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CHAP.

VII.

Nisan 2,

Lazarus thus an object of intense interest to the people*, became one of no less jealousy to the ruling authorities, the enemies of Jesus. His death was likewise decreed, and the magistracy only awaited a favourable opportunity for the execution of their edicts. But the Sanhedrin is at first obliged to remain in overawed and trembling inactivity. The popular sentiment is so decidedly in favour of Jesus of Nazareth, that they dare not venture to oppose his open, his public, his triumphant procession into the city, or his entrance amid the applauses of the wondering multitude into the Temple itself. On the morning of the second day of the week †, Jesus Monday, is seen, in the face of day, approaching one of the March. gates of the city which looked towards Mount Olivet.+ In avowed conformity to a celebrated prophecy of Zachariah, he appears riding on the yet unbroken colt of an ass; the procession of his followers, as he descends the side of the Mount of Olives, escort him with royal honours, and with acclamations expressive of his title of the Messiah, towards the city: many of them had been witnesses of the resurrection of Lazarus, and no doubt proclaimed, as they advanced, this extraordinary instance of power. They are met § by another band advancing from the city, who receive him with equal homage, strew branches of palm and even their garments in his way; and the Sanhedrin could not but hear within the courts of the Temple,

* John, xii. 9—11.

↑ John, xii. 12.

Matt. xxi. 1-10.; Mark, xi.

1 10.; Luke, xix. 29-40.;
John, xii. 12-19.

John, xii. 18.

CHAP.
VII.

Acclama

Temple.

the appalling proclamation, " Hosannah, blessed is the King of Israel, that cometh in the name of the Lord." Some of the Pharisees, who had mingled with the multitude, remonstrate with Jesus, and command him to silence what to their ears sounded like the profane, the impious adulation of his partisans. Uninterrupted, and only answering that if these were silent, the stones on which he trod would bear witness, Jesus still advances; the acclamations become yet louder; he is hailed as the son of David, the rightful heir of David's kingdom; and the desponding Pharisees, alarmed at the complete mastery over the public mind which he appears to possess, withdraw for the present their fruitless opposition. On the declivity of the hill he pauses to behold the city at his feet, and something of that emotion, which afterwards is expressed with much greater fulness, betrays itself in a few brief and emphatic sentences, expressive of the future miserable destiny of the devoted Jerusalem.*

The whole crowded city is excited by this increasing tumult; anxious inquiries about the cause, and the intelligence that it is the entrance of Jesus of Nazareth into the city, still heighten the universal suspense t; and even in the Temple itself, tions in the where perhaps the religion of the place, or the expectation of some public declaration, or perhaps of some immediate sign of his power, had caused a temporary silence among his older followers, the children prolong the acclamations; and as the sick, the infirm, the afflicted with different maladies, + Matt. xxi. 10, 11. Ibid. 15.

* Luke, xix. 41-44.

VII.

are brought to him to be healed, and are restored at CHAP. once to health or the use of their faculties, at every instance of the power and goodness of Jesus the same uncontrolled acclamations from the younger part of the multitude are renewed with increasing fervour.

Those of the Sanhedrin who are present, though they do not attempt at this immediate juncture to stem the torrent, venture to remonstrate against the disrespect to the sanctity of the Temple, and demand of Jesus to silence, what to their feelings sounded like profane violation of the sacred edifice. Jesus replies, as usual, with an apt quotation from the sacred writings, which declared that even the voices of children and infants might be raised, without reproof, in praise and thanksgiving to God.

Greeks.

Among the multitudes of Jews who assembled at The the Passover, there were usually many proselytes who were called Greeks* (a term in Jewish language of as wide signification as that of barbarians with the Greeks, and including all who were not of Jewish descent). Some of this class, carried away by the general enthusiasm towards Jesus, expressed an anxious desire to be admitted to his presence. It is not improbable that these proselytes might be permitted to advance no further than the division in the outer Court of the Gentiles, where certain palisades were erected, with inscriptions in various languages, prohibiting the entrance

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VII.

CHAP. of all foreigners; or even if they were allowed to pass this barrier, they may have been excluded from the court of Israel, into which Jesus may have passed. By the intervention of two of the Apostles, their desire is made known to Jesus; who, perhaps as he passes back through the outward court, permits them to approach. No doubt as these proselytes shared in the general excitement towards the person of Jesus, so they shared in the general expectation of the immediate, the instantaneous commencement of the splendour, the happiness of the Messiah's kingdom. To their surprise, either in answer to or anticipating their declaration to this effect, instead of enlarging on the glory of that great event, the somewhat ambiguous language of Jesus dwells, at first, on his approaching fate, on the severe trial which awaits the devotion of his followers; yet on the necessity of this humiliation, this dissolution, to his final glory, and to the triumph of his beneficent religion. It rises at length into a devotional address to the Father, to bring immediately to accomplishment all his promises, for the glorification of the Messiah. As he was yet speaking, a rolling sound was heard in the heavens, which the unbelieving part of the multitude heard only as an accidental burst of thunder: to others, however, it seemed an audible, a distinct, or, according to those who adhere to the strict letter, the articulate voice* of an angel, proclaim

*Kuinoël in loco. Some revert to the Jewish superstition of the Bath-Kol, or audible voice from heaven; but the more rational of

the Jews interpret this Bath-Kol as an impression upon the mind, rather than on the outward senses.

VII.

ing the divine sanction to the presage of his future CHAP. glory. Jesus continues his discourse in a tone of profounder mystery, yet evidently declaring the immediate discomfiture of the "Prince of this world," the adversary of the Jewish people and of the human race, his own departure from the world, and the important consequences which were to ensue from that departure. After his death, his religion was to be more attractive than during his life. "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." Among the characteristics of the Messiah which were deeply-rooted in the general belief, was the eternity of his reign; once revealed, he was revealed for ever; once established in their glorious, their paradisiacal state, the people of God, the subjects of the kingdom, were to be liable to no change, no vicissitude. The allusions of Jesus to his departure, clashing with this notion of his perpetual presence, heightened their embarrassment; and, leaving them in this state of mysterious suspense, he withdrew unperceived from the multitude, and retired again with his own chosen disciples to the village of Bethany.

fig tree.

The second morning Jesus returned to Jeru- Cursing salem. A fig-tree stood by the wayside, of that the barren kind well known in Palestine, which during a mild winter preserve their leaves, and with the early spring put forth and ripen their fruit.* Jesus ap

There are three kinds of figs in Palestine: 1. the early fig, which blossoms in March, and ripens its fruit in June; 2. the Kerman, which shows its fruit in June, and

ripens in August; and, 3. the
kind in question. See Kuinoël, in
loco. Pliny.H. N. xvi. 27. Theophr.
3. 6. Shaw's Travels. Matt. xxi.
18, 19.; Mark, xi. 12. 14.

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