Ezekiel
The Temple, City, and Land
In reading the description of the tabernacle in Exodus, or the temple in Chronicles, we never think of putting the question, Is all this literal? The words are so plain, the description so minute, the whole aspect so entirely historical, that no doubt can find entrance as to the literality of the whole. We do not feel at liberty to ask “can this be literal — might it not be all spiritual?”
It is in this very way that many feel in reading the last nine chapters of Ezekiel. Every thing about them wears the same aspect of literality and simple narrative as in Exodus or Chronicles, — so much so that many interpreters have contended for the descriptions being applied to the second temple; so unfigurative does the whole appear, so hard to spiritualize, and so like a picture of a real temple, a real land, and a real city. ‘
This seems to have struck Robert Hall; for in one of his sermons he gives us a remark which shows how he was perplexed by the spiritualizing expositions, and how he seems to have felt something like a necessity for falling back upon a more natural and simple meaning. “The latter chapters of Hzekiel, describing the erection of a certain temple, are involved in so much obscurity that it seems difficult to arrive at any determinate conclusion respecting the import of this mysterious prophecy. It is certain that the attempt to spuritualize it produces little beyond perplexity and confusion; nor have we any example in Scripture of an allegory so perfectly dark and enigmatic, as it must be confessed to be, on that supposition.”*
It may be well to notice also, that several writers, who have no sympathy with millennarianism, seem to take for granted that some such literal temple will yet be erected in the land of Israel in the latter day. Faber speaks about a future temple, though he enters into no particulars. “The utmost, I think,” says he, “that can be supposed respecting Christ’s second advent, is, that during the millennian period there may possibly shine’ forth, as of old, the glory of the Shekinah, in the tem-” ple of the restored and converted Jews at Jerusalem.y
* Works, vol. iv. p. 405.
+ Sacred Calendar, vol. iii. p. 475.
Petto remarks, ‘‘ Now will Ezekiel’s city and temple be erected, the glory of which will be, that the name of it, from that day, will be Jehovah Shammah, the Lord is there.”* And Bryce Johnstone, though he does not touch upon the temple, yet assumes that the two last chapters are literal, remarking that “the way in which it shall be divided among, and possessed by, the twelve tribes, after their restoration to their own land, is marked in the book of Ezekiel, chapter xlviii, in a most minute prediction.”+ Fleming’s language also is very strong. He is no millennarian, yet he expresses himself as strongly upon the future supremacy of Israel as any millennarian has done: “TI look upon the millennary state to be the most eminent and illustrious time of the Christocracy (1 hope none will reject the word, seeing it is so expressive of the thing), wherein Christ will revive, but ina more spiritual and excellent way, the ancient Theocracy of the Jews. For as under Moses, &c., God acted as King of the Jews, so I do expect that, after God has delivered his church from spiritual Egypt, and destroyed his enemies in the red sea of their own blood, he will once more exert his power and authority, and our blessed Redeemer will reign as King of his people, not, indeed, in such a
pompous way as among the Jews of old, but in a way
* Works, p. 136. + Sermons, p. 361.
adapted to the New Testament dispensation, and more immediately preparative unto, and typical of, the state of glory in heaven after the day of judgment
is over,” *
* Rise and Fall of Popery, pp. 71, 72. Whether Bishop Butler were a millennarian or not I shall not undertake to say, though his biographer (Bartlett) seems to think it needful to attempt to clear him from the charge. But he writes thus respecting Israel: — ‘‘ Things of this kind naturally turn the thoughts of serious men towards the full completion of the prophetic history concerning the final restoration of that people, concerning the establishment of the everlasting kingdom among them, the kingdom of the Messiah; and the future state of the world wnder this sacred government.” (Analogy, part il. ch. 7.) Take this in connection with another passage : — “It (Scripture) seems to contain some very general account of the chief governments of the world from the first transgression to a certain future period, spoken of both in the Old and New Testament very distinctly, and in a great variety of expression, the tames of the restitution of all things, Acts iii, 21.; when the mystery of God shall be finished, Rev. x. 7; when the God of heaven shall set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed, Dan. ii. 44, and the kingdom shall not be left to other people as it is represented to be during this apostacy, but judgment shall be given to the saints, Dan, vii. 22, and they shall reign, Rev. xx. 6; and the kingdom and dominion shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High, Dan. vii. 27.” (1d. part ii. ch. 7.) Then connect with this the following sentence from a letter of the Bishop to Dr Hare, — “Since they (members of the future kingdom of Christ), are not already invested with that degree of glory that will be communicated to them, they could not, under the notion of members of that kingdom, claim any earthly dominion, before the gloroous reign of Christ shall commence, when they shall indeed reign with him upon the earth. (See Bartlett’s Memoirs of Bishop Butler, Pp: 298.)! ‘
-’ I make these remarks, in order to show Mr Brown that his very strong censures upon us for our literal exposition of the passage, are not wholly deserved by us, but in a measure also by some of his own party. They did not feel that it was so easy to set aside the literal, and adopt the spiritual, as Mr B. thinks. They hesitated — doubted — and then came to the conclusion, that the literal is more likely to be the true meaning than the other. They were staggered by the singular and careful minuteness of the prediction. They did not venture to pronounce the literal impossible, and at all hazards to be abandoned.
