26. Unto these reasons and testimonies we may subjoin the use of the words themselves. ©3¥ is originally and properly a “rod” or “staff;” all other significations of it are metaphorical. Among them the principal is that of “sceptre,’—an ensign of rule and government ; nor is it absolutely used in any other sense, but in that very frequently : Papal. 7, yma bay ab bw; A sceptre of uprightness is the sceptre of thy kingdom.” Num. xxiv. 17, palgae) baw Dp, — “ A sceptre shall arise out of Israel;” that is, a prince or a ruler. Targum, “Christ shall rule out of Israel.” And this sense of the word is made more evident by its conjunction with PPM), a “law- giver”—he that prescribes and writes laws with authority to be ob- served. Deut. xxxiii. 21, “In a portion P5D PPM,” “of the lawgiver hidden ;” that is, Moses. “The great scribe,” saith the Targum; for, as they suppose, the sepulchre of Moses was in the lot of Gad. “ Me- chokek,” saith Aben Ezra; that is, ayn youn, “the great presi- dent” or “ruler.” Ps. eviii. 9, “Judah, PPA,” “my lawgiver;” with allusion to this prediction of Jacob. Isa. xxxiii. 22, “The Lorp is our judge, the Lorp is ¥PPNP,” “ our lawgiver.” These two words, then, in conjunction do absolutely denote rule and dominion.
27. The later masters of the Jews, to avoid the force of this tes-
278 THE PROMISED MESSIAH [EXERC. XII
timony, have coined a new signification for these words. “ Shebet,” they say, is only a “rod of correction;” and “ Mechokek” any scribe or teacher, which they would refer to the rabbins they have had in every generation. Some of them by “Shebet” understand a “staff of supportment,” which they were to enjoy in the midst of their troubles. So Iremember Manasseh Ben Israel, not long since, made it one of his reasons for their admission into England, that thereby this pro- phecy might receive somewhat of accomplishment by this counte- nance and encouragement in this land. But the most of them adhere to the former sense of the words. So they call the story of their calamities and sufferings mn’ paw;—“The Rod of Judah.” But this evasion is plainly and fully obviated in the former opening of the words, and confirmation of their genuine importance: for,— (1.) It is openly contrary to the whole context and scope of the place; (2.) To the meaning and constant use of the words them- selves, especially as conjoined; (3.) To the Targums, and all old translations; (4.) To the Talmud, and all their own ancient masters; (5.) To the truth of the story, Judah having been long in a most flourishing and prosperous condition, without any such signal cala- mity as that which they would intimate to be intended in the words, namely, such as for sixteen hundred years they have now undergone; (6.) The supportment they have had hath not been national, nor afforded to Judah as a tribe or people, but hath con- sisted merely in the greatness and wealth of a few individual per- sons scattered up and down the world, neither themselves nor any else knowing unto what tribe they did belong; and, (7.) This hath been in things no way relating to the worship of God, or their church-state, or their spiritual good; (8.) Their scribes were not formerly of the tribe of Judah, and their later rabbins wholly of an uncertain extraction. So that this pretence proves nothing but the misery of their present state and condition, wherein they seek a refuge for their infidelity in vanity and falsehood.
28. Our SECOND inquiry is concerning the subject of the promise under consideration, which is the “ Shiloh;” whereby we say the pro- mised Seed is intended. About the derivation and precise significa- tion of the word we have no need to contend. Most learned men look upon it as derived from 7”, to be “quiet, safe, happy, pros- perous;” whence also is 2¥, Ps, cxxii. 7, “safety, peace, prosperity, abundance.” Hence “Shiloh,” says Mercer, “ sonat tranquillum, pros- perum, pacatum, felicem, augustum, victorem, cui omnia prospere succedunt,”—“ signifies one quiet, prosperous, peaceable, happy, ho- nourable, a conqueror, to whom all things succeed well and happily.” To this etymology of the word agree Galatinus, Fagius, Melancthon, Pagninus, Drusius, Schindler, Buxtorfius, Amama, and generally all the most learned in the Hebrew tongue. The Vulgar Latin, ren-
SECT. 28, 29.] LONG SINCE COME. 279
dering the words, “qui mittendus est,” “who is to be sent,” as if it were from 72¥, corrupts the sense, and gives advantage to the Jews to pervert the words, as both Raymundus and Galatinus ob- serve. Neither is there any thing nearer the truth in the deriva- tion of the word from 12”, as though 4 were put for §, and ¥ for WS, so making it as much as 3 WN, “ que ei,” “which to him;” whereunto yet that § aréxeras and the ra droxeiueva airod of the Greeks, the former mentioned by Eusebius, the latter in the present copies, both by Justin Martyr, do relate or allude.
Others suppose Sw to signify “a son,” from mw, which denotes the “ after-birth,” or membrane wherein the child is wrapped in the womb. Thence HOW “ Shiloh,” should be the same with 122, “ his son,’ 7 being put for 1, which is not unusual, saith Kimchi. But Galatinus supposeth 7 to be a feminine affix, denoting that the Messiah was to be the seed of the woman, or to be born of a virgin; neither is his conjecture absolutely to be rejected, although Mercer pronounces it to be against the rules of grammar, for we know they hold not always in things mysterious. He that would be further satisfied about the importance of the word, may consult Raymundus, Porchetus, and Galatinus, in their discourses against the Jews on this subject; Kimchi, Pagnin, Mercer, Schindler, Philip ab Aquino, and Buxtorf, in their lexicons; Munster, Fagius, Drusius, Grotius, in their annotations on the text; Helvicus, Rivet, Episcopius, Boetius, Hoornbeek, in their discourses from it. The weight of our argu- ment lies not in the precise signification of the word. The Messiah it is who is intended in that expression,—