shepherds (ver. 11 sqq.), this is to be done by means of His servant David, so that the servant of the Lord is neither the people, nor the true Israel, nor the prophetic order, nor even the Messiah-prophet, but, as ver. 24 expressly says, "the prince." Comp. in addition, ch. xxxvii. 22, 24, 25: "My servant David shall be prince over them," etc., "and David My servant shall be their prince for ever."

We may accordingly assert rather, that the kingly office is prominent in Ezekiel's picture of the Messiah, and that, along with the prophetic office, the Messianic priesthood as well remains in the background with our prophet. At ch. xxi. 31 [26, Eng. vers.] the priestly dignity, which Tholuck holds to be still a matter of controversy, appears at most in union with the kingly. Among the priests of the temple (ch. xl. sqq.) the high priest is not named, but high-priestly mode of acting is made the duty of the priests. These are to become a highpriesthood, just as the whole temple becomes a holy of holies. That the Lord" is "at the same time the high priest," is not to be inferred from this circumstance. Undoubtedly "the man in ch. xliii. 6 is neither the one nor the other; and when it is there said by the glory of Jehovah, when it enters, with respect to the ark of the covenant, "the place of My throne," this comes rather from the lips of God as King, than from the lips of a high priest.

On the whole, the peculiarity of Ezekiel in his Christological relations may perhaps be said to attach less to the personality, which, as so circumstanced and clothed with such an office, by this or that other work, mediates the Messianic salvation, than to this salvation itself. As with Jeremiah already expressly the "Jehovah our Righteousness" of the Messiah (ch. xxiii. 6) passes over to the Messianic people (ch. xxxiii. 16), so Ezekiel's prophecy occupies itself peculiarly with the Messianic salvation of the people. That of course is, just as elsewhere also in the prophets, that Judah, and along with Judah Israel also, is to return from the exile. The deliverance from Babylon and that other very different redemption run into one another, just like the destruction of Jerusalem and the last judgment in the eschatological discourses of Jesus. Nor can it be looked upon as anything peculiar, that this outward return is conceived of Messianically as an internal one, as conversion to the Lord; for the case is the same with Jeremiah (ch. xxiv. 5 sqq., xxxi. 10 sqq., xxx. 18 sqq.). But although the subjective side is not forgotten, that the remnant shall remember and loathe themselves (Ezek. vi. 9, xviii. 31 even, xxxvi. 31 sqq.), yet the objective testimony preponderates even in ch. xi. 16: "I will be to them as a sanctuary." Of course this "Jehovah as a sanctuary" may be looked upon as Ezekiel's parallel to Jeremiah's "Jehovah our Righteousness," and compared with Jer. iii. 16, 17, Ezek. xx. 40 sqq. The fundamental idea of Israel is "a kingdom of priests," "a holy people," whose head is the King-priest, the Messiah, ch. xxxvii. 23, 28. If, however, Jeremiah, in describing the Messianic salvation, as it will be accomplished in the people, as they will be put in possession of it, speaks of the "heart," which God will give, to know Him, of the new covenant," where God "puts His law in their inward part and writes it on their heart," of the one heart and one way" (Jer. xxxii. 39 sqq.), Ezekiel on his part, and that just at ch. xi. 19, employs similar language, but the "new spirit," like "the spirit" occurring before in ch. i. 12, 20 sqq., is characteristic, is something additional (ch. xviii. 31); comp. besides, ch. xvi. 60 sqq. The Messianic salvation of the people (quite in harmony with the character of the book, according to ch. i.) is described as a sanctifying or glorifying of God in, as well as upon Israel (ch. xx. 41, xxviii. 25, xxxix. 27; comp. John xvi. 14). Based on this thought there arises the cleansing (ch. xxxvi. 22 sqq.; comp. ch. xxxvi. 32, 33, xxxvii. 23), which the Messianic period holds out in prospect (ver. 25), and the gift of a new heart and new spirit (ver. 26), which again (ver. 27) is made to include in it the fact, that God puts Ilis Spirit in their breast. The putting of the Divine Spirit in the whole house of Israel forms the kernel of the very characteristic vision of ch. xxxvii. (comp. ver. 14), and is expressly spoken of in ch. xxxix. 29 as the outpouring of the Spirit of Jehovah upon the house of Israel. That and nothing else is the peculiarity of the Christology of Ezekiel; in other words: the development of the Messiah, the Spirit-anointed of God, the Christ, into Christianity in the true Israel. Hence, "the peculiar blessing of the temple" (ch. xl. sqq.) is "its water-spring," ch. xlvii. (LANGE), which is at the same time the key to the understanding of these closing chapters of our book (John vii. 38, 39). Its Christology moves already within the circle of the economy of the Holy Spirit; nay, even ch. i. of our prophet is to be understood in accordance with John xvi. 14. One might say: ecclesiastically, while Daniel prophesies of the Messiah in His kingdom above all politically, on the side of the world. Comp. besides, the following section.

