Page images
PDF
EPUB

a series of learned divines as turning Scripture into sheer nonsense, merely because he has never taken the pains to understand their meaning. Let us now hear Dr. Todd upon the same argument :—

"Another leading error is the liberty assumed by expositors of taking the word king, wherever it occurs, as synonymous with kingdom. This is a liberty that could hardly be ventured on in any other ancient writer, without good and convincing reasons. Let it be granted that by a king the prophet does sometimes mean a kingdom; will it follow that the rule is general, or that the word may mean either king or kingdom, wherever it occurs, just as commentators please? Thus, where the four beasts are called in one place 'four kings that shall arise,' and in another the fourth beast is called a kingdom, it may perhaps be true that a king is synonymous with a kingdom; because, admitting the word king to be the true reading, there is a plain reason in the prophecy for so interpreting it. But is it fair to make this disputed reading the basis of a general rule? Would it be fair, even if the reading were indisputably genuine, to argue from a single instance, that in other cases, where no such reason can be given, the same interpretation should be adopted? Is it fair to assume this license in a prophecy where the words king and kingdom are used in manifest contradistinction: as Dan. vii. 23, 24; viii. 22, 23? These prophecies speak of kings and king'doms in the same sentence, and therefore in contradistinction to each other. A king, it is true, implies a kingdom, and a kingdom usually implies a king; but it will not therefore follow that in prophecy, any more than in history, a king and a kingdom are synonymous. For however convenient to commentators the assumption of such a principle, that may be true of a king which is not true of his kingdom; and we may be greatly deceived when we take upon ourselves to expound of kingdoms what the prophecy has foretold of kings" (pp. 124, 125).

"The general adoption of this erroneous canon has led to the neglect of a remarkable feature in the prophecy of the ram. The ten horns of the fourth beast are explained to be ten kings; but the four horns of the goat, we are told, are four kingdoms. Hencë I am disposed to suggest that the kingdoms represented by the four horns of the goat may perhaps be the same as those before presented under the emblem of the four beasts” (126).

"The horns, we are expressly told, are the kings, not the kingdoms, of Media and Persia" (p. 127).

"These three erroneous principles have perplexed, one or more of them, all the modern, and many of the ancient, commentators—that the Roman empire is the fourth kingdom; that the little horn of the fourth beast is a different power from the little horn of the goat; and that we are at liberty to consider the kings spoken of in the prophecy, not as individuals, but as kingdoms" (pp. 130, 131).

These passages are enough to show the nature of the objection, and the confidence with which it is propounded. The two last show further its connexion with the meaning of the vision just examined, of the ram and the goat. Of the three principles which Dr. Todd boldly denounces as erroneous, I have proved that the first admits of overwhelming demonstration, and that the fancied refutation of the second is a complete failure-a string of unwarranted assumptions. It remains for us to see whether the arguments upon this third point are more solid than on the two others. For this end the question at issue must be first defined, and then tried by the double test of reason and Scripture evidence.

1. The word king, according to the Futurists, is used throughout these prophecies in a sense strictly personal, and means a single individual, the person who, at some particular point of time, wields the sovereign power. Only in Dan. vii. 17, Dr. Todd, and perhaps the others, admit doubtfully of one solitary exception. By a kingdom, they understand either the country, or the subjects, in contrast to the king, or kings, who may rule over them. It is clear that the two words thus expounded are too distinct in their meaning to admit of interchange.

On the other hand, the word king, according to the Protestant interpreters, is used in an official sense, and

[ocr errors]

e

denotes, not an individual monarch, but a dynasty or ruling power, "¿ àeì Baoiλévwv." Its unity consists, in their view, not in the personal life of the ruler, but in the [sameness of the state ruled, or the continuance of the same regular succession and ruling power. The word kingdom, again, they interpret sometimes of kingly dominion or authority, abstractedly considered, as in Dan. vii. 14-27; Matt. vi. 13; Luke xix. 12-15; or else of the collective state and body politic, whether inclusive or exclusive of the ruler, who is its natural head. A king and a kingdom are thus distinguishable, as the head is from the body to which it belongs; and yet the former term may often be used as equivalent to the latter, without either obscurity or inconvenience.

