with his face heavenward, and arms clasped upon his breast, in such composure that scarcely could one hear him so much as breathe; as absorbed in God, and enjoying a calmness and transport which could not be expressed; while from the serenity, and something resembling splendor which appeared on his countenance, and in all his gestures afterward, one might easily discover that he had been on the Mount of Communion, and had descended, like Moses, with the divine glory on his brow. His public prayers were attended with such ardor, pertinence, and faith, that it appeared, says his biographer, "as though the heavens were burst open, and God himself appeared in the congregation."

He was sometimes rapt away, as from earth, in his devotions, being quite lost to himself, and insensible of everything around him, absorbed in the visions of God; and in these profound and solemn frames of mind he has remained for hours, still and motionless as a statue.

Such was Thomas Walsh. He died in 1758, in Ireland, whither he had gone for the improvement of his health. Wesley met him in Limerick, "just alive!" "O what a man," he writes, "to be snatched away in the strength of his years! Surely Thy judgments are a great deep!" His death presented an extraordinary and an instructive lesson. For weeks his soul was obscured with darkness; he desponded even of his salvation. The painful mystery spread a sensation of interest and awe throughout the Methodist communities of not only Ireland, but England, and public prayers were offered for him in the chapels of Dublin and London. He was doubtless suffering under the effects of disease on the nervous system; but good men did not then understand such phenomena as we do, with our more advanced science. "His great soul," says his biographer, "lay thus, as it were, in ruins for some considerable time, and poured out many a heavy groan and speechless tear from an oppressed heart and dying body. He sadly bewailed the absence of Him whose wonted presence had so often given him the victory over the manifold contradictions and troubles which he endured for his name's sake."

But God takes care of his own "dear children," and this his beloved and faithful servant was crowned with final and everlasting deliverance. Some Christian friends were praying about his dying bed. He requested them to retire and leave him alone, for a season of selfrecollection and prayer. When they returned he exclaimed: "He is come! he is come! my beloved is mine, and I am his!" and died.

FOURTH SERIES, VOL. XI.- 8

ART. VIII-EXPOSITION OF THE SECOND PSALM.

66

INTRODUCTION.

§ 1. General Remarks― Contents.

'ALL Scripture is given by inspiration of God," said the Apostle Paul to Timothy; and this declaration had respect to the Old Testament, inasmuch as the New Testament Scriptures were not yet published. The second psalm, therefore, as a part of this Scripture, we take to be inspired of God; we take it as inspired in its thoughts, and inspired in its words, and that David is simply the intelligent amanuensis.

Aside from this fact, this psalm has an additional interest, from its being a prophetic song, and being in fact a compend of the Gospel history from its commencement in the world down to the judgmentday. By a few strokes of the Divine pencil the whole Gospel picture, in its great outlines, is here portrayed. The opposition of heathenism and its princes; the raging of the wicked like the foaming sea; Jehovah sitting in the heavens and holding them in derision and rebuking them in his wrath; the Gospel established; the Son having the heathen for his inheritance; the sudden destruction of his enemies, and the blessedness of his people.

Such is the substance of this psalm, being full of the fatness and marrow of the Gospel, though first sung under the twilight of the Law, a thousand years before the Saviour's advent.

§ 2. Who was its Author?

That David, under Divine inspiration, was its author, there can be no doubt, though there is no superscription, as is usually the case in the other psalms. The testimony of the apostles is explicit as to this point, as recorded in Acts iv, 25: "And when they [the apostles] heard that, [the testimony of Peter and John in regard to the healing of the lame man,] they lifted up their voice with one accord and said: Lord, thou art God, which hast made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all that in them is; who, by the mouth of thy servant David, hast said, Why did the heathen rage, and the people imagine vain things?" God, then, uttered this psalm by the mouth of his servant David.

§ 3. Is the Psalm Messianic?

That is, is Messiah its subject? We answer, the

of this

Psalm is the Mɛooíaç of the New Testament. See John i, 43; iv, 25: "He [Andrew] first findeth his own brother Simon, and saith unto him, we have found the Messias, which is, being interpreted, the Christ," or the anointed. The woman of Samaria saith unto him, "I know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ," ὁ Χριστός.

From the word

alone nothing can be certainly determined, as it is applied in other passages to kings and priests of the Jewish nation, and in one instance to a heathen prince, Cyrus. Isaiah xlv, 1. But from its connection with the other parts of the psalm, there is no room to doubt its application to Christ.

In the first place there is peculiar appropriateness in the application of this name to Christ. As the high priest and the prince were inducted into office by the ceremony of anointing, (Exodus xxix, 29; Leviticus iv, 3,) they were often called "the Lord's anointed." So our Lord, when inducted into office by baptism, received the anointing of the Holy Spirit. Thus he was "God's anointed," in; this being from , to anoint, and thus he is appropriately called.

