life was cast into the lake of fire." From this | necessary and aliding factor of the mutual reladescription there seems to me to result that the books necessarily are meant for those who are, by the Supreme Judge charged with the judgment of particular ones. To this end they need, in the first place, many books that contain the works of individuals. God has a book-keeping for the life of every man. This divine record will be produced to every single one at the day of judgment. Is he a Jew? by one of the twelve Apostles. Is he a heathen? by some other saint. No man shall be able to remonstrate against this account for it will carry the evidence of truth in itself, and in the consciences of those to be judged. Should such a protest occur, the arraigned will be referred to the book of life. This is only one. For it contains only names. After this manner will the separation be accomplished, spoken of in Matt. xxv. 32 sq. For those whose names are found in the book of life go to the right side; the rest to the left. Then the great Judge Himself takes up the word in the manner described in Matt. xxv. 34 sqq., and calls the righteous to Himself, that they may inherit the kingdom that is prepared for them. But the wicked He repulses from Him into everlasting fire, that is prepared for the devil and his angels, in regard to which the account of the judgment in Matt. xxv., as far as the end is concerned, harmonizes entirely with Rev. xx. 15. tion between God and mankind, that shall be established for ever in its full glory. There shall come a time wherein Israel shall expand to humanity and humanity receive power to become Israel, wherein, therefore, the entire humanity shall be Israel. Then is the tabernacle of God with men no more a pitiful tent, made of mats, but the holy congregation is itself the living abode of God; and_the_gracious presence of Almighty God, whose glory compares with the old pillar of fire and cloud, like the new, eternal house of God, with the old perishable tabernacle, is then itself | the light and defence of His house. man. 25. On iv. 5, 6. "But give diligence to learn this, that the Prophet calls to mind, that Christ alone is destined to be the defence and shade of those that suffer from heat and rain. Fasten your eyes upon Him, hang upon Him as ye are exhorted to do by the divine voice, 'Him shall ye hear!' Whoever hearkens to another, whoever looks to any other flesh than this, it is all over with him. For He alone shelters us from the heat, that comes from contemplating the majesty (i. e. from the terror that God's holiness and righteousness inspire), He alone covers us from the rain and the power of Satan. This shade affords us a coolness, so that the dread of wrath gives way. For wrath cannot be there where thou seest the Son of God given to death for thee, that thou mightest live. Therefore I commend to you that name of Christ, wherewith the Prophet adorns Him, that He is a tabernacle for shade against the heat, a refuge and place of concealment from rain and tempest."-LUTHER.With some modification, we may apply here the comprehensive turn FOERSTER gives to our passage: 1) The dwelling of Mount Zion is the church; 2) the heat is the flaming wrath of God, and the heat of temptation (1 Pet. iv. 12; Ecclus. ii. 4, 5); 3) tempest and rain are the punishments of sins, or rather the inward and outward trials (Ps. ii.; Isa. lvii. 20); 4) the defence or the pillar of cloud and fire is Jesus Christ (1 Cor. x.). 24. On iv. 5, 6. "The pillar of fire and cloud belongs to the miraculous graces by which the founding of the Old Testament kingdom of God was glorified just as the New Testament kingdom was by the signs that Jesus did, and by the charismata of the Apostolic time. But that appearance was quite appropriate to the state of developed revelation of that time. This had not reached the New Testament level, and not even the prophetic elevation that was possible under the Old Testament, but only the legal in which the divine stands outwardly opposed to the huGod is present among His people, but still in the most outward way; He does not walk in a human way among men; there is, too, no inward leading of the congregation by the Holy 26. On v. 1-7. This parable has a brother in Spirit, but an outward conducting by a visible the New Testament that looks very much like it. heavenly appearance. And, for these revelations I might say: the head is almost the same. For to the whole people, God makes use entirely of the beginning of that New Testament parable nature, and, when it concerns His personal mani- (Matth. xxi. 33; Mar. xii. 1), “A man planted festation, of the elements. He does so, not mere- a vineyard, and set an hedge about it, and digged ly in distinction from the patriarchal theophanies, a wine-fat and built a tower," is manifestly imibut, particularly in contrast with heathen- tated after our passage. But here it is the vineism, in order to accustom the Israelitish con-yard that is bad, while there, in the New Testasciousness from the first not to deify the visiblement, the husbandmen are good for nothing. world, but to penetrate through it to the living, Here the Lord appears as at once owner and culholy God, who has all the elements of nature attivator of the vineyard; there the owner and culcommand as the medium of His revelation."