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| Conclusion. Clue to the Error of the Jews.
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Chapter XIV.—Conclusion.
Clue to the Error of the Jews.
Learn now (over and above the immediate question)
the clue to your error. We affirm, two characters of the
Christ demonstrated by the prophets, and as many advents of His
forenoted: one, in humility (of course the first), when He has to
be led “as a sheep for a victim; and, as a lamb voiceless before
the shearer, so He opened not His mouth,” not even in His aspect
comely. For “we have announced,” says the
prophet, “concerning Him, (He is) as a little child, as a
root in a thirsty land; and there was not in Him attractiveness or
glory. And we saw Him, and He had not attractiveness or grace; but His
mien was unhonoured, deficient in comparison of the sons of
men,”1445
“a man
set in the plague,1446
and knowing how to
bear infirmity:” to wit as having been set by the Father
“for a stone of offence,”1447
| 1447 See Isa. viii. 14 (where, however, the LXX. rendering is
widely different) with Rom.
ix. 32, 33; Ps. cxviii. 22
(cxvii. 22 in LXX.); 1 Pet.
ii. 4. |
and “made a little lower” by Him “than
angels,”1448
He pronounces
Himself “a worm, and not a man, an ignominy of man, and
the refuse of the People.”1449
| 1449 See Ps. xxii. 6 (xxi. 7 in LXX., the Alex.
ms. of which here agrees well with
Tertullian). |
Which evidences of ignobility suit the First
Advent, just as those of sublimity do the Second; when He shall be made no longer “a stone of
offence nor a rock of scandal,” but “the highest
corner-stone,”1450
after reprobation
(on earth) taken up (into heaven) and raised sublime for the purpose of
consummation,1451
and that
“rock”—so we must admit—which is read of in
Daniel as forecut from a mount, which shall crush and crumble the image
of secular kingdoms.1452
| 1452 Or, “worldly
kingdoms.” See Dan. ii. 34, 35, 44, 45" id="iv.ix.xiv-p10.1" parsed="|Dan|2|34|2|35;|Dan|2|44|0|0;|Dan|2|45|0|0" osisRef="Bible:Dan.2.34-Dan.2.35 Bible:Dan.2.44 Bible:Dan.2.45">Dan. ii.
34, 35, 44, 45. | Of which second
advent of the same (Christ) Daniel has said: “And, behold, as it
were a Son of man, coming with the clouds of the heaven, came unto the
Ancient of days, and was present in His sight; and they who were
standing by led (Him) unto Him. And there was given Him royal power;
and all nations of the earth, according to their race, and all glory,
shall serve Him: and His power is eternal, which shall not be
taken away, and His kingdom one which shall not be
corrupted.”1453
Then, assuredly, is
He to have an honourable mien, and a grace not “deficient more
than the sons of men;” for (He will then be) “blooming in
beauty in comparison with the sons of men.”1454
“Grace,” says the
Psalmist, “hath been outpoured in Thy lips: wherefore God
hath blessed Thee unto eternity. Gird Thee Thy sword around Thy thigh,
most potent in Thy bloom and beauty!”1455
while the Father withal afterwards, after making Him somewhat lower
than angels, “crowned Him with glory and honour and subjected all
things beneath His feet.”1456
And then shall they “learn to know Him whom they pierced, and
shall beat their breasts tribe by tribe;”1457
of
course because in days bygone they did not know Him when
conditioned in the humility of human estate. Jeremiah says: “He
is a human being, and who will learn to know Him?”1458
because, “His nativity,” says
Isaiah, “who shall declare?” So, too, in Zechariah, in His
own person, nay, in the very mystery1459
of His name
withal, the most true Priest of the Father, His own1460
| 1460 The reading which
Oehler follows, and which seems to have the best authority, is
“verissimus sacerdos Patris, Christus Ipsius,” as in the
text. But Rig., whose judgment is generally very sound, prefers,
with some others, to read, “verus summus sacerdos Patris Christus
Jesus;” which agrees better with the previous allusion to
“the mystery of His name withal:” comp. c. ix. above,
towards the end. | Christ, is delineated in a twofold garb with
reference to the two advents.1461
| 1461 See Zech. iii. “The mystery of His name”
refers to the meaning of “Jeshua,” for which see c. ix.
above. | First, He was clad in “sordid
attire,” that is, in the indignity of passible and mortal flesh,
when the devil, withal, was opposing himself to Him—the
instigator, to wit, of Judas the traitor1462
—who even after His baptism had tempted
Him. In the next place, He was stripped of His former sordid
raiment, and adorned with a garment down to the foot, and with a turban
and a clean mitre, that is, (with the garb) of the second advent; since He is demonstrated as having attained
“glory and honour.” Nor will you be able to say that the man
(there depicted) is “the son of Jozadak,”1463
| 1463 Or
“Josedech,” as Tertullian here writes, and as we find in
Bible:Zech.6.11">Hag. i. 1, 12; ii. 2, 4; Zech.
vi. 11, and in the LXX. | who was never at all clad in a sordid
garment, but was always adorned with the sacerdotal garment, nor ever
deprived of the sacerdotal function. But the
“Jesus”1464
there alluded to is
Christ, the Priest of God the most high Father;
who at His first advent came in humility, in
human form, and passible, even up to the period of His passion; being
Himself likewise made, through all (stages of suffering) a victim for
us all; who after His resurrection was “clad with a garment down
to the foot,”1465
and named the
Priest of God the Father unto eternity.1466
| 1466 See Ps. cx. (cix. in LXX.) 4; Heb. v.