It is the utter impossibility of the literal meaning that is so strongly urged against us, so much so that at times we can hardly get a hearing upon the point. It is looked upon as a case already adjudicated upon, and decided against us upon this preliminary point. In answer to this, I just urge the counterpart affirmation, as to the utter empossibility of a figurative ex position. Many have tried it, but utterly failed. Ness, in addition to his interpretation, gives us an appendix containing some eight or nine reasons against its literality.* Greenhill, Diodati, the Dutch annotators, Scott, ce.
* Ness’s “History and Mystery of the Old Testament,” a curious work in four thin folios, to which Matthew Henry is very largely indebted. See in loc.
have all tried it; but the incongruities, the contradictions, the puerilities, with which their comments are filled, are quite enough to show the utter vanity of such attempts to spiritualize. I do not cite any passages from all these, for this would not give one a fair idea of the whole; but let any reader peruse these continuously, and say what he has gathered from the perusal. Before he has reached the end of the first chapter he will feel the perplexity of which Robert Hall speaks, and before he has got half way, he will be convinced that the spiritualization of the chapters is a far greater difficulty than anti-millennarian writers are disposed to allow.
From the minuteness of the description of the temple as intimating perfection, many writers have argued in favour of its reference to the church under the gospel; yet it is singular that others have drawn the same conclusion as to the two last chapters of the Apocalypse, because it is there said, there was no temple in the New Jerusalem! On the one hand, it is affirmed that Hzekiel must be predicting gospel times, because he has so fully described a perfect temple; on the other hand, it is inferred that John is pointing to gospel times, because he tells us that there was no temple at all.
It is affirmed, that there is no more difficulty in allegorizing Ezekiel than the Song of Solomon, and that if we do the latter, why not the former? I answer, that there is a very wide difference between these two cases. In the Song we can go minutely to work, verse by verse, and find an appropriate meaning throughout. In each verse, we can trace the expression of some precise feeling, — some new phase in the varying circumstances of the saint or the church, — some new joy, or some new sorrow, — some bright hope, or some sad fear, — of each one of which, the special word or figure is the exact and suitable utterance. One might preach upon the Song verse by verse, with a whole sermon upon each, yet fall into no monotony. Is it so with Ezekiel? No. The whole nine chapters contain but one idea, — and all go to make up but one figure, viz. the perfection of the church under the gospel!! This one idea is to be gathered from the symmetry of the whole; for the individual parts do not admit of being spiritualised, either by verses or chapters! Take for instance the following verses: “And it shall come to pass, that when they enter in at the gates of the inner court, they shall be clothed with linen garments; and no wool shall come upon them while they minister in the gates of the inner court and within; they shall have linen bonnets upon their
heads, and shall have linen breeches upon their loins; they shall not gird themselves with any thing that causeth sweat ;* and when they go forth into the outer court, even into the utter court and to the people, they shall put off their garments wherein they ministered, and lay them in the holy chambers;t and they shall put on other garments, and they shall not sanctify the people with their garments; neither shall they shave their heads, nor suffer their locks to grow, they shall only poll their heads; neither shall they take for their wives a widow, nor her that is put away,” &c., (chap. xliv. 17-22.) Ijust ask, if these be not the literal regulations of a future temple, what are they? What allegory can you fasten upon these words? How can you expound either one clause, or the whole of them together? Mr Brown, in denying so strongly the literal, and asserting the allegorical, should have given us a specimen of how this is to be done. Suppose a minister were preaching upon these words, what could he draw out of them? I do not remember to have heard
* «This the Dutch annotators suppose to be a representation of the heedfulness and purity of the heart, which ought to be in the ministers of God’s church in the performance of their ministry!” — See en loc.
