Quotations From the Old Testament

 •  9 min. read  •  grade level: 10
 
Mr. Newman next refers to quotations. He tells us that no "unbiassed interpreter" would have dreamed of applying Isa. 7 to Jesus. (Phases, p. 125.) Why not? From Adam's time, the woman's seed was the subject of promise. It was confirmed, with fuller and more specific details, to Abraham, confining it to Isaac's line, then to Jacob's, then to Judah's family, and at last, as is well known, to David's family, in a very definite way, so as to have been the constant expectation of the Jews at the time Christ came-as Tacitus declares in a well-known passage. To the Jews the place where He was to be born was familiarly known. The coming of Christ, then, we know to be the grand object always kept in view in the Old Testament; and, on the supposition of God being the Author of the scriptures, a continual reference to this, accompanying a direct appeal to conscience connected with an already given law, would characterize the books which compose the Old Testament. An "unbiassed" and intelligent reader must expect to find it continually-it is the great object of the book; and to find it particularly in connection with David's family and with the restoration of Israel in a spared remnant, whom David's Son would save. No attentive reader of the Old Testament can dispute this.
Now Isa. 7 begins by alluding to a prophetic and mystic son of the prophet-a common prophetic figure-called, "the remnant shall return." (Shear-jashub.) According to the Old Testament doctrine, this would immediately suggest the thought of Messiah. So we find the pious Simeon and Anna prepared at once for the thought, and the disciples asking, Are the σωζόμενοι, the spared remnant, few in number? [translated, "few that be saved"? Luke 13:2323Then said one unto him, Lord, are there few that be saved? And he said unto them, (Luke 13:23).] Now Ahaz began the apostasy of David's family, the last stay of Israel; for, on the people "Ichabod" had long ago been written, and David raised up, and the peace and safety of the people made dependent on the faithfulness of his family in an express manner. 2 Chron. 7:17-2117And as for thee, if thou wilt walk before me, as David thy father walked, and do according to all that I have commanded thee, and shalt observe my statutes and my judgments; 18Then will I stablish the throne of thy kingdom, according as I have covenanted with David thy father, saying, There shall not fail thee a man to be ruler in Israel. 19But if ye turn away, and forsake my statutes and my commandments, which I have set before you, and shall go and serve other gods, and worship them; 20Then will I pluck them up by the roots out of my land which I have given them; and this house, which I have sanctified for my name, will I cast out of my sight, and will make it to be a proverb and a byword among all nations. 21And this house, which is high, shall be an astonishment to every one that passeth by it; so that he shall say, Why hath the Lord done thus unto this land, and unto this house? (2 Chronicles 7:17‑21).
Now Ahaz walked in the way of the kings of Israel, and made his son pass through the fire; he made molten images also for Baalim, and (though perhaps after this prophecy) introduced an idolatrous altar, after a Damascus pattern, into the temple, and set aside the brazen altar for himself to use as an oracle. To him Isaiah comes with his "remnant shall return," and addressing himself to the house of David, and referring to their unbelief and rebellion, judges it, and gives as a sign from God the birth of the virgin's son. Now that a1 virgin should marry and have a child is nothing that can be a sign from God, nor anything particular to do with the house of David. Nor would there be any reason for calling his name Immanuel, that is, God with us. I know it has been said-Mr. N. does not condescend to say why "an unbiassed interpreter" would not apply it to Jesus2 that Hezekiah was meant, in whose reign there was deliverance for Israel. Now Hezekiah had been born several years before the date of the prophecy. Thus the application of the prophecy to David's promised Son is the most natural and only intelligible one of the passage.
"Out of Egypt have I called my son"3 may present more difficulty, as supposing more knowledge of the ways of God.
The Son of man is presented in scripture as beginning in a new way of grace the whole condition of man. He is called the Second Adam.
So is it with respect to Israel. Christ was to begin all Israel's history over again under the new covenant, as the true stock in whom the promises were to be enjoyed, the old vine having been proved worthless. Thus, in John 1 do not doubt with reference to this, it is said, "I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman," referring to Isa. 6 and Psa. 80:88Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt: thou hast cast out the heathen, and planted it. (Psalm 80:8), to the end. The disciples thought He was a chief branch perhaps of the old vine, but that was not the true one now. He was the vine, the real fruit-bearing plant of God, and they the branches.
