*

eighth, he must accept a theory of authorship and of prediction, modified accordingly. So, if, under the head of Zechariah, he finds three distinct styles and aspects of affairs, he must acknowledge so much, whether he is right or wrong, in conjecturing the elder Zechariah of the age of Isaiah to have written the second portion, and Uriah, in Jeremiah's age, the third. If he would quote Micah, as designating Bethlehem for the birthplace of the Messiah, he cannot shut his eyes to the fact, that the Deliverer to come from thence was to be a contemporary shield against the Assyrian. If he would follow Pearson in quoting the second Psalm, "Thou art my son," he knows that Hebrew idiom convinced even Jerome the true rendering was, "Worship purely." He may read in Ps. xxxiv. that "not a bone of the righteous shall be broken;" but he must feel a difficulty in detaching this from the context, so as to make it a prophecy of the crucifixion. If he accepts mere versions of Ps. xxii. 17, he may wonder how "piercing the hands and the feet" can fit into the whole passage: but, if he prefers the most ancient Hebrew reading, he finds, instead of "piercing," the comparison "like a lion;" and this corresponds sufficiently with the "dogs" of the first clause; though a morally certain emendation would make the parallel more perfect by reading the word "lions" in both clauses.+ In either case, the staring monsters are intended by whom Israel is surrounded and torn. Again: he finds in Hosea that the Lord loved Israel when he was young, and called

• "Cavillatur. . . quod posuerim. viderer interpres, et Jud. locum darem."

Adorate pure,.. ... ne violentus Hieron. c. Ruffin., § 19.

The

Septuagint version may have כלבים for כלביאים f By reading יקף taken as from הקיפיני arisen from

him out of Egypt to be his son; but he must feel, with Bishop Kidder, that such a citation is rather accommodated to the flight of Joseph into Egypt, than a prediction to be a ground of argument. Fresh from the services of Christmas, he may sincerely exclaim, "Unto us a child is born:" but he knows that the Hebrew, translated "Mighty God," is at least disputable; that perhaps it means only "Strong and Mighty One," "Father of an Age;" and he can never listen to any one who pretends that the maiden's child of Isa. vii. 14 was not to be born in the reign. of Ahaz, as a sign against the kings Pekah and Rezin. In the case of Daniel, he may doubt whether all parts of the book are of one age, or what is the startingpoint of the seventy weeks; but two results are clear beyond fair doubt, that the period of weeks ended in the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes, and that those portions of the book supposed to be specially predictive are a history of past occurrences up to that reign. When so vast an induction on the destructive side has been gone through, it avails little that some passages may be doubtful, one perhaps in Zechariah, and one in Isaiah, capable of being made directly Messianic; and a chapter, possibly, in Deuteronomy, foreshadowing the final fall of Jerusalem. Even these few cases, the remnant of so much confident rhetoric, tend to melt, if they are not already melted, in the crucible of searching inquiry. If our German had ignored all that the masters of philology have proved on these subjects, his countrymen would have raised a storm of ridicule, at which he must have drowned himself in the Neckar.

Great, then, is Baron Bunsen's merit, in accepting frankly the belief of scholars, and yet not despairing

of Hebrew prophecy as a witness to the kingdom of God. The way of doing so, left open to him, was to show, pervading the prophets, those deep truths which lie at the heart of Christianity; and to trace the growth of such ideas- the belief in a righteous God, and the nearness of man to God; the power of prayer, and the victory of self-sacrificing patience, ever expanding in men's hearts- until the fulness of time came, and the ideal of the Divine Thought was fulfilled in the Son of man. Such, accordingly, is the course our author pursues, not with the critical finish of Ewald, but with large moral grasp. Why he should add to his moral and metaphysical basis of prophecy a notion of foresight by vision of particulars or a kind of clairvoyance, though he admits it to be a natural gift, consistent with fallibility, is not so easy to explain. One would wish he might have intended only the power of seeing the ideal in the actual, or of tracing the Divine Government in the movements of men. He seems to mean more than presentiment or sagacity; and this element in his system requires proof.

The most brilliant portion of the prophetical essays is the treatment of the later Isaiah. With the insertion of four chapters, concerning Hezekiah, from the histories of the kings, the words and deeds of the elder Isaiah apparently close. It does not follow that all the prophecies arranged earlier in the book are from his lips; probably they are not: but it is clear to

"Die Kraft des Schauens, die in Menschen verborgen liegt, und, von der Naturnothwendigkeit betreit, im hebräischen Prophetenthum sich zur wahren Weltanschauung erhoben hat,. ist der Schlüssel," &c. - Gott in der Geschichte, p. 149.