+ “As if God would thereby forbid his ministers to carry on hypocritical show of holiness before the congregation, and, on the contrary, would command them to be familiar with and among their brethren!” — Dutch Annot. in loc.
+ “Signifying honesty, modesty, and sobriety in life and conversation.” — Dutch Annot.
any one even attempting to lecture through these nine chapters of Ezekiel, verse by verse, upon the allegorical scheme. If the principle of their exposition was the same as in Canticles, how is it that Canticles is so oiten resorted to for texts, Ezekiel almost never, save by literalists? -
The Song of Solomon contains in itself the palpable intimations of its being an allegory; Hzekiel contains no such intimations; nay, the more one reads it, the more one feels the utter impossibility of making this temple an allegory. Take it literally, and all is plain, — take it allegorically, and all is dark as midnight, Take it literally, and it is all simplicity in its details, — take it allegorically, and all becomes a labyrinth of entanglement and confusion. Every expositor who has tried to allegorize it, has given evidence of the truth of this averment.*
Besides, granting that the temple is an allegory, I ask, “Of what is it an allegory?” Some say generally, “Of gospel times.” A temple an allegory of gospel times! A temple so perfect, that its perfection is the
very reason of its being allegorized, the figure of a
* «Tt is not easy to conceive why directions so minute, should be given, but in order to a real literal building. For surely no certain allegorical sense can be given of each, and to make them all only as ornaments of a parable, is loading it with ornaments beyond measure.” Archbishop Secker’s Dissertation,
206: A LITERAL BASIS.
times so imperfect, so changeable, so sad! Others say, it is “An allegory of Christianity.” A temple an allegory of Christianity! In what respects? Read over but one chapter, and see if you can expound it of Christianity. What part of Scripture gives authority for making a temple a figure of Christianity? Others say, it is “an allegory of the church since Christ came.” But what authority is there for this? The whole Church of God is indeed his temple, but how does this prove that a fragment of it during a certain number of ages is so? Especially, how can so perfect a temple represent a church so imperfect, so broken, as the church of God on earth has been, and will be until Jesus comes again?
Of what then is this temple an allegory? Surely we are entitled to ask this question of those who insist that it must be so, and that any literality here would be subversive of the very work of Christ? Will Mr Brown not give a direct answer to such a question, and expound these nine chapters after the allegorical method, verse by verse, just as he would do the Song?
Again, granting that the temple is allegorical, it must, in the first place, be literal. John Bunyan allegorized Solomon’s temple, but he did so under the idea that it was a real temple that he was allegorizing, The basis of such an allegory must be a reality. You cannot have the spiritual idea until you have got the real thing to which that idea corresponds, and out of which it is extracted.
Again, granting that the temple is an allegory, what are we to make of the place where it is said to be erected? The two concluding chapters point so plainly to the land of Judea, and to the new allotment of portions to the tribes therein; also to the city, the rebuilded Jerusalem; that it is difficult to help the conclusion that they refer to the literal Israel, and to their re-occupation of their own land again. I find that several allegorical expositors, when they come to these chapters, give some hints of literality thus far, as if they could not resist the impression that something more than allegory was intended here. Petto, Faber, and Johnstone, I have already referred to; but even Matthew Henry and Thomas Scott seem half inclined to give way; though the Dutch annotators push their
and Matthew Poole is so careallegory right through; ful not to- give an opinion, but to confine himself to the mere words and description, that from first to last during the nine chapters you cannot say whether he is a literalist or an allegorist.
* By the miry places and the marshes not being healed, “‘ is to be understood the difference between the shallow partakers of the grace aforesaid, and the reprobate that shall continue and perish in their filthiness and sin” !!! — Dutch Annot.
