But, alas! the Gospels come not before the Jew in this their genuine simplicity, but are encumbered by Gentile interpretations of the discourses, miracles, and parables of our Lord, which actually disallow the Jewish aspect of his ministry.

Nor has the book of the Revelation escaped the same treatment. In regard to the chapter before us, this deplorable spirit of Gentile monopoly is strikingly exhibited; for, whereas it obviously relates to the literal seed of Abraham-and so we have a precise enumeration of the twelve tribes, into which they were divided—our popular commentators will have it, that the nomenclature belongs to the visible Church; and that the sealing of a definite number out of every tribe, imports the preservation of the true servants of God, amidst the general corruption of Christianity which ensued upon its establishment throughout the Roman Empire by Constantine the Great! Surely, in the face of such manifest, however undesigned, perversion of God's word, it ought to be our determination, more than ever, to sit loose to the traditions of men; and to watch against that "licentious and deluding art," as has been well expressed, "which changeth the meaning of words, as alchemy doth, or would do, the substance of metals, making anything of what it listeth, and bringeth, in the end, all truth to nothing." The Bible is a book, let us remember, for the humble believer as well as the philosopher; and the necessary element for the understanding of it is that which all equally need-the teaching of the Holy Spirit. And of the terms which he employs, the best glossary is derived from the comparison of Scripture with itself.

Now, there is one word in the chapter before us, the import of which it is very necessary to determine, viz. :-" Israel." It has been already remarked, that there is no authority for applying it to the Gentiles, or the present Church. There is, however, a passage much relied on for the support of such notion, which, at first sight, may appear to favour it : "And as many as walk according to this rule, peace be upon them, and mercy, and upon the Israel of God." (Gal. vi. 16.) But a little consideration will show that even this passage refers to the literal Israel. In writing to the Church of Galatia, the apostle is delivering his judgment on the exemption of Gentile believers from the obligation of circumcision; judaising teachers having crept in, who inculcated the contrary. In doing this, he intimates that, however circumcision might be practised by Jewish converts, as a token of the covenant which God made with their father Abraham; yet, that for them or any of their Gentile brethren to observe this ordinance on the one hand, or to decline observing it on the other, as a ground of merit before God, was utterly vain." For," he writes, " in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature." He then dismisses the subject by the invocation in question: "And as many as walk according to this rule, peace be upon them, and mercy, and upon the Israel of God." Whereby we learn, not that the term Israel is a designation for all believers, (such a conclusion is quite gratuitous,) but that Jewish believers would not be true Israelites, i.e., the Israel of God, if they observed not the apostle's precept. Nathanael, we know, being a Jew of an ingenuous † Hooker.

* Horæ Apocalyptica, by Rev. E. B. Elliott.

† Or, a new creation.

an Israelite

and docile spirit, was commended by our blessed Lord as indeed;" (John i. 47 ;) and, in like manner, here, the Jewish members of the Church who would regulate their intercourse with their Gentile brethren after the principle laid down, are contemplated by the Spirit, as the Israel of God. This is the simple meaning of the verse, yielding no ground, it is contended, for giving the denomination " Israel," to any class of Gentiles.

Nor, be it further observed, in the kindred term, " Zion," ever applied in the Scriptures to designate the Church. In the Epistles to the Hebrews, it is true, the apostle says to believers, "Ye are come unto Mount Zion," (Heb. xii. 22,) but he speaks of their having equally come to the "heavenly Jerusalem," which shows plainly that what the apostle has in view is the glorious vision of the future, when the literal Mount Zion, in juxta-position with the glory from heaven, will be the scene of the manifestations of the Lord's kingdom in the latter day. This vision he supposes the believer to realise, even now, in the exercise of that faith which is the substance of things hoped for, the conviction (such ought to be the rendering of the original) of things not seen." (Heb. xi. 1.) Thus, there is no more authority for denominating the Church Zion, than Israel. It is merely a part of man's system, which is, at once, exploded by examination of the Word of God.

With this consideration of Scripture phraseology in general, the chapter before us, under the head of the twelve tribes of Israel, cannot be supposed for a moment to refer to aught but the seed of Abraham, the Jewish nation. Alas! that so patent a truth should require to be vindicated. We now proceed to its exposition in detail.

