Also the Epistle to the Hebrews-whether by Paul or by Apollos, or any other, is of small moment-is, sui generis, as a dissolving view of the Old Covenant, growing, as it were, into the graceful proportions of a New Temple of living stones, "gold, silver, and precious stones" being built into its foundations and walls, the Lamb being the light and glory thereof, its halls resounding with the praises of grace, its colonnades inscribed with promises, its ritual only pleasing remembrances of death and resurrection, victory accomplished over death and him that had the power of death.

Were there no other churches in Asia besides these seven? We know there were, as those of Galatia and of Colosse. Why were these seven selected? Because they had a different constitution; they were Jewish. Compare this Epistle to Ephesus, "to the angel of the church of Ephesus," and that of Paul," to the saints which are at Ephesus;" different in superscription, different in tone, pregnant with differences. Contrast these words, "I will remove thy candlestick out of its place, except thou repent" (Rev. ii. 5), with "ye are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit" (Eph. ii. 22). If these churches were Christian, their diversity calls for a careful consideration side by side with the Pauline Epistles.

"To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with Me in My throne" (iii. 21). Were there but one throne belonging to Christ this passage would present a serious difficulty in expounding the theory that these are not so much Christian epistles as Jewish. To Christ belongs the throne which is His as the accepted "Mediator between God and man," and which He will occupy with His Bride. To Him also belongs the throne of David, which all who overcome will share with Him. This last is a throne inferior in dignity to the former, as the earthly people will be to the heavenly. On both will Jesus be supreme-on the first as Son of God, on the second as Son of David. The seat on the throne, the crown of the Bride given in the day of her espousals, is not the reward to " Him that overcometh." Not this, but a more eminent endowment have all who are new creatures in Christ Jesus. "Father, I will," says Jesus, "that they also whom Thou hast given Me may be with Me where I am." Those who walk by faith are "more than conquerors," or overcomers.

There is nothing in these epistles of the love-song, as we read in the gospels, and notedly in the other epistles, or in that grand epithalamium of Solomon, or that forty-fifth psalm, which we understand however imperfectly-of the heavenly Bridegroom's rapturous admiration of His Bride, and of her melting response. There is a certain stately dignity, a full, calm approval and declaration of award, rather befitting the pleased or, on occasion, the offended Lord, than the ardent utterances, or disappointed desires of the royal and fervid lover. Who but is struck with the holy abandon of the Canticles in contrast with the measured apportionment of the Apocalypse? "Behold thou art fair, My love : behold, thou art fair:" "Thou art all fair, My love; there is no spot in thee." There is a far-off approach to this in Rev. iii. 9: "I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee." This surely is only the love of a friend, a fast friend. But what a dissonant chord is next struck for the ear of love! "I will spue thee out of My mouth," because the object thus addressed was "lukewarm" (xapòs). It has been supposed that there is "an allusion here to the well-known effect of warm water on the stomach" (Parkhurst). But what shall we think of these terrible words, "Thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked"? If this is to be the last state of the Church, as some have supposed, what dread might well fill the hearts of all lest they should be living then! More consonant far would such a state be with Isa. i. 16-18, and Zech. xii. 10-14, and with the previous history of "the Church in the wilderness." We mark in both instances long-suffering with eventual judgment, even cutting off: "I will remove thy candlestick"... "I will fight against thee with the sword of My mouth"... "I will come on thee as a thief." In contrast with this mark the love of Christ for His Church, His Bride reflected through His servant Paul: "My dearly beloved and longed-for" (Phil. iv. 1). Such is "the love of Christ which passeth knowledge." This is "the great mystery. . . . . Christ and the church."

Chap. iv. "After this," and "hereafter" are renderings of METà μeтà TaÛTα, after these things. "I was in spirit." Like i. 10, this is the translation of év TveúμаTI. It would be difficult to attach any meaning at all to these words if the Holy Spirit is

meant. It was simply a transference of spirit cognizance: the body is a locum tenens still, but the spirit is elsewhere in consciousness, a state not unknown to some of us.

We know that He who sat on the throne is not the Lord Jesus Christ by comparing this passage with v. 6; see also Exod. xxiv. 10; Ezek. i. 26—28. He is not yet on the throne of the Kingdom; for this reason the elders sitting on thrones cannot represent the Church. Who then are they? "Round about the throne were four and twenty thrones (@póvoi); and upon the thrones I saw four and twenty elders sitting clothed in white raiment ; and they had on their heads crowns of gold" (ver. 4). "The four and twenty elders fall down before Him that sat on the throne, and worship Him that liveth for ever and ever, and cast their crowns before His throne," &c. (verse 10). In 1 Chron. xxiv. 4 we read of twenty-four who were chosen to be " governors of the sanctuary and governors of the House of God;" these are said to be "chief men." They are not called "elders," yet doubtless were so.