§ 10. OF THE USe, theological IMPORT, AND DIFFERENT WAYS OF UNDERSTANDING

THE BOOK OF EZEKIEL.

Starke's Bibelwerk, v. p. 1703, says at § 14: "Godly readers find in this book profit and edification enough," to wit, in general: "in distress and trouble comfort and consolation," as well as "the most delightful instruction as to a God-pleasing walk." "Everywhere one perceives how earnestly God seeks to awaken men, and to deliver them from the power of darkness, sometimes by promises, sometimes by threatenings, but sometimes also, if words are going to prove of no avail, by means of public calamities." "But in particular the prophet serves (1) to give us the knowledge of the divine mercy, righteousness, truth, and power; (2) to give us the knowledge of the hatefulness of sin, for whose sake whole kingdoms are laid waste; (3) he gives us rules as to what every one has to do in his office on the breaking out of God's judgments; (4) he warns us how we are to be on our guard, etc., against false security, apostasy, presumption, hypocrisy, and the like; (5) and how, in the midst of the greatest corruption and severest oppression of the Church, we ought not to lose heart altogether, but to believe assuredly, that, as God is able to punish and exterminate His enemies, so also He is able to improve, protect, and make His Church glorious.”

Ewald shows how this use for all time connects itself with the immediate aims of Ezekiel in the publication of his book, when he remarks among other things: "For one thing, he had to show that Jerusalem must fall, because it was in itself, and had been for long, in a state of irremediable confusion and perversity, and therein at the same time for the living there lay the right lesson and warning for the future; but, secondly, he must also set forth the certainty of a better future, and of the indestructibility of the true Church, and bring out clearly the genuine hope as opposed to despair, as well as in opposition to hasty and vain expectations; in keeping alive the sacred fire during the long period of the exile this book certainly had no small influence," etc. Jesus Sirach expresses himself in these terms about our prophet, according to Fritzsche's translation (ch. xlix. 8, 9): "Ezekiel beheld the vision of glory, which the Lord caused him to see upon the chariot of the cherubim; for he made mention of the enemies in wrath, and did good to those who walked in right ways; but he comforted Jacob, and delivered them by assured hope."1

As regards the import of Ezekiel theologically considered, we shall the more readily abide by what the son of Sirach makes a starting-point, as the glory of God has already repeatedly been found by us to be of importance in getting at the contents of our book. In this way Ezekiel's theology is characteristically indicated. If, distinctively, God's "majesty " expresses His incomparable and immeasurable exaltation above heaven and earth, that unique, absolutely perfect independence of His being, in virtue of which He is God alone, in whom the greatness, power, beauty, continuance, and splendour of life are properly inherent, then Ezekiel makes known to us the glory of Jehovah as being the self-representation of the divine life-form in order to manifestation. As the "majesty" would be the sum of all supramundane divine attributes, so, according to him, the glory is the whole manifestation of God in mundane things. As the divine "majesty "-which by this means is shown to be moral-has as its counterpart the "holiness" of God, in accordance with which God is Himself pure, so the divine glory finds its counterpart in the righteousness of God, in virtue of which God, as Cleanser or Sanctifier, alike in judgment and in mercy, restores as well as displays His glory in the world. The righteousness of God is, next to the glory of God, and in connection therewith, the peculiar theologoumenon of Ezekiel. From this theological standpoint he delineates the downfall of Jerusalem, and likewise the downfall of the heathen nations referred to. Both have refused in free surrender to consecrate themselves to God, but have as much as ever they could in their own case treated God profanely, and made the world on its part unclean. The divine righteousness in judgment, as it is executed on both, adjusts this disorder, this contradiction as regards God's manifestation in the world, as regards His divine glory, through their being taken away by force, inasmuch as God consecrates to Himself the one as well as the other as a sacrifice, and in this way making atonement for the sin by means of the punishment, cleanses the world also, which is destined to be and to become full of His glory, and thus restores His glory in this respect. From the same theological standpoint mercy and salvation also are

