as a firmament; to John of glass.

They both had a vision of burning lamps of the fire of God’s Spirit, and of the four living creatures, whose sound was as the sound of many waters (1:24; Rev. 19:4-6). To both was given by the One encircled by the rainbow the roll of a book, which he was commanded to eat, and then go and prophesy (Ezek. 1:28, 2:1, 8-10, 3:1-4; Rev. 10:1, 2, 8-11).

“This,” said Ezekiel, “was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord” (1:28). When we read of the “glory of the Lord” in this book, we see in it the manifested presence of God as revealed in the Eternal Son, who, in the fulness of time, “became flesh, and dwelt amongst us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father.”

The sight of Christ upon the Cross—bearing our sin—brings us salvation. The sight of Christ upon the throne—baptizing with the Holy Ghost—sets us free for service. Ezekiel says that the Spirit entered into him, and that then he heard Him that spake unto him. The personality of the Holy Spirit finds frequent expression in this book.

A Man at God’s Disposal. The Lord sent Ezekiel to be a prophet. Whether they accepted or rejected him, they could not but “know that there had been a prophet among them.” Often we read “the hand of the Lord was upon me,” and often such words as “the Spirit took me up.” Do we, as workers, know what it is to have the Lord’s hand so strong upon us that His Spirit can take us up and wield us as He wills? Ezekiel was a faithful and obedient prophet; he spoke when the Lord opened his mouth, and was willing to be dumb when the Lord closed it, and therefore “they knew that it was the Word of the Lord.”

Ezekiel was sent to Ms own people. It may be easier to some to go as a missionary to India or China than to speak the Lord’s message to their own relations, or the members of their own church; but perhaps He is saying to them as He said to Ezekiel: “Thou art not sent to many people of a hard language, whose words thou canst not understand … go, get thee unto the children of thy people, and speak to them” (3:5, 11). Ezekiel had to give the Lord’s message to very difficult people: to the prophets, the elders, the shepherds, the princes; to Jerusalem and the land of Israel; to the leading heathen nations; to inanimate objects—dry bones, wind, fowls, beasts, forests.

A Watchman. The Lord sent Ezekiel to he a watchman. He told him not to be afraid of the people, but to give them warning, and that if he did not do so He would require their blood at his hands (chaps. 3 and 33). These chapters set before us very plainly our personal responsibility in giving the Lord’s message and warning men of sin. Paul was so faithful in doing this that he was able to say, “I am pure from the blood of all men” (Acts 20:26).

A Sign. The Lord sent Ezekiel to be a sign. “Ezekiel is unto you a sign” (24:24, 4:3, 12:11). The portrayal of the imaginary siege of Jerusalem was no doubt exactly calculated to make the men of those times think; for God fits His signs to the times. In the British Museum part of a similar tile of the same date may be seen, with a plan of Babylon drawn upon it. To be God’s sign to the people, Ezekiel willingly sacrificed all his private interests. He was willing to lie in any position God told him; to smite with his hand or strike with his foot; to go forth into the plain, or shut himself up within his house; to sacrifice his personal appearance (5:1); to eat his food by weight, or move house at a day’s notice. The severest test of all was when God took away the desire of his eyes and commanded him not to weep. He who wept by the grave of Lazarus understands the sorrow of our human hearts, and does not rebuke us for it. But He needed Ezekiel as a sign, and so He commanded him not to weep for his own private grief, but to weep bitterly for the sins of his people (24:15, 16, 21:6, 7).

The Lord will not ask the same extraordinary things of us that He asked of Ezekiel, but the line of following Him who was despised and rejected of men is certain to lie across the will of nature, right athwart the course of this world. Does the Lord find in us those who are absolutely pliant in His hands, as Ezekiel was? He is seeking such. “I sought for a man to stand in the gap before Me for the land, that I should not destroy it; but I found none” (chaps. 22:30, 13:5).

The Glory of the Lord. The Key-note of the book of Ezekiel is The Glory of the Lord, that is, His manifested presence. It occurs twelve times in the first eleven chapters. Then there is a great gap, and we do not meet with it again till the forty-third chapter. The glory of the Lord was grieved away from the Temple at Jerusalem by the idolatry of the people, and not till the city had been overturned to the uttermost could the glory come back and take up its abode in the new Temple. The message was, “Ye have defiled My sanctuary”; therefore “I will make thee waste.” Through several chapters the prophet is commanded to declare the judgments that were coming on the land on account of the “detestable things” and “the abominations” which the people had introduced into the sanctuary. In the eighth chapter Ezekiel is spiritually transported from the land of the Chaldeans to Jerusalem, and in a vision sees the four kinds of grievous idolatries which were practised in the courts of the Lord’s house, even to the worshipping of the sun with their faces to the east and their backs to the sanctuary.

We see the glory of the Lord gradually removing. Grieved away from the inner sanctuary by the sin of idolatry, the brightness fills the court. Then it departed from the threshold and rested over the cherubim, those beings who perfectly fulfilled God’s will and responded to His power. As the cherubim mounted from the earth, the glory of the Lord abode above their free pinions and mounted with them, forsaking the city and removing to the mountains. In the same way it is possible for a Christian so to provoke, resist, grieve, straiten, limit, vex, quench the Holy Spirit, that the heart may become like a ruined temple bereft of the glory.

There is many a blighted life from which the early glow has departed through simple disobedience—refusing to give the Lord’s message, it may be. “God can do so much with a spark, and it is dreadful when He cannot get a conductor for it” (Bramwell Booth). We grieve the Holy Spirit when we do not allow ourselves time for communion with God; we limit Him by doubting His power to cleanse and keep and fill. We provoke and resist Him by the idols in our hearts. We vex the Holy Spirit by our rebellion, by not really saying in very truth “Thy will be done.” And if rebellion is persisted in, the Holy Spirit may be quenched.

The spirit of worldliness is one of the chief idols that is grieving the Holy Spirit away from His temple. It is sapping the very life of the Church today. How much of the worldly spirit of utter selfishness there is in the business life, in the undue estimation of wealth and position, in love of display, and in friendships made with the people of the world, forgetting that “whosoever will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.” Christians conform to the world’s ways, and read the world’s books, and dress in the world’s fashions, instead of being a people separated unto the Lord. The real cure for this worldliness is such a vision of Christ Jesus as shall make the earthly lights pale before the splendour of it. If our hearts are satisfied with Him, the world will have no hold upon us. He said: “The Prince of this world cometh and hath nothing in Me.” Are we able to say: “The world knoweth us not, because it knew Him not”?

Shepherds. Chapter 34 contains a warning to the false shepherds who feed themselves and feed not the flock. It closes with a most beautiful prophecy of Christ as the Good Shepherd, which our Lord evidently applies to Himself in the tenth chapter of John. His promise of searching out His sheep, and bringing them back to their own land, is primarily for the Jews; but Jesus Himself spoke of His “other sheep,” which are not of the Jewish fold, which should also hear His voice, and that all should ultimately be gathered in one fold with one Shepherd.

A Clean Heart. Chapter 36 is also first for Israel, and points forward to the time of the restoration of God’s chosen people, when they shall be gathered out of all the countries and brought into their own land, and there cleansed from all their iniquities, and become God’s witnesses among the nations.

But it contains also a glorious picture of the Gospel and of Christ’s power to cleanse and save to the uttermost. Verses 16-28 show the deep and universal defilement of sin and God’s judgment of it. They show that there is nothing in us as sinners to commend us to God; that the salvation which is in Christ Jesus is all of His free grace and for the honour of His Holy Name, which we have profaned by our iniquities. The cleansing from all sin is promised, and with it the corresponding promise of the new heart; that He will take away our stony heart, and give us a heart of flesh, and put His Spirit within us to enable us to walk so as to please Him.

Dry Bones. Chapter 37 again refers primarily to the Jews. “Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel.” It is again a promise of salvation and restoration to God’s chosen people. But it contains a beautiful Gospel picture of God’s power to raise those who are dead in trespasses and sins. It corresponds with His words to Nicodemus about the necessity of the new birth, and the mighty action of the Holy Spirit, coming unseen as the wind, to quicken the dead. The chapter closes with the renewed promise of the future David to be the Shepherd-King of God’s people.

Judgment. Chapters 38 and 39 contain an account of the judgment that the Lord will bring upon His people through the instrumentality of Gog and his northern army. This is thought to be the final terrible trial of the chosen people, known as the time of Jacob’s trouble. In chapter 21 the Lord says He will send a sword against Jerusalem, and “I will overturn, overturn, overturn it: and it shall be no more, until He come whose right it is; and I will give it Him.” In chapter 22, after speaking of Israel’s dispersion, He says He will gather them together into the midst of Jerusalem as they gather metal into the midst of a furnace to melt it, so will He gather His people and melt them in the fire of His wrath. These terrible final judgments will be blessed to the conversion of the Jewish people and their restoration to the Divine favour.

The Temple. The last nine chapters contain Ezekiel’s vision of the New Temple. This vision has never yet been fulfilled. The Temple built by Zerubbabel, and that by Herod, fell far short of the size of the New Temple of which Ezekiel was given the plan by the angel. “Just what the meaning of this vision is, it is by no means easy to determine… . The new distribution of the land according to the twelve tribes and the prince and his portion, and the suburbs; the new city and the immense Temple area,—all combine to point to a future re-establishment of Israel and to the millennial glory. It has never yet had its appropriate fulfilment. To spiritualise it, as some do, exhausting all its splendours and hopes in the Christian dispensation, is to mistake its meaning and dwarf its magnificent proportions. For unmistakably the vision has to do with Israel in the last and glorious days when all Cod hath promised for that people shall have its accomplishment.”⁵⁹

When the Temple was complete, Ezekiel saw the glory of the Lord returning by the way of the east gate—the direction in which it had left the city—and filling the house of the Lord. If we have grieved the Spirit of the Lord away from our hearts, we must expect His return by the way that He went. That is to say, we must come back to the very point where we failed, and confess that particular sin to the Lord, and obey Him on that point, before we can expect Him to return, “The Holy Ghost, whom God hath given to them that obey Him.” In this chapter we read of the glory definitely coming back, and taking up its abode in the Temple, and continuing to fill it. This is what God expects shall be the normal condition of every Christian. “Be filled with the Spirit” (Eph. 5:18).

The RIVER. If we are filled with the Spirit there must be an overflow to others; and this brings us to the vision of the river (chap. 47). Whatever is the future application of this chapter to Israel, its spiritual application to us today is clear. The Lord wants to make His rivers of blessing flow out through every saved soul (John 7:37-39). Are we, as workers for Christ, “ministering the Spirit” to others?

The rivers issued out from the sanctuary. It is only from the presence of the Lord that we can go forth to bless others. It was from the south side of the altar—pointing again to the place of sacrifice as the source of blessing. “A pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb”; “A Lamb as it had been slain.” The river rose to the ankles, to the knees, to the loins, for the Lord means His power in us to increase till it becomes “waters to swim in, a river that I could not pass over”—self lost in the fulness of the Spirit. Wherever the river came the fish lived, the banks grew green, clothed with trees, bearing fruit for meat and leaves for medicine. God wants to use us wherever we go to bring life to dead souls, and blessing and healing to all around us. The only places that were not healed were the marshes. They were given up to salt. A marsh is something that is always taking in and never giving out. Unless we are giving out, in some way, to others, we shall become stagnant and useless.

“Rivers of living water.” This is God’s purpose for us. Do not let us reason from our old past experience of failure, nor from the parched condition of the Church around us. God says He will do a new thing: “Behold, I will do a new thing: now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert—viz. in the most unlikely places—to give drink to My people, My chosen.”

