1 Chron. 20. all power is given both in heaven and earth. Beside these offerings and intercedings, there was something more required of the priest, and that is, blessing. Aaron was separated, that he should sanctify the most holy things, he and his sons for ever, to burn incense before the Lord, to minister unto him, and to bless in his name for ever. We read of no other sacerdotal act performed by Melchizedek the priest of the most high God, but only that of blessing, and that in respect both of God and Gen. xiv. 19, man: First, he blessed man, and said, Blessed be Abram of the most high God, possessor of heaven and earth: then, Blessed be the most high God, which hath delivered thine enemies into thine hand. Now it is observable what the Rabbins have delivered, that at the morning sacrifice the priests under the law did bless the people with the solemn form of benediction, but at the evening sacrifice they blessed them not; to shew that in the evening of the world, the last days, which are the days of the Messias, the benediction of the law should cease, and the blessing of the Christ take place. When Zachariah the priest, the father of John Baptist the forerunner of our Saviour, executed his office before God in the order of his course, and the whole multitude of the people waited for him to reLuke L. 8, 21, ceive his benediction, he could not speak unto them, for he was dumb; shewing the power of benediction was now passing to another and far greater priest, even to Jesus, whose doctrine in the mount begins with Blessed; who, when he left his Luke xxiv. disciples, lift up his hands, and blessed them. And yet this function is principally performed after his resurrection, as it is Acts iii. 26. written, Unto you first, God, having raised up his Son Jesus, sent him to bless you, in turning every one of you from his iniquities. It cannot then be denied that Jesus, who offered up himself a most perfect sacrifice and oblation for sin, who still maketh continual intercession for us, who was raised from the dead, that he might bless us with an everlasting benediction, is a most true and most perfect priest. 22 50. Psal. ii. 6. Isai. ix. 6. The third office belonging to the Messias was the regal, as appeareth by the most ancient tradition of the Jews1, and by the express predictions of the prophets. Yet have I set my king, saith the psalmist, upon my holy hill of Sion. Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government 1 For the Chaldee paraphrase, in the most places where it mentioneth the Messias, doth it with the addition .מלכא משיחא,of King 4, 5. shall be upon his shoulder, saith the prophet Isaiah, who calleth him the Prince of peace, shewing the perpetuity of his power, and particularly of his seat. Of the increase of his Isai. ix. 7. government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgement and with justice, from henceforth even for ever. All which most certainly belongs unto our Jesus, by the unerring interpretation of the angel Gabriel, who promised the blessed virgin that the Lord God should give unto her son the Luke i 32, 33. throne of his father David, and he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever, and of his kingdom there shall be no end. He acknowledgeth himself this office, though by a strange and unlikely representation of it, the riding on an ass; but by that it was fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, Tell ye Matt. xxi the daughter of Sion, Behold, thy King cometh unto thee, meek, and sitting on an ass. He made as strange a confession of it unto Pilate; for when he said unto him, Art thou a king, John xviii. then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. The solemn inauguration into this office was at his ascension into heaven, and his session at the right hand of God: not but that he was by right a king before, but the full and public execution was de97 ferred till then, when God raised him from the dead, and set Eph. i. 20. 