Continued from Sermon VIII. Prejudices against the Doctrine of Antichrist.

SERMON IX.
The Prophetic Style Considered.

In recounting the various prejudices which have diverted many persons from giving a due attention to the prophecies concerning Antichrist, I may be thought to have overlooked one of the most considerable; which ariseth from the peculiar style in which they are delivered. But this being a subject of larger compass, and nicer inquiry, than the rest, (in which, too, the credit of all the prophetic scriptures, as well as those respecting Antichrist, is concerned) I have purposely reserved it for a distinct and separate examination.

WITHOUT DOUBT, a plain man, brought up in our customs and notions, and unacquainted with theological studies, when he first turns himself to the contemplation of the Jewish and Christian prophecies, will be surprised, perhaps disgusted, to find that he understands little or nothing of them. His modesty may incline him to think that such writings are too mysterious for his comprehension: or, his laziness and presumption may dispose him to reject them, at once, as perfectly unintelligible; to consider the language of them as a jargon to which no ideas are annexed; or, at least, as a kind of cipher of so wild and fantastical a texture that no clear and certain construction can be made of it.

Now, this prejudice, whichever way it points, will be obviated if it can be shown:

1. That the prophetic style was of common and approved use in the times when the prophecies were delivered, and among the people to whom they were addressed;

And

2. That this style, how dark or fanciful soever it may appear, is yet reducible to rule; that is, is constructed on such principles as make it the subject of just criticism and reasonable interpretation; and, in particular, to us at this day.

For a language is not fanatical that is authorized by general practice; nor can it be deemed unintelligible when it is capable of having its meaning ascertained.

I. The proof of these two points will most conveniently be given together, in a deduction of the causes which produced the character of the prophetic style.

That character, I believe, is truly given by those who affirm that the style of the prophets was only the poetical, and highly figurative style of the Eastern nations. But if you go farther and ask, How it came to pass that the Oriental poetry was so much more figurative than ours, it may not be enough to say, as many others have done, that this difference of character was owing to the influence of the sun, and to the superior heat and fervor which it gave to an Eastern imagination. For I know not whether there be reason to think that the sun hath any such effect on the powers of the mind; or that the fancies of men are apter to catch, and blaze out in metaphor, within a warm climate than a cold one: a figurative cast of style being observable in the native poetry of all countries; and that, so far as appears from history and experience, in a pretty equal degree.

Besides, if the fact were allowed, the answer would scarce be sufficient. For, as we shall presently see, the symbolic language of prophecy is too consistent and uniform, hath too much of art and method in it, to be derived from the casual flights and sallies of the imagination only, how powerfully soever you suppose it to have operated in the prophets.

We then must go much deeper for a true account of the emblematic and highly colored expression which glares so strongly in the prophetic scriptures; and we shall find it, partly, in the nature of the human mind; and, partly, in the genius, indeed, of the Oriental nations, and especially of the Jews, but as fashioned, not by the influence of their climate, but by the modes of their learning and institution.

I must be as brief as possible on a subject which many learned writers* have largely and fully discussed; and, as the reflections I have to offer to you upon it are chiefly taken from them, I may the rather bespeak your attention to what follows.

* Mede, More, Daubuz, Vitringa, and, above all, the learned Founder of this Lecture.

1. First, then, let it be observed that the original language of all nations is extremely extremely imperfect. Their stock of words being small, they explain themselves very much by signs, or representative actions: and their conceptions, in that early state of society, being gross and rude, the few words they have are replete with material images, and so are what we call highly metaphorical; and this, not from choice or design, or even from any extraordinary warmth of fancy, but of necessity, and from the very nature of things.

Such is the primitive character of all languages: and it continues long in all, because the figurative manner is thought ornamental when it is no longer necessary; and because the necessity of it is only, if at all, removed by long use and habit in abstract speculation: a degree of refinement to which the Orientals, and the Jews especially, never attained. And therefore in their languages, very long—

Manserunt, hodieque manent vestigia ruris. (Latin: Traces of the countryside have remained, and remain to this day.)