...

und mit vielen

"Jene Herrlichkeit besteht nicht in dem Vorhersagen. . . . Dieses haben sie gemein mit manchen Aussprüchen der Pythia, Weissagungen der Hellseherinnen dieses Jahrhunderts." Id., p. 151.

demonstration,* that the later chapters (xl., &c.) are upon the stooping of Nebo and the bowing-down of Babylon, when the Lord took out of the hand of Jerusalem the cup of trembling; for the glad tidings of the decree of return were heard upon the mountains, and the people went forth, not with haste or flight; for their God went before them, and was their rearward (chap. lii.). So they went forth with joy, and were led forth with peace (chap. liv.). So the arm of the Lord was laid bare; and his servant who had foretold it was now counted wise, though none had believed his report. We cannot take a portion out of this continuous song, and, by dividing it as a chapter, separate its primary meaning from what precedes and follows. The servant in chap. lii. and liii. must have relation to the servant in chap. xlii. and xlix. Who was this servant, that had foretold the exile and the return, and had been a man of grief, rejected of his people, imprisoned and treated as a malefactor? The oldest Jewish tradition, preserved in Origen + and to be inferred from Justin,‡ said the chosen people, in opposition to heathen oppressors; an opinion which suits chap. xlix. ver. 3. Nor is the later § exposition of the Targum altogether at variance: for, though Jonathan speaks of the Messiah,

• To prove this, let any one read Jerome's arguments against it, if the sacred text itself be not sufficient proof," Go ye forth of Babylon," &c.; chap. xlviii. 20.

† C. Celsum, i. 55 (quoted by Pearson).

For, in making the Gentiles mean proselytes, they must have made the servant Israel. ἀλλὰ τί; οὐ πρὸς τὸν νόμον λέγει, καὶ τοὺς φωτιζομένους ὑπ' αὐτοῦ, κ.τ.λ. - Trypho, ή 122.

Later, because it implies the fall of Jerusalem. It is thought to have been compiled in the fourth century of our era. It is very doubtful whether the Jewish schools of the middle ages had, except in fragments, any hermeneutic tradition so old as what we gather from the Church Fathers, however unfairly this may be reported. My own belief is clear, that they had not.

it is in the character of a Judaic deliverer; and his expressions about "the holy people's being multiplied" and seeing their sanctuary rebuilt, especially when he calls the holy people a "remnant," may be fragments of a tradition older than his time. It is idle, with Pearson, to quote Jonathan as a witness to the Christian interpretation, unless his conception of the Messiah were ours. But the idea of the Anointed One, which in some of the Psalms belongs to Israel, shifted from time to time; being applied, now to people, and now to king or prophet, until at length it assumed a sterner form, as the Jewish spirit was hardened by persecutions into a more vindicative hope. The first Jewish expositor who loosened without breaking Rabbinical fetters, R. Saadiah, in the ninth century, named Jeremiah as the man of grief, and emphatically the prophet of the return, rejected of his people. Grotius, with his usual sagacity, divined the same clew; though Michaelis says upon it, pessime Grotius. Baron Bunsen puts together, with masterly analysis, the illustrative passages of Jeremiah; and it is difficult to resist the conclusion to which they tend. Jeremiah compares his whole people to sheep going astray; § and himself, to a "lamb or an ox brought to the slaughter." He was taken from prison, and his generation, or posterity, none took account of;** he interceded for his people in prayer: ++ but was not the less despised and a man of grief, so

.Targumn on Isa. liii - דעמיה ית שארא and יסגון תולדת קודשא

t In Pearson's hands, even the Rabbins become more Rabbinical. His citations from Jonathan and from Jarchi are most unfair, and in general he makes their prose more prosaic.

Titularly styled Gaon, as president of the Sora school.

Jer. xxiii. 1, 2; l. 6–17; xii. 3.

Jer. xxxviii. 4–6, 13; xxxvii. 16.

** Jer. xi. 19-23; xx. 10; xxxvi. 19; xlv. 2, 3.

tt Jer. xviii. 20; xiv. 11; xv. 1.

|| Jer. xi. 19.