21. him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion. Then he, whose name is called the Word of God, had on his vesture Rev. xix. 13, and on his thigh a name written, King of kings, and Lord of lords. This regal office of our Saviour consisteth partly in the ruling, protecting, and rewarding of his people; partly in the coercing, condemning, and destroying of his enemies. First, he ruleth in his own people, by delivering them a law by which they walk: by furnishing them with his grace, by which they are enabled to walk in it. Secondly, he protecteth the same, by helping them to subdue their lusts, which reign in their mortal bodies; by preserving them from the temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil; by supporting them in all their afflictions; by delivering them from all their enemies. Thirdly, whom he thus rules and protects here, he rewards hereafter in a most royal manner, 37. 16. Rev. i. 6. making them kings and priests unto God and his Father. On the contrary, he sheweth his regal dominion in the destruction of his enemies, whether they were temporal or spiritual enemies. Temporal, as the Jews and Romans, who joined together in his crucifixion. While he was on earth he told his Matt. xvi. 28. disciples, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom: and in that kingdom he was then seen to come, when he brought utter destruction on the Jews by the Roman armies, not long after to be destroyed themselves. But beside these visible enemies, there are other spiritual, those which hinder the bringing in of his own people into his Father's kingdom, those which refuse to be subject unto him, and consequently deny him to be their king; as all wicked and ungodly men, Luke xix. 27. of whom he hath said, These mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me. Thus sin, Satan, and death, being the enemies to his kingdom, shall all be destroyed in their order. For he must reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet and the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. Thus is our Jesus become the Prince of the kings of the earth; thus is the Lamb acknowledged to be Lord of lords and King of kings. 1 Cor. xv. Rev. i. 5. Rev. xvii. 14. Natüre ་་ Wherefore, seeing we have already shewed that the prophetical, sacerdotal, and regal offices were to belong unto the promised Messias, as the proper end and immediate effect of his unction; seeing we have likewise declared how Jesus was anointed to these offices, and hath, and doth actually perform the same in all the functions belonging to them: there remaineth nothing for the full explication of this particular concerning the Christ, but only to shew the manner of this unction, which is very necessary to be explained. For how they were anointed under the law, who were the types of the Messias, is plain and evident, because the manner was prescribed, and the materials were visible: God appointed an oil to be made, and appropriated it to that use; and the pouring that oil upon the body of any person was his anointing to that office for which he was designed. But being that oil so appropriated to this use was lost many hundred years before our Saviour's birth, being the custom of anointing in this manner had a long time ceased, being howsoever we never read that Jesus was at all anointed with oil; it remaineth still worthy our inquiry, how he was anointed, so as to answer to the former unctions; and what it was which answered to that oil, which then was lost, and was at the first but as a type of this which now we search for. The Jews' tell us, that the anointing oil was hid in the 98 days of Josiah, and that it shall be found and produced again when the Messias comes, that he may be anointed with it, and the kings and high-priests of his days. But though the loss of that oil bespake the destruction of that nation, yet the Christ which was to come needed no such unction for his consecration; there being as great a difference between the typical and correspondent oil, as between the representing and represented Christ. The prophet David calleth it not by the vulgar name of oil of unction, but the oil of gladness. Psal. xlv. 7. For though that place may in the first sense be understood of Solomon, whom when Zadoc the priest anointed, They blew 1 Kings i. 39, the trumpet, and all the people said, God save king Solomon. And all the people came up after him, and the people piped with pipes, and rejoiced with great joy, so that the earth rent with the sound of them; though from thence it might be said of him, Thy God hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness Psal. xlv. 7. above thy fellows: yet being those