If, then, a large part of the two concluding chapters refer to the restoration of Israel, the renewed fertility of their land and the rebuilding of their city, how can we deny literality to the temple which is described as situated in that very land? Here is an incongruity which the theory of our opponents cannot explain. If the temple be spiritual, then the Zand must be so too; the new divisions of the tribes must be so too, and the city must be so too. How are all these to be allegorized? The difficulty of allegorizing all these is very great; and any one who has gone through Jerome’s Commentary on these concluding chapters, will see how even he, skilled in allegorizing as he was, felt puzzled and bewildered, And this difficulty must be specially felt by those anti-millennarians who believe in the literal return of the Jews to Palestine, and in the rebuilding of Jerusalem.. For granting that this restoration is to take place, they must beat a loss to show cause why the two last chapters of the prophet are not to be interpreted of this restoration.
Accordingly Dr Keith does not hesitate to interpret literally the passages referred to. He seems to assume this as a thing too plain to need proof. I do not know why Mr Brown, in condemning millennarian writers for their views respecting Israel, and their land, in the latter day,should not have hinted, that there were some anti-millennarian writers, such as Dr Keith, who went quite as far as we have done. This would have been fair; for it would have shown his readers that hateful as these views may be, they are not views for which pre-millennialism is exclusively responsible. But does Dr Keith really literalize these portions of Ezekiel above referred to? He does. Thus he writes: “As the last proof which may here be given that the covenant still stands, it may be conclusive to hear what the Lord did speak concerning the inheritance of Israel, in anticipation of those days when it shall be apportioned in a manner altogether new among all the tribes.” He then quotes Ezek. xlvii. 13, 14.* Again; he speaks of the days, “when, according to the new division of the land as defined by Ezekiel, the twelve tribes of Israel, one as well as another, shall inherit the land from the river of Egypt.to the great river Euphrates.””+ Again; — “From the new and jinal division among all the tribes of Israel, as described by Ezekiel, 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 through the whole breadth of Immanuel’s land.”{ Again: — “In the new allocation of
* The Land of Israel, p. 56. Ft. Pp. CO. t Ib..p. 66; the tribes it is written,” &c.* In several other places he refers to Ezekiel’s predictions regarding the land, its boundaries and divisions, &c., taking uniformly for granted the literality of these. And, if I remember right, his reviewers, in some anti-millennarian journals, have not objected to his making use of these passages in a literal sense.
But Dr Keith is not the only one who takes the literality of these passages for granted. Mr Mason also, to whose work on the Jews I shall have occasion to refer, adopts the same view: “It merits our special attention,” says he, ‘“‘that in the vision of Hzekiel, relating to the state of Israel in the last days, the very same limits of the land are still more distinctly mentioned, (i. e. more distinctly than to Joshua,) and the same inheritance is described in all the four sides of
* The Land of Israel, p. 128.
+ The objection to the restoration of the temple is, that all types being done away in Christ, there can be no literal temple again. But it is to be noticed, that this is the very argument used by many against all literality in the prophecies which speak of Israel’s blessings. It is Mr Fairbairn’s argument against the restoration of Israel to their own land. And how will Mr Brown answer it, save by pointing to the passages which speak of that restoration. It is the very argument of an old author against Jerusalem being rebuilt : — “Jerusalem on this earth gave way to the heavenly Jerusalem, and will not be rebuilt. The temple will not be restored, for our High Priest is in heaven,” — Revelation Historically Explained, by J, J. Bachmair, 1778.
BROWN. pa i §
it; (Hzekiel xlvii. 13-21,) the prophet adds, ‘so shall ye divide this land unto you according to the tribes of Israel.’ Since the days of Joshua no division of the land has been made; this division therefore must be yet to come.”* Mr Mason uses language in another place which still more strikingly shows how he was inclined to literalize, not to allegorize, the whole concluding portion of the book. “In the nine chapters which conclude this prophecy, Ezekiel records a vision which describes the blessedness of Israel in the millennial period. In that vision, the conduct, the worship, and the provision of their priests, and the inheritance and prosperity of the people, are Divinely appointed. From these considerations, it clearly appears that God’s Israel shall yet enjoy an independent political existence among the nations.”+ These words are not from the pen of a millennarian. Mr Mason is warmly opposed to our system, and writes strongly against it. But in the above passage, he assumes as undeniable some of the very things which Mr Brown so strongly reprobates, and which he holds up to condemnation as the worst blots upon our system.
