صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

course of fulfilment ere the then current generation had passed away; those revolutionary convulsions ascribed to the last ages, which occur in and immediately after the days of the Jewish tribulation, and which are foretold under the imagery of a great agitation in the whole allegorical mundane system, must likewise have commenced during the lapse of the then current generation. The present translation therefore will leave us in no better plight than it found us: because it matters little, so far as the difficulty is concerned, whether ALL the predicted events were to be absolutely accomplished or were only to begin to be accomplished; ere the then current generation had passed away.

To such an objection I reply, that the expression ALL these things must be taken collectively; as must ever be the case, when a summary mode of describing a series of successive events is adopted. Hence, when it is said that this generation shall not pass away until ALL these things shall be put into a course of fulfilment, the meaning must plainly be; that the collective series, which comprehends ALL these things, shall be put into a course of fulfilment, ere the present generation shall have passed away.

Such a mode of speaking is so familiar to us, that I have noticed this possible objection, rather because it was possible than because it was of any weight. When we say, ALL the great events, which have changed the face of modern Europe, were put into a course of accomplishment at the breaking out of the

French

French revolution: who does not at once understand our meaning? No person would imagine for a single moment, that, because we use the word ALL when speaking collectively of the whole series, we would intimate, that every event, which has occurred within the last twenty seven years, began to occur in the year 1789. So far from it, he would immediately perceive, that, by the expression ALL the great events, we would describe the collective series which comprehends them all: and that, by the general assertion respecting them, we would intimate this collective series to have commenced with the French revolution.

Now it in this identical sense of collectiveness, a sense most abundantly plain and obvious, that I would understand our Lord's phraseology: this generation shall not pass away, until ALL these things shall be PUT INTO A COURSE OF FULFILMENT.

(3.) But the meaning of Scripture is perhaps best ascertained by comparing it with itself.

Now it is worthy of observation, that an exactly parallel mode of using an aorist of the very same verb occurs at the beginning of the Apocalypse; which is, in fact, an elaborate prophetic evolution of that identical series of events spoken of by our Lord as being about to be put into a course of fulfilment ere the then existing generation should have passed away.

"The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave "unto him, to shew unto his servants things which

must

must shortly" (not COME TO PASS or BE FULFILLED, as our translators in the same erroneous manner explain the original Greek, but)

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

BE A

FULFILLING" or BE PUT INTO A COURSE OF FULFILMENT *.

"

Now the things here alluded to, as appears from the whole tenor of the book, reach to the very end of the world. Hence, in the first place, they could not be fulfilled or be finished or come to pass shortly; therefore the aorist infinitive, which is here used as the aorist subjunctive of the very same verb is used in our Lord's declaration, must be understood in the sense of commencement extending into prolonged action: and, in the second place, all the matters foretold in the Revelation could not be fulfilled shortly or even begin to be fulfilled shortly, because they were to be successive through a long period of many ages; therefore the things must clearly be spoken of collectively, and the commencement intended must be the commencement of the series.

It is precisely in this same manner and no other, that I conceive our Lord's parallel expression ought to be understood. Just as the long series of the apocalyptic prophecies was shortly to be put into a course of fulfilment; so. the long series of all those things foretold by Christ was similarly to be put into

* Αποκαλυψις Ιησε Χρισία, την εδωκεν αὐτῷ ὁ Θεός, δείξαι τοις δέλοις αυλες & δει ΓΕΝΕΣΘΑΙ εν τάχει.

Rev. i. 1.

Ου ου μη παρελθῃ ἡ γενεα άυτη, έως αν παντα ΓΕΝΗΤΑΙ. ń Luke xxi. 32.

a course

a course of fulfilment, ere that generation had passed away *

(4.) I have

* Commentators, whose plan of exposition leads them to notice the first verse of the Apocalypse, are unanimous in giving this obvious sense to it.

[ocr errors]

"Things which must shortly come to pass: that is, things to come to pass, some shortly, and other some in succession of "time; as all interpreters agree." More's Works. p. 721.

"The book opens with the title or inscription of the book "itself; the scope and design of it to foretell things, which "should shortly BEGIN to be fulfilled, and should SUCCEED in "their due season and order till all were accomplished." Bp. Newton's Dissert. in loc.

"This book contains an account of many things, that should "shortly BEGIN to be accomplished." Lowman's Paraph. in loc.

[ocr errors]

66

The same ex

"Which must come to pass in a short time. pression is seen to recur at the close of the book and we may collect from it, that the events foretold in this prophecy BEGIN to be fulfilled even from the time of its delivery, and are to FOLLOW in a rapid succession until the final consum"mation." Woodhouse on the Apoc. in loc.

"Things which must shortly come to pass. It was to be a pro"phecy of the future state of the Church, and such a SERIES "of events then to come to pass, as should BEGIN immediately "after the visions themselves were seen by St. John.” Whis

ton on the Rev. part i. p. 32.

Mr. Mede is not led to notice this particular verse of the Apocalypse; but, how he understood it, may be distinctly seen from his comment on the third verse of the same chapter, "Tempus enim prope est; id est, jam adest tempus, quo verba prophetiæ hujus impleri COEPERINT, et indies MAGIS MAહ્ર GISQUE IMPLEBUNTUR.” Works. book v. c. 7. p. 907.

[ocr errors]

Even Bp. Walmesley could see, that such was the undoubted meaning of the passage. "The purpose of the Apocalypse is

to

(4.) I have argued without hesitation from the well known use of the Greek aorist, because the inspired Gospel of Luke was certainly written in the Hellenic language, whatever may have been the case with that of Matthew or of his evident copyist Mark : and the self-same word, in the self-same tense and mood, is employed by the first of these authors to express the declaration made by his divine Master. That declaration however must originally have been uttered by Christ himself, not in the Greek, but in the Hebrew. Now the word, which he most probably used in that language, will still bring us to the same result *. "This generation shall not pass

[ocr errors]

away, until all these things shall be a doing" or "shall be coming inceptively into existence."

(5.) On the whole, I may remark in conclusion, that the present mode of explaining a passage, the

"to disclose to the Christians A SERIES of events very interest. "ing to them, which must shortly come to pass." Gen. Hist. p. 1, 2. Yet with such strange closeness do sense and nonsense border upon each other, that almost in the same breath he actually tells us, that the angel, through whose instrumentality the Apocalypse is said to have been conveyed to St. John (Rev. i. 1.), is neither more nor less than his namesake John the Baptist. Gen. Hist. p. 2, 3. He might just as well for the same reason, namely the use of the word angel, assure us, that this internuncias was some one of the seven angels of the seven Asiatic churches.

* I should conceive, that the word used by our Lord must have been ". Accordingly the Hebrew translators of St. Matthew's Gospel employ that very word to express the Greek

γενηται.

VOL. III.

Q

difficulty

« السابقةمتابعة »