Thus far we may go in accounting for the figured style of the East from general principles. But this is by no means the whole of the case. For

2. We are to reflect that, before an alphabet was invented, and what we call literary writing was formed into an art, men had no way to record their conceptions, or to convey them to others at a distance, but by setting down the figures and shapes of such things as were the objects of their contemplation. Hence, the way of writing in picture was as universal, and almost as early, as the way of speaking in metaphor; and from the same reason, the necessity of the thing.

In process of time, and through many successive improvements, this rude and simple mode of picture-writing was succeeded by that of symbols, or was enlarged at least, and enriched by it. By symbols, I mean certain representative marks, rather than express pictures; or if pictures, such as were at the same time characters, and besides presenting to the eye the resemblance of a particular object, suggested a general idea to the mind. As, when a horn was made to denote strength, an eye and scepter, majesty, and in numberless such instances; where the picture was not drawn to express merely the thing itself, but something else which was, or was conceived to be, analogous to it. This more complex and ingenious form of picture-writing was much practiced by the Egyptians, and is that which we know by the name of HIEROGLYPHICS.

Indeed, these symbolic characters were likely, in a course of successive refinements, to pass into characters by institution: and have, in fact, undergone that change among the Chinese: and it might be expected that both would be laid aside by any people that should come to be acquainted with the far more convenient and expeditious method of alphabetic writing. But the event, in some instances, hath been different. The Chinese adhere to their characters, though from their late intercourse with the European European nations, one cannot but suppose that the knowledge of letters has been conveyed to them: and the Egyptians, through all the extent of their long-subsisting and highly polished empire, retained their hieroglyphics, notwithstanding their invention and use of an alphabet.

Their inducement to this practice might be, the pleasure they took in a mode of writing which gratified their inventive curiosity in looking into the natures and analogies of things; or, it might be a strain of policy in them to secrete by this means their more important discoveries from the vulgar; or, vanity might put them on raising the value of their knowledge by wrapping it up in a vehicle so amusing at the same time, and mysterious.

What account soever be given of it, the fact is that the Egyptians cultivated the hieroglyphic species of writing with peculiar diligence; while the antiquity, the splendor, the fame of that mighty kingdom kingdom excited a veneration for it in the rest of the world. Hence it came to pass that the learning of those times, which was spread from Egypt, as from its center, took a strong tincture of the hieroglyphic spirit. The East was wholly infected by it; so that it became the pride of its wise men to try the reach of each other’s capacity by questions conceived and proposed in this form.

Even the Greeks, in much later ages, caught the manner of symbolizing their conceptions from Egypt; and either drew their mythology from that quarter, or dressed it out in the old Egyptian garb. But the Israelites, especially, who had their breeding in that country at the time when the hieroglyphic learning was at its height, carried this treasure with them, among their other spoils, into the land of Canaan. And, though it be credible that their great Lawgiver interdicted the use of hieroglyphic characters, yet the ideas of them were deeply imprinted on their minds; and came out, on every occasion, in those symbols and emblems with which, under the names of riddles, parables, and dark sayings, their writings are so curiously variegated and embossed.

This then is the true and proper account of that peculiar style which looks so strangely, and to those who do not advert to this original of it, perhaps so fantastically, in the writings of the prophets. And what more natural than that a mode of expression which was so well known, so commonly practiced, and so much revered; which was affected by the wittiest, nay, by the wisest men of those times; which was employed in the theology of the Eastern world, in its poetry, its philosophy, and all the sublimer forms of composition—what wonder, I say, that this customary, this authorized, this admired strain of language should be that in which the sacred writers conveyed their highest and most important revelations to mankind?