Brown, in his Dictionary of the Bible, refers, amongst
other passages, to the 48th of Hzekiel, in proof of the
* Scriptural View, &c. p. 128. Ib, 7, 194.
restoration of Israel to their land,* evidently understanding it in the literal sense. Thomas Scott, though allegorizing almost the whole nine chapters, yet, when coming to the middle of the 47th chapter, can no longer resist the evidence of literality which is stamped upon every word, and says, “this seems to imply that a future restoration of Israel to the promised land is predicted.” In an old collection of prophecies regarding the Jews, printed in the Appendix to Powell’s Concordance, and prefaced by Dr Owen, (1673) the 47th of Hzekiel is (verses 22, 23,) taken literally, and quoted to prove that the Jews “shall be carried by the Gentiles to their place; who shall join themselves with the Jews and become the Lord’s people.”
Let me, for the sake of illustrating the question before us, ask the reader’s attention to the singular incongruities of the allegorical expounders of this passage. Jerome’s exposition of the last nine chapters is very bare. Indeed, it is obvious from his proem, that he was unwilling to expound it at all, and only did so in compliance with the urgent request of his female friend, Hustochium; yet even then speaking of himself as ignorans ad quae litora perventurus. Since his day, most commentators have entered upon their exposition of these chapters with the same re-
* See Article, Hebrews.
luctance and uncertainty, — the same profession of ignorance and helplessness; so that one cannot help asking, how is this, if the matter be so obvious as anti-millennarians will have it to be? They close their eyes against the simple meaning, and then they begin to complain that all is dark and unsatisfactory.*
One writer speaks of the passage as perobscura; — another as obscurissima et tnexplicabilis; — another as a vision potius admiranda quam explicanda; — and Greenhill gravely remarks, “the vision is dark, but God dwells in darkness.” Yet all this obscurity, and darkness, and mystery, these allegorists prefer to the admission that the description is that of a future temple to be reared in Judea in the latter day.
As might be expected, these commentators differ widely. Starckiws, in his bulky and elaborate commentary, after telling us very confidently that such a temple nunguam extruendum esse, adds, that it depicts ecclesram Nov Testaments que est cwitas Der, in qua Deus sibi templum struait nempe corda fidelium que ornat et illuminat. (See in loc.) So that it is the
* Yet the following sentence of Cappellus might be enough to startle us in our literalism, were it aught but the voice of a man. After telling us that no man will deny that all is spiritual, he adds, nemo Judaecus nist praefractus et plane obduratus que negare audeat, i, e. that all is spiritual; nay, multa sint que ne impudenlissimus quidem Judeus ausit contendere ad literam esse intelligenda. See the Preface to his Trisagion near the close.
city that typifies the New Testament Church, — while the seven chapters, descriptive of the perfect temple, are a description of a sinful human heart! Pfedffer, after declaring the literal sense to involve both the adsurdum and the impiwm, tells us — that the whole shadows forth regnum Christi spirituale et evangelicum.* Vitringa maintains that the temple is a literal one, but already past, referring it to Solomon’s, Jichaelas maintains that none of the temples hitherto erected suit this. Hichhorn asserts that it was intended that Ezekiel’s plan should have been adopted by the Jews returning from Babylon; but that as they did not do so, it was never executed! The Millerites of America, whose extravagancies are adduced as specimens of millennarianism, have no more tolerance for the literal interpretation than Mr Brown. They maintain that it refers to the heavenly Jerusalem.+
Dathe has a note of considerable length prefixed to the 40th chapter. His own opinion is, that these ine
* See his Dubia vexata Scripture Sacre, p. 791. One of the. “absurdities” which Pfeiffer points out, is the Dead Sea being freshened by the waters flowing into it! Should not the good man have complained also of the absurdity of Moses healing the waters of Marah by a piece of wood, and Elisha the water of Jericho by a little salt? Must the literality of these be sapped also, to suit man’s notions of absurdity. It is curious to see such men as Pfeiffer doing for prophecy, what the Rationalists in an after age have been doing for history.
+ Report of Conference, p. 71.
