1 Vol. xii, of works, p. 240.
72 ORIGINAL OF THE PRIESTHOOD OF CHRIST [EXERC, XXVII.
Peter’s confession, Matt. xvi. 16, John vi. 69, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God,” was nothing but a due application of the faith ofthe Judaical church unto the person of our Saviour ; which was all that he then called for. “Unless,” saith he, “ ye believe that I am he, ye shall die in yoursins.” And this faith of the church was principally built on this testimony, where God expressly calls the Messiah his Son, and that on the account of his eternal generation.
So Maimonides, Jarchi himself, and Kimchi, do all confess that their ancients interpreted this psalm of the Messiah. The words of Jarchi are plain: nawnds own sd) mwnn qb by pay ns wat yoy ty Sy wamed poo on ;—* Our masters expounded this psalm” (or, “the construction of it”) “concerning the King Messiah; but as the words sound, and that an answer may be returned unto the heretics, it is expedient to interpret it of David himself.” His con- fession is plain, that their ancient doctors looked on this psalm as a prophecy of the Messiah, as is also expressly acknowledged by Mai- monides and Kimchi in their expositions. But as to these words, ‘pon naywnds, “and for an answer unto the heretics,” the reader will not find them either in the edition of Basil or of Venice,—that is, of the Bible with their Masoretical criticisms and rabbinical annota- tions,—being expunged by such as had the oversight of those edi- tions, or before razed out of the copies they made use of.
A great number of instances of this sort, unto excellent advan- tage, are collected by the learned Dr Pococke, Note Miscellan., cap. vili. And in the same place, that we go no farther for it, the same learned author gives us an account of the evasions invented by some of the Mohammedans against the force of this testimony, which yet they allow to respect Jesus Christ, whom they will by no means grant to be the Son of God. A prophet, if we please, he shall be ; but that none may believe him to be the Son of God, the impostor himself laid in provision in the close of his Koran, in that summary of his Mussulman confession, “He is one God, God eternal, who neither begetteth nor is begotten, and to whom none is equal.” The reasons of their infidelity are putid and ridiculous, as is commonly known, and their evasion of this testimony a violent escape: for they tell us the text is corrupted, and instead of “ My Son,” it should be “ My prophet ;” and instead of “I have begotten thee,” it should be “T have cherished thee ;” the former words in the Arabic language consisting of the same letters transposed, and the latter differing in one letter only; and the fancied allusion between or change of the words is not much more distant in the Hebrew. But it is ridi- culous to suppose that the Jews have corrupted their own text, to the ruinous disadvantage of their own infidelity.
17. There is, therefore, an illustrious testimony in these words
SECY. 17.] IN THE COUNSEL OF GOD. 73
given unto the eternal pre-existence of the Lord Christ in his divine nature before his incarnation; and this causeth the adversaries of that sacred truth to turn themselves into all shapes to avoid the foree of it. He with whom we have before concerned ourselves raiseth himself unto that confidence as to deny that the things men- tioned in this psalm had any direct accomplishment in Jesus Christ ; and his next attempt is to prove that these words, Ps. xxii. 16, “They pierced my hands and my feet,” had no respect unto him. To this purpose doth he here discourse :—
“ Ka quee hic dicuntur si litera urgeatur, nunquam in Jesu Christo completa sunt. Nam ejus divinitati hec non competere, clarum est. Jam vero, ne cum natus quidem ex Maria est, historice hzeec illi evenerunt. Qui enim sunt isti, queeso, populi, quee gentes, qui reges, qui contra Jesum jam regem constitutum consurrexerunt ? Certe nec Pilatus, qui tamen rex non erat, nec Herodes ei hoc no- mine ut illum solio et dignitate regia deturbarent illi, molesti fuerunt ; neque consilia adversus ejus regnum contulerunt, nec copias colle- gerunt. Imo Pilatus quamvis illum regem dici audiret, tamen libe- rare et dimittere paratus erat. Et Herodes adversus eum non fre- muit, sed hominem contempsit, et illesum cum in potestate sua haberet dimisit. Pilatus Johan. xviii. 35, fatetur, ‘ Gens tua et ponti- fices tradiderunt te mihi;’ soli ergo Judi fuerunt hostes Jesu, et eorum consilia adversus eum non fuerunt inita; sed optatum finem consecuta; cujus contrarium hic narratur. In summa, tantus con- cursus, tanta consectatio, tantus armorum strepitus, et apparatus bel- lieus, quantum hee verba psalmi significant, nunquam contra Jesum extitit; praeterea isti reges et populi dicunt, ‘ Dirumpamus vincula eorum,’ etc. At Jesus nec Judeis nec gentibus imperitavit, nec vineula injecit, nulla tributa imposuit, non leges preescripsit, quibus illos constrictos tenuisset, et a quibus illi liberari concupivissent. Nam siquis hee ad doctrinam Jesu accommodet, spiritualem et mys- ticum introducet sensum,” etc.
Having elsewhere handled, expounded, and vindicated this testi- mony, I should not here have diverted to the consideration of this discourse, had it not been to give an instance of that extreme confi- dence which this sort of men betake themselves unto when they are pressed with plain Scripture testimonies; for not any of the Jews themselves, who despise the application of this prophecy to Christ in the New Testament, do more perversely argue against his con- cernment therein than this man doth. He tells us, in the entrance of his discourse on this psalm, that all the Hebrews, whose authority in the interpretation of the Scripture no sober man will despise, are against the application of this psalm unto Christ. But as he is deceived if he thought that they all agree in denying this psalm to