Nor let any man take offense at the condescension of the divine Inspirer, as though he degraded himself by this compliance with the humors and fancies of those to whom his inspirations were addressed. For let him reflect that in what form of words soever it shall please God to communicate himself to man, it must still be in a way that implies the utmost, indeed the same, condescension to our weaknesses and infirmities; nay, that immediate inspiration itself, though coming through no medium of language, is of necessity to be accommodated to our methods of perceiving and understanding, how imperfect soever they are.

Besides, if external revelation be possible, it must be given in some one mode of speech or writing, in preference to others. And, if we consider how ancient, how general, how widely diffused this symbolic style has been, and still is, in the world; how necessary it is to rude nations, and how taking with the most refined; how large a proportion of the globe this practice had overrun before, and at the time of writing the prophecies, and what vast regions of the South and East, not yet professing the faith, but hereafter, as we presume, to be enlightened by it, the same practice, at this day, overspreads—when we consider all this, we shall cease perhaps to admire that the style in question was adopted, rather than any other; or we shall only admire the divine goodness and wisdom of its author, who had contrived beforehand, in the very form of this revelation, what may possibly help to bring on and facilitate the reception of it. Certainly, it may become us, on such an occasion, to enlarge our ideas a little; and not to conclude hastily and peremptorily that, when a general blessing was intended by providence, the mode of conveying it should be instituted singly with an eye to our local notions and confined prejudices, and with no regard to the more prevailing sentiments and expectations of mankind.

In the mean time, it is past a doubt that the hieroglyphic style was predominant in the ancient world; in Judea, particularly, from the times of Moses to the coming of Christ. There was indeed a degree of obscurity in it, so far at least as to furnish the Jews, who had no mind to listen to their Prophets, with a pretense of not understanding them (as we see from the complaint brought against the prophet Ezekiel in the text, Doth he not speak Parables?); yet still, it cannot be denied that this mode of writing was of common and approved use in the ages when the prophecies were delivered, and among the people to whom they were addressed.

Our FIRST proposition is then reasonably made out; and so much of the SECOND as affirms that the prophetic style is constructed on such principles as make it the subject of just criticism and rational interpretation. For it was constructed, as we have seen, on the symbolic principles of the hieroglyphics; which were not vague, uncertain things, but fixed and constant analogies, determinable in their own nature, or from the steady use that was made of them. And a language formed on such principles may be reasonably interpreted upon them. So that what remains is only to show that there are means by which this abstruse language may become intelligible to us at this day.

II. That there are such means, you will easily collect, without requiring me to come to a detail on so immense a subject, from the following considerations.

1. Some light may be expected to arise from the study of the prophecies themselves. For the same symbols, or figures, recur frequently in those writings: and, by comparing one passage with another; the darker prophecies with the more perspicuous; the unfulfilled, with such as have been completed; and those which have their explanation annexed to them, with those that have not—by this course of inquiry, I say, there is no doubt but some considerable progress may be made in fixing the true and proper meaning of this mysterious language.

2. Very much of the Egyptian hieroglyphics, on which, as we have seen, the prophetic style was fashioned, may be learned from many ancient records and monuments, still subsisting; and from innumerable hints and passages scattered through the Greek antiquaries and historians, which have been carefully collected and compared by learned men.

3. The Pagan superstitions of every form and species, which were either derived from Egypt, or conducted on hieroglyphic notions, have been of singular use in commenting on the Jewish prophets. Their Omens, Augury, and Judicial Astrology seem to have proceeded on symbolic principles; the mystery being only this, That such objects as in the hieroglyphic pictures were made the symbols of certain ideas were considered as omens of the things themselves. Thus, the figure of a horse, being the symbol of prosperity and success in arms, when a head of this animal was found in laying the foundations of Carthage, the Soothsayers concluded that the character of that state would be warlike, and its fortune prosperous: or, thus again, because the sun was the common emblem of a King, or supreme governor in any state, an eclipse of this luminary was thought to indicate the ruin, or diminution, at least, of his power and fortune; and the superstition is not quite extinct at this day.*

* Hence, the allusion of our great poet,
— or from behind the moon
In dim eclipse disastrous twilight sheds
On half the nations, and with fear of change
Perplexes monarchs — P. L. i. 596.

