sojourn of Christ in Egypt was the prelude to the Christianiza- tion of that country ; see Deut. xxiii. 7. In the first ages of Christianity, the Egyptian Church was greatly distinguished : perhaps it will be so again hereafter : cf. Isa. xix. 24, 25. Con cerning the double fulfilment of the single meaning of a single prophecy, cf. Gnomon on ch. i. 22. In short, God embraced in one address, as with one love, both the Messiah Himself, in whom is all His good pleasure, and His people for His sake. The Messiah resembles His people in His adversity ; His people re sembles the Messiah in its prosperity. The head and the body are the whole Christ. Moreover, when His people was in Egypt, Jesus Christ was there also in one of those patriarchs who are enumerated in ch. i. 4. — Cf. Heb. vii. 10.
16. ' Everaiyfiri, was mocked) Such was the king's impression, entirely at variance with the spirit of the Magi. They did, however, hold the royal authority at nought in compari son with the Divine. Herod did not know what might be doing [and he, therefore, became anxious and infuriated]. — having sent) sc. murderers, and that suddenly. — i, he slew) This was a sin crying to Heaven for vengeance ; cf. ver. 18. — vavrag, all) " Of whom," says Feu- Ardent1 on Irenaeus iii. 18, — " Christ, whilst yet Himself a child, conse crated fourteen thousand as martyrs, by the unutterable cruelty of Herod, as the Ethiopians record in the Liturgy left to them by St Matthew, and the Greeks preserve in their calendar." — roi? vaTbag, the boys) not girls; cf. Exod. i. 16. — aero Bieroug, from two years old) The adjective is put in the masculine, as rpttrovg in 2 Chron. xxxi. 16 ; cf. the Hebrew original, xara rbv xpovov, x.r.X., according to the time, etc.) The time indicated by the Magi was, perhaps, a little beyond a year : and Herod laid down, therefore, two years as the limit of massacre.
18. ^>cavr, ev *Pa,aa ^x.oufft)?;, dpr,vog •x.a.t xX.aud/Aoj xai bdvpfAot; ToX;)^ 'Pa^/T^X xXa/ouffa ra TSX.VOC, a.\jrr^' xal ovx. ^'t)sA£ -rapaxX?]$5;va/, x.r.X. — A voice was heard in Rama, lamentation and weeping and much mourning : Rachel bewailing her children, and ivould not be com forted, etc.) The passage is thus rendered by the LXX., Jer.
1 FRANCOIS FEU-ARDENT, a Cordelier, was born at Coutance in 1541, be came Doctor of the Sorbonne in 1 570, and died at Baycux in 1610. lie pub lished an edition of Irev.seus, with an original commentary, in 1575. — (I. B.)