that promise, this his seed was to be "called," and who as yet had no offspring! And what will he now do, now that the same Word which gave the promise seems to retract it? Will he retract his faith, and give up his first hope? No: this were to make God untrue; and yet he goes forward without hesitation, and does not even expostulate. He asks no questions, because he sees no difficulty. But how this? What is faith's reasoning here, by which he is still enabled to hold fast by the Word of God? The Apostle again gives the explanation, and a very easy one to that faith which believes that "with God nothing is impossible:"-" By faith [he says, Heb., xi. 17] Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac; and he that had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, of whom it was said, In Isaac shall thy seed be called: accounting that God was able to raise him up even from the dead; from whence also he received him in a figure." In other words, he believed that after he had slain him the Lord would restore him to life, and make good His original promise.

Here again, indeed, is great faith: but again, it is to be observed, it is faith in resurrection; and in this again is Isaac specially the type of Christ,-that after he has been thus "in figure" raised from the dead, he becomes the father of the promised seed. And again is Abraham pronounced "justified" by this act (James, ii. 21): not, however, then first, for the Scripture quoted as then fulfilled,-" Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness," is found in Gen. xv. 6, in relation to his faith in the promise of a seed before Isaac was born. But his faith was hereby evidenced and proved; and it was the faith that justifies, because, again, analogous to the faith in Christ risen: a striking confirmation (this faith in both instances of it) of the fact established by the other promise of the Abrahamic covenant-the promise of the Land-that the resur

rection was not only remotely implied in it, but the very basis of it; and apprehended accordingly by Abraham and the patriarchs. (See the preceding Lecture.)

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The way in which Mede arrives at the conclusion here stated is an illustration of the process by which a fulfilment is made for a prophecy from the event, and at the same time shows that the theory of a tribal sceptre was resorted to only because the more obvious and natural sense was deemed to want the confirmation of history. Having shown that the ancient Jews understood the prophecy to relate to the Messiah, he says:

"Thus we and the ancient Jews agree about the aim and purpose of this Scripture. But we Christians believe further that it is long since fulfilled, although in regard to the exact point of time when this sceptre departed from Judah, we vary in our opinions.

Some will have it to have been when Pompey first brought the Jewish state under the Roman subjection. But against this it is objected: first, that it anticipates the time of Christ's birth too much, being sixty years before it; secondly, that it might as well be affirmed that the sceptre departed from Judah when Nebuchadnezzar carried them captive to Babylon, or when they were subject to the Persian or Greek monarchies.

"Others make it a little after; when Herod, an Idumæan stranger, yet formerly incorporated into the Jewish state and blood, was by the Romans invested to be their king, and the Asmonæan or Maccabæan race (which till then had borne the chief rule) was by him extinguished. Against this also lies the exception that it was too early, being thirty years and more before the birth of Christ, and more than twice as much before His Passion and Ascension, at which time he began his kingdom. Secondly, it is objected that under the reign of Herod the sceptre of Judah might seem rather to be advanced than departed, forasmuch as they then had a king of their own reigning over them; and though

not of Jewish origin, yet was he a proselyte, and so one of their own body. And if the sceptre were departed from Judah because one not of their own tribe had the sovereign rule over them, why was it not departed all the time the Asmonæan or Maccabæan families, who were Levites, reigned? No man would say that the sceptre was departed from Poland though the Polanders should choose a Swede, a German, or Frenchman, for their king; so neither from Judah though a Levite or Idumæan proselyte were their prince.

"Others think it not to have been till the final dissolution of the Jewish state by Titus.

destruction and

Against this it

is excepted that it is as much too long after either the Nativity or the Passion of Christ as the other two were before it; to wit, seventy years after the one, and nearly forty after the other."(Works, ut supra.)

Yet he afterwards decides for the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus; because this date embraces, together with the departure of the sceptre, or "Judah's ceasing to be any more a commonwealth," the gathering of the nations to Shiloh, which he deems to have been fulfilled in the "conversion of the Gentiles to the obedience of Christ which had then taken place."