-tivators are distinguished. This arises from the AUBERLEN. fact that the Lord Jesus apparently had in His As at the close of John's Revelation (chaps. mind the chiefs of the people, "the high-priests xxi., xxii.) we see the manifestation of the God- and elders" (Matth. xxi. 23, 24). From this it head to humanity return to its beginning (Gen. is manifest that here as there the vineyard is the ii., iii., iv.), in as much as that end restores just nation. In Isaiah, however, the vineyard, that that with which the beginning began, i. e. the is to say the vine itself is accused. The whole dwelling of God with men, so, too, we see in Isa. people is represented as having equally gone to iv. 5, 6, a special manifestation of the (relative) destruction." In the Synoptists, on the other beginning time recur again in the end time; the hand, it is the chiefs and leaders that come bepillar of fire and cloud. But what in the begin-tween the Lord and His vineyard, and would exning was an outward and therefore enigmatical clude Him from His property, in order to be able and unenduring appearance, shall at last be a to obtain it wholly for themselves, and divide it amongst them. Therefore there it is more the wicked greed of power and gain in the great that is reproved; here the common falling away of the whole nation. 27. V. 8. Here the Prophet denounces the rich, the aristocracy, and capital. Thus he takes the part of the poor and lowly. That grasping of the rich and noble, which they display sometimes like beasts of prey, at other times gratify in a more crafty and legal fashion, the Prophet rebukes here in the sharpest manner. God's work is opposed to every sin, and ever stands on the side of those that suffer oppression, no matter what may be their rank. God is no respecter of persons (Deut. x. 17 sq.). 28. V. 11-17. The morning hour, the hour when light triumphs over darkness, ought to be consecrated to works of light, as it is said: Aurora Musis amica, jjú тоι проdéрει μèv óðov, πpоçépei de Kai Epyou (HESIOD. Eрy. K. u. 540, Morgenstund hat Gold im Mund. "It was," says FOERSTER, "a laudable custom among the Persians, that the chamberlains entering in to their kings early in the morning, cried out with a loud voice: 'Arise, O king, attend to business, as Mesoromastes commands.'" On the other hand, "they that be drunken are drunken in the night," I Thess. v. 7 sq. So much the worse, then, when men do the works of night even in the early hour, and dare to abuse the light. "Plenus venter despumat in libidines," says AUGUSTINE. In vino dowria (Eph. v. 18). Corpus, opes, animam luxu Germania perdit. MELANCTHON. On ver. 15 FOERSTER cites the expression of AUGUSTIN: "God would not suffer any evil to be done in the world unless some good might thence be elicited." 29. V. 18. "Cords of vanity are false prejudices and erroneous conclusions. For example: no one is without sin, not even the holiest; God does not take notice of small sins; he that is among wolves must howl with them; a man cannot get along in the world with a scrupulous, tender conscience; the Lord is merciful, the flesh is weak, etc. By such like a man draws sin to him, binds his conscience fast, and resists the good motions of preventing grace. Thick cart-ropes signify a high degree of wickedness, the coarsest and most revolting prejudices. For example: God has no concern about human affairs; godliness delivers no one from misery and makes no one blessed; the threatenings of the prophets are not to be feared; there is no divine providence, no heaven, no hell (Deut. xxix. 17, 18, 19). Out of such a man twists and knots a stout rope, with which he draws to him manifest blasphemy, entangles himself in it, so that often he cannot get loose, but is sold as a servant under sin (Rom. vi. 16; 1 Kings xxi. 20, 25)." STARKE. 30. V. 19. "The wicked mock at the patience and long-suffering of God, as if He did not see or care for their godless existence, but forgot them, and cast them out of mind (Ps. x. 11), so that the threatened punishment would be omitted. They would say: there has been much threatening, but nothing will come of it; if God is in earnest, let Him, etc.; we don't mind threats; let God come on if He will! Comp. xxii. 12. 13; xxviii. 21, 22; Am. v. 18; Jer. v. 12; viii. 11; xvii. 15; Ezek. xii. 21 sqq." STARKE. 31. V. 20. "To make darkness of light, means to smother in oneself the fundamental truths that may be proved from the light of nature, and the correct conclusions inferred from them, but especially revealed truths that concern religion, and to pronounce them in others to be prejudices and errors. Bitter and sweet have reference to constitution, how it is known and experienced. To make sweet of bitter means, to recommend as sweet, pleasant and useful, what is bad and belongs to darkness, and is in fact bitter and distasteful, after one himself believes he possesses in the greatest evil the highest good." STARKE. 