1 Gregory sets up Ezekiel as a teacher and pattern for preachers.

conceived of in Ezekiel, and in fact under the presupposition of a substitution. "For the righteousness of God," says Beck (Lehrsätze, p. 115 sqq.), "is hallowed not merely in punishing, but also in putting again to rights and creating anew, when He puts His law as light and spirit outwardly and inwardly in the life, and sets up with creative power in the world, as its everlasting salvation, the reign of law which had been interrupted by sin." The self-manifestation of His glory is on this side, in fact, also its restoration through righteousness, but still more its blissful and lovely exhibition. Although a substitutionary suffering of the Servant of God, as in Isa. liii., is not met with in Ezekiel, yet the cleansing of Ezek. xxxvi. 25 is conceived of as one effected by priestly mediation; and the fact that substitution is no strange thought to our prophet, that such a view is with him fundamental, and will therefore also be presupposed by him for the salvation of Israel through the mercy of God, is shown by the tetralogy of recurring passages, ch. xiv. 14, 16, 18, 20. As there is no one now among the people, either prophet, or priest, or king, able to step into the breach, a substitution is demanded, by means of which full atonement can be made, by means of which righteousness gains the victory, and the glory of Jehovah in grace and mercy comes to be manifested. (Comp. besides, Oehler's very suggestive article in Herzog, ix. p. 419.) Hence the word of the prophet ever again just demands conversion to God, with whom all things are possible, while the delusion of a substitutionary suffering of the children for the guilt of their fathers is dismissed in the most energetic and decided way in ch. xviii. For the righteousness which Ezekiel holds up as a righteousness for man is "to do what is lawful and right,” “to deal truly" (ch. xviii. 5, 9), "to be righteous," and not to depart from righteousness, therefore also to remain righteous (vers. 24, 26): so that these children can neither know themselves to be guiltless, so as even to be capable of a substitution for their fathers, nor durst they allow themselves to be satisfied with a righteousness of pious pretence (in contrast with one that is personal and actual, and real and abiding);1 but they are to make themselves a new heart and a new spirit (ver. 31). As in particular this closing demand of the 18th chapter, in which the whole discourse about righteousness culminates, lets it be seen that the way of Israel's thoughts hitherto has been a false one, inasmuch as the matter in hand is more a conversion, will involve the new birth, a new creation, so in this way there rises into view, at the same time, as the true way for every man, the way to God, and therein the way of God, that God who "has no pleasure in the death of him that dieth" (vers. 32, 33, ch. xxxiii.), as the way of life. Each for himself, so runs with Ezekiel the antithesis to all fancied substitution in the judgment of God, an antithesis which leads to death (ver. 4). But as God wills the life of him who "turns from his way," the true way of life must offer a better, even a true substitution.

Baumgarten, however, gives less prominence (Herzog's Real-Encyl. iv. p. 298 sqq.) to such an ethico-theological meaning of our book than to an eschatological one, when he asserts, "that according to Scripture Israel's state of captivity by no means ceases after the return of a few thousands to Jerusalem under Cyrus, but continues down to the present day, and will last until the general conversion of Israel." The interpretation attempted from this point of view of the vision in ch. i., of the "prophetic word during the exile," of the "labours of Ezekiel during Israel's captivity,"-one may apply to it Baumgarten's own words-" drags into the passage with one's own hand the very thing that is to be proved from it." Here, however, the opportunity presents itself, before we enter on the exposition of the book of Ezekiel, of discussing the different modes of interpreting it. Baumgarten finds in the passage quoted, that in Ezek. i.-iii. (comp. ch. xi. 22, 23) "it is shown most clearly that a new method of revelation on God's part is to begin, wherewith there is given in Israel, even without the instrumentality of the sanctuary and the priestly service, a possibility of further development and progress ;" and then, in support of this view, he brings forward "as a new (?) beginning of inner development" the "prophetic position and labours of Ezekiel during the exile," in connection with which reference is made to Ezek. viii. 1, xi. 25, xiii. 24 (xiv. 1), xx. 1, xxiv. 19, xxxiii. 31, 32, just as the continuation is found "in the ordinance of the synagogue down to the present day." "What, above all, the meaning of the last third of the book amounts

"The bad sort of mere outward righteousness and sham holiness (says Baumgarten), which was one day to bring blasphemy and bloody persecution on the holy and righteous King of Israel and Him who was demonstrated to be the Son of God, as well as on His Spirit-anointed messengers of peace. Hence, also, Ezekiel's prophetic labours in word and deed are directed far more against this deepest and most lasting corruption, than against all else."