5–10. |
So, again, I will make an interpretation of the two goats which were
habitually offered on the fast-day.1467
Do not they,
too, point to each successive stage in the character of the Christ who
is already come? A pair, on the one hand, and consimilar (they were),
because of the identity of the Lord’s general appearance,
inasmuch as He is not to come in some other form, seeing that He has to
be recognised by those by whom He was once hurt. But the one of them,
begirt with scarlet, amid cursing and universal spitting, and tearing,
and piercing, was cast away by the People outside the city into
perdition, marked with manifest tokens of Christ’s passion; who,
after being begirt with scarlet garment, and subjected to universal
spitting, and afflicted with all contumelies, was crucified outside the
city.1468
| 1468 Comp. Heb. xiii. 10–13. It is to be noted, however, that all
this spitting, etc., formed no part of the divinely ordained
ceremony. | The other, however, offered for sins, and
given as food to the priests merely of the temple,1469
gave signal evidences of the second
appearance; in so far as, after the expiation of all sins, the priests
of the spiritual temple, that is, of the church, were to enjoy1470
| 1470 Unless Oehler’s
“fruerentur” is an error for “fruentur” ="will
enjoy.” | a spiritual public distribution (as it were)
of the Lord’s grace, while all others are fasting from
salvation.
Therefore, since the vaticinations of the
first advent obscured it with manifold figures,
and debased it with every dishonour, while the second (was foretold as) manifest and wholly worthy of God,
it has resulted therefrom, that, by fixing their gaze on that one alone
which they could easily understand and believe (that is, the
second, which is in honour and glory), they
have been (not undeservedly) deceived as to the more obscure—at
all events, the more unworthy—that is, the first. And thus to the present moment they affirm that
their Christ is not come, because He is not come in majesty; while they
are ignorant of1471
the fact that He
was first to come in humility.
Enough it is, meantime, to have thus far followed
the stream downward of the order of Christ’s course, whereby He
is proved such as He was habitually announced: in order that, as a
result of this harmony of the Divine Scriptures, we may understand; and
that the events which used to be predicted as destined to take place
after Christ may be believed to have been accomplished as the result of
a divine arrangement. For unless He come after whom they had to
be accomplished, by no means would the events, the future occurrence
whereof was predictively assigned to His advent, have come to
pass. Therefore, if you see universal nations thenceforth
emerging from the profundity of human error to God the Creator and His
Christ (which you dare not assert to have not been prophesied, because,
albeit you were so to assert, there would forthwith—as we have
already premised1472
| 1472 See cc. xi. xii.
above. | —occur to you
the promise of the Father saying, “My Son art Thou; I this day
have begotten Thee; ask of Me, and I will give Thee Gentiles as
Thine heritage, and as Thy possession the boundaries of the
earth.” Nor will you be able to vindicate, as the subject
of that prediction, rather the son of David, Solomon, than Christ,
God’s Son; nor “the boundaries of the earth,” as
promised rather to David’s son, who reigned within the single
land of Judea, than to Christ the Son of God, who has already illumined
the whole world1473
with the rays of
His gospel. In short, again, a throne “unto the
age”1474
| 1474 Or, “unto
eternity.” Comp. Bible:Ps.89.35-Ps.89.37">2 Sam. (2
Kings in LXX.) vii. 13; 1 Chron. xvii. 12; Ps. lxxxix. 3, 4, 29, 35,
36, 37 (in LXX. Bible:Ps.88.38">Ps. lxxxviii.
4, 5, 30, 36, 37, 38). | is more suitable to
Christ, God’s Son, than to Solomon,—a temporal king, to
wit, who reigned over Israel alone. For at the present day nations are
invoking Christ which used not to know Him; and peoples at the present
day are fleeing in a body to the Christ of whom in days bygone they
were ignorant1475
), you cannot
contend that is future which you see taking place.1476
| 1476 Oehler’s
pointing is discarded. The whole passage, from “which you dare
not assert” down to “ignorant,” appears to be
parenthetical; and I have therefore marked it as such. | Either deny that these events were
prophesied, while they are seen before your eyes; or else have been
fulfilled, while you hear them read: or, on the other hand, if you fail
to deny each position, they will have their fulfilment in Him with
respect to whom they were prophesied.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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