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Such is the accuracy, with which the spiritual pride of the Jews during our Saviour's ministry, and their supercilious contempt of the Gentiles, is described. With equal exactness is their situation delineated, ever since they incurred the heinous guilt of crucifying the Lord of life. From that time to this, their name has been almost literally a curse over the whole earth.

5. Isaiah dwells so continually on the call of the heathens, that to recite all his prophecies relative to that great event would be nearly to recite the whole volume. I cannot however forbear adducing one more to the same purpose, in which Christ himself is the speaker: because it seems particularly to relate to Europe.

Listen, O ye isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far—I have laboured in vain, I have spent my strength for nought and in vain; yet surely my judgment is with the Lord, and my work with my God. And now, saith the Lord, that formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob again to him, Though Israel be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, and my God shall be my strength. And he said, It is a light thing, that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give thee a light for the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth.

'Isaiah xlix. 1, 4-6.

The Prophet after this immediately proceeds to delineate the character of Christ.

Thus saith the Lord, the Redeemer of Israel, and his Holy One, to him whom man despiseth, to him whom the nation abhorreth, to a servant of rulers: Kings shall see, and arise: princes also shall worship.'

Isaiah, with a view to prevent any misappli'cation of these prophecies, describes the person, to whom they allude, with so much exactness, that all possibility of error is effectually precluded, except in those who obstinately shut their eyes against the truth. I gave my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair. I hid not my face from shame and spitting."

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The whole of this was accurately accomplished in the person of Christ. Pilate, therefore, took Jesus and scourged him; and when they had blindfolded him, they struck him on the face.* And Herod, and his men of war, set him at · nought, and mocked him, and arrayed him in a gorgeous robe; and some began to spit on him."

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6. But the sufferings of the Lord are yet more copiously predicted by Isaiah in what may well be deemed the most remarkable of his prophecies.

He shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness: and, when we shall see him, there is no beauty, that we should desire him. He

Isaiah xlix. 7. Luke xxii. 64.

2 Isai. 1. 6.
5 Luke xxiii. 11.

3 John xix, 1.
• Mark xiv. 65.

is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief-But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities—He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth. He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation?'-He made his grave with the wicked and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth."

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I agree with Geier, that this expression cannot relate to the miraculous conception of our Lord, because signifies a generation of men living together at the same period, not a physical generation. Quapropter non est, ut cum quibusdam patribus, Athanasio, Justino, et Tertulliano, accipiamus hanc vocem de generatione Christi humana ex virgine. Geieri Mess. Mors, Sepult. et Resurr. At the same time, I think it much more probable, that should relate to the wickedness of the generation in which Christ lived, than to the spiritual generation of his children, because this seems to involve a sense, which the word is scarcely capable of bearing.

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Isaiah liii. 29. However unwilling the modern Jews may be to allow the relation of this prophecy to Christ, such was the universal opinion of antiquity. Chaldæum (paraphrasten) si inspiciat Judæus, videbit hæc ejus expressa verba ad Esa.

ecce prospere aget servus meus הא יצלח עבדי משיחא .13 .lii

Messias: item ad cap. liii. 10. na mba nim intuebuntur regnum Messiæ; quæ ipsa Targumi verba, ne tanquam' per allegoriam dicta interpretetur Abarbenel, satis cavet L'Empereur. Rabbinos veteres, quorum apud nos exigua adeo copia, allegare supersedeo; sufficiat id factum jam esse a Galatino, lib. viii. art. C. V. cap. 15. Sufficiat insuper hanc antiquorum mentem non diffiteri recentiores; audi Alscichum;

No person, who reads this, can avoid seeing almost every circumstance in the history of Christ specified with as much accuracy as if the writer had been an historian, instead of a prophet. The scornful question of the Jews, Can any good come out of Galilee'; the rejection of the Messiah by his own citizens, because, as they thought, he was the son of the carpenter; and the general infidelity of the whole Jewish nation, simply because he did not come arrayed in the majesty of empire, and the terror of authority: were all distinctly enumerated several centuries before the event. Thus also, the particulars of his death and sufferings; his being led from prison and judgment; and the meekness of his deportment during his trial; are all mentioned in a book, written during the establishment of the Law of Moses. Even the singular difference, between his ignominious death and his honourable interment, is not forgotten in this wonderful detail.

Here, however, according to the reading of the present Hebrew text, there is some difficulty; for the solution of which I must again have recourse

וקבלו כי :i. e. Rabbini tuostri uno ore confirmant אחד קיימו .traduntque de rege Messia prophetam loqui על מלך משיח ידבר

Geieri Mess. Mors, Sepult. et Resurr. In order to elude the force of such prophecies, the Jews have invented the fable of a double Messiah. The first they style the son of Joseph, and believe that he will appear in a depressed condition; the second they style the son of David, and believe that he will appear as a triumphant prince. Thus the Targum on Cant. iv. 5. Two are thy Redeemers; Messiah the son of David, and Messiah the son of Ephraim.

to the same eminent Critic, to whom I have been already indebted.

All the strange perplexity of commentators, in labouring to make sense of the words at present, and the remarkable want of success in their variety of attempts towards it, affords the justest grounds to suspect, that there is some mistake in the present Hebrew. And I humbly apprehend, the whole difficulty is owing to this, that the words

.have changed places במתיו and קברו

I must next observe, that the first verb in this verse should probably be rendered passively, in analogy to the verbs preceding; for after the words, he was oppressed, he was afflicted, he was brought, he was taken, he was cut off, should not be rendered, and he was put, or placed? It certainly may be so rendered; and I only desire leave to translate here, as the very same word, consisting of exactly the same letters, is now translated properly in 2 Sam. xviii. 9. And Absalom's head caught hold of the oak,' and he was taken up between the heaven and the earth. I presume, that every Christian reader will be agreeably surprised now, at seeing (with this exthe word change) expressed in their regular translation. And he was taken up with wicked men in his death; and with a rich man in his sepulchre. Since the preceding parts of the prophecy speak so indisputably of the sufferings and death of the

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