32. V. 21. "Quotquot mortales," etc. As many as, taking counsel of flesh, pursue salvation with confidence of any sort of merit of their own or external privilege, a thing to which human nature is much inclined, oppose their own device to the wisdom of God, and, according to the prophet, are called wise in their own eyes (xxviii. 15; xxx. 1, 2; Jer. viii. 8, 9; ix. 23 sq.; xviii. 18). VITRINGA. 33. V. 26 sqq. The Prophet here expresses in a general way the thought that the Lord will call distant nations to execute judgment on Jerusalem, without having in mind any particular nation. VITRINGA quotes a remarkable passage from the excerpts of JOHN ANTIOCHENUS in VĂLESIUS (p. 816), where it is said, that immediately after TITUS had taken Jerusalem, ambassadors from all the neighboring nations came to him to salute him as victor and present him crowns of honor. TITUS refused these crowns, "saying that it was not he that had effected these things, but that they were done by God in the display of His wrath, and who had prospered his hands." Comp. also the address of TITUS to his soldiers after the taking of Jerusalem in JOSEPH. B. Jud. VII. 19. HOMILETICAL HINTS. 1. ii. 6-11. Idolatry. 1) What occasions it (alienation from God, ver. 6 a); 2) The different kinds: a. a coarse kind (ver. 66, ver. 8), b. a more refined kind (ver. 7); 3) Its present appearance (great honor of the idols and of their worshippers, ver. 9); 4) Its fate at last (deepest humiliation before the revelation of the majesty of God of all that do not give glory to Him (vers. 10, 18). 2. ii. 12-22. The false and the true eminence. 1) False eminence is that which at first appears high, but at last turns out to be low (to this belongs impersonal as well as supersensuous creatures, which at present appear as the highest in the world, but at last, in the day of the Lord of Hosts, shall turn out to be nothing); 2) The real eminence is that which at first is inconspicuous and inferior, but which at last turns out to be the highest, in fact the only high one. 3. iii. 1-9. Sin is the destruction of a people. 1) What is sin? Resisting the Lord: a. with the tongue, b. with deeds, c. with the interior being (vers. 8, 9); 2) In what does the destruction consist (or the fall according to ver. 8a)? a. in the loss of every thing that constitutes the necessary and sure support of the commonwealth (vers. 1– 3); b. in insecure and weak props rising up (ver. 4); c. in the condition that follows of being withont a Master (ver. 5); d. in the impossibility of finding any person that will take the governance of such a ruinous state (vers. 6, 7). 4. iii. 4. Insurrection is forbidden by God in express words, who says to Moses "that which is altogether just thou shalt follow," Deut. xvi. 20. Why may not God permit an intolerable and often unjust authority to rule a land for the same reason that He suffers children to have bad and unjust, parents, and the wife a hard and intolerable husband, whose violence they cannot resist? Is it not expressly said by the Prophet "I will give children to be their princes, and babes shall rule over them?" "I gave thee a king in mine anger, and took him away in my wrath," Hos. xiii. 11. THOLUCK. 5. iii. 10-13. "Let us learn to distinguish between false and real comfort." 1) False comfort deals in illusion: the real deals in truth; 2) The false produces a present effect; the real a lasting one; 3) The false injures the one comforted; the real is health to him." HARMS. that is to be looked for in the future. 1) Its preli6. iv. 2-6. The holiness of God's Church on earth minary: the judgment of cleansing and purifying (ver. 4); 2) What is requisite to becoming a partaker? a. belonging to the remnant (vers. 2, 3); b. being written in the book of life (ver. 3); 3) The surety of its permanence: the gracious presence of the Lord (vers. 5, 6). 7. v. 21. The ruin of trusting in one's own wisdom. 1) Those that have such confidence set themselves above God, which is: a. the greatest wickedness, b. the greatest folly; 2) They challenge the Divine Majesty to maintain its right (ver. 24). C.-THE THIRD PORTAL. We have already shown above, in the general introduction to the threefold entrance, that Isaiah would not place this account of his call at the head because he felt the need of preparing his readers for it. At the same time he brings it about that this, not merely elevated, but holy, and even holiest of all dramas, is put in the place that becomes a holiest of all, that is to say, not without, but within; not in aditu, but in adyto. As in the temple, the court of the priests and the holy place, with the altar of incense, constituted the approach to the holiest of all, so, too, here Isaiah puts two entrances in front of that history that really transpoзes us into the inmost sanctuary, that explains to us how it was possible that Isaiah, the son of Amoz, should be admitted to the vision of God, and had the boldness to offer himself as God's messenger. If one were not governed by the illusion that only chap. i. can be an introduction, it would never enter his mind that