a ee a ae
DATHE, OSIANDER. 2Va
chapters contain not a promise or prophecy of a temple, but a command, — mihi videtur propheta non promittere sed preecipere, — a command which the Jews either neglected or were not in circumstances to fulfil, after the return from Babylon.* He is as far from what I believe to be the true meaning as any of his fellow-commentators; but he sees enough of the prophecy to make him refuse to allegorize it. After showing that the prophecy must refer to the Jews, he remarks, as to the allegorical interpretations, — illae mysticae explicationes wa arbitrarice sunt, wtaque contortae, ut mirum esse possit placere ea potuisse aut vera vidert vires doctis, nist ex alus exenvplis constaret quantum semper ingenium judicio praevaleat apud eos qui sensum mysticum ubique venantur. He then gives a few specimens of the allegorical interpretations: “The temple primarily signifies Christ, but also the church, his body, according to Osiander; the steps (xl. 6,) mean, advances in the knowledge of good; the chambers where the priests put on their robes, refer to the putting off the old man and putting on the new by believers; .... the places for boiling (xlvi. 24,) typify the way in which ministers should prepare their sermons, so that they be not crude and ill-arranged, — vn ecclesia Christi coguuntur carnessacrificiorum cum ecclesiee ministri evangelicas de
* Dathii Prophete Majores, pp. 469-475.
Pp
Christo conciones non impraemeditatas et crudas maleque dispositas auditoribus objictunt, sed solide et dextre populum de religione docent.” He gives these as the very words of Osiander.* Surely whatever evil may be supposed to lurk in the millennarian expositions of these chapters, this may at least be said, that they are more natural, more simple, more self-consistent than the above. No anti-millennarian seems to agree with his fellow in expounding the supposed allegory.
Greenhill, in his copious exposition, is another of the thorough allegorists. The following is a specimen of the good man’s interpretations. He makes the waters to be “the waters of the gospel;” the fishers to be “the preachers of the gospel;” and the fish are those that are “brought in by the gospel;” so that it would appear that sinners live by nature in the waters of the gospel; nay, that the waters themselves bring them out of the waters, — the gospel itself brings them out of the gospel. But as to these fishes, let us follow the
* Starckius in like manner says, coquere, i. e., bene examinare omnia quae populo volunt proponere: and Hafenreffer tells us that by the culinae, &c.,is meant varia edulia esse fidelibus, gratia Det, remissio peccatorum, &c. Again, Starckius says of the waters in the 5th verse, that they denote Divine grace, multitudinem Divine gratie: then, forgetting this, he tells us in verse 10th, that the fishers in these waters are the ministers of Christ, who draw men ex abysso miserie et damnationis. See in loc.
exposition of the emblem, and learn why they are
called by that name : — “1, Because as fish are generated of spawn, or seed and water, so believers are born of water and of the Spirit.
. Fish, it is conceived, were not under the curse;
SS)
so believers are not under the curse of the law.
3. They keep fresh in salt and brackish waters, and true converts do. When there are brackish corrupt doctrines abroad, the sound believer is not tainted by them; arianism, pelagianism, familism, rantism, and quakerism do not corrupt them.
4. Some fish swim constantly against the stream. Such are true Christians, — they swim against the stream, and are not led by the multitude.
5. Fish live in and by the waters, they cannot live on dry land; they presently die without water.* And thus Christians live in and by the waters of the sanctuary. ‘These spiritual fish cannot live without them,
6. Fish of the same kind do sort together. So do
true converts, — they leave their old company, and sort with the regenerate and godly.”
‘Were Greenhill some extravagant expositor of lit-
* Why then should they be fished out of the waters by these fishers?
tle weight and name, I should not have thought it worth while to cite the above specimen. But he is one of note and authority. His Commentary has, a few years ago, been reprinted, with a preface by Mr Sherman of Surrey Chapel. In that preface Mr 8. tells us that “as a practical expositor of Ezekiel, Greenhill will ever rank deservedly high.” “Nay,” he adds, “he fully explains the meaning of the prophet”! Whether the above be a “full explanation of the meaning of the prophet,” the reader can judge. Had any millennarian written one sentence of it, he would have been smothered with the weight of ridicule flung upon him from every side.
