cies were merely general promises and threats, and thus have obscured events clearly predicted. Others have expected that the events predicted in the prophecies should be foretold in chronological order, and to make this evident, have perverted many passages by forced interpretations. Almost all have been unwilling to acknowledge, that the mind of the prophets was dwelling on a different object from that which the Deity through their words intended to express, and that therefore there is really in some passages a double sense.Of these two last points it will be necessary to speak somewhat more particularly.

§ 81. Of the prophetic perspective vision.

They are certainly in an error who suppose that the prophets saw future events in historical order and clearness; for evidence may be derived from the prophecies themselves to prove that they beheld only some things, and those not at all as we are accustomed to view objects near at hand, but as we see things at a distance. Hence the prophets are often compared to the watchmen who were formerly stationed on towers, and thence beheld and announced events which were occurring at a distance. II Sam. xiii. 34. xviii. 24–27. II Ki. ix. 17-19. In like manner the prophets, raised, as it were, upon an elevated station, looked forward to what should come to pass in future times, and were commanded to announce what they beheld to others; Isa. lii. 8. xxi. 6—12. Jer. vi. 17. Mic. vii. 4. Ezek. iii. 17. xxxiii. 1–9. Rev. iv. 1. xxi. 10. For this reason a prophet is called a seer, ,, and his prophecy, a sight or a vision, 1, 7.[a] The

prophecies therefore resemble pictures which represent extensive prospects, comprising many objects at various intervals of distance; and as in these all the objects are not depicted with equal clearness, but, while the outline of the foreground is distinct and its colouring vivid, the distance is less perfectly defined, and the extreme back ground is clothed with a shadowy mist; so the prophecies exhibit as it were in a painting a delineation of various future objects or events, the nearest of which are the most perfectly described, while the more remote are shown in proportion to their distance in a weaker light and with a fainter outline; the intervals of time are not distinctly no

ted, but all the objects are simultaneously represented, as they lay in prospect before the prophet and therefore not in historical or chronological order, but as they casually occur to the sight of the beholder, some objects, by their importance, first attracting his attention, and afterwards recalling it at frequent intervals, while others less prominent, receive but a transient notice. Comp. Gen. xv. II Sam. vii. I Chron. xvii. Ps. lxxxix. 2--38. Hence it appears that in the prophecies it was scarcely possible, before the accomplishment, to distinguish which of the events predicted was near at hand, and which more remote. The prophets frequently interweave descriptions of remote events, with others of objects near at hand. Thus Zechariah, c. ix. in v. 1-8, speaks of Alexander, in v. 9. s., of the Messiah, whom he beholds afar off, in v. 11. ss. of the Maccabees, and in c. xi. again of the Messiah. Comp. Isa. xi. Mic. i. 2-v. 14. Ezek. xxxvii. 15-28.

It is further worthy of observation, that the prophecies have this peculiarity, that the circumstance which constitutes the foreground is sometimes an image of the much more important circumstance which constitutes the distance, the former possessing a surprising resemblance to the latter. In this respect the comparison drawn from the perspective in painting does not hold good.

[a) LEIGHTON, Select Works, I. 43, gives the following beautiful illustration of Isa. Ix. 1.: "The prophet, elevated by the spirit of GOD to a view of after ages, as clear as if present, seems here to find his people sitting under a dark mantle of a sad and tedious night, and having long expected the sun's return in vain, before its time, they give over expectation when it is near them, and desperately fold themselves to lie perpetually in the dark. Now the prophet, as it were standing awake upon some mountain, perceives the day approaching, and the golden chariots of the morning of deliverance hasting forward, and seems to come speedily with these glad news to a captive people, and sounds this trumpet in their ears, arise, shine, for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee."

A remarkable instance of this prophetic vision, seen, as from a watchtower, in an extended plain, may be found in Isa. lxiii. 1—6. See VELTHUESEN de optica rerum futurarum descriptione, ad illustrandum locum Ies. lxiii. 1-6., in Comm. Theol. a VELTHUESEN, KUINOEL, et RUPERTI, Vol. VI. pp. 75-117. Tr.]

§ 82. Some prophecies have a double sense.[a]