Life. Throughout the Book of Ezekiel we see Christ as the Giver of Life. The cherubim, in the vision of the first chapter, were illustrations of the abundant life of His redeemed. The Man clothed in linen, who is thought by many to be the Angel of the Covenant, our Great High Priest, set the mark of life upon God’s faithful ones, that their lives should be spared in the destruction of the city (chap. 9:2). His first word to the out-cast babe—which represented Israel, and became “perfect through His comeliness,” which He had put upon it—was Live (chap. 16:6). His word through the watchman was: “I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked … turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die, O house of Israel?” (33:11). His care as a Shepherd is over the life of His sheep (34). He answered His own question, “Can these dry bones live?” with the words, “Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live” (37:3, 5). Finally, as we have seen, His promise was, “Everything shall live whither the river cometh.”

“Son of Man.” Throughout the book God addresses Ezekiel as the “Son of man.” It is part of His wondrous grace that He has chosen man to be His messenger to his fellow-men, instead of choosing angels. The greatest exhibition of this grace is the fact that the Son of God became the Son of Man to fit Him to be God’s messenger to us. “For verily He took not on Him the nature of angels; but He took on Him the seed of Abraham”; in all things made like unto His brethren, that He might be able to succour and to save us.

The book closes with the promise of God’s continual presence. “The name of the city from that day shall be Jehovah-shammah, The Lord is there.”

6. Daniel

The omnipotence of God is exhibited as much in His power to keep Daniel pure and true and faithful to Himself amidst all the corruptions of a heathen Court, as it is in the outward deliverances which He wrought for His servant as recorded in this book. Carried captive as a youth, Daniel found himself in this position of extreme difficulty through no choice of his own, and we may learn from this history that there is no position, however full of temptation, in which the Lord is not able to keep us from falling, if we have not placed ourselves there wilfully.

Daniel’s character is beautiful in its simplicity. It shows the same consistency throughout, attributing every power, every success, every deliverance to God. A chief statesman in the first empire of the world, a chief adviser of a great monarch, a great protector, doubtless, of his own people, he never introduces himself or his own actions, except as illustrations of God’s power. From the first picture we have of him, as a youth of royal descent, refusing to defile himself with the heathen king’s meat (no doubt as being connected with idol sacrifices), and carrying his companions with him by the power of his influence, to the aged statesman in the last days of the Captivity, we see the same undeviating faithfulness. Even his enemies confessed that they could find no fault in him, and no occasion to accuse him except they found it against him concerning the law of his God.

A Man greatly Beloved. Daniel was a man greatly beloved. We read that God had brought him into favour and tender love with the Court official Ashpenaz. The proud and despotic Nebuchadnezzar seems to have had a real affection for the man whom he honoured throughout his long reign. The regard Darius felt for him is undisguised. When he found what a trap he had fallen into, he “was sore displeased with himself, and set his heart on Daniel to deliver him.” We can well imagine that Daniel’s great age added poignancy to the king’s remorse at having to pass such a sentence upon him. Cyrus, no doubt, was greatly influenced by his aged statesman, who in all probability showed him the prophecy of Isaiah which led to his issuing the decree for the building of the Temple at Jerusalem.

But, best of all, Daniel was greatly beloved by his God. We are thrice told this. He was a man of prayer, as we see on various occasions. The interpretation of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream was given him in answer to the united prayer of himself and his companions, and he did not fail to acknowledge publicly that it was so. Later on, in spite of the decree of Darius, he quietly pursued his usual custom, and prayed to God with his windows open towards Jerusalem “as he did aforetime.” Again, believing Jeremiah’s prophecy as to the restoration of his people, he set himself to seek the Lord by prayer and fasting, and, in the memorable prayer of chapter 10, made a full confession of sin on behalf of his people. Again, in the third year of Cyrus, after three weeks of fasting and prayer (10:1, 2), another vision of the future is granted to him. In this account we are allowed a glimpse into one of the mysteries of delayed answers to prayer. How little we realise the unseen forces of darkness which are arrayed against us! The thought of this should lead us to pray more earnestly. We cannot understand the mystery of prayer; but we have God’s promise, and we know by experience that He does hear and answer prayer, and this is enough for us.

A Contrast of Power. The great object of the Book of Daniel is to bring out the power of God as contrasted with the great world-power. This thought is brought out in the two sections into which the Book of Daniel is divided. The first six chapters are mainly Narration, the last six mainly Revelation.

Chapter I. God’s power is shown, as we have already seen, in the character of Daniel and his three companions, and in the wisdom and understanding which God gave them above all the wise men of Babylon. All of them had before borne names commemorative of the true God. The change of names, though in two cases at least they were named after idols, did not change their hearts. They were trained in all the learning of Chaldea, as Moses had been trained in the learning of the greatest country of his time.

Chapter II. God’s power is shown in His revelation to Daniel of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream and the interpretation thereof, which the wise men of Babylon were unable to give.

Chapter III. It is shown again in His deliverance of the three companions of Daniel from the fiery furnace when they had refused to worship the golden image. It was no uncommon thing for sovereigns of vast empires to claim Divine honours; and it may have been with some idea of this kind that Nebuchadnezzar set up this huge golden image, probably representing himself, and sent for all the officials of his kingdom to come and worship it. History has no finer picture than that of these three young men standing alone against a nation with the calm faith that God would deliver them, yet adding, “but if not—be it known to thee, O King, that we will not worship the golden image.” According to His promise (Isa. 43:2), the Lord was with them in the fire, “and the form of the fourth was like the Son of God.” Here is our first sight of Christ in this book; and He is still with His own when they pass through the fire, and many a saint has proved since then, as they did, that the only effect of the fire is to burn the bonds. “Lo, I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they have no hurt.”

Chapter IV. Again we see God’s power in His dealings with Nebuchadnezzar. First He warned him in a dream of his coming madness, and revealed to Daniel the interpretation of it. Daniel’s respectful regard for his monarch comes out in his reluctance to tell him the interpretation: “He sat astonied for one hour, and his thoughts troubled him.” The king had to encourage him to speak, and then with what mingled tenderness and boldness he exhorted him to repentance. At the end of twelve months, as the proud monarch was boasting of his power on the roof of his magnificent palace, the stroke of God fell, and he was driven far from among men, and had his dwelling among the beasts of the field. There he repented, and God restored him according to His promise. This whole chapter is of special interest as being, not a record by Daniel, but a State Paper sent out by Nebuchadnezzar to his people.

Chapter V. God’s power is shown again in the awful handwriting on the wall, when Belshazzar’s sacrilege received God’s retribution. The prophet who had pleaded so deferentially with Nebuchadnezzar had only words of fearless condemnation for the foolish and sensual young king his grandson. A bad reign came to a sudden termination. “In that night was Belshazzar king of the Chaldeans slain”—we are not told how; “and Darius the Mede received the kingdom.” The Medo-Persian army took the city in all likelihood without fighting. Darius probably received the kingdom from Cyrus as his vicegerent over some portion of it. His identity is still to some extent a puzzle to historians, but so was Belshazzar’s until recently. “For history testifies that the last king of Babylon was Nabonidus; that he was absent from the capital when Cyrus entered it, and that he lived many years after the Persian conquest. The contradiction between history and Scripture was complete. But the since-deciphered inscriptions have disclosed that Belshazzar was eldest son and heir to Nabonidus, that he was regent in Babylon during his father’s absence, and that he was killed the night the Persian army entered the inner city” (Sir R. Anderson).

Chapter VI. Once more God’s power was shown in the deliverance of Daniel from the lion’s den, when the incorruptibility of his conduct had made enemies for the aged statesman, and they had successfully intrigued against him.

Manifestation of Power. The time of the captivity in Babylon was a special occasion for God to manifest His power. When His chosen people were captives in Egypt He wrought wonders for them by the hand of Moses, and snowed, both to them and to the great Egyptian nation, that He was Lord over all. So now once more when His people were in captivity He made bare His arm, and showed forth His mighty power, so that even these great world emperors were brought to confess that He is the Living God, the Most High, the King of Heaven, whose dominion is an everlasting dominion. In this very centre of Pagan world-power Jehovah visits His exiles by miracle and prophecy, to show His power and comfort them by glimpses of the future. “Fulfilled prophecy is miracle in the highest sphere, that of mind. It is the ever-growing proof of Divine prescience in the authors of sacred Scripture” (H. Grattan Guinness).

This revelation of the future became an added confirmation to God’s people as they saw it gradually fulfilled before their eyes. But how far more is it a confirmation to our faith, to us who can look back on the wide sweep of revelation already fulfilled in the world’s history. God makes a special appeal to fulfilled prophecy as the seal of the truth of His word (Jer. 28:9; 2 Peter 1:19-21).

Universal Dominion. The first revelation in this book occurs in the historic portion of it, in Nebuchadnezzar’s dream of the great image with its head of gold, its breast and arms of silver, its belly and thighs of brass, and its legs of iron, its feet and toes of iron and clay, brought to nothing by a stone cut out without hands which smote the image, and broke it to pieces; and the stone became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.

No human ingenuity could have hit upon the interpretation. The image symbolises the world-kingdoms in their historic succession, God makes known to Nebuchadnezzar “what shall come to pass hereafter,” in the glorious future Kingdom of Christ. He reveals first the Gentile dominion. Four great empires, and only four, were to succeed each other in the government of the world from the Chaldean to the end. The first was the Babylonian with Nebuchadnezzar at its head: “Thou art this head of gold.” The grant of Empire was made to him by God Himself (ver. 37, 38; Jer. 27:5-7).

The breast and the arms of silver denote the Medo-Persian Empire which overthrew the Chaldean, and became its successor in the government of the world. The brass, or rather copper, is the Grecian, which overturned the Persian; and the iron is the Roman, which succeeded the Greek. From the Book of Daniel itself we learn which are the world-kingdoms symbolised. Chapter 2:38 shows us that the head of gold is Babylon. In 8:20 we see that the Medo-Persian empire was to succeed the Chaldean; and 8:21 declares that Grecia follows Persia, while 9:26 plainly indicates that Rome is the fourth. After that the power is divided.

In the stone cut out without hands we see the Kingdom of Christ, whose kingdom shall never be destroyed; it shall break in pieces and destroy all these kingdoms and it shall stand for ever.

The Four Beasts. Chapter VII. In Daniel’s vision of the four beasts we have these four kingdoms under another symbol. In the great image of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream we have the magnificence of these kingdoms in man’s view. In Daniel’s vision we have the same in God’s view. He sees them as a set of devouring wild beasts. The first, or Babylonian, was like a lion with eagle’s wings. Jeremiah had likened Nebuchadnezzar both to the lion and eagle (49:19, 22). Persia was the cruel bear, the animal who delights to kill for the sake of killing, and to tear for the sake of tearing—a heavy beast, well portraying the ponderous Persian armies. The third is the leopard or panther, an animal insatiable above every other beast of prey, gifted with a swiftness which scarce any prey can escape, represented yet further with four wings. Here we see the rapid marches of Alexander’s army and his insatiable love of conquest. In thirteen brief years he had subdued the world.

The fourth beast was “dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly, and had great iron teeth.” This is the Roman Empire.

