the terror of the ungodly, but a fear springing from a sense of forgive- ness and acceptance a fear which dreads to offend against love so wonderful, and which cannot bear to think even of the possibility of being once again excluded from the fellowship of Him whose loving- kindness is better than life.
And all this will take place in the " latter days." This brings us to the same landmark of time as indi- cated in the inspired forecast of the history of Israel given by Moses at the very beginning of their national career (Deut iv. 30).
" In the latter," or " last days," " the days of Messiah," as Jewish commentators themselves explain, which to them will not begin until they shall say : " Blessed is He that cometh in the name of Jehovah ! " Israel's sin and sorrow shall end ; the yoke of Gentile rule shall
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be broken ; men shall no more serve themselves of him, but "they shall serve Jehovah their God, and David their king, whom God will raise up unto them."
For thus said Jehovah : " Like as I have brought all this great evil upon this people, so will I bring upon them all the good that I have promised them."
II. The "Ichabod" Period and the Return of the Glory of Jehovah
II
THE "ICHABOD" PERIOD AND THE RETURN OF THE GLORY OF JEHOVAH
WITH the fortieth chapter begins the second half of the Book of Isaiah, the last twenty-seven chapters forming a separate and continuous prophecy by itself. This grand prophetic Messianic epic of the Old Testament, the centre and heart of which is Christ, forms one of the very richest portions of God's self- revelation. Sublimely grand is its very style and language. " There is in fact no more Johannic book in the whole of the Old Testament than this book of consolation," says a great German Bible student. 1 " It is like the product of an Old Testament gift of tongues. The fleshly body of speech has become changed into a glorified body, and we hear, as it were, spiritual voices from the world beyond, or world of glory."
It is remarkable and masterly in its structure, for as we proceed we find the one larger cycle of twenty-seven chapters divided into three smaller cycles of nine chapters, each interlinked with the other, and ending with the same refrain of peace and blessedness to the righteous, and "no peace to the wicked." 2
1 Delitzsch.
2 See Appendix III. on the structure of the second half of Isaiah at the end of the book.
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Wonderful also is its comprehensiveness, the whole order of the New Testament being anticipated in it. It begins where the New Testament begins with the ministry of John the Baptist, the voice crying in the wilderness, and it ends where the New Testament ends, with the new heavens and the new earth, wherein shall dwell righteousness. A certain school of modern criticism, of some of the representations of which I am bold to say that they apply to the study of Scripture a wisdom which is certainly not from above, claim most positively to have discovered another author for these last twenty-seven chapters ; or to speak more accurately, being positive only in putting aside the claims of the Son of Amoz under whose name they stand, and who was believed to be the writer by the compilers of the Old Testament canon, and by the Apostles of the New Testament, these gentlemen are at a loss to find the real author, and not unfrequently call their pseudo Isaiah by the significant name of the "Great Unknown." 1 On my shelf yonder there stands a book on Messianic prophecy by a clever writer, and in the section devoted to the second half of Isaiah I was greatly struck when reading it with the frequent repetition of the phrase the " Great Unknown." The words impressed me as of solemn significance. Prophecy is not of man's origina- tion, but emanates from the Great Omniscient God. " Holy men," Scripture assures us, " spake as they were moved (or borne along) by the Holy Ghost." Now God forbid that I should characterise alike all who have been entrapped by the novelties and the daring
1 " Great " the writer of these chapters certainly was, but for that very reason we may doubt his being unknown, or that there was any necessity of a work which bears on its very face the true prophetic stamp being smuggled in under another name to give it authority.
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of this school, but of many of them I must utter the sad conviction that it is the Holy Spirit, the real author of prophecy, who is the "Great Unknown," or they would not speak and write of Scripture as they do. Once granted that prophecy is supernatural in its essence, and that there is nothing improbable in the fact that one speaking from the mouth of God could definitely foretell things to come, and speak of things and persons which as yet were not, as though they were and most of the arguments in favour of a later date and different author for these chapters fall to the ground. As to the supposed differences in language and style, I can only state that to one dissimilarity it would be easy to point out many marked features both of style and language which are peculiar alike to both parts of the Book of Isaiah. One little link which binds together the two halves of this prophecy shines out in connection with the subject we are about to consider, namely, the Revelation of the glory of Jehovah.
Isaiah's earlier prophecies terminate with the thirty- fifth chapter, that wonderfully sublime paragraph which contains, in germ, most of the leading thoughts of the last twenty-seven chapters. 1 Following that, we have four chapters of contemporary history, containing the account
1 Delitzsch, who to the grief of many, finally gave way in a measure, to the rationalistic pressure around him, and accepted the theory of a later authorship of the last twenty-seven chapters of Isaiah, says in his commentary on the thirty-fifth chapter that it is "like a mosaic" from passages in the second half of the book, and continues : " We have intentionally avoided crowding together the parallel passages from chapters xl.-lxvi. The whole chapter is, in every part, both in thought and language, a prelude of that book of consolation for the exiles in their captivity. Not only in its spiritual New Testament thoughts, but also in its ethereal language, soaring high as it does in majestic softness and light, the prophecy has now reached the highest point of its development."
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of Sennacherib's invasion ; the destruction of his army ; Hezekiah's sickness and recovery ; and of the embassy sent by Merodach-baladan, ostensibly to congratulate Hezekiah on his recovery, but in reality, as we know also from 2 Chron. xxxii. 31, to "inquire of the wonder that was done in the land," in the great reverse which befell the arms of Assyria, whom Babylon, till then a subject power, was before long to supersede. In that thirty-ninth chapter we have a most striking definite an- nouncement to Hezekiah of the seventy years' captivity among the very people whose ambassadors he had tried to impress with the importance of his kingdom, and the riches of his treasures. " Then said Isaiah to Hezekiah, Hear the word of Jehovah of Hosts. Behold the days come, that all that is in thine house, and that which thy fathers have laid up in store until this day, shall be carried to Babylon : nothing shall be left, saith the Lord. And of thy sons that shall issue from thee, which thou shalt beget, shall they take away ; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the King of Babylon."
This announcement forms at once the threshold and the standpoint of the last great prophecy written at a later period of the prophet's life.
The captivity has become ideally a present fact to the prophet, and in vision he already beholds the land desolate, the Temple destroyed, the people pining in Chaldean bondage ; and it is just like God, to open up in advance, a stream of consolation, to accompany the faithful remnant all through the weary wilderness march of the shorter, and of the present much longer captivity. But to return from the short digression. What is the climax to which we are gradually led up in the earlier prophecies of Isaiah? It is found in the second verse of the thirty-fifth chapter, " They shall see the glory of
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Jehovah, the excellency" (or