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This prophecy of Balaam is particularly worthy of attention in connexion with the position, which it is the design in these Lectures to establish, as to the subject and scope of the early prophecies of a Redeemer, among which it would be expected to have had a place in this series. But the number of the Lectures is limited, and so remarkable a prophecy could not be properly treated in a Note. Besides, I had been led to notice it in a work recently published, where both the partial fulfilment of it at the first advent of the Saviour, and its ulterior reference to the Second, are pointed out" Discourses on the Life of Christ" (No. III., "On the Epiphany"): in confirmation of the first of which applica

tions Bishop Newton observes:-" The Christian fathers, I think, are unanimous in applying this prophecy to our Saviour and to the Star which appeared at His Nativity. Origen, in particular, saith that in the Law there are many typical and enigmatical references to the Messiah; but he produceth this as one of the plainest and clearest of prophecies. And both Origen and Eusebius affirm that it was in consequence of Balaam's prophecies, which were known in the East, that the Magi, upon the appearance of a new star, came to Jerusalem to worship Him who was born King of the Jews" (Origen, Contr. Cels., 1. 1, § 60; In Numeros Hom., 13, §7; Eusebii, Demonstrat. Evangel., 1. 9, § 1).

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This point has been noticed by Hengstenberg in his Christology of the Old Testament," who, in the section on this prophecy, says,—

"The meaning of this language, according to most of the interpreters, is, that the tribe of Judah should not cease to subsist as a people, and have a government of their own, until the Messiah came; that then, however, it should lose its dominion; which, they say, was fulfilled soon after the coming of Christ, by the destruction of Jerusalem.

"We, however, believe the following to be its true meaning: Judah shall not cease to exist as a tribe, nor lose its superiority, until it shall be exalted to higher honour and glory through the great Redeemer who shall spring from it, and whom not only the Jews, but all the nations of the earth, shall obey."

And, having shown that this exposition of the passage is liable to no philological difficulty, inasmuch as the word "till" does not always imply cessation, but not unfrequently up to and thenceforth-in illustration of which he quotes the observation of Abenezra, "Non est sensus verborum sceptrum esse recessurum cum venerit Schiloh; sed hæc locutio

similis est ei, Gen. xxviii. 15, Non deseram te usque dum fecero quod locutus sum tibi,' quod, nempe, velim te reducere in hanc terram; i. e. multo minus te reductum in terram deseram: similiter dicitur, Non auferetur sceptrum de Jehudah donec veniat Schiloh, i. e. numquam auferetur sceptrum de Jehudah, multo minus quum venerit Schiloh'-he adds,

"What especially determines us to prefer the above explanation to the other, which is generally received, is, that the future termination of the dominion of his tribe, which, according to the latter explanation, is here foretold, does not at all accord with the joyful nature of the remaining part of this address to Judah. Besides, it would seem too early to announce already the future rejection of Judah; and such an interpretation could not be admitted unless no other could on good ground be established."

Yet this author afterwards asserts that "the fulfilment". of the prediction "that through the Messiah the tribe of Judah should extend its dominion over many nations,"-is shown in Matt. i. 1-16 (the genealogy which merely proves that Christ is descended from Judah); and repudiates the idea of the return of the Jews to their land, and of the restoration of the kingdom to Israel, as, in the most express and unequivocal prophecies of it, only imagery of what Christ should accomplish for His covenant-people, furnished by the history of the redemption from Egypt, the Theocracy, or the reign of David: notwithstanding the evidence to the contrary from the literal accomplishment of every prophecy that has been already fulfilled. (See, for example, his comment in the same work on Isa. xi.)

For though that kingdom, and the rule of Judah's sceptre, as also of David's throne, be now suspended, this (to use an argument of his own) as little disproves the truth of the predictions of its continuance or permanence than "the temporary cessation of the national subsistence during the