The Son or God. With the close of the vision of the four beasts we have a further revelation of Christ in Daniel. We see the throne of God, and the Ancient of Days sitting there in judgment, and the books opened. And there, on the right hand of God the Father, Daniel sees God the Son. “One like the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven,” and everlasting dominion and glory given to Him. We see in act what was said in words in David’s Psalm, which Jesus quoted as written of Himself, “The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit Thou on My right hand until I make Thine enemies Thy footstool.” When the High Priest said to our Lord, “I adjure Thee by the living God, that Thou tell me whether Thou be the Christ, the Son of God,” Jesus saith unto him, “Thou hast said: nevertheless, I say unto thee, Hereafter shall ye see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven.” Then the High Priest rent his clothes, saying, “He hath spoken blasphemy.” Our Lord applied these words of Daniel to Himself, and the High Priest immediately recognised in them His claim to deity.

Chapter VIII. Next we have a vision of the ram and the he-goat, the kingdom of Medo-Persia overthrown by the kingdom of Grecia. It contains the prophecy of the division of the latter kingdom, on the death of Alexander, between his four generals. Daniel had this vision at Shushan, the capital of Persia, where, seventy years later, the events recorded in the Book of Esther took place.

Seventy Weeks. Chapter IX. This chapter contains, as we have already seen, Daniel’s discovery from the prophecy of Jeremiah that the Captivity was nearing its close. This shows the great importance of the study of the Holy Scriptures; and the eleventh verse of this chapter contains a testimony both to the antiquity and to the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch. Daniel’s prayer was followed by the vision of the seventy weeks. The angel Gabriel tells Daniel that seventy weeks are determined or measured off, upon his people and the holy city; within which period of time God will perform His whole work, promised and predicted throughout all Scripture.

Seventy weeks. The word “week” is retained, because there is no English word which exactly expresses the idea of the original. It is seventy times seven years that is meant, 490 years in all. It was a form of reckoning familiar to the Jews from earliest times.

The seventy weeks are divided into three groups, viz. seven weeks, sixty-two weeks, one week. The seventy weeks began with the edict of Artaxerxes to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, in the Jewish month Nisan of the year 445 B.C. “The language of the prophecy is clear: ‘From the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto Messiah the Prince, shall be seven weeks and threescore and two weeks.’” Sir Robert Anderson, with the assistance of astronomical calculations supplied by the Astronomer-Royal, Sir G. B. Airy, has calculated that this interval (173,880 days, or seventy times sixty-nine prophetic years of 360 days) brings us to the very day of Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem, the climax of His ministry, when the prophecy of Zechariah was fulfilled, “Behold thy King cometh unto thee,” and the day of Zion’s irrevocable choice. The correct translation of our Lord’s words is: “If thou hadst known, even on this day, the things that belong unto thy peace, but now they are hid from thine eyes.” The prophecy continues: “And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for Himself.”

Then follows the prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem. In A.D. 70 the Roman eagles swooped down on the devoted city and destroyed both city and temple. But the prophecy points onward to a time yet to come. The last week is rent off from the other sixty-nine and stands by itself. There is a mighty break between the sixty-ninth and the seventieth in the series. The death of Christ broke the chain for the weeks; for that event sundered the relation then existing between God and the chosen people.

Verses 24-27 refer plainly to the manifestation of Jesus Christ to fulfil all righteousness and to make full atonement for the sins of His people (compare 1 John 3:8 and 2 Cor. 5:19).

“The Time or the End.” The last three chapters of Daniel contain one vision. Chapter 10 reveals the influence of supernatural beings in the affairs of earth. Chapters 11 and 12 point on to the “Time of the end,” and the appearance of anti-Christ. Daniel, Paul, John (2 Thess. 2; Rev. 19), prophesy of the mighty scenes and events of this time, the Day of the Lord. They severally declare that the great adversary will be destroyed by the coming of Jesus Christ Himself. Our Lord’s own testimony is identical with theirs (Matt. 24 and 25; Mark 13 and Luke 21). Our Lord quotes the words of Daniel about the daily sacrifice being taken away, and the abomination that maketh desolate being set up.

Resurrection. Chapter 12:1, 2 predicts a time of unparalleled trouble. Our Lord speaks of the same (Matt. 24:21). It is the great tribulation. Here the resurrection of the dead is more plainly foretold than anywhere else in the Old Testament: “Many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.” The future joy of those that turn many to righteousness is revealed.

The vision closes with a word of personal comfort to the faithful prophet: “Go thy way till the end be: for thou shalt rest, and stand in thy lot at the end of the days.”

Authenticity. A book which contains such exact predictions is one which is likely to be assailed. “The Book of Daniel is especially fitted to be a battle-field between faith and unbelief. It admits of no half measures. It is either Divine or an imposture.” With these words Dr. Pusey begins his most valuable volume on Daniel. He shows that to write any book under the name of another, and to give it out as his, is in any case a forgery. But in this case, if the writer were not Daniel, the book would be one continued lie in the name of God; for, as we have seen, the book ascribes everything to God.

The proofs of the authenticity of the book can barely be touched upon here.⁶⁰

1. Witness of Daniel. The book claims Daniel for its author (8:1, 2, etc. etc.)

2. Witness of Ezekiel. Ezekiel testified both to the existence and character of Daniel (14:14, 20, 28:3).

3. Witness of the Monuments. The records of the monuments testify with ever-increasing clearness, as more of them are deciphered, to the absolute accuracy of the details of Daniel’s description. The local colouring is true to life, such as could not have been invented by a forger in Palestine of later date

The inscriptions show that there was a school in connection with the palace of Babylon, where youths, including captive princes, were trained in the learning of Chaldea, which embraced a wide circle of subjects.

The monuments vouch, either directly or indirectly, for each one of the classes into which Daniel divides the wise men of Babylon; also for the articles of dress worn by his companions: they are such as would have been worn by nobles on a great festive occasion.

Casting into a fiery furnace and into a den of lions were punishments well known in Babylon.

On the plains of Dura there stands today a rectilinear mound, about twenty feet high, an exact square of about forty-six feet at the base, resembling the pedestal of a colossal statue. Everything leads to the belief that Nebuchadnezzar’s golden image was set up in this place.

Nebuchadnezzar’s proud and imperious personality has been stamped upon our imaginations from childhood. The monuments bear abundant testimony to the same. “To astonish mankind, I reconstructed and renewed the wonder of Borsippa, the temple of the seven spheres of the world.” The Arabs still use the ruins of Babylon as a large quarry, and carry off its bricks. Nine out of every ten of these bricks is stamped with the name of Nebuchadnezzar, a silent answer to the truth of his question, “Is not this great Babylon which I have built?”

4. Witness of Language. Another proof of the date of this book is the languages in which it is written. From chapter 2:4 to the end of chapter vii. it is in Aramaic or Syriac, the common language of the Gentile nations, the language of commerce and diplomacy over the then known world. The rest is in Hebrew. The part written in Aramaic relates to the Gentile supremacy over Israel. The use of this language signifies that God had for a time set aside the Jew. During the Captivity, just at the time that Daniel wrote, both languages, the Aramaic and the Hebrew, were understood by the Jewish people, and they would be able to follow the whole book. The Jews did not understand Aramaic in the reign of Hezekiah (2 Kings 18:26), and they had ceased, as a nation, to understand Hebrew by the time of Ezra, for when he read to them the Law, he had to give the sense or translate as he went. If the book had been written, as is alleged, during the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, or immediately before it, in order to console the Jews under their persecutions, is it likely that the writer would have wrapped up his words of comfort in a language .they could not understand?

The presence of certain Greek words in the Book of Daniel is supposed to point to the book having been written after the conquests of Alexander. Most of these supposed Greek words have been found to be really Aramaic, their actual number has been reduced to two, and these are the names of two musical instruments. Modern discovery has revealed the widespread interchange of thought and commerce between the most ancient nations of the earth. A busy commercial intercourse existed between Greece and Babylonia, about a century before the time of Daniel. The harp with seven strings was invented by Terpander, a Greek poet and musician in the year 650 B.C. This seven-stringed harp was introduced into Babylon within twenty-five years of that date, for we find it sculptured then on the monuments. This kitharis is one of the two remaining Greek words in Daniel!

Witness of Christ. There remains yet one more proof which can hardly be put alongside the foregoing, as it transcends them all. It is the testimony of our Lord Himself. He quoted from this book as recorded in Matthew 24:14, 15, 30; Luke 21:24; and again in Matthew 26:63, 64, when, as we have seen, He applied the prophecy of Daniel about the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven as a proof of His Messiahship and His deity. He speaks expressly of the “Prophet Daniel” by name, with the words added, “whoso readeth, let him understand.” It is a remarkable fact that our Lord thus commends to our study this Book of Daniel, and also the Book of Revelation, both full of unfulfilled prophecy, both difficult to understand; and the Book of Revelation, which is the most difficult of all, opens with a blessing on him that readeth, and those that hear and keep this word of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and it closes with a solemn warning to those who shall either add or take away from the words of the prophecy of this book (Rev. 1:1-3, 22:16, 18, 19).

7. The Minor Prophets

These twelve were classed by the Jews as one book. That period which they cover, within which the major prophets also fall, extends from about 870-440 B.C. For the sake of better understanding their teaching, they may be grouped round the four greater prophets.

1. Isaiah is illustrated by Hosea, Amos, and Micah.

2. Jeremiah is illustrated by Obadiah, Habakkuk, and

3. Zephaniah.

4. Ezekiel is illustrated by Joel, Jonah, Nahum.

5. Daniel is illustrated by Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi.

The connection of time with the first group is obvious. Obadiah is connected with Jeremiah by his prophecies against Edom. Habakkuk and Zephaniah are closely connected with the same prophet. The last three of the twelve, with Daniel, lived to see the return after the Captivity. Joel, Jonah, and Nahum contain prophecies concerning the Gentiles which may be taken as linking them with Ezekiel, who prophesied in a Gentile land during the Captivity.⁶¹

“The prophecies contained in these twelve books present one complete view. The kingdom of David is seen as rent asunder, and its riven portions end in apparent ruin. But a believing remnant always survives the wreck, and a restoration will come when David’s Son will rebuild the ruined nation and re-establish the throne. There is a constant look forward, past Macedonian conquests and Maccabean successes, the apostasy of the Jews and the destruction of Jerusalem, beyond even the dispersion of the elect nation, to the final conversion and ultimate restoration of God’s chosen people. The Old Testament outline of Messiah and His Kingdom, which at earlier periods of prophecy was like a ‘drawing without colour,’ now reaches completeness, and every prophetic book adds at least another touch or tint to the grand picture… Once let the reader of prophecy get clear conceptions of this fact, that Christ is its personal centre and Israel its national centre, and that round about these centres all else clusters, and that in them all else converges, and, ‘whether he walks or runs, he will see all things clearly,’ for the vision is written in large letters as upon tablets by the wayside.”⁶²

8. Hosea

The prophet Hosea was a contemporary of Isaiah and continued to prophesy for sixty-five or seventy years. He was God’s messenger to the northern kingdom of Israel and only mentions Judah incidentally. He addresses Israel sometimes as Samaria and Jacob and Ephraim—the last because that tribe was the largest of the ten and the leader in rebellion. The book abounds in expressive metaphors. Ephraim is “a cake not turned,” “a silly dove without a heart”; her king is “cut off as foam upon the water.” Hosea began to prophesy during the reign of Jeroboam II, king of Israel, one of the most powerful of her kings, and during the reign of his successors, whom the prophet does not even name because they were not of the Lord’s choosing (8:4). There was not one of them found who would risk his throne for God. This was a striking illustration of the Law in Deuteronomy 17:15, “Thou shalt in any wise set him king over thee, whom the Lord thy God shall choose.” That Israel possessed the written Law in the days of Hosea is shown from various passages, notably 8:12.

