in favor of admitting infants to baptism and church membership, but actually engaged in directly opposing the ground on which the practice is defended, and establishing principles which positively exclude it from all place in the kingdom of Christ. ARTICLE III. T. THOLUCK ON THE MESSIANIC PSALMS. TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN. BY THE EDITOR. [We are not prepared to endorse, in all respects, the views of Prof. Tholuck, in respect to the principle of the interpretation of the Messianic Psalms. We have translated the following article, because it contains some general contributions to a sound exegesis, and because it will interest the theological student to know the opinions of so eminent a man. One of his chief errors seems to us to be the latitude which he allows to the scheme of a double sense, and the indefinite manner in which he leaves his views on this point to be applied incautiously by the inexperienced and the unlearned. We question, also, whether he does not encourage a broader use of the typical interpretation than the nature of the case or a sober and accurate application of hermeneutical rules will permit. While we freely acknowledge that there are many types in the Old Testament, and many events of a typical character, we have serious objections to an unwarrantable extension of such an interpretation. It is calculated only to introduce into the exegesis of God's word the errors of a luxuriant fancy, and to make every thing mystical and uncertain. See Ernesti, Part I, chap. 1, § 26. Stuart's Hints on Prophecy, pp. 33-38. TR.] THE prophets of the Old Testament have foretold a period when the spirit of grace and supplication shall be poured upon Israel. Then the people shall be governed by just laws, and inherit the earth forever. The constraints of the former covenant shall be taken away, and the law shall be written in their hearts. All the people of the earth shall join themselves to Zion, and call upon the name of the Lord, and serve him with one consent. David, the servant of God, shall then be restored, in the person of a descendant from his root, and, like the good shepherd, shall feed the people of God. Peace shall reign over the earth; nothing shall hurt or destroy, but every being shall subserve the interests of man. A late interpreter has remarked, it would be inexplicable if a subject so important to the Jewish creed as the prophecy of the Messiah were not in the Psalms. Indeed, the Psalms being lyrical compositions, and expressing the feelings which the faith of the people, as taught by the law and the prophets, was adapted to awaken, it would be strange if the Messiah in whom the prophets believed had not been spoken of in them. This would be still more strange in the case of David, since we know from the last Psalm composed by him which has been preserved (2 Sam. 23), that visions of the future Messiah. animated his hopes, and pervaded his poetry. We quote his words, because they are important to a critical explanation of the Messianic prophecies of the Psalms. 1. "David, the son of Jesse, said, The man who was raised on high said, He who was the sweet Psalmist of Israel;— 2. The Spirit of the Lord spake by me; His word is on my tongue. 3. The Rock of Israel spake to me :- 4. As in the morning light the sun ariseth, Through the clear shining and the rain the earth sends 5. Is not my house thus before God? Hath he not made with me an everlasting covenant- All my salvation and all my desire, does he not cause 6. But the ungodly,-how are they like thorns cast away, 7. He that touches them fills his hand with iron and They are burned on the spot with fire.'"'* From these words, we learn that David was conscious of divine inspiration; and particularly when he spoke of the Messiah. Our Lord affirms that this was the case (Mat. 22: 43) in regard to the 110th Psalm. Moreover, the writers of the psalms generally knew themselves to be under divine influence (Ps. 49: 5, 12: 6). We learn also that the announcement contained in 2 Sam. 7: 12–16, was further unfolded to David, when the impulse of divine inspiration was upon him.† At first, it was the thought of the perpetuity of the regal office in his family, that filled him with gratitude and surprise. "Who am I," said he, with affecting humility, "that thou hast brought me hitherto? And this was yet a small thing in thy sight, O Lord God; but thou hast spoken also of thy servant's house for a great while to come-such is the condition of Luther's translation of verse 3 is erroneous; also the Vulgate, the Syriac, and still more, the LXX. The Targum introduces the Messiah, but less naturally. We agree substantially with Tremellius, de Wette, Fr. von Meyer. Compare also the English version. Ewald (Die prakt. Bücher des A. B., I. S. 100) renders it-" If one rules over men in justice and in the fear of God, it is as when the morning is clear," etc. This destroys the possibility of referring the passage to the Messiah. But verse 5 shows that such a translation is inadmissible. We subjoin the following remarks of Prof. Tholuck, appended to his observations on the twenty-second Psalm,-which contain a fuller expression of his views of the divine inspiration of the sacred writer. This Psalm (the twenty second) is a truly wonderful composition. It is characterized by expressions of deepest suffering, coupled with such a triumphant prediction of events consequent upon the suffering, as David could never have uttered, had he not been raised above himself. But here, as in other psalms, the Spirit of God elevated the writer to a sublime consciousness, by virtue of which he spoke that which was applicable to himself only in a subordinate sense, and which met a