chap. vi. is the account of a second call to a merely special mission. DELITZSCH remarks: "What UMBREIT says, that chap. vi. makes the impression on every unprejudiced mind of being the inaugural vision of the Prophet cannot in fact be denied. Only the position that chap. vi. has in the book wields a contrary influence against this impression as long as it does not admit of being understood in some other way. But the impression remains (as with i. 7-9) and even reappears." Well, then, we bring the impression that chap. vi. makes (of being the account of the inauguration) into the most harmonious relation to the place it holds in the book, by explaining it as the third, the most elevated and holiest entrance to the prophecies of Isaiah. Concerning the time of its composition not much need be said. That Isaiah wrote chapter vi. no one denies. Whether, then, he wrote it immediately after he had the vision, or later, is indifferent. From the nature of things the former is more probable. At all events he assigned the chapter its present position when he made up his book. THE SOLEMN INAUGURATION OF THE PROPHET. CHAPTER VI. 1-13. 1 IN the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the LORD sitting upon a throne, 2 high and lifted up, and 'his train filled the the temple. Above it stood the seraphim: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain 3 he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And 'one cried unto another, and said, Holy! holy holy! is the LORD of hosts: The whole earth is full of his glory. 4 And the "posts of the 'door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house 5 was filled with smoke. Then said I, Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts. 6 Then flew one of the seraphim unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which 7 he had taken with the tongs from off the altar: and he 'laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged. 8 Also I heard the voice of the LORD, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go 9 for us? Then said I, 'Here am I; send me. And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye 'indeed, but understand not; 10 Make the heart of this people fat, And make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes, Lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, And understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed. 11 Then said I, LORD, how long? And he answered, Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, And the houses without man, And the land be "utterly desolate; 12 And the LORD "have removed men far away, 'And there be a great forsaking in the midst of the land. 13 But yet in it shall be a tenth, 123 And it shall return, and shall be eaten : 13 As a 'teil tree, and as an oak, 'whose substance is in them, when they cast their T TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL. (with Ver. 1. The prophet designates the Lord as " the sign of the accusat., but without the article as a proper noun). Both i. 24; iii. 1; x. 16, 33; xix. 4) and *′ (iii. 17, 18; iv 4; vi. 1, 8, 11; vii. 14, 2^; viii. 7; ix. 7. 16; x. 12; xi. 11; xxi. 6, 8, 16; xxix. 13; xxx. 20; xxxvii. 24; xxxviii. 16) occur only in the first part of Isaiah.—XV)) D7 is used by Isa. ii 13, 14, and lvii. 15, where the Lord Himself is so named.— the hem, the broad folded train of which the hems are the ends. The word (used mostly of the priestly garments, Exod. xxviii. 33, 34; xxxix. 24, 25, 26; comp. Jer. xiii. 22, 26; Nah. iii. 5) does not again occur in Isaiah Ver. 3. (is not infin., which is always, but) is substantive, written oftener i. Comp. viii. 8; xxxi. 4; xxxiv. 1; xlii. 10. Ver. 7. Piel and Pual in xxii. 14; xxvii. 9; xxviii. 18; xlvii. 11. T Ver. 10. The verb p, pinguem esse, is found in the Kal. only Deut. xxxii. 15, and Jer. v 28; beside the present the Hiph. occurs only Neh. ix. 25, with the meaning "to become fat." The ears shall become heavy, hard of hearing, deaf. (Kal) is used in this sense lix. 1. Also the word is used of the eyes (Gen. xlviii. 10) and of the tongue (Exod. ix. 10 [ adj.]. Comp. Zech. vii. 11 (Hiph.). The Hiph. occurs more frequently of making heavy, i. e., hardening the heart: Exod. viii. 11, 28; ix. 34; x. 10. is the Hiph. imperat. from yy oblinere, to besmear, plaster over (comp. xxix. 9; xxxii. 3). is always used transitively. It must therefore be thought of as joined to the general, ideal subject, which the notion of the verb of itself suggests. As is well known, especially verbs that designate a trade or an occupation in some art are wont to be so used. Therefore may a verb that signifies the healing art be readily so construed. Isaiah resorts to this mode of speech not seldom; vii. 24; viii. 4; xxi. 9; xxxiv. One might fall on the conjecture by comparison of 5, that as there so here it ought to read N. שׁלכת Ver. 13. comp. iv. 4.— - is terebinth (i. 30) and is oak (ii. 13; xliv. 14). Both are extremely lasting trees, that become very old and grow steadily in size. Comp. GESEN. Thes. p.51; Job xiv. 7-9.