Baron David

The Ancient Scriptures and the Modern Jew


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"of our God." And what is the great theme of the last twenty- seven chapters ? It is the same. The central thought of the prologue, or introduction, consisting of the first eleven verses of chapter forty is : " And the glory of Jehovah shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together," which is explained in the last of the brief four sections into which the introduction is divided, by the words : " Behold the Lord God will come with strength and His own arm shall rule for Him ; behold His reward is with Him and His work before Him." It is from this blessed announcement that the streams of comfort flow ; it is for this glorious culmination that the way is to be prepared, and all the twenty-seven chapters but unfold the process by which this grand consumma- tion will finally be brought about.

      " The glory of Jehovah shall be revealed." I wonder if we all understand what is meant by the expression, " The glory of Jehovah." I fear that some expressions that are much on our lips, are but little understood by us. Let me then state at the outset that the words, " Khebod Jehovah " (the glory of Jehovah), in the Hebrew scriptures, always mean the glory of the personal presence of Jehovah ; the glory surrounding and attendant on the visible manifestations of Jehovah on the earth. In order to elucidate this important subject, let me draw your attention to several different scriptures.

      No sooner did God bring Israel out of Egypt than, in keeping with His purpose of a theocracy, He Himself came, and took His place at the head of that nation, and the visible symbol of His as yet invisible presence was the pillar of cloud, which at night turned into a pillar of fire. The first mention of this symbolical cloud is in Exod. xiii. 21, 22, where we read: "And Jehovah

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      went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud to lead them the way ; and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light ; to go by day and by night. He took not away the pillar of the cloud by day, nor the pillar of fire by night from before the people." In verse 19 of the following chapter we have this pillar of cloud associated with the Angel of Jehovah, for we read : " And the angel of God which went before the camp of Israel removed and went behind them ; and the pillar of the cloud went from before their face and stood behind them."

      Now I need only point out in passing that there is only one Being in the Old Testament who bears the name of the " Angel of Jehovah," and that is Messiah, the Son of God, the second Person in the Blessed Trinity. The word angel, either in the Hebrew or Greek, does not in itself denote the nature or quality of the messenger. It may be one of the heavenly messengers or spiritual intelligences whom we usually call by this name. It may be a man, or it may be He who pre-eminently is the Messenger of God to man, of whom we read " last of all He sent His Son." It was this Divine Angel or Messenger of Jehovah, who, when the time arrived for the bringing Israel out of Egypt, appeared to Moses in the burning bush, and said of Himself, " I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob," so that Moses, recognising Him to be God, was afraid and hid his face (Exod. iii. 2–6). And it was He also who " in His love and in His pity redeemed them, and bare them, and carried them " all the days of old, and went before them in His pillar of cloud all through their wilderness journeys.

      He is called the " Angel of God's Presence " (or " of His face," Isa. Ixiii. 9), because He is the only face or

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      personal manifestation of God which man has ever seen, or can see, and who, after His incarnation, could there- fore say in answer to the yearning desire of man, " Show us the Father and it sufficeth us," " He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father " ; and He is " the Angel of the Covenant," even the Divine Lord who was suddenly to come to His Temple to inaugurate the new dispensa- tion. When once the Tabernacle was built for His dwelling-place, the symbol of His special presence in the midst of His redeemed people was always asso- ciated with the sanctuary. Thus we read of its dedica- tion in Exod. xl. 33–35: "Moses finished the work" (that is, of putting the Tabernacle together). " Then a cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of Jehovah filled the Tabernacle. And Moses was not able to enter into the tent of meeting because the cloud abode thereon, and the glory of Jehovah filled the Tabernacle." " So it was always ; the cloud covered it by day and the appearance of fire by night " (Numb, ix. 16).

      When in process of time, after the establishment of the kingdom of Israel, the permanent " House " or " Palace " l of Israel's true King took the place of the movable tent, we read the same thing in connection with the consecration of the Temple as we do of the Tabernacle.

      "And it came to pass when the priests were come out of the holy place that the cloud filled the house of Jehovah so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud ; for the glory of Jehovah had filled the house of Jehovah" (i Kings viii. 10–11). " So it was always." I would not assert that all through the frequent lapses into apostacy, and in the latter evil

      1 During the time of the Theocracy there was only one word for Temple and Palace.

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      days of the history of the kingdom, the people could always see the symbol of God's presence with them, but so long as the first Temple stood He did not finally withdraw from the people He was pleased to call His inheritance ; and Israel's high priests on entering once a year into the Holy of Holies were conscious that there, " between the Cherubim," God dwelt as in no other nation, although His presence fills the universe. Thus it continued until a particular point in the history of Israel, recorded in the Book of Ezekiel. The prophecy of Ezekiel forms a very important link in the progress of Old Testament revelation, but it is specially im- portant for the light it throws on two great events in Jewish history. One of these events is the de- parture of governmental power from Judah. This is announced in the remarkable passage in chapter xxi. 26, 27, and was explained in a preceding section of this work. 1

      But secondly, simultaneous with the removal of governmental power the prophet saw the departure of the glory of Jehovah from Israel. The connection is most significant. The true King of Israel, as already explained, was Jehovah, and the removal of crown and mitre, and the departure of the sceptre from Judah therefore really meant the withdrawal of God from them. We all remember the touching account the prophet gives of the departure of the glory in three earlier chapters. 2

      First he sees it in its wonted place between the Cherubim in the Holy of Holies then he sees it lift itself from off the cherub and move to the threshold, where it evidently remained for awhile. Then he sees it move again, this time mounted on the Cherubim, the

       See " Without a King and without a Prince," page 13.

      Ezek. ix, x., xi.

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      symbols of God's executive power on the earth, and passing out by the east gate it " stood," or remained hovering, over the court, " So that the court was full of the brightness of the glory of Jehovah." Again he sees it depart from the court of the temple and stand over the city. Have you ever asked yourself the reason of this slow and deliberate departure of the glory from Israel ? Why not depart from them at one bound ? Oh, my dear friends, in symbolical language God the Father thus spoke to His rebellious but beloved people the very words that Jesus spoke to Israel centuries later : " O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings and ye would not." He did not want to leave them. Oh, if they had but repented and cleansed their way, then would He not have taken His presence from among them. " For the space of three years and a half, said Rabbi Youchanan, the Shekhinah was sitting upon the Mount of Olives thinking peradventure Israel might repent ; " T but instead of repenting they only grew bolder in their sins, and, as God Himself pathetically complains to the prophet, they literally drove Him from their midst by their wickedness. " Son of man," he says, " seest thou what they do, even the great abomina- tions that the house of Israel committeth here, that I should go far off from my sanctuary " (Ezek. viii. 6). So that the prophet again sees the glory of Jehovah going

      ' Quoted by M. Margoliouth in his " Lord's Prayer," from the Preface to the Kabbalistic commentary on the Book of Lamen- tations, Aychah Rabatha. He