incontrovertibly uttered in the immediate person of Jehovah. The following clause, "from the time of its being [,] I there," presents a difficulty from the gender of "it" suffixed to the substantive verb. To what does this feminine pronoun refer? I submit to the judgment of the candid critic, that the reference is to the feminine noun understood by

inference from in the preceding clause. This figure in construction occurs not only in the Hebrew Scriptures, but in Greek and Latin authors. Thus the sense will be," from the time that the beginning was, there I was;" exactly answering to the language of the Evangelist, " In the beginning was the Word: -the same was in the beginning with God." That the whole context is in the person of the Messiah, and that it has an ultimate respect to the conversion of the Jews, has been shown by able interpreters.35

34 "Nomen genere discrepans ad intellectum referatur, aut ex textu ipso explicetur ratione antecedentis sententiæ."-Buxtorf. Thesaur. pp. 323–325.—“ An adjective often agrees with the signification, and not with the termination, of a noun; or with a more general term."-Dr. Jones's Lat. Gramm. p. 98; his Greek Gramm. p. 179.

35 Authors cited by Poole in his Synopsis, Calovius, Glassius in his Philol. Sacra, Lib. III. Tr. ii. Can. 13. Prebendary Lowth, Vitringa, &c. Some of the most rational and judicious of the Christian fathers have maintained this interpretation; and that, in the third century, the passage was held to be a prophecy of the Messiah, we have the evidence of Origen. "That the Saviour and the Holy Spirit were sent by the Father for the salvation of men, is manifest by the passage of Isaiah speaking in the person of the Saviour; And now the Lord hath sent me and his Spirit. It must, however, be observed that the expression is ambiguous; whether it should be understood, God sent, and the Holy Spirit also sent, the Saviour; or, as we take it, The Father sent both the Saviour and the Holy Spirit."-Orig. Comment. in Matth. cap. xiii. ap. Opera, ed.

The last word in" and his Spirit," is from its position properly and naturally the accusative.

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Thus, the more closely we examine this text, the more we are led to perceive it to be the declaration of Him whose "hand founded the earth, and his right "hand expanded the heavens," and who is "from the beginning;—but whom the Father set apart, and "sent into the world."36 The mutual illustration of this passage, and many in the New Testament, cannot but rise to the recollection of the serious reader. In prophecy the Messiah declares, "the Lord Jehovah hath sent Me and his Spirit ;" and, when actually sojourning with men,-" I came forth from the "Father, and I have come into the world ;-the "Comforter whom I will send to you from the Father, "the Spirit of truth who proceedeth from the Father, "He shall testify concerning me.'

Dan. ix. 4.

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"And I prayed to Jehovah my God, " and I confessed, and I said, I beseech thee, O Lord [Adonai], the Great and Awful God-&c. 17. And now, hear, O our God, the prayer of thy servant "and his supplications, and cause thy face to shine upon thy sanctuary which is desolate, for the Lord's

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Delarue, tom. iii. p. 595. The Chaldee Targum applies only the last clause to the prophet: "Draw near to my Word, [Memra,] hear this; from the beginning I have not spoken in secret; from the time that the nations were dispersed from the fear of me, there I brought near Abraham your father to my worship. The prophet said, And now the Lord God hath sent me and his Word [Memra].” Calvin has adopted this forced and unnatural parenthesis. J. D. Michaelis is undecided which interpretation to prefer. Seiler and Gesenius adopt the abrupt change of persons, against which the reasons advanced above appear to me to have a decisive weight. 37 John xvi. 28; xv. 26.

36 John x. 36.

[Adonai] sake.-19. O Lord hear, O Lord for'give, O Lord [Adonai, in each instance,] hearken "and do; defer not, for thine own sake, O my "God.-"

There appears to be no just or probable reason that can be given for the clause in v. 17, which introduces Adonai in the terms of personal distinction from the Adonai who is immediately addressed; unless we admit that a conception of such distinction, however imperfect and obscure, was produced in the prophet's mind by the Author of inspiration.

To these passages all those have an undoubted claim to be added, which mention an Angel of Jehovah, to whom they attribute characteristics of divinity; and which have already been considered.

It now remains for the serious and intelligent inquirer to review the matter advanced in this Section, and to consider whether, from the frequent and remarkable use of plural names and attributives in application to the Deity, in the diversity of forms and coincidences which the instances have presented, there does not arise a presumption, to say the least, that these peculiarities in the structure of the Old Testament were intended to communicate and to confirm the notion that a real Plurality, though mysterious and thus revealed in distant glimpses, does

38

3866-Nor would I contend that" [this class of passages]" is to be numbered among the decisive proofs of the doctrine. Still ” [such passages]"supply us with arguments strongly corroborative of it; and, at the same time, the clear revelation of the doctrine in the New Testament not only throws light upon many texts of the Hebrew Scriptures, but such sort of light as to vindicate them from the charge, to which they would otherwise be liable, of extreme darkness and confusion."-Stonard on Zechariah, p. 19.

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exist in the undoubted but not less mysterious Unity of the Divine Essence.

39 Whoever has considered the Simplicity and Spirituality, the Eternity and the Ubiquity, of Deity, and has duly thought upon the questions involved in those doctrines, will not think this intimation improper.

CHAP. V.

RECAPITULATION OF THE PRECEDING CHARACTERS OF THE

MESSIAH.

By a careful and impartial analysis, we have endeavoured to obtain the separate result of each leading part of the Prophetic Testimony to the Person and Character of the then future MESSIAH. Those results must now be placed in a connected review.

A series of prophecies, reaching from the commencement to the close of the ancient dispensations, has exhibited to us a GREAT DELIVERER from evil, originally and repeatedly promised by God,' and perpetually the object of the desire, expectation, and hope of the best and most enlightened men, and of those whom the Deity signalized by miraculous communications of his will, to be by them published as the oracles of his righteousness and grace. In the process of those declarations, this great Personage came to be designated by a preeminent appropriation of the term MESSIAH, to express his excellent qualities and important offices.

From those sources we have learned, that the Messiah was to be a real and proper human being; the descendant of Adam, Abraham, and David;3 in some 1 Gen. iii. 15; xxii. 18, &c. &c.

2 Gen. iii. 15, &c. &c.

3 Gen. xxii. 18. 2 Sam. vii. 19, &c.