————— occurs again only 1 Chr. xxvi. 16, where a naby is spoken of. Is this the gate of casting out (probably only an opening in the wall through which things were thrown out) then the word here is dejectio, prostratio (comp. Jer. ix. 15). Instead of we look for cording to our mode of expression. But the Hebrew in his way of representation sees, as it were, the idea בָּם ac Ver. 12. The Piel P is used by Isaiah again of the whole tree before him still, and in or on this ideal only xxvi. 15; xxix. 13. On the contrary Kal. occurs in the second part: xlvi. 13; xlix, 19; liv. 14; lix. 9, 11. The Hiph. does not occur in Isaiah at all. properly the forsaken one, fem. But this feminine here must be taken as the collective genus, so that the word signifies the forsaken (the forsakenness, desolation). Comp. xvii. 2, 9. at tree he distinguishes the stump still present and the and אשר belong together. (comp. i. 4; Ezr. ix. 2) signifies the still-existing principle of holy life. The suffix in D ( only here in Isaiah, 7337 xix. 19) refers to 7. T: EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL. 1. Isaiah describes in plain and simple lan- | vers. 8-13 his call to the prophetic functions and guage, by which the grandeur of the contents is the commission imparted to him. only made the more conspicuous, how, in the year 2. In the year- filled with smoke.— that King Uzziah died he saw the Lord sitting Vers. 1--4. The year that Uzziah died was the on a high, elevated throne. The train of His gar-year 758 B. C. JEROME (in the Epist. 18 ad ments filled the temple (ver. 1). Seraphim sur- Damas.) remarks that this was the same year rounded Him, cach having three pairs of wings: quo Romulus, Romani imperii conditor, natus est," one covered the countenance, one the feet, and that Romulus was born. The theocracy declines: with the third they flew (ver. 2). One cried to the other the thrice-holy (ver. 3), a cry whose power shook the threshold. But the house was full of smoke (ver. 4). The majestic vision awakes in the Prophet the feeling of his sinfulness, and the fear that he shall be destroyed, because he, as a sinful man, has seen the Lord (ver. 5). But one of the Seraphs reconciles him with a glowing coal that he has taken from the altar (vers. 6, 7). Thereupon the Prophet hears the voice of the Lord himself, who asks: whom shall I send? Isaiah offers himself as messenger (ver. 8). He is accepted and his commission is imparted to him. But this commission is of an extraordinary character. For it is not so much told him what he shall announce. but what shall be the immediate consequence of his announcement. That is to say, he shall speak to the people, but with the (express) consciousness that not only will it be of no use, but that the people will become only the more hardened (vers. 9, 10). The Prophet, without regarding the difficulty for himself in the matter, only inquires, because the fate of his people distresses him, how long this anger of the Lord against His people is to last (ver. 11 a.). This answer is: until all is destroyed (ver. 11 b.), the land devoid of men (ver. 12), and not more than a tenth part of the inhabitants remain in it, that shall be dealt with as a tree that was felled for burning. For such becomes a prey to the flames to the very stump that remains in the ground. So there will remain of Israel but the remnant of a remnant (ver. 13). The structof the chapter is extremely simple: vers. 1-4 ribe the scene of the transaction; vers. 5-7 rror of the Prophet and the allaying of it; the world - power springs up. It is asked whether the event took place before or after the death of Uzziah. Without doubt the event took place before the death, but the record of it was made after it. For if both occurred before Uzziah's death there would have been no mention made of it. If both occurred after the death of the king, then the event would belong to the period of Jotham's rule, and one would justly look for the name of this king. Thus what has been just stated remains the only possible answer to the above question. Our passage then agrees very well with i. 1, for then Isaiah had prophesied already under Uzziah. Moreover, xiv. 23 (“in the year King Uzziah died ") supports this explanation, for there it is presumed in the whole context that Uzziah still lives. The opinion of those Rabbis, who, following the lead of the Chaldee, understand the passage to refer to the civil death of Uzziah, i. e., to his becoming a leper, is justly pronounced by GESENIUS a rabbinical caprice. How did Isaiah see the Lord? In reality? or only in the idea, i. e. in fancy, so that, then, the grand painting were only the poetic clothing of a purely subjective, inward transaction? The latter is the opinion of rationalistic expositors. For example, KNOBEL says: At all events there happened a moment in Isaiah's life, when the seer, in holy, divine enthusiasm, soared aloft to Jeho vah and heard the Lord's call to the prophetic office. This event of his God-inspired inward man he portrays in the passage before us, and amplifies it with free, poetic art. more completely than he experienced it." But one must be, just a rationalist, to hold that such a transaction can |