to," Baumgarten gives as follows, ch. xxxvi. xxxvii.: "a resurrection of the dead and buried nation, and an everlasting spring for their frost-bound land, as soon as the spirit of prophecy shall prove mighty enough, in the power of its divine source, to breathe upon and wake up this field of the dead,-which the prophet even is able to do as yet only in type (ch. xxxvii. 3, 7),—when the spirit of the prophetic word shall have entirely filled the Gentile world, or (?) when the fulness of the Gentiles shall have come in, and by this means shall have the power and the task to wake up the dead people of God (Rom. xi. 25, 26).”—Ch. xl.-xlviii. : "For when Israel as a nation is converted to their God, how can they, how dare they exhibit their faith and obedience otherwise, than in the forms and ordinances which Jehovah has given to this nation? And is it not plain, that only after this conversion will the whole law in all its parts receive that fulfilment, which it has always hitherto demanded in vain? The Church of God is to find its goal in the condition here seen and described by the prophet of Israel (!). At that goal the Gentiles finally enter again into the community of Israel (!), and find in the law of Israel their national (!) statute-book, according to the will of God. We must accustom ourselves to recognise in these lofty and glorious descriptions not merely the final shape of Israel, but also the ultimate model for the converted and incorporated Gentiles (comp. ch. xlvii. 22?)." This is not the place to enter on a fuller treatment of this extreme development of a view of our prophet, in support of which the Epistle to the Galatians and that to the Hebrews do not appear to have been written, nor Acts xv. to have been meant; it must just be left to characterize itself. Tholuck (Die Propheten und ihre Weissag. p. 151 sqq.) says: "Although in scarcely any other department of Scripture has there been the same fluctuation with respect to the hermeneutical principles as in the exposition of the prophets, yet we may take the liberty of saying, that throughout all periods and sections of the Church the typological character of prophecy has been usually taken for granted. In reference alike to Old Testament prophecy in general, and to our prophet also in particular, we shall have to distinguish more exactly the following different modes of interpretation (comp. with Tholuck, the valuable article of Oehler on Prophecy,' Herzog's Real-Encycl. xvii. p. 644 sqq.):—1. The allegorical interpretation, which, with a one-sided development, must degenerate into arbitrariness, as the exegesis of the ancient Church shows us. 2. The historical interpretation of the Antiochean school, then of a Grotius, now of the rationalistico-naturalistic criticism. 3. The symbolical (e.g. Häv., HENGST.) and the mystical interpretation (e.g. of the Berleburg Bible). 4. The typical interpretation, which is combined sometimes with the symbolical, sometimes with the allegorical, sometimes with the historical, just as in general all these interpretations are mixed in the different expositors. If one chooses to call the historical the realistic interpretation, the other interpretations may be contrasted with it as idealistic; and if they are not to escape a certain measure of censure by being designated as "spiritualistic," as is done by Oehler, then the opposite interpretation might not without reason admit of being designated as a materialistic one. Pietism in former days, just as it revived Jewish legality to the hurt of the ideality of free Christian life, bordered with its chiliasms on a view of the prophetic word, which Jerome (down till Lyra and Luther, an authority in the exposition of the prophets.'-THOLUCK) had condemned as Judaizing": "Ut quæ Judæi et nostri, immo non nostri Judaizantes, carnaliter futura contendunt, nos spiritualiter jam transacta doceamus," sqq. "A comparatively small fraction," Tholuck calls them, "who, just as recently again most of the English and a number of South German, especially Wurtemberg theologians have done, held themselves bound by the letter to understand literally what is said of the return of Israel, of the taking possession of the lands of the heathen, of the new temple, and sacrificial worship."

As regards the general view lying at the foundation of the following exposition of the book of Ezekiel, it coincides with Oehler in this, that prophecy is directed to the end, as being at the same time the goal of the history of Israel. There belongs to it, therefore, an eschatological character in general, and inasmuch as the history of Israel is determined essentially and distinctively by the law (Rom. ii. 17 sqq.), and Christ is the end of the law, the eschatological character of Old Testament prophecy must be, especially in its position towards the law, in the law, to a large degree the Christological one. For "all the prophets and the law (itself) prophesied until John the Baptist" (Matt. xi. 13); in Him, therefore, to whom John could point with his finger, this prophecy ceases; it has become fulfilment (2 Cor. i. 20; Matt. v. 18; Heb. i. 1; 1 John ii. 18; 1 Pet. iv. 7). The development of such fulfilment of prophecy,

