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he was to accomplish, and the nature and progress of his kingdom; such, again, the prediction of an apostasy within the Christian Church, and the purely prophetic delineation of things to come in Daniel's "scripture of truth," and the apocalypse of St John. In regard to these predictions and others of a similar description, we have simply to do with the omniscience of God in foreseeing, his veracity in declaring, and his overruling providence in directing what should come to pass. But when, on the other hand, the word of prophecy takes the shape, as it so often does, of threatenings of judgment, or promises of good things to come, the prophetic element is not the first and the determinate thing, which must at all events develop itself, but rather that which is secondary and dependent. It always takes for granted a certain frame of mind and course of behaviour on the part of those interested in its declarations; and before we inquire whether the things occurring in experience precisely correspond with those previously announced in the prophecy, there is a primary question to be settled, How does the spiritual condition of the persons interested agree with what is implied or expressed in the prophetic word?

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That this word, in so far as it utters what directly bears on the wellbeing of men, should thus be bound up, for the measure of fulfilment it is to receive, with their spiritual condition, is no expedient devised to meet a difficulty in interpretation. On the contrary, it rests on a principle which is essentially connected

with the nature of God, and is inwoven, we may say, as a ground-element in all the manifestations he has given of himself in Scripture. There, from first to last, all is predominantly of a spiritual or moral, not simply of a natural character; and, in nothing more does the religion of the Bible in its entire course differ from the religions of the world, than in the place it assigns to the principles of righteousness, ever putting these first, and subordinating to them all divine arrangements and purposes. The evil and the good here are no mere nature-processes, but results growing out of the eternal distinctions, which are rooted in the character of God, between sin and holiness. It was the grand error of the Jews in ancient times to forget this. Surrounded on every hand by the foul atmosphere of heathenism, which was just the deification of nature, they were too prone to feel as if they held their portion of good on merely natural grounds; they thought their lineal descent from Abrahám alone secured them in what was promised, and thus came practically to disregard God's threatenings on account of sin, and to convert his promises into absolute and unconditional titles to blessing. For them a most pernicious and fatal mistake in experience, as it must also be for us in interpretation, if we should fall in any degree into their error! We want the key to a right interpretation at once of God's threatenings and of his promises, unless we see them in the mirror of his own pure righteousness; and we shall unquestionably misunderstand both him and them, if we suppose that

even when he most severely threatens, he can smite the truly repentant sinner or people, or that he can continue to bless the children of promise when they harden their heart against reproof, however expressly and copiously he may have promised to bless.*

* See a fuller development of the principle of interpretation brought out in this chapter in the Supplementary Remarks.

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CHAPTER VIII.

THE DISPLEASURE OF JONAH AT THE PRESERVATION OF

NINEVEH.

FROM the effect produced on the mind of God by the repentance of Nineveh toward him, we now pass to the effect produced on the mind of Jonah by the repentance of God toward Nineveh. This at first sight appears strange, so strange as to seem almost inexplicable in a man who had passed through such singular experiences, and had been so peculiarly honoured in his work. "But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry (or rather, he was very much grieved or vexed *). And he prayed unto the Lord, and said, I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish; for I knew that thou art a

* This is evidently the affection meant to be noted here. The word in the original properly denotes being hot, usually hot with anger; but as a person may be hot with grief or vexation as well as anger, the expression is used also of this. So, for example, of David in 2 Sam. vi. 8, where David is said to have been displeased (hot) at the breach God had made on Uzzah; the meaning plainly is that he was distressed and grieved.

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gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil. Therefore now, O Lord, take, I beseech thee, my life from me; for it is better for me to die than to live. the Lord said, Doest thou well to be angry?" marginal reading here is nearer the proper meaning, but it should be, as the Septuagint correctly renders it, Art thou very much grieved? *

The

* The rendering of the expression here, and in the other verses where it occurs, given in the authorized version, Doest thou well to be angry? has been an unhappy error, as it has tended greatly to countenance and keep up the mistaken view that has prevailed regarding Jonah's character. As the words stand in the original, they form a sort of phrase, or idiomatic turn of expression, and every one knows, that what seems to be a literal translation of such modes of speech, will often be very far from a correct representation of the meaning. For example, the expression, "He is at great pains to improve his mind," would perhaps be very naturally turned by a German or an Italian into words which signified, that the person meant put himself to severe agony to secure his improvement; yet a less literal rendering would give a much correcter idea of the meaning. So here. The Greek translator of the Septuagint, by much the oldest version of Old Testament Scripture, perfectly understood the expression, and expressed it well by words answering to those given above, Art thou very much grieved? The Syriac expresses the same meaning, and so also the learned Jew, Kimchi, who adds, "As for so, it imports the strengthening of a subject;" . e., merely denotes here that the grief or vexation was very great. Henderson, in his work on the Minor Prophets, properly renders it, "Art thou much vexed?" though he still fails to take a just estimate of the character and feelings of Jonah. The mistake, so often repeated in the versions, arose from not adverting to the use of the infinite absol. of the Hebrew verb so, which is often taken as an adverb, and can then only be rendered by very much, greatly, or exceedingly. See the Lexicons.

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