but the covenant they brake, although God" was an husband unto them," i. e. protected them as an husband does his wife. The covenant that God promised was to be a new covenant, not to be engraven upon tables of stone-not a code and system of laws, but the Gospel, which was to be put "in their inward parts," to be engraven by the sanctifying influence of the Holy Spirit upon the heart. Here is the promise, although faint, of the Third Person in the blessed Trinity, because it is by his assistance, that the heart is impressed by the Gospel. God further promises, that He will be our God, and that we shall be his people that the knowledge of the Lord shall be so diffused, that all shall know Him from the least unto the greatest, which is evidently a prophetic allusion to the spreading of Christianity. And that He will forgive our iniquity, and remember our sin no more;—that it will be no longer necessary to teach every man his neighbour; for they shall be taught by the Holy Ghost. The iniquity of the world could only be pardoned by Jesus Christ dying upon the cross; consequently this prophecy emphatically points to the great atonement, and the kingdom of Christ upon earth. A Mediator stood between offended Deity and guilty man, who obtained for us reconciliation, appeased the wrath of heaven, and obtained for us eternal life, and that Mediator was Christ. In the thirty-fourth verse, there is a plain allusion to the idolatry which obscured the knowledge of God, with an intimation of the pure religion, which should adorn the New Covenant, and a promise of the forgiveness of sins, which was the characteristic of the Redeemer. All then should be fodidaкTOL, taught of God, as the Apostle says; all should be the epistle of Christ,-written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not on tables of stone, but in fleshy tables of the heart. To this prophecy, St. John in his first epistle, appears likewise to allude1; and this state of religious advancement could nowhere exist under the dispensation of the Old Testament. To this also Christ's promise of the Holy Ghost, who should teach His disciples all things, who should guide them into all truth3, has a decided application. In the latter part of the prophecy, the restoration of the kingdom of God is depicted under the figure of the restoration of Jerusalem, in which are many weighty particulars. The extension of Christ's kingdom is pourtrayed by the circumference described by the prophet; and the unholy places, by which the holy city of Jerusalem was surrounded, are here included, and prophetically made holy to the Lord. The hill Gareb, which was in the north-west, was the 1 1 John ii. 20-27. 2 John xiv. 26. 3 John xvi. 3. hill of lepers, according to the law', which ordered such to be placed without the camp 2, and which, after the erection of Jerusalem, was enforced in like manner with respect to the city. Thus Uzziah was obliged to live apart without the city3; and even during the siege of Samaria the ordinance was rigorously maintained. Bearing in mind the foregoing prediction of the forgiveness of sins, and recollecting that leprosy is often used in Biblical idiom for sin, some have not inaptly compared this passage with Rev. xxi. 27; Eph. v. 5; Gal. v. 19—21: accordingly if this view be correct, the prophet shows, that the morally unclean may be purified, and that those who will not be purified by Christ will remain under the same rejection and expulsion, as the lepers under the law. This view is indeed strengthened by the legal purification having been accounted typical of that effected by our Saviour. The hill Goah, which lay on the south-west of the city, has been supposed to have been the place, where malefactors were executed, and to have been an older name of Golgotha. This cannot be proved etymologically, but it is probable from the identity of site; that Golgotha lay without the city we are assured by the following verse:-"Wherefore Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered without Numb. v. 3. 2 Lev. xiii. 46. 3 2 Kings xv. 5. 5 Lev. xiv. 49-53. the gate." These, therefore, with the other places of impure estimation which are mentioned, are predicted to become holy unto the Lord; and the context shows, that this predicted time was the Christian æra; consequently we have here a splendid and minute prophecy of the universality and glory of Christ's kingdom, and of the unbounded mercy, which he dispenses to his people. CHAP. XXXiii. 14-26. LUKE i. 69, 70, &c. Here God renews his pledge of fulfilling his promise to the house of Israel and Judah, concerning the Messiah. This was the promise of Shiloh to the patriarch, of the righteous Branch from the root of Jesse, which we have previously discussed. The prophecy of the 18th verse is, however, distinct from our former subject, and had a threefold fulfilment : the first when, after the Jews returned from Babylon, God permitted the re-erection of the temple, which was a renovation of the priesthood; the second, which was the highest realization of the Levitical Priesthood, when Christ, as the High Priest and Mediator, bore and atoned for the sins of his people; to which the third may be adjoined; since through 1 Heb. xiii. 12. Christ the faithful become priests unto God, and have free access through Him to the Father. The descendants of Levi, after the flesh, are not intended in this prophetical priesthood; the name is used on the principle of accommodation, which we have before explained'. In fact, to understand the passage otherwise, would be to break all connection between it and other passages. When, however, we consult other portions of Scripture, the obvious meaning appears 2; but this prediction is so similar to those on which we have commented, that an extension of our remarks is not required. EZEKIEL. EZEKIEL was contemporary with Jeremiah, and of the priestly order; but, without sufficient reason, supposed to have been Jeremiah's amanuensis. He was carried captive to Babylon by Jehoiachin, king of Judah, 598 years before Christ. He resided near the river Chebar, and began his prophecies in exile seven years before the destruction of Jerusalem; according to some, about the fifth year of his capti 1 Thus in Isaiah lxi. 6, priests and ministers of God, independent of the tribe of Levi, are mentioned; and in Isaiah lxi. 21, God declares his purpose of taking others for Priests and Levites. 2 Consult 1 Pet. ii. 9. Apoc i. 5, 6. v. 10. |