Ver. 1.* This is another instance of the ministration of angels, in connection with the providential government of God, as it will be exercised in the period of the Lord's day, or the day of the Lord. We read in Matt. xxiv. 31, that when the Lord Jesus appears in the clouds of heaven at his second advent, (the saints of the present dispensation, be it remembered, having been gathered to him before,) then, amongst other things," He shall send his angels, . and they shall gather together his elect" (i.e., the spared Jews, who will constitute the restored nation) "from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." Such is, as it were, the final scene of the rehearsal of Israel's fortunes; and here we look back to the opening scene, and descry the same parties, Israel and the angels; only, now, the latter stationed at the four corners of the earth,t as though ready to fold it up like a vesture, are employed in holding in the ordained agencies of judgment; while, meantime, a first fruits of the former are being discriminated and sealed for preservation, when the judgment bursts forth. In the one scene, we have presented to us the consummation of the Divine purpose, the chosen nation collected; in the other, we have the process rehearsed, which gives a happy augury of it.

Ver. 2. This is a commissioner of mercy to an election from Israel presently defined; and, therefore, he is fitly represented as coming from the east, or the sun rising-as it is literally given in the margin; for the

[* The reader will please have the verses before him, as to save space we omit them. ED.]

† Quære, "land."

irradiation of light is continually used in the Scriptures, as the emblem of joy and gladness; and, especially, of the festivity associated with Messiah's day. Thus, amongst the last words of the sweet Psalmist of Israel, testifying to his Son and Lord, we read :-" He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God; and he shall be as the light of the morning when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds." (2 Sam. xxiii. 3, 4.) And to the same effect was the advent of this Holy One hailed by Zacharias, when he uttered the words: "Through the tender mercy of our God, whereby the day spring' (literally, as in the place before us, the sun rising-it is the same word) "from on high hath visited us." (Luke i. 78.)

Having the seal. This is after the manner of earthly rulers, who have seals as the impress of their authority, the use of which they delegate to chosen servants acting for them. The introduction of such emblem here, is to signify that an act of Divine discrimination is about to ensue, by virtue of which there shall be insured, in the midst of Israel's apostasy, and the impending judgments coming on them, a seed to serve the Lord.

Ver. 2, 3. Thus an arrest is put upon the agencies of devastation ready to be let loose, till this angel and his fellows ("we") fulfil the trust assigned to them; from whose formal recital of the same, we learn through what objects in nature, mankind, and especially Israel, will be plagued, the earth, the sea, and the trees; as, also, that the sealed ones will manifestly owe their immunity, amidst all this scene of judgment, to their being acknowledged of God as the people of his choice; for they are spoken of as being to be sealed on their foreheads. This expression, doubtless, further implies, that they will openly confess Jehovah in that day as the God of their salvation; and, in the ninety-first Psalm, we have the prophetic celebration of both their piety and preservation; they will say of the Lord:-" He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust." "He will deliver them from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence. They shall not be afraid for the terror by night, nor for the arrow that flieth by day. A thousand shall fall at their side, and ten thousand at their right hand, but it shall not come nigh them. Only with their eyes shall they behold and see the reward of the wicked." (Vers. 3, 5, 7, 8.) This Psalm, it is obvious, applies not to the present Church dispensation; for, in seasons of epidemic suffering and mortality, the saints, now, are not exempted; nor is it promised that they shall be.

It may be well to add, that the spared remnant, in Ezekiel ix., are commanded of God to be distinguished in like manner as the sealed ones here, from the devoted inhabitants of Jerusalem, whose unblushing idolatry is shown in vision to the prophet:-" And he called to the man clothed with linen, which had the writer's inkhorn by his side; and the Lord said unto him, Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof." (Ver. 3, 4.) These parties, it is to be observed, have their lot cast in the corrupt city, and not in the Jewish land at large, or among the nations. But that they belong to the sealed ones, viewed in this wider aspect in the chapter before us, is highly probable, inasmuch as it seems to be the same future crisis of latter day apostasy, from which both are delivered.

At all events, the notion that Ezekiel's vision has had its realisation in the past, cannot satisfy the careful inquirer; whereas, the analogy between it, and the rehearsal here presented to us is strikingly obvious.

Ver. 4. Thus the number of the sealed is given in the gross. It is told off as it were in the hearing of the apostle. Twelve times, twelve thousand of every tribe-a full square number-denoting completeness; representing, perhaps, as the multiple of the twelve patriarchs and twelve apostles, not only so many units of individuals, but their relation, as nucleus, to the entire nation eventually to be collected. For, it is not to be supposed that 144,000 constitutes all that shall survive of the seed of Abraham, to inherit the promises made to the fathers; but that, first of all, the proportion, selected from all the tribes, will be chosen of God to confess him, and be confessed by him, in the midst of the nation.