nay,

as it is given in Christ, embraces, as may be understood, the perfecting of the Church, so that in this sense, and as regards this relation, there occur also eschatological elements in the narrower acceptation of the word in the Old Testament prophets, apocalyptic features in their picture of the Messiah. But as the development of Christ in the perfecting of the Church is that which takes place through the Holy Ghost, for which reason the eschatological tenets of the Christian faith stand rightly in the third article,-the end of the ways of God in this respect is not flesh, but (now that the Word has become flesh) the glorified corporeity, a new heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness (Rom. xiv. 17),—so also nothing can be taken into view, for the eschatology strictly so called, which would result in a national Israel and an establishing of its law, or even in a Jewish-Christian redeemed humanity, especially as in Christ neither Jew nor Greek availeth anything (Gal. iii. 28), and the law has come in between merely, and that because of sin, until the Seed of promise should come, unto whom it had to serve as a schoolmaster only (Rom. v. 20; Gal. iii. 19, 24). "Prophecy contents itself," says Tholuck in the work referred to, "with setting forth the full realization of the kingdom planted in Israel, and along with that the satisfying of the religio-moral need of redemption on the part of mankind, as the ultimate goal of the earlier history of mankind." Tholuck, therefore, looks upon "the realization of the pictures in Ezek. xl. sqq., in the spiritual sense, as having already taken place in the Christian Church," while Oehler again, especially because of Rom. xi. 26,1 at the same time holds strongly, as an essential element of all prophecy, that of Ezekiel included, the actual "restoration of the covenant people, preserved as they are even in their rejection for the fulfilment of their destiny." Comp. besides, the reasons which, according to Tholuck (p. 197 sqq.), stand opposed to a gross realistic" view of the last chapters of Ezekiel. Hävernick (Vorles. über die Theologie des A. T.) expresses himself thus (p. 165): "The closing predictions of Ezekiel have in earlier times been usually understood typically, and referred directly to the person of Christ, the apostles and Christian affairs in general, and in this way the typical system in principle degenerated into a wild allegory. This mode of interpretation has called forth the other extreme, according to which the prophets are permitted to determine nothing else beforehand but the state of things as it was really to take place (but did not take place) after the exile, prophecy being thus transformed into a new legislation. Hence the prophetico-symbolical interpretation is most correct, according to which those representations are to be understood in the sense which they had already for one living under the Old Testament theocracy, viz. as symbols, whose true and full significance is to be realized only in the new Church."

66

(On prophecy in general one may compare also the thoughtful and profound statement by Beck, Christl. Lehrwissenschaft, p. 354 sqq.)

1 We may be permitted to take this opportunity of casting a glance on this oft-mentioned passage, without attempting (for time would fail us for such a purpose) to defend the following interpretation in view of the context in Rom. ix.-xi. First of all it is to be observed, that in Rom. xi. 25 the apostle speaks of a μvorégion Touro, placing the pronoun after the substantive, whereby roure is made to refer not to what follows, but to what has been already said: "the foresaid mystery." Let one compare Eph. v. 32 and 1 Cor. xi. 25 with ver. 26. Then, further, and this is the most important consideration, exegetical tradition must submit to be told, that arò μigovs, if one translates it as hitherto: "in part," is not very appropriate in any of the passages where it occurs elsewhere (Rom. xv. 15, 24; 2 Cor. i. 14; ii. 5). Miços (usiga) is the portion that is due (Rev. xxi. 8), and so ȧrò migovs will mean: as is due, in due measure, or of right. The LXX. give their support to this meaning, and it suits admirably in the New Testament passages in question. The foresaid mystery is that discussed in Rom. ix. sqq., which is spoken of to the Ephesians also, namely: that Christ hath made in Himself of Jews and Gentiles, these two, one new man (Eph. ii. 15), so that all believers from among Jews as well as Gentiles are one in Christ (Gal. iii. 28), Israel after the Spirit, the Israel of God (Gal. vi. 16). This mystery we ought to know well, in order that we may not in our self-sufficiency forget, that hardening has happened to the nation of Israel according to desert, of right, which judgment of hardening endures unto the end, until the fulness of the Gentile nations be come in, namely, in Israel's place as a nation, xal obra (ver. 26), i.c. and so (but not: and then), in this way all Israel shall be saved. That is to say: when the silently and continually growing temple of God shall be built up to the last stone (Eph. ii. 21), in this way shall all Israel, i.e. all that belong to it in truth (Rom. ix. 6), in this way shall all the children of the promise attain to salvation, which would be the ἀπολύτρωσις τῆς περιποιήσεως, the full salvation (Eph. i. 14), the ἀποκάλυψις τῶν υἱῶν τοῦ θεοῦ (Rom. viii. 19). And with this agrees also the Pauline application of the quotation from Isa. lix. 20, viz. not:

for Zion (?), Sept. xv Záv, but ix Záv; thus (ra), when the salvation comes from the Jews to the Gentiles. Comp. Doctrinal Reflections on Deut. xxx. (Lange's Com.).