“Wickedness of the Land. The moral state of Israel was as bad as it could possibly be. The idolatry inaugurated by Jeroboam I., the son of Nebat, had continued for upwards of two hundred years, and had diffused every form of vice among the people. “The Lord hath a controversy with the land,” said Hosea, “because there is no truth, nor mercy, nor knowledge of God in the land. By swearing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery, they break out” (4:1, 2). Drunkenness and shameful idol festivals were spread over the land. The idolatrous priests even waylaid and murdered the wayfarers.

Judgment and Mercy. Hosea was sent both to denounce the sins of the people and to proclaim to them the compassionate love of God, and His willingness to have mercy upon them if they would but return to Him. He himself was made a sign to the people. His longsuffering love for a wife who proved faithless to him, and whom he bought back from a life of shame, was a picture of God’s love to His rebellious people, who had broken their covenant with Him and had given themselves up to the worship of idols.

God first pronounces His judgment upon His people. He will be to them as a moth and rottenness, as a young lion, as a leopard, as a bear robbed of her whelps. He says He has hewed them by the prophets and slain them by the words of His mouth. He foretells the awful destruction of Samaria, the sword that shall slay them, and the fire that shall destroy them. But along with judgment He makes known His mercy, His earnest desire for their repentance. “I will go and return to My place, till they acknowledge their offence, and seek My face: in their affliction they will seek Me early” (Hosea, 5:15). Nothing can exceed the earnestness and love with which the Lord entreats Ephraim to return to Him. “How shall I give thee up Ephraim?” Four times over this “How” is repeated. “O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in Me is thy help.” “O Israel, return unto the Lord thy God; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity. Take with you words, and return to the Lord: say unto Him, Take away all iniquity, and receive us graciously. … I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely.” And then follows His gracious promise of restoration, that He will be as the “summer night-mist” to Israel, and it shall grow with the beauty of the lily, with the strength of the cedars of Lebanon, with the fragrance of the undergrowth of those mountains, and with the fruitfulness of the olive, and the corn, and the vine, and the perennial greenness of the fir-tree.

The Messiah. Messianic allusions in this book are clear and beautiful. Both Peter and Paul show us that the prophecy of 1:10 has been fulfilled in Christ (1 Pet. 2:10; Rom. 11:25, 26).

In 3:4 the present state of Israel is described. “Without a king, without a prince, without a sacrifice, without an ephod”—the sign of the priest—because they have rejected their King, their true Priest after the order of Melchizedek, and are still rejecting the sacrifice He offered. And, on the other hand, they are “without an image, and without teraphim,” for they are free from idolatry. The next verse describes their glorious future, when they shall return and seek the Lord their God, and David their King—the Lord Jesus Christ.

Resurrection of Christ. Chapter 6:2: “After two days He will revive us: in the third day He will raise us up, and we shall live in His sight.” The resurrection of Christ, and our resurrection in Him, could not be more plainly foretold. The prophet expressly mentions two days, after which life should be given, and a third day, on which the resurrection should take place. Verse 3: “His going forth is prepared as the morning; and He shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth.” He who should so go forth is the same as He who was to revive them and raise them up—even Christ, who as “the Day-spring from on high hath visited us,” coming forth from the grave on the resurrection morning, and of whom it was foretold that He should “come down like showers upon the mown grass.”

“Out of Egypt.” 11:1. “I called My Son out of Egypt.” This had a primary fulfilment in Israel as a type of Christ. Its real fulfilment, as we are told by Matthew (2:15), was in Christ, the Only-begotten Son of God.

One Saviour, 11:4. “I drew them with cords of a Man, with bands of love.” Christ drew us with cords of a man when for us He became man and died for us. “I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto Me.”

13:4. “There is no Saviour beside Me.” “Thou shalt call His name Jesus (Saviour); for He shall save His people from their sins.” “Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved.”

13:14. “I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death.” “The word rendered ransom, signifies rescued them by the payment of a price; the word rendered redeem, relates to one who, as the nearest of kin, had the right to acquire anything as his own, by paying the price. Both words in their most exact sense describe what Jesus did for us” (Dr. Pusey).

“O death, I will be thy plagues; O grave, I will be thy destruction,” is a burst of triumph at the promised redemption, when Christ being risen from the dead became the first-fruits of them that slept.

9. Joel

Joel was the first to prophesy the outpouring of the Spirit upon all flesh. His prophecy seems to have been delivered all at one time—not like that of Hosea, spread over a period of many years—and its scope extends from his own day to the end of time.

He was probably the earliest of the prophetic writers, but he tells us nothing about himself beyond the few words necessary to authenticate his book and give it its Divine authority. “The word of the Lord that came to Joel the son of Pethuel” (1:1).

Locusts. He was prophet to Judah, and, using God’s present judgment of a plague of locusts, with urgency he calls his people to repentance in order to avert the still severer judgment upon their sins by means of hostile armies, of which the army of locusts was a type.

In graphic language he describes the plague, calling first on the old men to confirm its unparalleled severity. The drunkards feel the effects of it, for the vines have perished. The priests have no meat offering of corn, nor drink offering of wine to offer. The husbandmen and vine-dressers are ashamed. The cry of the cattle and sheep goes up to God. Joel urges the people to call a fast, and then, in the beginning of the second chapter, he continues his description of the plague.

Before the army of locusts the land is as the Garden of Eden—behind them it is a desolate wilderness (2:3). An army of locusts is incredible to those who have not watched it. They fill the air, and darken the sun like an eclipse (ii. 2), and spread for miles over the land. The advance columns will attack all that is green and succulent; in half an hour every leaf and blade is destroyed (1:11, 12). Others coming on in succession will strip the bark from the trees (1:6, 7). A land so devastated takes years to recover (1:17-20). The noise of their wings can be heard for miles, and the noise of their browsing is like a fire (2:5), and the land over which they have passed has the appearance of being fire-swept (2:3). Having stripped the country, they scale the walls of the cities, in serried ranks like mailed horsemen and chariots, and marching into the houses consume everything which can be consumed in their resistless onslaught (2:4, 7-9).

“The Day of the Lord.” “Blow the trumpet in Zion … for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand. Sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly; gather the people” (2:1, 15-17). Joel urges all classes of the people to repent, from the priests—the ministers of the Lord—and the elders, to the bride and bridegroom, and the children, even the little ones. “The day of the Lord” always signifies judgment; the expression occurs five times in this short book, and is its Keynote. It refers, doubtless, to a series of judgments—the present locusts, the coming armies of invasion which were about to come as a scourge of God upon the land, and the final Day of the Lord described in the third chapter.

Joel calls on the Lord to spare His people, and, like Moses, urges the plea that the heathen would question “Where is their God?” (2:17). His call to repentance is enforced by promises. The pity of the Lord, His readiness to bless if the conditions are fulfilled, the removal of the scourge, the plentiful rain and abundant crops, and the outpouring of the Spirit.

Promise of the Spirit. This brings us to the great central promise of the book. Other prophets have foretold details of our Lord’s life on earth and of His future reign; to Joel was committed the privilege of telling that He would pour out His Spirit upon all flesh, alike on Jew and Gentile, bond and free, male and female; for all should be one in Christ Jesus. He tells us that the blessing shall flow forth from Jerusalem (2:32, 3:18). This prophecy, we are distinctly told, was fulfilled on the day of Pentecost; for Peter said, “This is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel.” And again: “This Jesus hath God raised up, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, He hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear” (Acts 2:16, 32, 33). It no doubt has a further fulfilment yet to come after the great Day of the Lord, which is described in the third chapter, when unquestionably the prophet looks forward to a final day when the Lord shall come in judgment. Christ speaks of this day in the same figure of a great harvest (3:13; Matt. 13:36-43), and we find the figure of the wine-press again in the Book of Revelation (3:13; Rev. 14:18-20).

A Lesson for Today. The whole book contains a beautiful spiritual lesson for today. First, the desolated condition of the Church of Christ. It is laid waste by many spiritual foes, well described in chapter 1:4. There is famine and drought on all sides. The call goes forth afresh today to the Church of God to come down into the very dust before the Lord in true repentance of heart. This repentance should begin with the leaders, the ministers, the elders, the vine-dressers. But it may be the work will begin with the little ones, as it has been so often in times of revival. If only there is this turning of heart to the Lord we may count on the fulfilment of His promise of the abundant outpouring of His Spirit, and that He will restore the years that the canker-worm hath eaten.

Although the third chapter is one of judgment we may take it also in a spiritual sense, and see the Church, prepared by the fulness of the Spirit, ready to fight the battle of the Lord against the hosts of darkness, ready for a great ingathering of souls, and multitudes, multitudes shall be brought into the valley of decision.

10. Amos

The “man of God from Judah” was sent to Bethel in the northern kingdom to rebuke Jeroboam I. as he was sacrificing to the golden calves. Another man of God from Judah was sent to prophesy at Bethel, during the reign of Jeroboam II., in the person of the herdsman, or shepherd, Amos. Amos is one of the many instances in the Bible of the Lord calling a man to some special service while occupied with his ordinary daily work.

On the wild uplands of Judah beyond Tekoa, which is twelve miles south of Jerusalem, Amos, inured to hardship and danger, received his training as a prophet straight from the hand of the Lord. His beautiful style abounds in illustrations drawn from his mountain home. He had learnt the power of the Creator in the mountains and the wind, in the dawn and in the darkness. Like David he had gazed upon the stars and looked beyond them to their Maker. Like him also, as he had “followed the flock” (7:15), he had known what it was to defend them from the wild beasts, both the lion and the bear, and is probably describing his own experience when he speaks of a shepherd taking out of the mouth of the lion “two legs or a piece of an ear.”⁶³ The snare of the fowler and the snake concealed in the rough stone wall were alike familiar to him. He was also a “gatherer,” or “dresser,” of sycamore fruit. This fruit, which is a very inferior sort of fig, only eaten by the very poor, has to be scarified at one stage of its growth with a special instrument for the purpose, in order to enable it to swell and ripen properly. Many of the figures which Amos uses are taken from the milder lowlands; these also may have been familiar to him in his earlier life, or, as a keen observer of nature, may have struck him as he prophesied in the plains of Samaria. He speaks of the oaks and the cedars, the vines and fig-trees and olive-trees, the gardens, the ploughmen, the sower, the reaper, and the cart pressed down with its weight of sheaves.

The Earthquake. Amos opens his prophecy by quoting the words of Joel, “The Lord will roar from Zion, and utter His voice from Jerusalem.” He tells us in the verse before, that his prophecy was uttered “two years before the earthquake.” Joel also says, “The heavens and the earth shall shake.” They no doubt refer to the same earthquake, and it must have been one of exceptional severity; for Zechariah speaks of it nearly three hundred years later, as an event well remembered, though the whole captivity in Babylon had intervened (Zech. 14:5). The Hebrew word Ba’ash suggests the English word Crash, “two years before the crash.” Dr. Waller, in his little book on Amos, shows how perfectly the prophet’s description of the coming catastrophe fitted the event, though probably at the time he prophesied he did not realise that it was an earthquake he was describing. Twice over (8:8, 9:5, R. V.) we read that “The land is to rise up wholly like a flood, and sink again as the flood of Egypt.” This is a most terrible form of earthquake. “If the widespread effect of the earthquake in Amos is indicated literally by the clause seven times repeated in chapters one and two, ‘I will send fire which shall devour the palaces,’ then the shock must have extended from Tyrus to Gaza on the coast of the Mediterranean and from Damascus to Rabbah of the children of Ammon on the east of Jordan. The whole of the bed of the Jordan is said to be volcanic—which means that the underground forces are there, and available if the Lord of creation should choose to set them at work.”⁶⁴ Eires almost invariably follow severe earthquakes.