But, of all the Pagan superstitions, that which is known by the name of Oneirocritics, or the art of interpreting dreams, is most directly to our purpose. There is a curious treatise on this subject which bears the name of Achmet, an Arabian writer; and another by Artemidorus, an Ephesian, who lived about the end of the first century.* In the former of these collections (for both works are compiled out of preceding and very ancient writers) the manner of interpreting dreams, according to the use of the Oriental nations, is delivered; as the rules which the Grecian diviners followed are deduced in the other. For, light and frivolous as this art was, it is not to be supposed that it was taken up at hazard, or could be conducted without rule; an arbitrary or capricious interpretation of dreams, considered as a mode of divination, being too gross an insult on the common sense of mankind. But the rules by which both the Greek and Oriental diviners justified their interpretations appear to have been formed on symbolic principles, that is, on the very same ideas of analogy by which the Egyptian hieroglyphics (now grown venerable, and even sacred) were explained. So that the prophetic style, which is all over painted with hieroglyphic imagery, receives an evident illustration from these two works.

* See these two works published together, under the title of Artemidori Daldiani et Achmetis Sereimi F. Oneirocritica, by Nicolaus Rigaltius. Lutet. 1603.

I have said that this superstition was more immediately to our purpose than any other. For some of the more important prophecies are delivered in the way of dreams; and therefore, without doubt, the rules for interpreting the symbols presented to the mind of the prophet in these inspired dreams were the very same with those that were laid down in the Gentile Oneirocritics. The conclusion, I know, may appear bold and hazardous. But you will reflect that there is really nothing more strange in applying this mode of interpretation to dreams than to any other species of prophecy—to visions, for instance, or parables, or even, in general, to any part of the prophetic style. The compliance, on the part of the inspirer, is the same on every supposition; and only shows that, when the Deity thinks fit to reveal himself to men, he does it in a way that is suitable to their ideas and apprehensions. Nor is any sanction, in the mean time, given by this accommodation of himself to the pagan practice of divining by dreams. For, though the same symbols be interpreted in the same manner, yet the prophecy doth not depend on the interpretation, but the inspiration of the dream. A casual dream, thus interpreted, is only a dream still; the received sense of the symbols represented in it no way inferring the completion of it. But when the Almighty sends the dream, the symbols are of another consideration, and not only signify, but predict an event.

Now, if men will mistake a barely significant emblem for a prophetic inspiration, the fault is in themselves, and not in the use of the common emblems; which may be the vehicle of a true prophecy, though craft or superstition take occasion from them to divine lies.* It follows that the rules which the ancient diviners observed in explaining symbolic dreams may be safely and justly applied to the interpretation of symbolic prophecies, and especially to such of them as were delivered in the form of dreams.

Ezekiel xiii.9.

4. It is lastly to be observed that not only the Arabic and other Oriental writers, but even the Greek and Latin poets may contribute very much to the exposition of the ancient prophets. For these poets abound in strong metaphors and glowing images, which were either copied from the symbolic language of the East, or invented on the same principles of analogy as prevailed in the Egyptian hieroglyphics. So that many expressions which seem dark and strange in the writings of the Jewish prophets may be clearly illustrated and familiarized to us, even from classic usage and example.

And now from these several sources; that is, from the scriptures themselves—from the still subsisting monuments of Egyptian hieroglyphics—from the Gentile ceremonies and superstitions—and from the greater works of genius and fancy, transmitted to us both from the Eastern and Western poets—such a vocabulary of the prophetic terms and symbols may be, nay hath been,* drawn up, as serves to determine the sense of them in the same manner as any common art or language is explained by its own proper key, or dictionary; and there is, in truth, no more difficulty in fixing the import of the prophetic style than of any other language or technical phraseology whatsoever.

