SECT. 34.] LONG SINCE COME, 283
honour was allowed him by the caliph who in those days ruled there; so that when he passeth in the streets, they cry before him, “Make way for the son of David.” Fagius long since returned a proper answer to this story in a proverb of their own, 7pywS Ayn way pi ;—“ He that hath a mind to lie, let him place his witnesses at distance enough.” When Benjamin passed over those eastern parts of the world, they were greatly unknown to Europeans, and he had thence advantage to feign what he pleased for the reputation of his nation; which he was not wanting to the improvement of. Time hath now brought truth to light. The people of Europe, especially the English and Hollanders, have some while since discovered the state of things in those parts, and can hear no tidings of Benjamin’s principality, nor his son of David; nor could the Jews ever since get any one to confirm his relation. Besides, if all that he avers should be granted to be true, as in the main it is undoubtedly false, what would it amount unto as to the matter in hand? Is this the sceptre and lawgiver promised unto Judah, as the great privilege above his brethren? It seems, an obscure, unknown person in Bagdad, in cap- tivity, by the permission of a tyrant, whose slave and vassal he is, hath a pre-eminence among a thousand Jews, all slaves to the same tyrant !
And this is all they pretend unto in Mn way, in the forty-second story, where they give us an account of this Nw2 or moun wn, “prince” or “head of the captivity,” as they would have him esteemed, A rich Jew they would make him to be, chosen unto a presidentship by the heads or rectors of the schools of Bagdad, Sora, and Pombeditha; and they confess that for many ages they have chosen no such president, because the Saracens killed the last that was so chosen. Is this, I say, the continuance of the tribe and sceptre of Judah? Judah must be a nation, a people, in a political sense and state, dwelling in their own land, and have rule and dominion exercised therein According to their own law, or the sceptre and law- giver are departed from them; and this they evidently are sixteen hundred years ago: and therefore the Shiloh, the promised Messiah, is long since come; which is the truth whose confirmation from this testimony was intended.
EXERCITATION XIII.
OTHER TESTIMONIES PROVING THE MESSIAH TO BE COME.
1, Other testimonies proving the Messiah to be come—Hag. ii. 3, 6-9; Mal. iii. 1. 2, State of the people at the building of the second temple, in the days of Darius Hystaspes, not Nothus. 3. The house treated of by Haggai the second house; 4. Proved against Abarbanel. 5. The glory promised to this house. 6. Brief summary ofthe glory of Solomon’s temple—Its projec-
284 OTHER TESTIMONIES PROVING [EXERC. XIII.
tion; 7. Magnificence. 8. Treasure spent about it. 9. Number of work- men employed init. 10. Ornaments. 11. Worship. 12. Second temple compared with it—Pretensions of the rabbins about its greatness and dura- tion removed—What was the glory promised to the second house—Opi- nion of the Jews. 13. The promise of it not conditional—The meaning of v2) in the text—Evasions of Abarbariel, Kimchi, and Aben Ezra examined. 14. Their opinion of the glory promised to the second house—Of the great- ness of it—Things wanting in it by their own confession. 15. The glory of this house not in the days of the Asmoneans or Herodians; 16. Not in its continuance. 17-24. Circumstances proving the true Messiah to be the glory —Anomalous construction of the words removed. 25, 26. Mal. ii. 1 ex- plained. 27-29. Confession of the ancient Jews.
1. WE shall now proceed to other testimonies of the same evi- dence and importance with the foregoing. The end of calling and separating the people of the Jews from the rest of the world, the forming of them into a nation, and the setting up of a political state and rule amongst them, being solely, as we have declared, to bring forth the promised Messiah by them, and to shadow out his spiritual kingdom, it was necessary that he should come before their utter desolation and final rejection from that state and condition; which also he did, according to the promise and prediction before insisted on and explained. The same was the end of their ecclesiastical or church state, with all the religious worship that was instituted therein. Whilst that also, therefore, continued and was accepted of God, in the place of his own appointment, he was to be brought forth and to accomplish his work in the world. ‘This also, in sundry places of the Old Testament, is foretold. One or two of the most eminent of them we shall consider, and manifest from them that the true Mes- siah is long since come and exhibited unto the world, according to the promise given of old to that purpose. The first we shall fix upon is that of Haggai, chap. i. 3, 6-9, whereunto we shall add Mal. iii. 1. The words of the former place are, “ Who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory? and how do ye see it now? is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing? Thus saith the Lorp of hosts; Yet once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land; and I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the Lorp cf hosts. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the Lorp of hosts) The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former, saith the LoRD of hosts: and in this place will I give peace, saith the LorD of hosts.” Those of the latter are, “ Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the cove- nant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the Lorp of hosts.” Both to the same purpose.