Reading Amos in the light of the earthquake we can account for various things he foretells. The fires throughout the book. “The waters of the sea poured upon the face of the earth” (5:8). “If there remain ten men in one house they shall die” (6:9). “He will smite the great house with breaches, and the little house with clefts” (6:11). “Shall not the land tremble?” (8:8). “Smite the lintel of the door, that the posts may shake” (9:1). “He toucheth the land and it shall melt” (9:5).

But behind the primary fulfilment of his words in the earthquake there was the terrible invasion of the Assyrians, and the people carried into captivity (5:27, 6:14). And behind all this “the day of the Lord.” “Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel” (4:12).

Judgment on the Nations. Amos opens the way for his message to Israel by proclaiming the Lord’s judgment upon six surrounding nations—Damascus (Syria), Gaza (Philistia), Tyrus (Phoenicia), Edom, Ammon, Moab. Then he comes nearer home and pronounces judgment against Judah (2:4), and against Israel itself (2:6), and finally against the whole nation (3:1, 2).

It would seem that the people questioned his authority, for he proceeds by a series of seven questions to show that the Lord has revealed His secret to him, and that therefore he can do no other than prophesy (3:3-8).

He denounces the sins of Israel in more graphic detail than Hosea, dwelling especially on the careless ease and luxury, the oppression of the poor, the extortion and lying and cheating which prevailed, and the utter hypocrisy in worship. The Lord grieves over the people for not attending to His judgments, with the refrain, “Yet have ye not returned unto Me, saith the Lord,” and the renewed invitation, “Seek ye Me and live.”

Five Visions. The last three chapters contain a fivefold vision of judgment which the Lord showed Amos. First the locusts, and second the fire, which judgments are removed in answer to his intercession. Third the plumb-line. There was no hope of deliverance from this last. The Lord said, “I will not again pass by them any more.” This unqualified pronouncement of judgment stirred up the smouldering animosity of Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, to a flame, and he denounced the prophet to the king, saying, “The land is not able to bear his words,” so mightily had they shaken the nation. At the same time he urged Amos to flee away back to the land of Judah and prophesy there—but not here at the Court of the king. Amos fearlessly told of the Lord’s call, “I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but the Lord took me as I followed the flock, and said, Go, prophesy unto My people Israel.” He then pronounced the Lord’s judgment upon Amaziah, and proceeded with the account of the remaining visions regardless of the interruption. The fourth vision was of the basket of summer fruit, the last basket. “The end has come upon My people.” The prophet saw the guilty nation ripe for judgment. The fifth vision is of the Lord Himself, standing upon the altar, and closes with the glorious promise of restoration for the fallen Tabernacle of the House of David, the promise of the Messiah who was to come at the moment of its greatest humiliation. This passage is quoted in Acts (15:15-17) by James, and applied to the ingathering of the Gentile believers, and God’s favour at the same time to the House of David, when His purpose for Jew and Gentile alike will be accomplished.

11. Obadiah

Between the Gulf of Akaba and the Dead Sea lies a range of precipitous red sandstone heights, known as Mount Seir.

Here Esau settled after he had despised his birthright, and his descendants, having driven out the Horites (Gen. 14:6), occupied the whole of the mountain (Deut. 2:12). The capital city Selah, or Petra, “Rock,” was a city unique of its kind amid the works of man. Perched like an eagle’s nest (ver. 4) amid inaccessible mountain fastnesses, the dwellings were mostly caves, hewn out of the soft rock (ver. 3, 6), and placed where you could scarce imagine a human foot could climb.

Judgment or Edom. Against this people the prophecy of the unknown prophet Obadiah, “a worshipper of Jehovah,” was directed.

To Israel God had commanded (Deut. 23:7), “Thou shalt not abhor an Edomite; for he is thy brother.” But Edom had shown an implacable hatred to Israel from the time that he refused him a passage through his country on the way from Egypt to Canaan (Num. 20:14-21) to the day of the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans, when Edom malignantly cried “Rase it, rase it” (Ps. 137:7).

For his pride and cruel hatred the total destruction of Edom was decreed (ver. 3, 4, 10). The people were driven from their rocky home five years after the destruction of Jerusalem, when Nebuchadnezzar, passing down the valley of Arabah, which formed the military road to Egypt, crushed the Edomites. They lost their existence as a nation about a century and a half B.C., and their name perished at the capture of Jerusalem by the Romans. “As thou hast done, it shall be done unto thee.”

Deliverance for Israel. The book closes with the promise of deliverance for Zion: “And the House of Jacob shall possess their possessions.” “The first step in the future successes of the Jews is the recovery of what was previously their own” (Speaker’s Commentary).

Obadiah predicts the coming of the Day of the Lord and the establishment of Messiah’s kingdom.

12. Jonah

Carved in rude outline on the walls of the catacombs of Rome, there is no more favourite representation than that of Jonah as a type of the resurrection.

“On the horizon of the Old Testament there has always blazed this sign of the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus—the sign of the prophet Jonah.” Our Lord declared that no sign should be given to the men of His generation, save the sign of the prophet Jonas (Matt. 12:39). And since then “age after age the Jew has been confronted with that sign. He killed the Messiah, and out of the grave of the Crucified has arisen a power which has changed the lives of myriads all down the ages. Our Lord gave a promise, the rising from the dead, and He has kept it. He has proved His claim to be the Son of God and the world’s Saviour.”⁶⁵ “Declared to be the Son of God with power, by the resurrection from the dead” (Rom. 1:4).

The Prophet. Jonah was the son of Amittai, the prophet, a native of Gath-hepher, a Galilean village, a little to the north of Nazareth, the home of his great Anti-type. Jewish tradition says that he was the son of the widow of Zarephath, whom Elijah restored to life. But though we have no sufficient ground for this tradition, Jonah was the successor of Elijah and Elisha, and was probably acquainted with them both, and was the link between them and Hosea, Amos, and Isaiah. It is likely that he was trained in the schools of the prophets, and that he exercised his ministry during the reign of Jeroboam II., and perhaps before it.

His name signifies “the dove,” and his first prophetic utterance was one in keeping with his name. It was a message of comfort to Israel, that the Lord had seen the affliction of His people, and that He would save them by the hand of Jeroboam, the son of Joash, and restore to them the border lands which they had lost through the invasion of the Syrians. We are told this in 2 Kings 14:25-27, a record which was probably written long after Jonah wrote his book; and it would seem that the writer took special care to do honour to God’s prophet who has been so unsparing of his own character in his faithful record.

The fact that Jonah was a historic character tells against the idea that the book is a mere parable. The writer of a parable would not have been likely to invent an imaginary story about a real man. Jonah’s candid record of his own faults is another evidence of the truth of the account, as also the fact that the Jews admitted the book to the Canon of Scripture, though it militated against their national prejudices in exhibiting God’s mercy to another nation.

Why did Jonah disobey? “The word of the Lord came to Jonah, Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry against it; for their wickedness is come up before Me. But Jonah rose up to flee unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord” (Jonah 1:1, 2).

What was the reason of the prophet’s deliberate disobedience? It was not cowardice, as we see from his attitude in the storm; nor was it the length of the journey, for a voyage to Tarshish on the coast of Spain was a far more hazardous undertaking than even the long overland journey to Nineveh; for the caravans of camels bearing merchandise plied regularly in those days to the great Assyrian capital. His reluctance was, no doubt, partly to be found in the prevalent idea of his country, that all other nations were outside the pale of God’s mercy. But beyond this, Assyria was the dreaded foe of Israel, the scourge with which Jonah perhaps knew that God was going to punish his country (see Hosea 9:3). For generations Assyria had been making fierce raids on the lands bordering on the Mediterranean, and the punishments which she inflicted upon her captives were cruel beyond the wonted cruelties of those times, even to flaying her victims alive. “Violence” was specified by the men of that city themselves, in the hour of their repentance, as their peculiar sin (3:8).

In the proclamation of God’s judgment to Nineveh, Jonah saw the possibility of mercy for that city, and the sparing of his country’s foe; for he had a true knowledge of God’s character as a merciful and gracious God, of great kindness (chap. 4:2). He also may have thought that the one hope for the moral restoration of his own country was the object-lesson of God’s judgment on a large scale upon what was then the leading city of the world.

Jonah was God’s prophet to Israel, his whole being was bound up in the salvation of his own people, and it was no doubt his intense patriotism which made him question the wisdom of God’s command, and made him ready to incur His displeasure and abandon his prophetic office rather than risk the welfare of his country.

Jonah was a diligent student of the Psalms. He knew perfectly well that even if he “took the wings of the morning and dwelt in the uttermost parts of the sea,” he could not really flee from God’s presence; but, like many a servant of the Lord since, he thought that by a change of circumstances he might get away from the pressure of God’s hand upon him or stifle His voice. And so he went down to Joppa. “And he found a ship going to Tarshish: so he paid the fare thereof, and went down into it, to go with them unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.”

The Storm. A graphic account of the voyage follows. “The book of Jonah is the most beautiful story ever written in so small a compass, only 1328 English words. In writing it is condensation that declares the master.” The violent storm, the efforts of the mariners, the indignation of the shipmaster at finding Jonah carelessly asleep at such a juncture, when even these heathen sailors were crying “every man to his god,”—the whole scene lives before us. They cast lots to discover who was answerable for such an unusually severe storm. The lot, as in the case of Achan, directed by God, fell upon the guilty prophet, and then we can picture the mariners crowding round him and plying him with questions. “Tell us why this evil has come?” cries one. “What is your occupation?” cries another. “Where do you come from?” “What is your country?” “Who are you?” We are told the fear and astonishment of these simple sailors as they learn from his own lips that he serves the God who made the earth and this tempestuous sea, and yet that he is fleeing from His presence. They ask his advice, but shrink from carrying it out when he tells them to cast him into the sea. But all their efforts are useless and they yield at last, earnestly beseeching the Lord not to lay this innocent blood to their charge.

The Gentile Pilate was willing to have released Jesus when the Jews cried “Crucify Him.” He washed his hands, saying, “I am innocent of the blood of this just Person.”

As Jonah was cast forth into the sea it ceased its raging, and these heathen men were turned to the Lord, and not only offered sacrifices, but made vows for their future life. In Jonah’s willingness to be cast into the deep, we have a picture of Him who said of His own life, “No man taketh it from Me, I lay it down of Myself.”

“The Lord prepared a Great Fish.” There is a Hebrew word manah, to “appoint” or “arrange,” rendered “prepare” in the authorised version, which Jonah uses several times. He who “sent forth a great wind into the sea,” “prepared a gourd,” “prepared a worm,” “prepared a vehement east wind,” and in like manner “prepared a great fish “to swallow Jonah.

Those who smile over the story of Jonah and the whale would do well to remember not only that our Lord Himself referred to it, but in what connection. He used it as a most solemn sign regarding the most solemn event of His life on earth. And He has expressly told us that in the great Judgment Day the men of Nineveh shall rise up and condemn the men of this generation, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold a Greater than Jonah is here. “We cannot imagine our Lord using these solemn words of a fictitious people and of a fictitious repentance.

To us who believe in the greatest miracle of all—the incarnation and resurrection of Christ—it is but a little thing to believe that God saved Jonah in this way to be a type of our Saviour’s resurrection. We have no alternative to believing Christ’s word that He did do so, but, on the other hand, God had many alternatives at His disposal by which He could make such a thing possible. Let us consider a few of them.