This substitution of Christ for Israel was taught in a very plain and remarkable manner by the prophets. Thus, in Isa. 49, the prophet begins with presenting Israel as addressing the nations as being the One in whom Jehovah was to be glorified. Then, verse 4, Messiah says he has in that case labored in vain; and then, verse 5, the Lord places Him with a yet more glorious inheritance in Israel's place, though gathering Israel too to God. He takes the place of servant to glorify God. In the end of the prophecy the faithful remnants are found as the servants.
This word "servant" is just the key to the whole prophecy from chapter 40 to the end. First, Israel is the servant to show forth Jehovah's praise. He failed. Messiah becomes His servant for it and is rejected by Israel, who thus fills up his guilt; and then the remnant, who, when the body becomes adversaries, are separated from it, and are the servants, accepted and delivered by Him at His return. Hence Matthew, or really the Spirit of God, applies this passage according to the whole tenor and purpose of the prophets-this judgment of Israel, Messiah being rejected, and the setting up of the kingdom in Him according to the prophecies, being the great subject of this gospel. Such too was the constant judgment of the Jews in a crowd of passages. It is not spiritualizing.4 Jesus was not brought out of the world in any spiritual sense. He came down from heaven. Egypt is a great deal to Messiah, as taking up the lot of Israel itself.
As to John 10:3535If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken; (John 10:35), Mr. N. entirely perverts what is said. He says (Phases, p. 125), "Psa. 82 rebukes unjust governors, and at length says to them, `I have said, Ye are gods,'" &c. In other words, "though we are apt to think of rulers as if they were superhuman, yet they shall meet the lot of common men," and then accuses the Lord of using this "as His sufficient justification for calling Himself Son of God: for 'the scripture cannot be broken.'"
Now, this is either a good deal of ignorance, or, to say the very least, very culpable carelessness. At any rate, Mr. N.'s paraphrase has nothing to do with the matter. "We are apt to think" is on the face of it a very different thing from Jehovah's saying "I have said." Further, the Lord is not saying anything to prove what He is, but convicting the Jews of unreasonableness in their blame of Him, on the ground of their own scriptures. What He says is perfect, as surely it must be. In the psalm, Elohim is judging amongst the Elohim, and declared that He had called these judges-perverse as they had become, so as to call judgment down on themselves-Elohim.
They have this name, particularly in the instructions given from Sinai, for causes to be brought to them-the parties were to make it good according to [the award of] Elohim-God or the judges. Hence the Lord says, "If the scriptures, which you own have irrefragable authority, give the name of Elohim to persons instructed by the word, how can you call it blasphemy that I apply the title ' Son of God' to one whom the Father has sanctified and sent into the world?" The argument is of the plainest force to show their injustice, which is the Lord's object.
Mr. N. has not only misrepresented the reasoning of the Lord, but he has misrepresented what He says.
Mr. N. then takes in, in the lump, all the quotations of the New Testament: some had always been "a mystery" to him. Now they were clearly wrong; if canvassed, "it may appear that not one quotation in ten is sensible and appropriate." (Phases, p. 126.) Then it is assumed, that "it is so manifest that they most imperfectly understood that book," that the decision of the New Testament writers concerning the value and credibility of the Old Testament is not to be accepted. Thus it is settled. The only answer one can give to an assertion of this kind is, that it is not manifest. The only thing manifest that I see is, that Mr. N. has not the smallest notion of the purport and character of the Old Testament, as clearly expressed in it. The passages he has referred to certainly will not make any "unbiased interpreter" think so.
It is merely setting up his decision, after having shown himself to be singularly incompetent to judge, not only above that of the New Testament writers, but above the clear judgment of hundreds, founded on sound reasoning and investigation, and intelligent study of the real bearing of the Old Testament, as the expression of the purpose of God. The decision of one who can turn "I have said, Ye are gods"-the plain fact which we find in the Psalms, and in a remarkable part of the Old Testament, applying to the subject-into "We are apt to think rulers superhuman" is not worth much attention in the investigation of the applicability of passages of the Old quoted in the New.