2. Let us now inquire, on grounds of reason, which use of the term is more likely to obtain in these visions. Both senses of the word occur in common language— under what circumstances is each of them employed? When we speak of events limited, within a few years, or individual in their very nature, we use the term in its individual and personal sense-as the visit or the King of Prussia to England, or the exile of the late King of France. But when we refer to events properly national, relating to laws or constitutions of state, or which may be presumed to last through a long course of years, we use the same term, just as naturally and regularly, in its official and wider sense. Such is its meaning in expressions like these:-The King of Prussia is the most powerful Protestant monarch on the continent; the Emperor of Austria is the main support of the Church of Rome; there have been long and bloody wars between the kings of France and of England. The context, or the nature of the event, thus decides, in every case, the true meaning of the term.

Let us apply the principle to the present subject.

The first lesson in the study of prophecy is taught us by St. Peter, that "one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." Our conceptions of time need here to be expanded, if we would rightly appreh end the vast range of the Divine counsels. Thus each of the visions already examined has been found to reach from the time of the prophet to the second advent. In passages so brief, and which yet have so wide a range, reason and common sense prescribe to us that we should take the word king in its wider and larger meaning, wherever there is no distinct mark of a merely personal character to limit and restrain its full significance.

Again, in three visions out of four, the word only occurs as the explanation of a symbol. The four parts of the image and the four beasts confessedly denote four kingdoms. Whether, then, is it more natural to suppose that a toe of the image or a horn of a beast denotes an individual person, or a kingdom with its official ruler? The answer is self-evident. Indeed, it is very like an absurdity to say that the great image, which in its four parts has denoted in succession four mighty kingdoms, historically terminates in ten individuals alone, to the exclusion of the kingdoms over which they rule. But if the kingdoms are included, and are represented in their rulers, we have clearly reverted from the personal to the official sense, and no law of reason or of usage suffers us then to bind down the term to the person of one individual. The à priori argument is therefore, on both accounts, entirely in favour of the Protestant acceptation.

3. Let us next consider the à posteriori evidence, and examine the usage of Scripture in every instance in succession.

(1). The first is in Dan. ii. 37, 39. It is there said to

Nebuchadnezzar, "Thou art this head of gold. And after thee shall arise another kingdom inferior to thee." It is plain that, since the silver denotes another kingdom, and the brass a third kingdom, the head of gold denotes a kingdom also. Yet it is twice declared "Thou art this head of gold-another kingdom inferior to thee." It is as clear, then, as words can make it, that Nebuchadnezzar is viewed, not personally as an individual, but officially, as the existing ruler, as indeed verse 37 teaches throughout. Therefore, his son or grandson, on succeeding to the kingdom, would equally represent the head of gold during the time of his rule. In fact, the prophet gives his reason for applying the title to Nebuchadnezzar, his actual possession of the supreme power, vv. 37, 38. This first instance, then, is decisive for the official sense: and it is an extreme case, for it is not merely the term king that is employed, but an individual who is singly addressed as by name; and yet the context proves beyond doubt that he is viewed as representing the kingdom, and that the same words include his successors in their turn. Yet this is the very passage upon which Mr. Burgh grounds a lecture to all the Protestant commentators, for their negligence in overlooking the self-evident contrast it presents between kings and kingdoms. "Was it (he asks) to Babylon as a kingdom that the head of gold applied? No, but to Nebuchadnezzar, the then king, and to the kingdom only as under him." Such an argument refutes itself. If the words apply strictly to Nebuchadnezzar in person, then clearly they exclude "the kingdom as under him,' just as much as they exclude the empire of China. But if they refer to him officially, which they plainly do, as representing the empire of Babylon, then they must include also his successors in their turn, who represented the same empire. It is, therefore, Mr. Burgh, and not the

« PreviousContinue »