complete fulfilment only in his great successor. He heard the waves of death roaring around him; and from the midst of its agonies, he might cherish the hope that the deliverance which he experienced would serve as a consolation to the pious in Israel. But how far his expressions surpass that which his circumstances could have enabled him to utter." A higher Spirit must have come over him, under whose influence he expressed that which was beyond the circle of human view. The descriptions and the hopes set forth had a subordinate truth in respect to his own condition; but they were for the first time properly realized in the Messiah, his antitype. Our Lord himself viewed the Psalm in this light, when at the commencement of his death-agony he used the first words of it; and not without probability is the conjecture of many interpreters, that the Redeemer uttered at the same time the exclamation of wo at the beginning of the psalm and the exclamation of triumph at the end. men?"* Perhaps no other or higher thought entered at that time into the mind of David, than that of a perpetual posterity on the throne of his kingdom. This apprehension of the meaning of the prophecy is expressed in Psalms 89, 30, and 37; and in Ps. 18: 51, he praises God, "who sheweth mercy to his anointed, to David and to his seed, forevermore." But if any one has the history before him, believing at the same time in the connection between the revelations of the Old Testament and of the New, and recognizing the gift of prophecy, to him it is evident that in those words the Spirit of God pointed to him in whom the promise met a complete fulfilment (Luke 1: 32, 33). This may be conceded, even though we should be compelled to suppose that David was unconscious of the deepest meaning of the prophecy communicated to him; as perhaps it was concealed from Peter, till the last moment of his life, what the prophecy of Christ signified in respect to the mode of his death (John 21: 18). The prophets have constantly acknowledged this deeper meaning. "Behold the days come," saith the Lord by Jeremiah, "that I will perform that good thing which I have promised unto the house of Israel and to the house of Judah. In those days and at that time will I cause a righteous Branch to grow up unto David; and he shall rule well, and execute justice and righteousness in the earth. For thus saith the Lord, David shall never want a man to sit upon the throne of the house of Israel." Compare what is said in Is. 11: 1 of the Branch out of the stock of Jesse. It is impossible to deny that the prophets have acknowledged that in a great successor of David, that prophecy should have its ultimate fulfilment. Is it conceivable, then, that this truth should have been hidden from David? If he believed in a Messiah, in a king of Zion, such as he describes in Ps. 2 and 110, whom all the ends of the earth should obey, who should be both king and priest forever, after the order of Melchizedek (Ps. 2: 7; 110: 4), must not the thought have * According to 1 Chron. 17: 17. "This is a high elevation, according to the condition of men." [We submit whether the last clause of ver. 19 is not naturally joined with the close of ver. 18. For a similar separation of clauses naturally belonging together, compare Mark 16: 3,4. For a similar thought, see Ps. 8: 3, 4.-TR.] VOL. XI.-NO. XLIII. 30 arisen in his mind, that the eternal kingdom of his house. pointed to this Branch? Now, if not earlier in his life, David at least acknowledged, that the Messiah whose victories he celebrated in Ps. 2 and 110, should proceed from his stock. In his latest prophecy, which has been quoted, he sees in spirit a ruler in the fear of God proceeding from his house, under whose reign a cloudless sun should arise upon mankind, and the earth should produce abundance of fruit (comp. Ps. 67: 7). The everlasting covenant of God with David ordained this.* All ungodly powers were to vanish away before the triumphant might of his house. These words we are compelled to regard as a clear declaration of David's anticipations of the Messiah. Two psalms of David (Ps. 2, 110) and one of Solomon (Ps. 72) relating to the person of the Messiah, exist in our collection; to the latter the fortyfifth must be added. In order to a proper understanding of these psalms, we must offer the following general observations on their nature and form. If we look among the prophecies for nothing but predictions which were to be fulfilled in the life of Christ, then it is allowed that only some individual passages have met a proper fulfilment. The present Jews seek for passages in the Old Testament which relate to Christ in this sense, and believe themselves justified in maintaining confidently that they are few in number. But we ask, is it reasonable to confine Christ and his kingdom to the brief space of less than three years, during which he was active in his human form upon earth? Rather was not this the beginning, whose completion introduces the glorious future reign of the Messiah? The prophecy extends to Christ in all the successive developments of his character, and to his kingdom in its entire extent, till the final consummation described in 1 Cor. 15: 28; 13: 12; 2 Pet. 3: 13; Rev. 21. If this is understood and admitted, it should be considered further that the prophecies relating to the Messiah and his kingdom are expressed in such a manner as to preclude the possibility * What is said of the ruler might, perhaps, be taken collectively, and applied to the whole house of David. But even then, this prophecy would be an advance upon that in 2 Sam. 7. It would be only to say that David did not perceive the ground of the communication made to him, then nor till the last. |