* See Dr. Lancaster’s Symbolical and Alphabetical Dictionary, prefixed to his abridgment of the Commentary on the Revelation, by Mr. Daubuz.

III. But, if the case be so clear, you may now be tempted to ask, “What then becomes of the obscurity in which the prophecies are said to be involved; and in particular, how comes it to pass that they may not be as well explained before the completion as after it;* which yet is constantly denied by writers on this subject, and, even, by your own principles, cannot be supposed?”

* See this objection urged by Mr. Collins in his Grounds and Reasons, &c. p. 220. Lond. 1737.

To this objection I shall not reply by saying that the style of the prophets, though intelligible, yet requires much practice in the interpreter to unfold its meaning; for that is the case of many other arts and sciences, which yet are generally understood: nor that the symbolic terms are frequently capable of several senses, which must needs perplex the interpretation; for there is no common language in which the plainest words do not frequently admit the same difference of construction, which yet creates no great difficulty to those who attend closely to the scope of a writer: I shall not therefore, I say, amuse you with these evasive answers, but reply directly to the purpose of your inquiry, by observing,

“That there are several methods, or, if you will, artifices, by which the inspired writers, under the cover of a symbolic expression, and sometimes even without it, might effectually conceal their meaning before the completion of a prophecy, though the language in which they write be clearly explicable on fixed and stated rules.”

1. When the prophecy is of remote events, the subject is frequently not announced, or announced only in general terms. Thus, an earthquake is described—a mountain is said to be thrown down—a star, to fall from heaven; and so in numberless other instances. Now, an earthquake, in hieroglyphic language, denotes denotes a revolution in government; a mountain is the symbol of a kingdom, or capital city; a star, of a prince, or great man: but of what government, of what kingdom, of what prince the prophet speaks, we are not told, and are frequently unable to find out, till a full coincidence of all circumstances, in the event, discloses the secret.

2. The prophetic terms are not only figurative, but sometimes, and in no common degree, hyperbolical (of which the reason will be given hereafter), so that nothing but the event can determine the true size and value of them. This seems to have been the case of those prophecies in the Old Testament which describe the tranquility and felicity of Christ’s kingdom; and may possibly be the case of those prophecies in the New which respect the Millennium.

3. It being the genius of the prophetic style to be enigmatical, this cast is sometimes times purposely given to it, even when the expression is most plain and direct. Thus Jeremiah prophesies of Zedekiah, king of Judah, that he should be delivered into the hands of the king of Babylon, that his eyes should behold the eyes of the king of Babylon, and that he should go to Babylon.* Ezekiel, prophesying of the same prince, says that he should go to Babylon, but that he should not see it, though he should die there.“” Now Josephus tells us that the apparent inconsistency of these two prophecies determined Zedekiah to believe neither of them. Yet both were strictly and punctually fulfilled.

* Jeremiah xxxiv. 3.
** Ezek. xii. 13.

4. Lastly, the chief difficulty of all lies in a circumstance not much observed by interpreters; and, from the nature of it, not observable till after the event; I mean, in a mixed use of the plain and figured style: so that the prophetic descriptions are sometimes literal, even when they appear most figurative; and sometimes, again, they are highly figurative, when they appear most plain. An instance of literal expression under the mask of figurative occurs in the prophet Nahum, who predicts the overthrow of Nineveh in these words—With an over-running flood he will make an utter end of the place thereof. [Nahum i. 8.] An over-running flood is the hieroglyphic symbol of desolation by a victorious enemy: and in this highly figurative sense, an interpreter of the prophecy would, in all likelihood, understand the expression. But the event showed the sense to be literal; that city being taken, as we know from history, by means of an inundation. Of figurative expression under the form of literal, take the following instance from a prophecy of Christ himself; who says to the Jews, Destroy this temple, and I will raise it up in three days. [John ii. 19.] It was natural enough for the Jews to understand our Lord as speaking of the temple at Jerusalem; the rather as this term had not been, and, I think, could not be, applied to any person before Jesus: to Him it might be so applied; and we know that he spake of the temple of his body. [ver. 21.]