Archbishop Secker has a dissertation upon this vision of Ezekiel, in which he tries to show two things, — that the temple, &c. predicted, must be taken literally; and, that they are not future, but past. Along with not a few others, he seems to have felt the difficulty (not to say the “sheer impossibility”) of allegorizing or spiritualizing the vision, and points, in several instances, to the absurdity of such a method of interpretation. At the same time, he gets entangled in his own difficulties, and in trying to give a past, and yet a literal application to the scene, he says some strange things, such as the following, regarding the waters which are said to flow from the temple: “There was some literal foundation for this also; for there was much water conveyed in pipes to the temple for washing the place, and the sacrifices, and the priests; and if I understand Lowth aright, they ran out at the east end of the temple; and these several pipes uniting their streams with one another, and with the water of Siloam, and Kidron, and others, and with the waters from cisterns, might in a short space grow deep and considerable, and might also have trees on their banks, though I find no mention of any.... What virtue the leaves of these trees might have, I know not.” Then, after stumbling over some more difficulties, he asks, “Can it be intended, then, only as a hyperbolical expression, that, in some time then future, Jerusalem should have a more plentiful supply of water, (which must be, he adds, in a note, “by the repairing of the aqueducts,”) or, in general, that it should have every thing they could wish?” Then, as to the healing of the waters of the Dead Sea, (after groping about in perplexity,) he says, “the conversion of the Gentiles is foretold in the Old Testament under the figure of taming wild beasts, and may be well understood here in Ezekiel by healing the waters of the Dead Sea.” Then, afraid for the literality of the passage, he adds the caution, “that this doth not prove that the rest of the prophecy is not to be understood literally.” Then, as Ezekiel mentions “fishers,” he thinks the passage might favour the idea of a reference to Christianity, for the apostles were called fishers of men. This, however, he does not sanction, adding, “this makes a confusion of figures; first to make the waters a symbol of religious knowledge and divine grace, then instantly to represent the conversion of men by pulling them out of these waters in which they alone can live.*
Nor are Protestant commentators the only allegorists of this passage. Popish ones adopt the same view. The ancient ones, such as Villalpandus, the Spanish Jesuit of the sixteenth century, make the temple literal, but past. The Douay annotators incline to the allegorical sense, and give the following as the sense of the waters, &c. in the 47th chapter: “These waters are not to be understood literally, but mystically, of the baptism of Christ, and of his doctrine and grace; the trees that grow on the banks are Christian virtues; THE FISHES aRE CHRISTIANS, that spiritually live in and by these holy waters; the fishermen are the apostles and apostolic preachers; the
* Not having Secker at hand, I take these extracts from New-come, who reprints the Archbishop’s dissertation. Some may be inclined to smile at the last extract, and may not relish what they think a burlesque upon Scripture. I have quoted it, as well as the others, to show the hopeless intricacies, and ludicrous contradictions, with which they beset themselves who refuse to admnit ie scene to be future and literal.
EZEKIEL AND THE CANTICLES. py
marshy places are such, as being out of the church, are separated from these waters of life.”* d/aldonatus, a Spanish Jesuit, also of the 16th century, makes the first part of the river (which reached to the knees) to denote those making progress, but not perfect, — profictentes sed nondum ad perfectionem venerunt; the third part (reaching to the loins) to denote the perfect; the last part, to denote the condition of the blessed.
I leave these extracts for the reader’s meditation. He will draw his own conclusions as to the allegorizing of these chapters. If the literal be such an absurdity as we are told it is, what, I ask, is the nonliteral? Surely by this time something like a consistent allegory might have been constructed out of this temple. If these nine chapters are a continuous allegory like the Song of Solomon, and as capable of exposition as such, how is it that interpreters have so thoroughly failed? And how does it happen that while the commentaries on “the Song” are so numerous, so full, so minute, so satisfactory, so consistent, the expositions of Ezekiel are so few, so meagre, so incongruous,
so contradictory t+
* See Annot. in loc. I might have declined to enter on the subject of Ezekiel’s temple, as it is not essential to our system. Let that templebe entirely spiritual, does that prove that millennarianism is false? We never adduce it in proof of our views, though most of us hold its yaya THE COMMEMORATION
A few concluding sentences, and I leave this subject. The temple, the worship, the rites, the sacrifices, have all their centre in the Lamb that was slain. To Him they point, and of Him they speak. Why should they not be allowed to do so in the millennial age, if such be the purpose of the Father? They are commemorative not typical. They are retrospective then, not prospective, as of old. And how needful will retrospection be then, especially to Israel? How needful, when dwelling in the blaze of a triumphant Messiah’s glory, to have ever before them some memorial of the cross, some palpable record of the humbled Jesus, some visible exposition of his sin-bearing work,
in virtue of which they have been forgiven, and saved,
literality. It may be answered, that if we hold millennarianism we must hold the literality of Ezekiel, that we cannot take the one without taking the other. This is just the common argument against the restoration of Israel: ‘ If you believe that the Jews are literally to be restored, you cannot stop short of millennarianism.”” How would Mr Brown reply to this? I suppose he would not find it difficult to confute Moses Stuart, when he says, with reference to them who interpret literally Israel’s restoration to Palestine; “‘on the same principles of interpretation, I will prove to a certainty that the Levitical priesthood and ritual, and sacrifices, are to be reinstated in more than all their primitive pomp and glory; I will show that every Jew on earth is literally to be a priest and a king; that all the Gentiles are literally to be hewers of wood and drawers of water to them, &c.” (Sermon at the ordination of Rev. W. G. Schauffler, as Missionary to the Jews, 1845.)