The older interpreters, who drew their rules of interpretation from the style of the prophets, acknowledged the existence of two literal senses in some prophetic passages. When however this principle was too broadly applied by wild and irregular expositors, it became suspected, and has at length been almost entirely exploded, on the ground that in no passage more than a single meaning can be given to each word, and consequently no more than a single sense to the whole passage. But this reasoning does not prove that God could not, by his especial interference, so modify the language of the prophet, that it should convey, beside the sense which the prophet himself might have in his mind, another sense still more exalted. Thus the declaration of the high priest: "it is expedient for us that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not ;" is explained by John (xi. 50. 51.) in a twofold sense. For although the high priest merely intended to say that true policy required the execution of an individual in order to preserve the state, yet the evangelist declares, that by those words God designed to express another truth, namely, that Jesus was to die for the sins of men. That the case of the prophets was similar we learn from themselves, when they confess that they do not understand their own predictions: for in such circumstances either they must have attached to their words a sense different from that designed by the DEITY; or they must have intended to convey by them some general and indefinite idea, when in the divine purpose they had a particular and definite signification. In either case, the existence of a double sense must necessarily be allowed, viz. the subjective, or that which appears to the speaker to be the meaning of the words uttered by him at the instigation of the Holy Spirit; and the objective or that which is really intended by the Deity himself. Comp. SEILERS Biblische Hermeneutik, 1800, § 195 -199. S. 225-233. That a similar double sense does exist in other places where there is no confession of the prophets that their predictions are not understood by themselves, will be readily granted, if we consider that many prophecies must, before their accomplishment, have been equally obscure with those the obscurity of which is thus acknowledged. So when Isaiah predicted to Hezekiah that his roval

treasures should be carried to Babylon, and that the regal posterity should be eunuchs in the Babylonish court (Isa. xxxix.), it is plain that he understood it as referring to the Assyrian monarchy, although its seat was then at Nineveh; but God by this prophecy designated, not the captivity of Manasseh among the Assyrians mentioned II Chr. xxxiii. 11., but the subjection to the Chaldeans, and the Babylonian captivity. Again, when Micah predicted the ruin and prolonged desolation of Jerusalem and the temple, (c. iii. 12.) and the transportation of the inhabitants of Jerusalem to Babylonia (c. iv. 10), he referred the fulfilment of his prophecies to the Assyrians, and was so understood by the Hebrews (Jer. xxvi. 18. s.), who imagined that his predictions had failed of accomplishment on account of their repentance and reformation; while in reality the Chaldeans were referred to by the DEITY. In another place (c. iv. 10—13), when predicting the return from Babylon, and the success of the Hebrew arms, Micah either must have been totally at a loss to conjecture when, how, and by whom his predictions should be accomplished, or he must have conceived of some other accomplishment than that intended by the DEITY and displayed by the event. Comp. also Isa. liii-lxvi. Zech. ix-xiv. Perhaps the prophets sometimes understood an expression literally, which was intended to receive a more loose or figurative interpretation, and the contrary. So Micah (c. v. 5.), prophesying concerning the Maccabees, would probably suppose that the enemies of the Hebrews, of whom he was then speaking, were the Assyrians properly so called; whereas they were Assyrians only in a more extended use of the word, but properly speaking, Syrians.

The doctrine, already advanced of a double sense in some of the prophecies, is still further confirmed by this consideration, that in all of them GoD intended to designate certain definite circumstances, which were to be unfolded in the interpretation, although they may not have been perceived by the prophet himself. Thus, when the prophets predicted the propagation of the true religion among other nations, it was undoubtedly the will of the DEITY, and therefore is the objective sense of the prophecies, that this propagation should take place at the time, and in the manner, in which it did actually come to pass, and by the instrumentality of the very men who did really bring it about. Nevertheless the prophets thought that it was to be ac

complished, either by the victories of the Hebrews inducing idolaters to acknowledge their God who gave such proofs of his power, to be the true and only GOD; or by that method of conversion which the Maccabees afterwards attempted.

From the preceding observations it must appear evident that the rule in hermeneutics which excludes the application of the New Tes tament to the interpretation of the Old, is not to be strictly followed. Otherwise we shall shut out all rays of light from a place already dark; which no one would choose to do whose eyes were not purblind or weak.

[a) See HORSLEY's Sermons, S. XVIII. p. 53. ss. Also ALLIX's Reflections on the Old Testament, c. viii. in Watson's Tracts, I. 376. ed. 2d., and JORTIN'S Rem. on Ecc. Hist. I. 128. ss. ed. Lond. 1805. Tr.]

The writings of the prophets which are yet extant, are by no means confined to prophecies. They contain very many passages which relate to other subjects, such as the nature and attributes of God; the religious and moral duties of man; reproofs of idolatry and other vices; exhortations to the practice of religion and virtue; together with advice and warnings respecting the political state of the country and the administration of affairs, which, in the theocratical form of government, were sent to the kings and princes of the Hebrews by the prophets as ambassadors of their supreme monarch JEHOVAH. Those writers of the present age, who, from this latter portion of the contents of the prophetic Scriptures, have concluded that to prophesy means merely to utter some wise saying, (etwas weises sagen,) have childishly played upon the etymology of the German word weissagen, when the etymology of the original Hebrew leads to a very different meaning. Nor are they less in error who represent the prophets as mere demagogues; for in fact they were so far from attempting to obtain any influence among the populace, that they criminated the people as well as the kings, the nobles, and the priests, and even threatened foreign nations with destruction. Besides, their instructions relate much oftener to religious and moral, than to political affairs, and several of the prophets, as for instance Isaiah and Jeremiah.