The same equivocal use was, sometimes, purposely made of proverbial expressions, as learned men have observed.*

* See Grotius on Matt. xxvi. 23.

I omit many other causes of obscurity in the prophecies; such as the seeming incredibility, sometimes, of the things predicted—the undefined chronology and geography—the intricacy of the method—and many other considerations. But you will collect from these brief hints, respecting the expression only, that, though the symbolic language be reducible to rule, and therefore, in the main, sufficiently intelligible, yet that there is room enough for the introduction of so much obscurity into the prophetic writings as may answer the ends of the inspirer, and conceal the full meaning of them from the most sagacious interpreter, till it be revealed, in due time, by the event.

Or, if it be thought that such difficulties as the event removes are not, in their own nature, invincible before it happens, it is still to be considered that the giver of the prophecy is, by supposition, divine; and as he, therefore, foresaw, in framing the texture of it, that such difficulties would, in fact, be invincible, they served the purpose of a designed concealment just as well as if, in nature, they were. Whence the conclusion is still the same, That the prophetic style might be the cover of impenetrable obscurities in a prophecy before its completion, and yet the terms of it be clearly explicable on established rules; the event only enabling the expositor more skillfully and properly to apply the rules.

IV. To conclude this subject: it will now be acknowledged that the suspicions which have been taken up against the prophetic way of writing, as if it were vague, illusory, or unintelligible, are utterly without foundation. The style of the prophets was the known, authorized style of their age and country, in all writings especially of a sacred or solemn character; and is even yet in use with a great part of mankind. It further appears that, as it was understood by those to whom it was addressed, so the principles on which it was formed are discoverable by many obvious methods, and may be applied, with success, to the interpretation of it at this day.

The prophetic style is, then, a sober and reasonable mode of expression. But this is not all. We may even discern the expediency, I had almost said the necessity, of this style, considered as the medium or vehicle of prophetic inspiration.

For we have seen that the scheme of scriptural prophecy extends through all time; and is so contrived as to adumbrate future and more illustrious events in preceding and less important transactions: a circumstance which shows the harmony and connection of the whole scheme, and is not imitable by any human art or forethought whatsoever. But now a figurative style is so proper to that end that we scarcely conceive how it could be accomplished by any other. For thus the expression conforms, at once, to the type, and antitype: it is, as it were, a robe of state for the one; and only the ordinary, accustomed dress of the other: as we may see from the prophecies which immediately respect the restoration of the Jews from their ancient captivities, and, ultimately, their final triumphant return from their present dispersion—from the prophecies concerning the destruction of Jerusalem, which prefigure, at the same time, the day of judgment—from those concerning the first coming of Christ; which, also, set forth his reign with the saints on earth, and even the glories of his heavenly kingdom—and in a multitude of other instances.

These successive, and so different, schemes of providence could only be signified together in a mode of language that contracted or enlarged itself as the occasion required. But such is the singular property of a symbolic style. For none but this hath fold and drapery enough, if I may so speak, to invest the greater subjects; while yet (so complying is the texture of this expression), it readily adapts itself to the less considerable, which it ennobles only, and not disfigures. The difference is, that what is a metaphor in the former case becomes an hyperbole in the latter. And this double use of the same symbol is the true account of such figures as are thought most extravagant in the description of the prophets.

We see, then, in every view, how reasonable, how expedient, how divine, the symbolic style is, in such writings as the prophetic. So that if any be disposed, in our days, to take up the complaint of the text, and to upbraid the prophets by asking, “Do they not speak Parables?” We may now take courage to answer, Yes: but parables which, as dark as they are accounted to be, may be well understood; and, what is more, parables which are so expressed as to carry an evidence in themselves that they are what they assume to be, of divine inspiration.

(To be continued.)