Mount Hor (hor-ha-hor). From Mount Hor ye shall point out your border unto the entrance of Hamath; and the goings forth of the border shall be to Zedad. And the border shall go on to Ziphron, and the goings out of it shall be at Hazarenan: this shall be your north border. And ye shall point out your east border from Hazar-enan to Shephan; and the coast shall go down from Shephan to Riblah, on the east side of Ain," * &c.

Again, when all these tribes had dwelt in Canaan till Joshua was old and stricken in years, the land that remained to be possessed was defined, according to the word of the Lord, who had promised it to their fathers; and the definitions of these territories show, as the Lord himself declared, that VERY MUCH LAND pertained by covenanted right to the seed of Jacob, besides that which they inherited in the days of Joshua.†

"This is the land that yet remaineth: all the borders of the Philistines, and all Geshuri, from Sihor, which is before Egypt, even unto the borders of Ekron northward, which is counted to the Canaanite : five lords of the Philistines; the Gazathites, and the Ashdothites, the Eshkalonites, the Gittites, and the Ekronites; also the Avites. From the south, all the land of the Canaanites, and Mearah that is beside the Sidonians, unto Aphek, to the borders of the Amorites: and all the land of the Giblites, and all Lebanon towards the sunrising, from Baal-gad under Mount Hermon, unto the entering into Hamath; all the inhabitants of the hill-country, from Lebanon unto Misrephoth-maim, and all the Sidonians, them will I drive out before the children of Israel; only divide thou it by lot unto the Israelites for an inheritance, as I have commanded thee."‡

But the borders of the land, which was finally and forever to be inherited by the twelve tribes of Israel, were as expressly and explicitly defined, after the last of them had been plucked from off it, and while Judah was captive in Babylon, and Ephraim in Assyria, as they were thus marked out by the word of the Lord to Joshua, when all the seed of Jacob dwelt in Canaan; and when the large portion that remained was divided among them by lot, as if they had held it in actual possession, while yet faithful to the covenant of their God, "the land was subdued before them." Moses, a wanderer in the wilderness, and Ezekiel, an exile † Josh., xiii., 1.

* Numb., xxxiv., 6–11.

+ Ibid., 2-6.

in Chaldea, were alike privileged to record the sure word of a covenant-keeping God, by which the borders of the inheritance are defined, and the perpetuity of the covenant declared; whether, in the one case, its truth had, for the first time, to be tried, or in the other, it seemed to have ceased forever, when all the tribes of Israel were exiled bondsmen, in countries far distant from Jerusalem and Samaria.

“Thus saith the Lord God, This shall be the border whereby ye shall inherit the land according to the twelve tribes of Israel: Joseph shall have two portions. And ye shall inherit it one as well as another; concerning the which I lifted up my hand to give it unto your fathers: and this land shall fall to you for inheritance. And this shall be the border of the land towards the north side, from the great sea, the way of Hethlon, as men go to Zedad; Hamath, Berothah, Sibraim, which is between the border of Damascus and the border of Hamath; Hazar-hatticon, which is by the coast of Hauran. And the border from the sea shall be Hazar-enan, the border of Damascus, and the north northward, and the border of Hamath. And this is the north side. And the east side ye shall measure from Hauran, and from Damascus, and from Gilead, and from the land of Israel by Jordan, from the border unto the east sea. And this is the east side. And the south side southward, from Tamar to the waters of strife in Kadesh, the river to the great sea. And this is the south side southward. The west side also shall be the great sea from the border, till a man come over against Hamath. This is the west side. So shall ye divide this land according to the tribes of Israel. Now these are the names of the tribes. From the north end to the coast of the way of Hethlon, as one goeth to Hamath, Hazar-enan, the border of Damascus northward, to the coast of Hamath (for these are his sides east and west), a portion for Dan. And by the border of Dan, from the east side unto the west side, a portion for Asher,"* &c.

The territory, secured by such charters to Israel, is not undefined, and cannot be forever doubtful. Its peculiar position, in relation to the other kingdoms of the world, as well as its peculiar features, and qualities, or capabilities, as anciently exemplified, or yet more fully to be developed, require to be separately considered; but these scriptural

* Ezek., xlvii., 13–23; xlviii., 1.

records at once attest that its bounds are ample, and that it is a large, as it will also be shown in the sequel that it is a goodly land. The terms of the covenant, were it only man's, are not to be tampered with, nor is their plain significancy to be at all abated. That of the Lord is not to be explained away in any manner that does not give a full meaning to every word of promise it contains. It is not needful, and it is not meet to qualify the words of the Holy One of Israel, whose promises to the fathers cannot fail. His word has its vindication in itself-its infallible certainty in his own Almighty power. He who set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel, at the time when He divided among the nations their inheritance, and separated the sons of Adam, or the whole race of man, fixed such borders of the inheritance of Israel as best befit an everlasting possession, and such as, though questioned or displaced in ages past, shall assuredly be known of all men when the covenant shall be fulfilled, and the whole earth shall be filled with his glory.