On considering all the passages in the Revelation where elders are spoken of, there seems to be nothing from which we may definitely conclude who they represent. In Zech. vi. 11 we read, "Take silver and gold, and make crowns, and set them upon the head of Joshua, the son of Josedech, the high priest ;" and verse 14, "The crowns shall be to Helem, and to Tobijah, and to Jedaiah, and to Hen," &c. The distinctive office of these elders. seems to be to praise. On one occasion an elder informs John concerning "the great multitude . . . . of all nations." We find them on thrones, and occupying a position nearer to the throne "on which One sat" than the angels. But the "living creatures" are still nearer though in a somewhat anomalous position, for they are "in the midst of the throne and round about the throne." How could this be? How could they be in the midst and round about the throne at the same time? Let us suppose the throne to be circular and all is easy to comprehend. Around the supreme part of the throne then, but within or "in the midst" of the continued circle would these living creatures be located. But who are they? Compare Isa. vi. 1-3; Ezek. x. 12, 14. That they are agents of the Almighty there can be no doubt: but are there any characteristics of that

economy which is spoken of as "grace and truth"? We are not to think of Him concerning whom they cry, "Holy, holy, holy Lord God Almighty" that He has merged His vindictive holiness in the scheme of grace. These living creatures are "full of eyes before and behind . . . . and within." All eyes, as it were, to see everything, God's inquisitors. Est Deus in mundo, qui omnia videt: There is a God in the world, who sees all things. Thus wrote a heathen. "There is no God," says the modern fool with God's Word to instruct, but he has "got beyond that." All the authorities unite in substituting the future of the verbs in verse 10; we then translate, "When these living creatures shall give glory, and honour, and thanks to Him that sitteth on the throne, who liveth for ever and ever, the four and twenty elders shall fall down before Him that liveth for ever and ever, and shall cast their crowns before His throne." Neither the elders nor the living creatures appear to represent the Church. These verbs may, however, be future Aorists.

CLIFTON.

W. HOWELL.

HORÆ SEMITICE,

COMPRISING HISTORICAL AND BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES OF THE SHEMITIC LANGUAGES..

BY REV. BERNHARD PICK, ROCHESTER, NEW YORK, U.S.

A. THE HEBREW LANGuage.

THE Hebrew language is only a single branch of a great parent stock, called Shemitic-so called because spoken chiefly by nations enumerated in Scripture amongst the descendants of Shem (Gen. x. 21 ff.), of which Prof. M. Müller (“Science of Language," i. p. 396, Am. ed.), exhibits the following:

GENEALOGICAL TABLE [OF THE SHEMITIC FAMILY OF LANGUAGES]. Living Languages.

Dialects of Arabic.

Amharic.

The Jews

Neo Syriac.

Classes. Arabic or (Southern

Hebraic

Dead Languages.

or

Shemitic Family.

Like all other languages, the Hebrew has been subject to a series of changes. Its grammatical development was probably more early than that of the offsets of the parent stem; for, as Gesenius shows, of many forms the origin is still visible in Hebrew, while all traces of it have vanished from the kindred. dialects.

§ 1. Name and Origin.

The Hebrew language takes its name from Abraham's descendants, the Israelites; who are ethnographically called Hebrews, and who spoke this language while they were an independent people. In the Old Testament it is poetically called the language of Canaan (ywooα ʼn Xavaavîtis, Isa. xix. 18, "emphatically the language of the holy land consecrated to Jehovah, as contrasted with that of the profane Egypt," as Haevernick expresses it), and also the Jews' language (Iovdaïorí, 2 Kings xviii. 26; Isa. xxxvi. 11. 13; Nehem. xiii. 24), from the kingdom of Judah. The name "Hebrew language," nowhere occurs in the Old Testament, since in general there is rarely anything said of the language of the Israelites it appears in the prologue to Ecclus., êßpaïarí, and in Joseph., Antiqq. i. 1, 2, γλῶττα τῶν Ἑβραίων. In the New Testament païorí, John v. 2; xix. 13. 17, &c., and eßpais SiáλEKTOS, Acts xxi. 40; xxii. 2; xxvi. 14, denote the Aramaic, which was spoken in the country at the time.' In later Jewish writers (as in the Targumists), the Hebrew language is called NTP? (the sacred tongue), in contrast to the Aramaic

. (לְשׁוֹן חוֹל)

Ibn Ezra (+1168),

1 There is a controversy as to the origin of this name. Buxtorf (+1629), Löscher, F. E. (+ 1749), Buddeus, J. G. (+ 1764), Lengerke (+1855), E. Meier (+ 1866), Ewald (+ 1875) and others, derive it from the Shemite Eber (Gen. x. 24; xi. 14 ff.), while most of the Rabbins and of the Fathers (as Jerome, Theodoret, Origen, Chrysost.), Arias Montanus, Paulus Burgensis, Munster, Luther, Grotius, Scaliger, Eusebius, Walton, Clericus, Rosenmüller, Gesenius, Eichhorn, Hengstenberg, Bleek, and others, derive it from 5, "beyond," following the LXX., which translates (Gen. xiv. 13) by d πeрáτns, “the man from beyond," referring to Abraham's immigration.

2 The passage in Philo (de vita Mosis, 1. ii. p. 509, ed. Colon., Young's transl. vol. iii. p. 82) according to which the original of the Pentateuch was written in Chaldaic, shows how much the Alexandrians of that time had lost the knowledge of the difference of the dialect, and is to be ascribed to Philo's ignorance in this depart

ment.