Now, the sense of these words is, that either Christ was taken away, that is, killed and slain, by his pressures, and the pretended judgment that was passed on him, or else that he was delivered from the straits and judgment that might have come upon him. Although he was so afflicted, yet he was taken away from distress and judgment. Junius would have the former sense; and the exegesis of the word " taken away" by the following words, " He was cut off from the land of the living," seems to require it. In that sense the words are, '' By durance, restraint, affliction, and judgment," — either the righteous judgment of God, as Junius, or the pretended juridical process of men, — "he was taken away" or slain. If I go off from this sense of the words, of all other apprehensions, I should cleave to that of eternal restraint or condemnation, from which Christ was delivered in his greatest distress, Isa. 1. 7, 8, Heb. v. 7. Though his afflictions were great and his pressures sore, yet he was delivered from eternal restraint and condemnation, it being not possible that he should be detained of death.
Applying all this to Jeremiah, says Grotius, " He was delivered from prison and judgment by the Babylonians." That ^\^?,^ is " de- livered," and that he was delivered by the Babylonians from judg- ment, after that judgment had passed on him and sentence been executed for many months, is strange. But let us proceed to what follows: —
2. " Who shall declare his generation?" — " Who shall speak it, or be able to speak it?" i~ii"n, " his generation." liT is " astas, generatio, Steculum." Gr. •yivsa- Trjv ysviav avrov rig diTiy/jfferar, — " Who shall ex- pound his generation?" or declare it; that is, "Though he be so taken away by oppression and judgment, yet his continuance, his genera- tion, his abiding, shall be such as ' quis eloquetur V who shall speak it?" It shall be for ever and ever; for he was to be " satisfied with long or eternal life," and therein to "see the salvation of God."
This is, says Grotius, " Who can declare the generation of Jere- miah, he shall live so great a space of time?" He began his pro- phecy when he was very young, chap. i. 5, even in the thirteenth year of Josiah, and he continued prophesying in Jerusalem until the
476 VINDICT^ EVANGELIC^.
eleventh year of Zedekiah, about forty years, and how long he lived after this is uncertain. Probably he might live in all sixty years, whereas it is evident that Hosea prophesied eighty years or very near. Now, that this should be so marvellous a thing, that a man should live sixty or seventy years, that God should foretell it as a strange thing above twice so many years before, and express it by way of admiration that none should be able to declare it, is such an interpretation of Scripture as becomes not the learned, annotator. Let the learned reader consult Abrabanel's accommodation of these words to Josiah, and he will see what shifts the poor man is put to to give them any tolerable sense.
3. " For he was cut off out of the land of the living." "On a'/pirai avh rng yrig h l,<^n ocurov' — " His life was taken from the earth;" to the sense, not the letter, "i]^?, " cut off," as a branch is cut off a tree. "^U is " abscindere, succidere, extidere," to cut off. " The land of the living" is the state and condition of them that live in this world; so that to be " cut off from the land of tlie living" is a proper expression for to be slain, as in reference to Christ it is expressed by another word, Dan. ix. 26. " The meaning of this is," says Grotius, *' Jeremiah was cast into prison and into the miry lake. ' He was cut off out of the land of the living ;' that is, he was put into prison twice, and taken out again." If this be not to offer violence to the word of God, I know not what is. The learned man confesses that this whole prophecy belongs to Christ also, but he leaves no sense to the words whereby they possibly may be applied to him. How was Christ cast into prison and a miry pit, and taken out from thence by the way of deliverance?
4. " For the transgression of my people was he stricken." Of the sense of this expression, that Christ was stricken, or that the stroke of punishment was upon him, for our sins, or the sins of God's people,
1 have spoken before. Grotius would have it "by the sin;" that is, the " people sinned in doing of it;" that is, in putting Jeremiah into prison. The whole context evidently manifests, and the proposition in the relation wherein it stands to sin and punishment necessarily requires, that the impulsive and meritorious, not the efficient cause, be denoted thereby.
Verse 9, " And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death ; because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth."
" M dabit impios p7~o sepuUura, et divitem pro morte sua. Illi ipsum etiam interficere voluerant, ut legimus Jer. xxvi. At Deus ipsius vice viros potentes quidem, sed improbos, sacerdotes iiompe mortem Jeremise machinates, morti dedit per Chaldteos