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Newton, Dr. Prideaux, and others: whether the latter has ever been preferred, I know not *.

In making our selection then among the different meanings which the verb to seal may be supposed to have, that, which naturally occurs the first, is the unintelligibleness of the prophecy until it should have received its accomplishment: and this interpretation is the more specious, because the verb is certainly used elsewhere in that very sense by Daniel himself t. Accordingly, it has been adopted by some commentators: but I greatly doubt, nevertheless, whether it be tenable. A vision may be so sealed; but it is hard to conceive, how a prophet can: and the original word signifies a prophet, not a prophecy, as our translators have rendered it. Besides, the vision of the seventy weeks would be unintelligible, not merely during the lapse of those seventy weeks (to which the unintelligibleness of the prophecy must, according to this interpretation, be limited); but from the very time of its being delivered (which was prior to the earliest possible date of the seventy weeks according to any a priori conjecture, namely the first year of Cyrus), to at least the termination

* As far as I can collect from Pole's Synopsis, Glassius seems to have had some such idea; but his meaning is not expressed very clearly.

† Dan, xii. 9.

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of the Jewish war (which, if the seventy weeks be continuous, must necessarily be posterior to them from whatever era they are reckoned *), not to say to the final overthrow of the Roman empire at the close of the 1260 years t-The next meaning of the verb, which might possibly occur, is that, which the Jews and some of the ancient versions ascribe to it; namely, the completion or finishing of the vision, This I should not be unwilling to adopt in either of its modifications, if we had more satisfactory proof that the verb ever bore such a sense in Scripture: for, since, the seventy weeks are to bring both the coming and the death of the Messiah, they might well be said likewise to bring the accomplishment of all the visions and of all the prophets‡; or, since the prophetic canon under the Law closed with Malachi, they might equally be said to bring on the finishing of it. But, when the word can be interpreted in a perfectly unobjectionable manner agrecably to Scripture, I think it the most adviseable to

The chronological untenableness of the hypothesis of Scaliger and Mr. Mede, which would make them end with the sacking of Jerusalem, has already been shewn.

+ That the prophecy extends to the close of this famous period, will be shewn hereafter in the present chapter § VI. 3. $ "Omnium prophetarum scopus est Christus; hinc in Talmud sic scribunt, Omnes prophetæ paticinati sunt de diebus Messia," Pol, Synop, in loc,

adopt

adopt such an interpretation-I conceive therefore, that the sealing of the vision and the prophet signifies the authentication both of this numerical vision, and of all the other descriptive visions of the Old Testament, by their exact completion in the person of Christ, on the one hand; and the authentication of the great prophet, both by his perfectly fulfilling every vision respecting him, and by the miraculous attestation of his heavenly father to his divine commission, on the other hand*. This seems to me the most natural and unobjectionable interpretation of the clause: and, in this sense, the vision and the prophet were manifestly sealed in the course of the seventy weeks.

(6.) The last particular is the anointing of the Most Holy One.

Under the Levitical dispensation, kings, priests, and prophets, were alike inaugurated into their respective offices by the ceremony of anointing t. Now, since our Lord is at once our king, our priest, and our prophet, he is figuratively said, in allusion to the ceremony under the Law, to have been anointed also at his inauguration into office. His

*Matt. iii. 16, 17. xvii. 5—Mark i, 10, 11. ix. 7—Lukė i, ii. iii. 21, 22—John i. 31. xii. 28, 29, 30-Luke xxiv. 25, 26, 27-Heb. i-1 Peter i. 10, 11, 12-2 Peter i. 16-21.

† Levit. viii, 30—1 Kings xix, 16—2 Sam. ii, 4.

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types were anointed only with consecrated oil: but God anointed him with the Holy Ghost and with power*. It seems most natural to suppose, that the spiritual ceremony of his unction ought to be considered as having been performed at his baptism. He possessed indeed the Spirit from his very birth; and he was born a king ‡, and a prophet §: but his solemn inauguration into his triple office took place at his baptism, when the Holy Ghost descended upon him in a bodily shape like a dove, and when a voice from heaven proclaimed him to be the beloved Son of God in whom he is well pleased. It was then that he was anointed with the Holy Ghost and with power. Previous to his bap tism he performed no miracles: but immediately after it we find him manifesting forth his glory by the changing of water into wine I. Previous to his baptism he led a retired life of meditation and devotion: but immediately after it he began to act under his spiritual commission both of prophet, priest, and king**. As a prophet, he publicly applied to himself those words of Isaiah, "The Spirit

* Acts x. 38.

+ Luke i, 35.
Luke iii. 21, 22.

↑ Matt. ii. 2. ¶ John ii. 11.

Luke ii. 30, 31,32. ** Bp. Kidder thinks, that our Lord was twice anointed, first at his conception, and secondly at his baptism. It seems however most natural to ascribe his unction to the latter alone, Demous. of the Messiah. part I. chap. i. p. 11.

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"of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anoint"ed ed me to preach the Gospel to the poor: he hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted,, to preach "deliverance to the captives and recovering of

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sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are "bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the "Lord*." As a priest, zealous for the honour of God and the purity of his worship, he authoritatively drove out of the temple those that profaned its courts by secular traffic, charging them not to make his father's house a house of merchandise f. And, as a king, he exercised supreme power both over the inanimate creation, the most inveterate diseases, and the evil spirits of darkness: insomuch that the multitude, astonished at what they saw, and fully acknowledging the justice of his claims to royalty, would, upon one occasion, have even taken him by force to make him a king,

2. We have now considered the six particulars destined to be accomplished within the period of the seventy weeks. With some one or more of them these seventy weeks must necessarily terminate§; and they must plainly terminate with such as in point of chronology are the latest. Now the fourth particular, the causing of the eternal righteousness to

*Luke iv. 18, 19. + John ii. 13-17. ↑ John vi. 15. According to the 2d abstract position.

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