The connexion which we discerned between the vision of the rainbow round about the throne in the fourth chapter, and the visitations following-as designed to guarantee the recovery of the earth, notwithstanding the convulsions that it was to undergo, has its counterpart, here, in this sealing of the tribes in relation to the infliction of the trumpet plagues. Israel will be the subjects of these heavy woes; but still the nation will survive, indicated by the earnest of these sealed ones; and so a special allusion to this comes in at chapter ix. 4, where the locust torment is said to affect only those men who have not "the seal of God in their foreheads." The whole history of the period through which these sealed ones pass, and which is here given in detail, seems shortly summed up in the angel's communication to the prophet Daniel:-" And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people: and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time; and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book." (Dan. xii. 1.) May we not regard Michael as answering to the commissioned angel with the seal of the living God; the unprecedented time of trouble, to the period of the trumpet woes; and the people found written in the book and delivered, to that ingathering, of which the twelve thousand, sealed out of every tribe, constitutes an impressive earnest ?

Ver. 5, 6, 7, 8. Here the names of the tribes and the number of those sealed out of them, are accurately specified in detail, as though the Divine faithfulness would subject itself to be abundantly tested, touching the event of their preservation. And, accordingly, in chapter xiv. of this book, we have this very company presented to us, in attendance on Messiah, when he appears; with the distinction attaching to them of having passed unharmed, morally as well as physically, through their ordeal of fierce temptation: "And I looked, and, lo, a Lamb," (or, as it should be,)" the Lamb stood on the Mount Zion, and with him an hundred and forty and four thousand, having his Father's name written in their foreheads. And I heard a voice faom heaven, as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of a great thunder: and I heard the voice of harpers harping with their harps; and, they sung as it were a new song before the throne, and before the four beasts," (living creatures,) "and the elders, and no man could learn that song but the hundred and forty and four thousand which were redeemed from the earth. These are

they which were not defiled with women; for they are virgins. These are they which follow the Lamb withersoever he goeth. These were redeemed from among men, being the first fruits unto God and to the Lamb." From this last expression-"first fruits "--we collect what has been already hinted, that, however these sealed of the tribes may constitute an honoured portion, yet, to them will not be limited all that shall be eventually saved of Israel. Their character, as first fruits, rather involves the ingathering of many others, as the harvest.

It appears that before Israel entered the land of Canaan under Joshua, Balak and Balaam, a king and a false prophet, like the enemies we find in the Apocalypse, conspired against them; but the open method of cursing not succeeding,-the Lord having turned the curse into a blessing, -the device at length prepared was to send Midianitish women into the camp of Israel to corrupt them, which, alas! prevailed, and drew down God's wrath upon the hitherto favoured people. But after chastening them, God did not forget the Midianites. Accordingly, we read at the beginning of this chapter:"-" And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Avenge the children of Israel of the Midianites; afterwards shalt thou be gathered unto thy people. And Moses spake unto the people, saying, Arm some of yourselves unto the war, and let them go against the Midianites, and avenge the Lord of Midian." Now, observe how the detachment is drawn for that expedition : "Of every tribe a thousand, throughout all the tribes of Israel, shall ye send to the war. So there were delivered out of the thousands of Israel, a thousand of every tribe, twelve thousand armed for war." The army thus formed, we may naturally regard as incensed, not only against the Midianites, but against their wicked licentiousness, which had proved so fatal to Israel; for, when the Midianitish women, who ought not to have been spared, were afterwards brought to the camp, we find Moses thus inflaming the zeal of this army against them :-" Behold, these caused the children of Israel, through the counsel of Balaam, to commit trespass against the Lord in the matter of Peor, and there was a plague among the congregation of the Lord."t Thus between the number and spirit of this host of old, and that of the hundred and forty-four thousand before us, an analogy obtains, such as we might look for between type and antitype. And the correspondence, in regard to exemption from hurt in the case of both parties, is equally remarkable; for, as the hundred and forty-four thousand are seen to survive through all their terrible encounters, so with the detachment of twelve thousand sent against the Midianites, not one was missing when their census was taken :-" And the officers which were over thousands of the host, the captains of thousands, and captains of hundreds, came near unto Moses; and they said unto Moses, Thy servants have taken the sum of the men of war which are under our charge, and there lacketh not one man of us." Surely all this is significant of some typical relation being designed between the two histories.

On one other point it may be well to remark, before leaving the exposition of this vision-the omission in the enumeration of the tribes of that of Dan. Some have accounted for this as a mark of retribution toward that tribe, because, it is thought, of the Antichrist being to issue

* Chapter xxxi.

† Verse 16.

Verses 48, 49.