The Septuagint translated this word ὅ Χριστός. κατὰ τοῦ κυρίου καὶ κατὰ τοῦ χριστου αυτοῦ, against Jehovah and against his Christ; χριστός being from χρίω, I anoint.

We observe, further, that this name

is not only peculiarly appropriate to the Saviour, but its Greek equivalent, 8 Xplorós, is the most common name by which he is designated in the New Testament, except "Inoõvs.

2. Our second reason for believing that this psalm has for its subject the Messiah, is the fact of the usage of the personal poetic pronoun third plural, in in the third verse, referring for its antecedent to The rebellious chiefs cry out,

and in in the second verse.

"Let us break their bands asunder:
Let us cast their cords from us."

That is, the bands and cords of Jehovah and his Anointed, of the Father and of the Son. It is hardly needful to say that the terms "bands" and "cords" are metaphorical, for government and laws; and further that it would be very puerile, as well as very impious, to refer in, thus associated with Jehovah, to any merely human or Israelitish prince.

3. Our third reason for believing that this psalm is Messianic, is that the hero of the song is so significantly addressed in the seventh

verse:

Jehovah declares, "Thou art my Son;

This day I have begotten thee."

We are here introduced to the deep mystery of the Sonship of Messiah. He is the Son of the living God in a peculiar sense. Under the endearing relation of Son, the second person of the Trinity is here set forth. Emphatically the Father declares, "Thou art my Son." Similar to this was the language heard from the heavens on the occasion of our Saviour's baptism, and on the mount of transfiguration, "This is my beloved Son!" See Matthew iii, 17 and xvii, 5. The Saviour himself alludes to this high relation when he asks the Pharisees, "What think ye of Christ? whose Son is he? They say unto him, The son of David. How then doth David by inspiration call him LORD?" [if he be not also the Son of God, and thus divine.]

This emphatic language of Jehovah, therefore, Thou art my Son, cannot refer to any mere human being, but to Him alone who is equal with and one with the Father.

4. Our fourth reason for believing this psalm to be a prophecy of Christ, is the fact that it is referred to Christ by all the apostles in Acts iv, 23-29. We will quote the entire passage, as we regard it as conclusive of the question before us:

"And being let go, they [Peter and John] went to their own company, [namely, the apostles and the Church,] and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said unto them. And when they heard that, they lifted up their voice to God with one accord, and said, Lord, thou art God, which hast made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all that therein is; who by the mouth of thy servant David hast said, Why did the heathen rage, and the people imagine vain things? The kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord, and against his Christ. For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod, and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, were gathered together, for to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined to be done."

Here it is declared that the very things which God had determined should be done, and had declared by his servant David, in the second psalm, a thousand years before, should be done to Christ and his servants by Herod, and Pontius Pilate, and the people of the

Jews; all was actually fulfilled in the history of Christ and the disciples.

So also the Apostle Paul, in Acts xiii, 33, declared that "God had fulfilled the same unto us their children, in that he had raised up Jesus again; as it is written in the second psalm, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee." So also the same apostle testifies to the same thing in Hebrews i, 5: "To which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee?" The reader is left to infer that God has not made this address to any angel, but he has made it to Jesus, his Son. So also in Hebrews v, 5: "Christ glorified not himself to be made a high priest; but he that said unto him, [glorified him, saying,] Thou art my Son, to-day have I begotten thee." And in three passages of the book of Revelation the triumph of Christ over all his foes is declared in the words of the tenth verse of this psalm: "He shall rule them with a rod of iron; as the vessel of the potter shall they be broken to pieces." Revelation ii, 27. "And she [the woman] brought forth a manchild, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron: and her child was caught up unto God and his throne." Revelation xii, 5. “And out of his [Christ's] mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron." Revelation xix, 15. These Scriptures of the New Testament are perfectly conclusive that the inspired writers understood the second psalm to be a prophecy of Christ.

5. Our fifth argument for this position is that the entire internal evidence of the psalm goes to this point. Behold in it an epitome of the Book of Revelation, the coming and establishment of the kingdom of God. It is not to David, as De Wette and others would have it, that the heathen are to be given, but to a greater than David, even David's illustrious Son. The uttermost parts of the earth shall be given to Him alone. It is to Him that judges and kings are to bow down and pay homage, and it is He alone who is the Judge of judges, the LORD of LORDS, and the KING of KINGS. Such is the character of the hero of this psalm, a character which belongs alone to the Son of God.

It remains only to observe, that we have but reiterated the general sentiment of both the Jewish and Christian Churches. All the old Jewish interpreters agree in expounding it of Messiah, as is confessed particularly by Rabbi Solomon Jarchi, who has this remarkable passage: "Our doctors expounded this psalm of King Messiah, but that we may answer the heretics, meaning Christians, it is expedient to interpret it of David's person."