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and loved, — to which they owe all their blessedness and honour, — and by means of which, God is teaching them the way in which the exceeding riches of His grace can flow down to them in righteousness. And if God should have yet a wider circle of truth to open up to us out of His word concerning his Son, why should he not construct a new apparatus for the illustration of that truth? Our opponents admit that that temple was designed to set forth truth as a shadowy model; but if the shadowy model be fitted for developing and illustrating truth, why should not the palpable, tangible reality do so? Nay, why should it not do much more effectually? If the mere description of a model kingdom be fitted to teach lessons of wisdom, much more (if that were possible,) the literal erection of that kingdom; and if the description of a model temple be so profitable and so charged with lessons, — much more shall that model temple itself, when actually erected, give forth its holy lessons
of truth and righteousness.
From a literal temple did the Shekinah depart, to a literal temple is that Shekinah to return.* Over
* Lowth (the elder) remarks : — “the glory of the Lord, that is the Shekinah or symbol of God’s presence, when it departed from the city and temple, settled itself upon the Mount of Olives (Ezek. xi. 23.) So, when God shall return to Jerusalem, and make it the seat of his presence again, it shall return by the
Israel did that Shekinah once spread its flaming skirts, and over Israel is that same Shekinah to spread its skirts yet more gloriously in the latter day. first, the prophet describes it to us ere it is removed. Then he gives the reasons for its removal. Then we see it, or rather hear it, beginning to come forth from the shrine (iii. 13.) Then there is a pause, and the prophet takes up anew the burden against Israel for their sins, if that they may repent, so that the glory may not leave them. But they sin on. Then the glory goes up from the cherub and takes its place above the threshold, still unwilling to depart. And again, there is a pause. Israel is again warned; if so be they may repent, and not compel the Lord to withdraw from them; but they turn not. Then the glory rises, and taking wing, stands in air right above the east gate of the sanctuary, hovering over the guilty
city as if in yearning love. Again, there is a pause.
same way itdeparted. (Ezek. xliii. 2.) We may add, that when the Lord ascended from the Mount of Olives, the angels told his disciples he should come again, in like manner, that is ina visible and glorious appearance at the same place.” See on Zech. xiv. 4, — Dr Candlish also thus writes, ‘‘ the very glory of the Lord which long afterwards shone in the wilderness, in the temple, and on the Mount of Transfiguration, and WHICH MAY YET AGAIN ILLUMINE THE WORLD,” (on Genesis, p. 29.) So that Mr Faber does not stand among post-millennarians alone in this view, as Mr Brown affirms, p. 231, 1.
Israel is once more warned, that they may repent and not provoke the Lord utterly to withdraw. But they harden their heart. And again the glory rises and takes its place right over the Mount of Olives, as if still lingering in fond affection, as did Jesus when he wept over the city from the same mountain. Then the vision vanishes. The glory is seen no more.
But it is yet to re-appear. A return is predicted, and the same prophet that saw the glory depart, was also given in vision to see it return.* The departure was a real one, so shall the return be. The place of its first abode was a literal temple, so shall be the place of its abode in the latter day. The future shrine will be more glorious and vast; but not on that account the less literal and true.t
* xiii, 1 — 4. + Faber thus writes: “‘ As a present Jehovah was alike mani- - fested between the cherubim at the gate of Paradise, and between the cherubim in the Levitical sanctuary; so there are passages which seem not obscurely to intimate that in the last age of the Christian church a similar manifestation of the incarnate Word, radiant in all the effulgence of the Shekinah, will take place in the holy mountain of God. Here, as from a throne, there is some reason to believe that the Man-Jehovah will preside oracularly a visible spiritual king over his obedient people.” — On the Dispensations, vol. i. p. 22, Though subsequently Mr Faber has become a post-millennarian, it is remarkable that he still retains his opinion as to the re-appearance of the Shekinah in the latter day.
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