The word translated “a great fish” in the Old Testament, and a “whale” in the New Testament, is in both cases “a great sea-monster,” the term including whales, sharks, and other varieties. Many believe it to have been the Carcharias, or white shark, constantly found in the Mediterranean, often 30 feet long and more; and there are traces of a much larger race, now extinct. The voracity of the shark leads it to swallow whole all it can. Horses, sea calves the size of an ox, a reindeer without horns, have all been found at different times inside sharks. Men have also been found several times—in one instance it was a man in a coat of mail.

In 1758 a sailor fell overboard from a frigate in the Mediterranean, and was swallowed by a shark. The captain had a gun fired at it, and the creature cast the man out of his throat, and he was taken up alive and but little injured. The fish was harpooned, dried, and presented to the sailor, who went round Europe exhibiting it. It was 20 feet long.

The Spermaceti whale has a throat capacious enough to swallow substances much larger than a man, and it is its almost invariable habit to eject the contents of its stomach just before death. A case is related in the Expository Times for August 1906, of a sailor being found inside a whale as it was being cut up. This took place off the Falkland Islands in 1891. But the man, though alive, was unconscious. The miracle consisted in Jonah being preserved alive some thirty-two to thirty-four hours, and, part of the time at least, in a state of consciousness.⁶⁶ But the Creator of all is surely as well able so to prepare a fish as to make this possible, as our modern engineers are to prepare a submarine for the same purpose.

The Rev. James Neil believes the “great fish” to have been the Arctic Right Whale (Balcena mysticetus). This whale has an enormous head and a mouth 12 feet square. To its upper jaw are attached hundreds of baleen or whalebone blades, some of them from 10 to 15 feet long, and 8 inches wide, highly elastic, with delicately fringed edges. These blades usually lie up against the palate of the mouth. The whale draws into its mouth an immense quantity of water, filled with small jelly-fish, on which it feeds. It then lets down the baleen bars in front of its wide open mouth and strains the water out through the fringes of hair, retaining the tiny food on which it subsists. The smallness of its throat prevents it from swallowing large fish, and would utterly prevent it swallowing Jonah. This species of whale occasionally wanders into southern seas, and in a warm climate, like that of the Mediterranean, where it has been seen in recent times, is apt to turn sick and lie about on the surface of the water, and all the time it remained on the surface there would be plenty of air in its mouth. In such a prison cell as this, with its “bars,” of which Jonah speaks, and “the weeds wrapped about his head,” as they would certainly be in the whale’s mouth, it may well have been that Jonah was imprisoned. It may be objected to this that our Lord said that Jonah was in the whale’s belly. But this is rather a confirmation than otherwise, for it must be remembered that He also said that the Son of Man must be “in the heart of the earth,” whereas His place of burial vas in a cave on the very surface of the earth’s crust, corresponding exactly to the mouth of the whale. In both cases the figure of synecdoche is used, by which the part of a thing is put for the whole of it; and the same figure is used in the expression “three days and three nights,” where, by synecdoche, the whole is put for the part.

Jonah’s prayer to God from his prison cell is the breathing of one to whom the Psalms had long been familiar. He quotes short fragments from various Psalms, and adapts them to meet his own case. There are allusions in his prayer to the great Messianic Psalms 22, 69, 16. Most striking of all is the application of 16:10: “Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt Thou suffer Thine Holy One to see corruption.” Jonah says: Out of the belly of hell cried I,” and “Yet hast Thou brought up my life from corruption.”

“And the Lord spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land.”

The Commission repeated. “And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, saying Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.” Twice the word comes unto the prophet from the Lord, “Arise/” Once from the shipmaster. Sinners are sleeping, like Jonah, with only a plank between them and eternity, and the call to them is, “Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light.” But the call to awake came here to God’s servant through the heathen shipmaster: He often chooses to send His message through a rough instrument. Let us be ready to hear it, however it comes.

Twice the Lord speaks direct to Jonah “Arise.” He did not upbraid him for his disobedience; the sharp lesson he had learnt was enough; and in His goodness He is still willing to use His servant, prepared now to do His bidding. “A ‘bent’ Jonah was able to bend all heathen Nineveh, so that revival blessing held back impending judgment. Oh that God’s people might be ‘bent’ in like manner now; that revival blessing might be poured out upon London and the whole world!”⁶⁷

The tidings of Jonah’s miraculous escape must have spread far and wide. The sailors would tell the news. All Israel would know it. In the constant interchange of thought between those ancient nations the news might well have reached Nineveh itself. Or it may have been left for Jonah to tell the Ninevites of it. Certain it is that they knew it somehow, for Jonah was not only a prophet to them; our Lord tells us that he was a sign, a sign which carried conviction with his preaching.

Nineveh. “That great city.” God Himself calls it great.⁶⁸ Until 1841 all that was known of Nineveh was gathered from the Bible and a few scattered fragments of Assyrian history; and sixty or seventy years ago there were those who looked upon Nineveh as a myth. But since that date the excavations have continually been proving the truth of the Bible account. The city is great in its antiquity, founded by Nimrod. It was great in its size. Three chariots could drive abreast on the top of its walls. “A city of three days’ journey,” Jonah says; and the excavations prove its walls to have enclosed a circuit of sixty miles, just about three days’ journey in its circumference. It evidently enclosed a good deal of pasture land besides the actual buildings, which agrees with Jonah’s words, “much cattle.” As it contained 120,000 little children, too young to know their right hand from their left, the total population would not have been far short of a million. Nineveh was great in its palaces, its fortifications and temples, and in its marvellous works of art—its great stone lions and bulls, with wings and human faces. It was great in its high civilisation, and it was great, above all, in its wickedness.

To this city Jonah was sent the second time, this time with “sealed orders.” “Preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.” There was no hesitation this time. Jonah arose and went. The burden of his message was: “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.”

“The Men of Nineveh repented.” Jonah’s own soul had been so stripped and prepared by God that his message came with the power of the Spirit. He himself was a sign. God’s Spirit worked so mightily that at the end of one day’s preaching the city was stirred to its depths. The record is: “So the people of Nineveh believed God.” They acted immediately upon their belief, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth. This repentance evidently began among the people themselves, for chap. 3:6 should be translated, “And the matter came unto the king,” that is the whole account, and he too believed; and he rose up from his throne, and laid his robe from him, and covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And the decree went forth from the king and his nobles that there should be a universal fast in Nineveh, extending even to the beasts of the field. Man and beast were clothed in sackcloth, and the cry of repentance—mingled, no doubt, with the lowing of the distressed beasts—went up from the great city into the ears of a compassionate and long-suffering God. God saw that the repentance was sincere; that it did not end with the putting on of sackcloth, but that the people turned from their evil ways. And He heard their cry and spared the city.

The question arises, Is it likely that the state would interfere in such a matter, and that a royal edict would be issued enjoining a long fast? Professor Sayce gives the answer from the monuments of Nineveh, and tells us that in the days of Ezarhaddon II., when the northern foe was gathering against the Assyrian empire, the king issued a proclamation enjoining a solemn service of humiliation for one hundred days.

Again, Is it likely that the beasts should be clothed with sackcloth? Herodotus tells us that when the Persian armies were in Greece, on the occasion of the death of one of their generals, a mourning spread through the camp. They cut off the hair from themselves and their horses and their beasts of burden. Such a custom then was common to a closely neighbouring nation.

God’s dealings with Nineveh, and His dealings with His repining prophet in the last chapter, alike show us His merciful loving-kindness. Jonah was angry that the great city, the enemy of his country, should be spared. He was angry at the destruction of the gourd which had sheltered him. Concerning both the Lord asks him with the utmost tenderness, “Doest thou well to be angry?” And Jonah, still not sparing his own character in any detail, hands on the lesson to his countrymen, and hands down the lesson to us, that God’s salvation is intended for the whole world.

The book of Jonah is essentially a missionary book, a foreshadowing of our Lord’s great commission to go and preach the Gospel to every creature.

When Christ came back from the grave, the message of His Gospel was borne to the Gentiles, and has proved the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth, the world over.

13. Micah

Micah’s home was the village of Moreshah, in the maritime plain of Judah, near the borders of the Philistines.

He was a contemporary of Hosea and Isaiah, and prophesied in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and the earlier years of Hezekiah, kings of Judah. He prophesied concerning both Samaria and Jerusalem, but the burden of his prophecy was for Judah.

Micah bore the same name, abbreviated, as Micaiah, the son of Imlah, the prophet of Israel, who stood alone for God against the 400 false prophets, 150 years before this, in the days of Ahab, when he and Jehoshaphat went against Ramoth-Gilead (1 Kings 22). Micaiah had concluded his prophecy with the words, “Hearken, O people, every one of you.” Micah begins his prophecy with the same words. The three divisions of his book each begins with this call to Hear: 1:2, 3:1, 6:1. Micaiah had seen “all Israel scattered upon the hills, as sheep that have not a shepherd.” Micah’s prophecy abounds in allusions to the Good Shepherd and His pitiful care over His flock.

With much brokenness of heart Micah denounces God’s judgments upon Judah for their sins, but he seems to hasten over the words of judgment, and to linger over the message of God’s love and mercy, concluding his prophecy with a specially beautiful proclamation of it, with which he identifies his own name, Micah, which means “Who is like God?” “Who is like the Lord, the Pardoner of sin, the Redeemer from its guilt, the Subduer of its power? For no false God was ever such a claim made. This was the one message that he loved above all to proclaim; and his own name was the herald to the people in his day” (Dr. Pusey).

Samaria and the Cities of Judah. Micah proclaims the coming judgment first upon Samaria, and then upon the cities of Judah. These were all speedily fulfilled by the armies of Assyria.

The idolatry of Israel had spread to Jerusalem, and the strong city of Lachish seems to have been the connecting link, “the beginning of the sin of the daughter of Zion” (1:13). It is this spread of idolatry, and all its attendant evils, to Judah, under king Ahaz, which Micah specially deplores. He rebukes the extreme oppression of the poor, women and little children being driven from their homes; covetousness and self-aggrandisement, even at the price of blood, which he graphically likens to cannibalism. He specially denounces the sins of the rulers, bribery among the judges, false weights and balances.

Micah further proclaims the captivity in Babylon (4:7), and the destruction of Jerusalem (3:12), even to the ploughing up of the city, which was fulfilled by the Emperor Hadrian. We are distinctly told in the book of Jeremiah that this prophecy led to the great turning to the Lord of King Hezekiab and his people, at the beginning of his reign, which averted the destruction of the city, it may be for 136 years, and led also to the great reformation under that king. The elders of Judah reverted to this prophecy of Micah about 120 years after it was uttered, when the priests would have put Jeremiah to death for predicting the same doom.

“Bethlehem of Judah.” But for us the great interest of the prophet Micah centres round its clear prophecies of the Saviour who was to come. It was from this book that “all the chief priests and scribes of the people,” gathered together by Herod, proclaimed unhesitatingly that it was at Bethlehem of Judah that the Christ, the King, should be born. This prophecy proclaims His eternity. He who was to go forth from Bethlehem as the Ruler, was He whose goings forth were “from the days of eternity.” Micah 5:3 is closely connected with Isaiah 7:14.

“He shall stand and feed (or rule) in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord His God.” Here we have the majesty of the Royal Shepherd caring for His flock.

Micah’s picture of the restoration of Zion and many nations flowing to it, and the glory and prosperity of Christ’s Kingdom, with its reign of universal peace, was introduced by Isaiah into his prophecy,

14. Nahum

The destruction of Nineveh is the one burden of Nahum. The prophet’s name means Comfort, and his word of comfort is for Judah, “The Lord is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble, and He knoweth them that trust in Him” (1:7). “Behold upon the mountains the feet of him that bringeth good tidings and publisheth peace,” points forward to the proclamation of the good tidings of the Prince of Peace.