words are spoken unto God, as well as of God, (therefore God, thy God) the oil with which that God is anointed must, in the ultimate and highest 40. בימות המשיח עתיד הקב"ה להחזיר לעמו אותי שמן המשחה שעשה משה שנגנז עם הארון ובו ימשחו המלכים והכהנים הגדולים In the days of the Messias בימים ההם: God will restore unto his people the oil of unction which Moses made, which was hidden with the Ark; and the kings and high-priests shall be anointed with it in those days. Abarbanel Comment. ad 30 Exodi. [v. 22. sqq. art. 13. f. 7 a. col. 2.] Now the loss of that oil, which they call the hiding of it, may well be thought to foretell the period of the Mosaical administration, being they confess that after that they never had any priests anointed, because they had no power to make the same oil. So plainly confesseth the same Abarbanel [Ibid. לא היה כהן משוח בבית :[2 .f. 6 b. col שני לפי שכבר היה כנכו שמן המשחה שננזו 2 'Duas personas, ejus qui unctus est Dei, et qui unxit, intellige. Unde et Aquila Eloim on verbum Hebraicum non nominativo casu, sed vocativo, interpretatur, dicens Océ: et nos propter intelligentiam Dee posuimus, quod Latina lingua non recipit, ne quis perverse putet Deum dilecti et amantissimi et Regis bis Patrem nominari.' S. Hieron. Epist. 140 [Ep. 65. § 13. vol. 1. p. 382 E.] 'Quod sequitur, Unxit te, Deus, Deus tuus, primum nomen Dei vocativo casu intelligendum est, sequens nominativo; quod satis miror cur Aquila non, ut cœperat in primo versiculo, vocativo casu interpretatus sit, sed nominativo, bis nominans Deum, qui supradictum unxerit Deum.' Idem. Ibid. [p. 383 E.] 1 Acts x. 38. Luke i. 35. sense, signify a far greater gladness than that at Solomon's coronation was, even the fountain of all joy and felicity in the Church of God. The ancients' tell us that this oil is the Divinity itself, and in the language of the Scriptures it is the Holy Ghost. St Peter teacheth us, how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost, and with power. Now though there can be no question but the Spirit is the oil, yet there is some doubt, when Jesus was anointed with it. For we know the angel said unto the blessed Virgin, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. From whence it appeareth, that from the conception, or at the incarnation, Jesus was sanctified by the Holy Ghost, and the power of the Highest; and so consequently, as St Peter spake, he was anointed then with the Holy Ghost, and with power'. Again, being we read that Matt. iii. 16. after he was thirty years of age, the Spirit like a dove descended and lighted upon him; and he, descending in the power of the Spirit into Galilee, said unto them of Nazareth, Luke iv. 14, This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears, (meaning that of Isaiah,) The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel; hence hath it been also 21. Isai. Ixi. 1 1 So Gregory Nazianzenus expounds the place: Ὃν ἔχρισεν ἔλαιον ἀγαλλιάσεως παρὰ τοὺς μετόχους αὐτοῦ, χρίσας τὴν ἀνθρωπότητα τῇ θεότητι, ὥστε ποιῆσαι τὰ ἀμφότερα ἕν. [Orat. 10. § 4. Vol. I. p. 241 B.] And again: Χριστὸς δὲ, διὰ τὴν θεότητα· (not that his Divinity was anointed, or Christ anointed in respect of his Divinity; but that he was anointed in his Humanity by his Divinity) χρίσις γὰρ αὕτη τῆς ἀνθρωπότητος, οὐκ ἐνεργείᾳ κατὰ τοὺς ἄλλους χριστοὺς ἁγιάζουσα, παρουσίᾳ δὲ ὅλου τοῦ χρίοντος ἧς ἔργον, ἄνθρωπον ἀκοῦσαι τὸ χρίον, καὶ ποιῆσαι θεὸν τὸ χριόμενον. Οrat. 2. de Filio [Orat. 30. § 21. Vol. 1. p. 555 D.] * Χριστὸς ἐχρίσθη ὡς βασιλεὺς καὶ ἱερεὺς τῷ χρίσματι τῆς σαρκώσεως. Germanus Constant. [Rer. Eccl. Con templ. Migne, Patrol. Gr. xcviii. 384 c.] Κεχρίσθαι γὰρ οὐχ ἑτέρως φαμὲν τὸν υἱόν, ἢ ὅτι κατὰ σάρκα γενόμενον, δηλονότι καθ ̓ ἡμᾶς, καὶ ἐναν θρωπήσαντα. Titus Bostrens. [ad Luc. iv. 18. p. 783 в.] 'Deus est qui ungit, et Deus qui secundum carnem ungitur Dei Filius. Denique quos habet unctionis suæ Christus nisi in carne consortes? Vides igitur, quia Deus a Deo unctus, sed in assumptione naturæ unctus humanæ Dei Filius designatur.' S. Ambros. de Fide. 1. i. c. 3. [§ 24. Vol. II. p. 448 D.] 'Hæc omnia carni conveniunt, cui piissimum et gloriosissimum Verbum unitum est pro salute cunctorum.' Cassiodorus in Psal. xliv. 9. *This is not a genuine work of Titus Bostrensis, and must be of a considerably later date. See Ceillier IV. 313. |