From the new and final division among all the tribes of Israel, as described by Ezekiel, whereby they shall inherit the land, concerning the which the Lord lifted up his hand to give it unto their fathers, it is perfectly manifest, as specified in every instance, that the borders of each tribe shall be from the east side unto the west side, or in parallel lines stretching throughout the whole "breadth of Immanuel's land." And thus-in respect to the extreme boundaries, comprehending them all-from the River of Egypt to the River Euphrates, setting the bounds by the Red Sea on the south, and from the River Euphrates to the great sea, or the Mediterranean, on the north, including all Lebanon, and all the hill-country to the entrance into Hamath with the Euphrates on the east, from the border to the east sea, and on the west, from the border to the River of Egypt, and from thence along the Mediterranean coast to the entrance into Hamath, lines have been drawn and borders have been set, which, if looked at with a single eye, might place the land in visible perspective before us, as the Lord espied it for the people whom He created for his glory, and to whom He gave it by an everlasting covenant, which He will yet remember.

Though thus definitely marked, "the promised land" has often been measured by the far narrower bounds which Is

rael of old actually possessed. Error is congenial to error, as truth to truth. While the perpetuity of the covenant concerning the land has been disregarded, the extent of the inheritance has shrivelled into mean dimensions. As if the kingdom were never to be restored to Israel, and the perpetual covenant had ceased forever, many critics and commentators, in dealing with the word that abideth forever, have set themselves to a merely antiquarian task, and have sought rather to fix the borders of the promised land by the limited region which the Israelites occupied of old, than to measure the guarantied inheritance itself by the borders which the Lord of the whole earth assigned it. The borders, as prescribed, can alone rightfully determine what the extent of the land is which they bound and comprehend. They alone fix what the everlasting possession shall be. But they are not to be drawn from their true stations and trans. ported from them, in order to form an imaginary boundary around a temporary and partial possession, which in reality never reached them. The borders must determine the promised land, and not the land, as actually possessed, the borders. The territory solely possessed as their own, by a people faithless to their God, who broke the covenant into which they had entered with Him, does not necessarily form the measure of the whole inheritance promised to their fathers, and which shall be finally bestowed upon their faithful offspring, any more than the short time, according to the plaint of Isaiah, during which they held that portion of it as their own, limited the term of the everlasting covenant of unchangeable Jehovah. The time has not come, and never shall, till the sun and moon be no more, when they shall cease to be a people, and their name and nation fail before the Lord. More numerous than they were when they were rooted out of their father's land, they are still looking in millions to their return. And the sole question here is, not What were the limits of the land anciently occupied by their race? but What is the land, as defined in the Word of God, in its length and in its breadth, concerning which the Lord lifted up his hand to their fathers, as decreed from the beginning, and as it shall yet fall to the twelve tribes of Israel for their inheritance?

The investigation is important, not as limited merely to the illustration of the ancient, though scriptural, history of a rebellious race-for such, save only by a temporary and

often partial suspense, they were-but as pertaining to the immutability of the covenant, and of the words of promise it contains, by which the extent of Israel's inheritance-the gift of God to the patriarchs and to their seed-is defined; and as thereby pertaining, too, to the future history of the world, and to the high destiny of Israel, when the covenant shall, in its full extent, be realized at last, and the large and goodly land, as the Lord himself has set its bounds, shall, according to his everlasting covenant, be their everlasting pos session.

Though often held to be identical, it is abundantly plain that the land possessed by the Israelites in ancient times formed but a portion of the promised inheritance. The covenant was made with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as we have seen, on absolutely unconditional and unrestricted terms. The promises were Yea and Amen. The oath was essentially irrevocable. The arm of the Almighty would finally effectuate all that his hand had been lifted up to avouch to the believing patriarchs. But though He will never draw back his covenant, it must be ever known as that of a holy, as of a faithful God. Before his people entered into Canaan, nay, before they had reached either of the northern points of the Red Sea, by which the bounds of their inheritance were set-though they had passed that sea itself by a miracle as on dry ground-the law was given in thunder, and in lightning, and in fire from Sinai. It was added by reason of transgression long after the promise had been made. The condition of obedience was annexed to the covenant made with the Israelites; and on that depended not only the extent of the inheritance they would occupy, but, save for the forbearance and long-suffering patience of their God, the possession of any part of it, even for a single day. If righteousness had come by the law to sinful man, then the borders of Israel of old might have been identical with the bounds of their inheritance as set down in the covenant. Or if a priesthood, with all its paraphernalia, or, as the Gospel speaks, beggarly elements, could have drawn from bulls and goats blood efficacious for the atonement of sin, the transgressors of Israel might have broken the covenant and have kept the land. But explicit truths of the Old Testament, as well as fundamental doctrines of the New, are overlooked in maintaining that the covenant, even as respects the land, was fulfilled in all its extent to