Nineveh. The rest of the prophecy is wholly concerned with Nineveh. The dwelling-place of the prophet is uncertain. It may have been Capernaum, “the city of Nahum.” The time in which he prophesied, from internal evidence, seems to have been between the fall of No-Amon (Thebes) in Upper Egypt, 663 B.C., and the fall of Nineveh, 606 B.C., for he speaks of the one as past (3:8-10) and the other as future (1:8, 14).

“The prophecy of Nahum is both the complement and the counterpart of the book of Jonah” (Dr. Pusey). God revealed His Name to Moses as showing His two-fold character. “The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering and forgiving iniquity, and that will by no means clear the guilty.” Jonah dwells on the first side of God’s character (4:2), Nahum brings out the second. “A jealous God and Avenger is the Lord… The Lord is slow to anger and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked.” God had shown His long-suffering to the great city. It had repented at the preaching of Jonah. But though multitudes of individuals were, no doubt, truly turned to the Lord, its repentance as a nation was short-lived, and we find it guilty again of the very sins from which it had repented, violence and insatiable cruelty (2:11, 12). But beyond all this, Nineveh seems to have been guilty of an open defiance of the living God, as shown in the blasphemous attitude of Sennacherib, and in the allusions of Nahum 1:9, 11.

The doom of the city was delayed two hundred years, but it fell at last, and Nahum’s prophecy was one of unconditional and final destruction. With an over-running flood would God make a full end of her; her name should be utterly cut off, and He would dig her grave. The mustering of the armies round Nineveh, the marshalling of the forces within the city, are described with graphic eloquence.

The destruction of Nineveh was complete. It occurred almost at the zenith of her power. According to Nahum’s prophecy, it came true that the Tigris assisted the attacking army of the Medes and Babylonians in its overthrow (2:6), and it was partly destroyed by fire (3:13, 15). So deep and so effectually did God dig its grave that every trace of its existence disappeared for ages, and its site was not known. But its excavations since 1841 have been confirming the truth of God’s Word.

The City of Thebes. Among other revelations, we have the actual fall of the city of Thebes, No-Amon, alluded to by Nahum, described on the monuments in the words of Assur-banipal, the Assyrian king, who was its conqueror. He tells us how completely he took the city, carrying off its gold and silver and precious stones, and two lofty obelisks, covered with beautiful sculptures, weighing 2500 talents (over 90 tons), which he raised from their place and transported to Assyria, with a great and countless booty.

15. Habakkuk

Habakkuk is the prophet of faith. His name means “Embrace” or “one who strongly enfolds.” Through all the mystery of sin and its apparent success, through the mystery of suffering and of God’s judgments, he lays hold of God’s promises, and clings to Him with faith triumphant.

He tells us nothing about himself except that he was a prophet, and we may infer from chapter 3, which is evidently a Psalm for the Temple, that he had to do with arranging its services, and was probably a Levite, as he speaks of “my stringed instruments.”

Habakkuk opens his prophecy with the cry, “O Lord, how long shall I cry and Thou wilt not hear?” as he looks round upon the iniquity which prevailed in Judah.

The Lord’s answer is that He is about to bring a punishment upon this sinful nation in the form of the terrible Chaldean invasion.

The Chaldeans were noted for their cavalry (1:8) they were noted also for scoffing at their captive kings (1:10). Jeremiah’s prophecy was fulfilled that Jehoiakim should be “buried with the burial of an ass,” that is, “cast forth beyond the gates of Jerusalem,” as food for the vultures (Jer. 22:19).

Having seen in vision the destruction of his people, Habakkuk again brings his questionings in confidence to God (1:12): “Art Thou not from everlasting, O Lord, my God, mine Holy One? we shall not die.”

“The Just shall live by Faith.” Habakkuk’s next question is, How is it that He who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity will execute His vengeance upon Judah by a people even worse than themselves? He then resolves to wait for God’s answer to his complaint.

As he waits upon God on his watch-tower God speaks again, and tells him to make plain, so that he that runs may read it, this glorious message for all time, “The just shall live by faith.” “This motto became the centre of Paul’s teaching (Rom. 1:17; Gal. 3:11; Heb. 10:38). In Romans just is the emphatic word; in Galatians FAITH; in Hebrews live” (Dr. Pierson). Habakkuk speaks of an immediate vision, but he looks on to the end. “At the end it shall speak … though it tarry wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry.” In Hebrews the quotation, “The just shall live by faith,” is preceded by the words, “For yet a little while, and He that shall come will come, and will not tarry.” “Surely I come quickly” are our Saviour’s last words in the Bible.

Then God shows Habakkuk that the Chaldeans will be destroyed themselves for their iniquity. God had used Babylon as His hammer to punish the nations, and He was about to break the hammer itself in pieces (Jer. 50:23). And He points forward to the Day of Christ when the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea (2:14).

Habakkuk’s Prayer. Then follows the prayer of Habakkuk. His description of the majesty of God is as fine as any in the whole Bible. He describes the wonderful history of God’s dealings with His people in bringing them into Canaan. Here again there are foreshadowings of a greater salvation yet to come, as we catch glimpses of the working of Him who is the brightness of His Father’s glory.

Three times in this prayer he uses the exclamation Selah, found elsewhere only in the Psalms. It is a call to pause and be silent that the soul may “listen to the divine illuming,” as in the last verse of chapter 2, “The Lord is in His holy temple, let all the earth keep silence before Him,” and the words of 2:1, “I will watch to see what He will say unto me.” How much we need this silence of soul before the Lord in these days, that we may give Him time to speak to us, that we may “listen to the divine illuming.” As we saw in studying the book of Job, the rays of light are vocal, but it needs a finely-tuned ear indeed to hear them.

Though the prophet trembles at the revelations of the Lord, yet he stays himself upon Him in quiet confidence, knowing that he can rest in the day of trouble. He sums up in the finest poetical language the failure of everything of earth, and when all nature and every seeming hope is dead, he adds, “Yet will I rejoice, as with exulting joy, in the God of my salvation.” It is almost the name of Jesus, for Jesus is “Jehovah—Salvation,” or “Jehovah is Salvation,” whence the words are here rendered, even by a Jew, “in God the Author of my redemption,” and by Augustine, “In God my Jesus.”

16. Zephaniah

This short book has been called “The Compendium of all prophecy.” It is a survey of the universal government of Jehovah, His judgment of the whole earth.

Zephaniah (“the watchman of Jehovah”) gives his own genealogy to the fourth generation, showing his descent from Hizkiah, who is probably identical with King Hezekiah. He prophesied during the early part of the reign of Josiah, before idolatry had been put away by the reforms of that king.

Zephaniah’s prophecy is marked by the emphasis he lays upon the Day of the Lord. The final application is to the Day of Christ. The impressive language can only find its fulfilment in the great Day of His wrath, described in Revelation 6. “A day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of wasting and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness, a day of trumpet and alarm” (Zeph. 1:14-16).

But meanwhile, a day of judgment was near for Judah on account of her sins. He urges her to seek the Lord while there is still time. He then proclaims God’s judgment upon various nations which have oppressed God’s people—upon Philistia, Moab, Ammon, Ethiopia, Assyria, prophesying the fall and utter desolation of Nineveh.

The third chapter shows God’s coming judgment upon Judah and Jerusalem, and the future restoration and joy of God’s people in the day of the Messiah.

The Lord in the Midst. The third chapter contains a beautiful lesson, taken spiritually. It describes the sinful condition of a soul apart from Christ—ver. 1, sins of commission; ver. 2, sins of omission. Those who should have been leaders in righteousness are leaders in iniquity—princes, judges, prophets, priests. Then the Lord Himself takes the place of these leaders, and we see Him “in the midst,” fulfilling each office in turn. First He comes to our hearts as Judge, and convicts us of all that is sinful there, bringing His judgment to light (5-7). Second, He comes as Prophet, teaching us with pure lips to call upon His name—still “in the midst,” dealing with the pride of heart, and bringing us low into the place of blessing, in the presence of His holiness (8-13). Third, He comes “into our midst” as King, to reign in undisputed sway in the heart that is surrendered to Him. When the Lord reigns thus the song begins (14-16). Fourth, He is “in the midst” as our Great High Priest, bringing us into the place of communion with Himself. Here we know Him as the Beloved of our souls. “He will rejoice over thee with joy, He will rest in His love, He will joy over thee with singing.”

The chapter closes with six beautiful “I wills” of what the Lord will do for us.

17. Haggai

Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi are the three prophets to the restored remnant that returned from Babylon. They all make frequent use of the title “The Lord of Hosts.”

Haggai and Zechariah were probably among the first exiles who returned with Zerubbabel. From his words in 2:3 it is thought that possibly Haggai himself had seen the glory of Solomon’s Temple, in which case he would be an old man at this time, while Zechariah was quite young (Zech. 2:4).

The burden of Haggai’s message was, “I am with you saith the Lord of Hosts” (1:13).

To the prophet Haggai is given the privilege—along with Zechariah—of stirring the people by his few concise words to the work of rebuilding the Temple. His message may be summed up in the words, “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.” He uttered four short prophecies during the last four months of the second year of Darius.

In the first he endeavoured to shame the people out of their apathy in beautifying their own houses while the house of the Lord lay waste; and he tells them that all the drought on crops and cattle had its source in this neglect. This prophecy produced the desired effect, and Zerubbabel, the governor of Jerusalem, and Joshua the High Priest, and the residue of the people rose up and began the work of rebuilding the Temple, which had been interrupted by their surrounding enemies, chiefly the Samaritans.

A month later discouragement seems to have beset the workers at the contrast between the glory of the former house and the poverty of this latter. Haggai exhorted them to be strong and build, for the Lord was with them, His Spirit would remain among them, and, moreover, a time was coming when the Lord of Hosts would shake the heavens and the earth, and the Desire of all nations should come, and His glory should fill the Temple, so that the glory of this latter house should be greater than that of the former, and in this place would the Lord of Hosts give peace.⁶⁹

A SlGNET. The fourth prophecy was addressed to Zerubbabel, and through him to Christ. Zerubbabel was a prince of the house of David, he had led back the people from captivity, he had built the Temple. In all this he was a type of Christ, who is the Servant of the Lord, chosen of Him, set as signet or seal upon the hand of the Father, the “express image of His person.” This word in Hebrews 1:3 means the impression made as by a seal upon wax.

Haggai’s message is full of stirring words to us today. If, as a Church, we thought more of the Lord’s work of saving souls than of our own comfort, there would be no lack of means to carry it forward.

“Consider your ways,” said Haggai; if we so adjust our ways as to make them fall into line with God’s will for us, we have the certainty of His promise, “I am with you, saith the Lord of Hosts.” And if His Spirit remaineth among us, we need fear neither opposition from without, nor discouragement from within.

18. Zechariah

We have already seen the connection of this prophet with Haggai. He was probably a priest as well as a prophet. (See Neh. 12:16.)

His first prophecy occurred just after the time of discouragement, when the people had begun to rebuild the Temple, and he warns them not to disappoint God, as their fathers had done. He has a special word of encouragement to the ruler Zerubbabel, who must have been conscious of his own weakness, and that it was indeed a “day of small things.” “Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord of Hosts” (4:6-10). He promised that the mountains of difficulty should be removed, and that he who had laid the foundation should have the joy of bringing forth the headstone with rejoicing, crying, “Grace, grace,” unto it.

Christ is both the Foundation-stone and the Headstone of the corner.

Eight Visions. Zechariah’s second prophecy consists of eight visions concerning God’s final dealings with Israel. First, of Myrtle Trees, a picture of Israel today, outcast but never forgotten by Jehovah. Second, of Horns and Smiths, foretelling the overthrow of Israel’s enemies. Third, of the Measuring Line. This shows the future prosperity of Jerusalem. The presence of Jehovah as a wall of fire round about His people will make walls unnecessary, the extent of the city will make them impossible. Fourth, of Joshua, a picture of Israel cleansed and restored to the priestly position of access to God. Fifth, of the Candlestick, or, as it should be, lamp-stand, Israel as God’s light-bearer. The two olive-trees in this vision refer in the first place to Zerubbabel the ruler and Joshua the priest, and thus through them to both offices fulfilled in the person of the Messiah. Sixth, the Flying Roll, government of the earth. Seventh, the Ephah, restriction of wickedness. Eighth, the Chariots, the administrative forces of righteousness (Dr. Campbell Morgan, Westminster Record for September 1907).

Then follows the symbolic act of crowning the High Priest (6:9-11). By this act the two great offices of priest and king are united in his person, type of the person and work of the Man whose name is the Branch (ver. 12, 3:8), who shall sit on His throne of glory as a Priest, the Builder of the eternal Temple of the Lord, and “bear the glory.”

“Thy King cometh unto Thee.” More than any other of the Minor Prophets, Zechariah foretells the Saviour. Twice He is announced as the Branch; God speaks of Him as My Servant (3:8). We have the prediction of His entry into Jerusalem, riding upon an ass’s colt (9:9). In contrast to the false shepherds we see Him as the Good Shepherd, saving His flock, caring for the poor of the flock (9:16, 11:11). We see Him as the Smitten Shepherd, with the sheep scattered (13:7). In the words “Awake, O sword, against My Shepherd, and against the Man that is My fellow, saith the Lord of Hosts,” we have a specially clear revelation of Christ, both in His Divine and human nature; the Man, the smitten Shepherd, is spoken of by God as His fellow, on an equality with Him and yet distinct in His personality.

Zechariah speaks of “the blood of the Covenant” (9:11), which our Lord applied to His own blood. “This is My blood of the New Covenant, which is shed for many unto remission of sins” (Matt. 26:28, R.V.). We have the prophecy of His betrayal by Judas for thirty pieces of silver, even to the fact that the money was “cast to the potter in the house of the Lord” (11:12, 13).

Zechariah prophesies the conversion of his people to the Lord in the day that the Spirit is poured out upon them, and when they shall look on Him whom they have pierced, and the sin of the nation shall be washed away through that fountain opened through their Messiah’s death on Calvary (12:10, 13:1). He speaks of the wounds with which He was wounded in the house of His friends (13:6). The third part of the remnant shall be brought through the fire and purified in the time of Jacob’s trouble (13:9).

The last chapter foretells the Great Day of the Lord, which is always associated with the coming of Christ to judgment. He who ascended from the slopes of Olivet shall so come in like manner as those who watched Him saw Him go. “And His feet shall stand upon the mount of Olives … and the Lord my God shall come, and all the saints with thee. … It shall be one day which shall be known to the Lord … at evening time it shall be light… . And the Lord shall be King over all the earth: in that day shall there be One Lord, and His name One.”

19. Malachi

Malachi—“the Messenger of the Lord”—wished to be known by this name only. Like the Forerunner, of whom he prophesies, he was but a voice. Speaking of Levi, as an example of the true priesthood, he says “He is the messenger of the Lord of Hosts” (2:7). He speaks of John the Baptist as God’s “messenger,” and of our Lord Himself as “the Messenger of the Covenant” (3:1).

And what is the “burden” of the Lord’s message by Malachi? “I have loved you, saith the Lord.” What a message to a people who were disappointing God’s love!

Malachi bears the same relation to Nehemiah that Haggai and Zechariah bear to Zerubbabel. He lived either at the time of Nehemiah or directly after, for he rebukes the very same sins among the people that Nehemiah dealt with on his second visit to Jerusalem:—(1) The corruption of the priesthood (Neh. 13:29; Mal. 2:8). (2) The alliance with idolatrous wives (Neh. 13:23-27; Mal. 2:10-16). (3) The neglect of the tithe (Neh. 13:10-12; Mal. 3:10). Eliashib the priest was allied unto Tobiah the Ammonite, and had allowed him the use of a great chamber in the courts of the House of God. Eliashib’s grandson also had married a daughter of Sanballat, the Horonite (Neh. 13:1-9).

“WHEREIN?” Malachi’s message is to the priests who ought to have been the leaders in righteousness, and also to the people who followed their lead in neglecting and dishonouring God. His book is marked by its straightforward, plain words of rebuke, by which he brings home their sins to a self-satisfied people, who had a form of godliness, but were denying the power thereof.⁷⁰ Every rebuke of the prophet was disputed by the people with the question “Wherein?” or “What?”⁷¹

1. 1:2: “Wherein hast Thou loved us?”

2. 1:6: “Wherein have we despised Thy name?”

3. 1:7: “Wherein have we polluted Thee?”

4. 2:17: “Wherein have we wearied Him?”

5. 3:7: “Wherein shall we return?”

6. 3:8: “Wherein have we robbed Thee?”

7. 3:13: “What have we spoken so much against Thee?”

8. 3:14: “What profit is it that we have kept His ordinance?”

9. 2:14: “For what?” or “Wherefore?” (referring to what Malachi had said in ver. 13).

Malachi describes the coming of Christ to His Temple. He came as a little babe to the expectant gaze of Simeon and Anna. He came to overturn the tables of the money-changers. He comes to the temple of our hearts. His coming is as purifying fire. With the patience of the Refiner of silver He sits till He sees His own image reflected in the molten metal. And when He takes up His abode in our hearts He is a “swift Witness there against sin.” Our Lord calls Himself “the faithful and true Witness.”

“The Whole Tithe.” This book contains the secret of spiritual blessing. “Bring ye the whole tithe into My storehouse.” The tithe was the outward recognition that everything belonged to God. We are to bring Him our whole selves, body, soul and spirit, all that we have and all that we are, all that we know about in our lives and all that we do not know about yet. If we thus honestly keep nothing back from Him we may be certain that He will accept us and will open the windows of heaven, and pour us out such a blessing that there shall not be room enough to receive it, but it shall flow out to all around. “All nations shall call you blessed, for ye shall be a delightsome land, saith the Lord of Hosts.”

Amidst all the hypocrisy and formalism there was a little remnant who feared the Lord. His ear was bent down to hear them as they spoke together of Him. He promised that they should be His own special treasure in the coming Day of the Lord. That Day should be as an oven and consume the wicked as stubble, but it should arise upon this faithful remnant as “The Sun of Righteousness with healing in His wings.”

The Old Testament closes with the word “curse.” But it is expressive of the great desire of God’s love to avert it, for He says “Lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.”

The New Testament closes with blessing. “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.”

A silence of 400 years lay between the voice of Malachi and the voice of one crying in the wilderness, “Prepare ye the way of the Lord.” “But there is a remarkable link between the two Testaments: the last figures on the inspired page of Malachi, and the first on the inspired page of Matthew, are the Angel of the Covenant and His Forerunner” (Dr. Pierson).

⁴¹ Christ and the Scriptures, p. 49. Adolph Saphir, D.D.

⁴² See Outline Studies in the Books of the Old Testament, p. 207. W. G. Moorehead, D.D.

⁴³ See Many Infallible Proofs, p. 55, by A. T. Pierson, D.D., who shows that the twenty-five distinct predictions given by our Lord respecting the destruction of Jerusalem, by the law of compound probability reduce the chance of fulfilment to one in nearly twenty millions! Yet every one of these predictions was fulfilled in that event.

⁴⁴ The Approaching End of The Age, p. 4. H. Grattan Guinness.

⁴⁵ History of the Jews, 2:399. Milman.

⁴⁶ What are we to Believe? chap. 10. Rev. J. Urquhart.

⁴⁷ What are we to Believe? chap. 8. Rev. J. Urquhart.

⁴⁸ Abridged from Roger’s Reasons, by Rev. John Urquhart.

⁴⁹ It was a custom before the death of a condemned person for a proclamation to be made that others might bear witness to his innocency. That no such proclamation was made for our Lord was part of the injustice of His trial. See Lowth on Isaiah, p. 363.

⁵⁰ The intention was to give Him the burial of a criminal along with the two thieves. But Joseph of Arimathea, hitherto a secret disciple, came to Pilate and craved the body of Jesus, and with reverent hands it was laid by the rich man in his own new tomb. That is the Gospel record. It was written seven hundred years before on the prophetic page.

⁵¹ Lines of Defence of the Biblical Revelation, p. 139. Prof. Margoliouth.

⁵² See The Unity of Isaiah, p. 71. John Kennedy, D.D.

⁵³ Ten Years’ Digging in Egypt, pp. 50-64.

⁵⁴ Bible Characters, p. 153. Dr. Alexander Whyte.

⁵⁵ Outline Studies. Moorehead.

⁵⁶ The Inspiration and Accuracy of the Holy Scriptures, pp. 44-47. Urquhart.

⁵⁷ Stanley’s Jewish Church.

⁵⁸ See Farrar’s Life of Christ, vol. 2. p. 199.

⁵⁹ Outline Studies in the Books of the Old Testament, p. 274. Moorehead.

⁶⁰ For convincing proofs see Lectures on Daniel the Prophet, Dr. Pusey; The Coming Prince and Daniel in the Critics’ Den, Sir R. Anderson; The Biblical Guide, and The Inspiration and Accuracy of the Holy Scriptures, Rev. J. Urquhart.

⁶¹ Hosea, by Chas. H. Waller, D.D.

⁶² The Keywords of the Bible. A. T. Pierson, D.D.

⁶³ “The common Syrian goat, Copra mambrica, may be at once recognised by its enormous pendent ears a foot long, often reaching lower than its nose, and its stout recurved horns” (The Natural History of the Bible, p. 93, by Canon Tristram).

⁶⁴ Amos, by Chas. H. Waller, D.T.

⁶⁵ The Biblical Guide, Rev, J, Urquhart, vol. viii. p. 146.

⁶⁶ It is a Jewish saying that “A day and a night make an Onah, and part of an Onah is as the whole.” Even in England a prisoner sentenced to three days’ imprisonment is seldom more than forty hours in jail, and sometimes only thirty-three—part of a day reckoning by law as a day (Sir R. Anderson).

⁶⁷ Jonah, Patriot and Revivalist, p. 19. Rev. W. F. S. Webster.

⁶⁸ Jonah, the Truant Prophet. Rev. F. B. Meyer.

⁶⁹ Herod’s Temple, to which our Lord came, was not a new Temple, but a renovation of this second Temple, with splendid additions and improvements. In Haggai’s words, “The silver is Mine and the gold is Mine, saith the Lord of Hosts,” we probably have a prophecy of its magnificence when adorned at the cost of many millions by Herod, so as to make it a glorious house, just before He whose house it was came to it, as it were in preparation for His august presence. Yet the true glory was the presence of the “Great King” in His deep disguise as a peasant of Galilee (Rev. James Neil).

⁷⁰ Studies in Malachi. Rev. G. Campbell Morgan.

⁷¹ In questions 1 to 6 it is the Hebrew word bemah, “in what,” or “wherein.” In questions 7 and 8 it is the Hebrew word mah, “what.” In question 9 it is the Hebrew word atmak, “for what,” or “wherefore.”