Resultados para: "CATHOLICITY"

<p>altar--not for sacrifice, but as the &quot;pillar&quot; for memorial and worship (Jos 22:22-26). Isaiah does not contemplate a temple in Egypt: for the only legal temple was at Jerusalem; but, like the patriarchs, they shall have altars in various places.

pillar--such as Jacob reared (Gen 28:18; Gen 35:14); it was a common practice in Egypt to raise obelisks commemorating divine and great events.

at the border--of Egypt and Judah, to proclaim to both countries the common faith. This passage shows how the Holy Spirit raised Isaiah above a narrow-minded nationality to a charity anticipatory of gospel catholicity.</p>

<p>Although--anticipating the objection of the priests at Jerusalem, that the exiles were &quot;cast far off.&quot; Though this be so, and they are far from the outer temple at Jerusalem, I will be their asylum or sanctuary instead (Psa 90:1; Psa 91:9; Isa 8:14). My shrine is the humble heart: a preparation for gospel catholicity when the local and material temple should give place to the spiritual (Isa 57:15; Isa 66:1; Mal 1:11; Joh 4:21-24; Act 7:48-49). The trying discipline of the exile was to chasten the outcasts so as to be meet recipients of God&#039;s grace, for which the carnal confidence of the priests disqualified them. The dispersion served the end of spiritualizing and enlarging the views even of the better Jews, so as to be able to worship God everywhere without a material temple; and, at the same time, it diffused some knowledge of God among the greatest Gentile nations, thus providing materials for the gathering in of the Christian Church among the Gentiles; so marvellously did God overrule a present evil for an ultimate good. Still more does all this hold good in the present much longer dispersion which is preparing for a more perfect and universal restoration (Isa 2:2-4; Jer 3:16-18). Their long privation of the temple will prepare them for appreciating the more, but without Jewish narrowness, the temple that is to be (Eze. 40:1-44:31).

a little--rather, &quot;for a little season&quot;; No matter how long the captivity may be, the seventy years will be but as a little season, compared with their long subsequent settlement in their land. This holds true only partially in the case of the first restoration; but as in a few centuries they were dispersed again, the full and permanent restoration is yet future (Jer 24:6).</p>

<p>poured out my Spirit upon . . . Israel--the sure forerunner of their conversion (Joe 2:28; Zac 12:10). The pouring out of His Spirit is a pledge that He will hide His face no more (Co2 1:22; Eph 1:14; Phi 1:6).

The arrangements as to the land and the temple are, in many particulars, different from those subsisting before the captivity. There are things in it so improbable physically as to preclude a purely literal interpretation. The general truth seems to hold good that, as Israel served the nations for his rejection of Messiah, so shall they serve him in the person of Messiah, when he shall acknowledge Messiah (Isa 60:12; Zac 14:17-19; compare Psa 72:11). The ideal temple exhibits, under Old Testament forms (used as being those then familiar to the men whom Ezekiel, a priest himself, and one who delighted in sacrificial images, addresses), not the precise literal outline, but the essential character of the worship of Messiah as it shall be when He shall exercise sway in Jerusalem among His own people, the Jews, and thence to the ends of the earth. The very fact that the whole is a vision (Eze 40:2), not an oral face-to-face communication such as that granted to Moses (Num 12:6-8), implies that the directions are not to be understood so precisely literally as those given to the Jewish lawgiver. The description involves things which, taken literally, almost involve natural impossibilities. The square of the temple, in Eze 42:20, is six times as large as the circuit of the wall enclosing the old temple, and larger than all the earthly Jerusalem. Ezekiel gives three and a half miles and one hundred forty yards to his temple square. The boundaries of the ancient city were about two and a half miles. Again, the city in Ezekiel has an area between three or four thousand square miles, including the holy ground set apart for the prince, priests, and Levites. This is nearly as large as the whole of Judea west of the Jordan. As Zion lay in the center of the ideal city, the one-half of the sacred portion extended to nearly thirty miles south of Jerusalem, that is, covered nearly the whole southern territory, which reached only to the Dead Sea (Eze 47:19), and yet five tribes were to have their inheritance on that side of Jerusalem, beyond the sacred portion (Eze 48:23-28). Where was land to be found for them there? A breadth of but four or five miles apiece would be left. As the boundaries of the land are given the same as under Moses, these incongruities cannot be explained away by supposing physical changes about to be effected in the land such as will meet the difficulties of the purely literal interpretation. The distribution of the land is in equal portions among the twelve tribes, without respect to their relative numbers, and the parallel sections running from east to west. There is a difficulty also in the supposed separate existence of the twelve tribes, such separate tribeships no longer existing, and it being hard to imagine how they could be restored as distinct tribes, mingled as they now are. So the stream that issued from the east threshold of the temple and flowed into the Dead Sea, in the rapidity of its increase and the quality of its waters, is unlike anything ever known in Judea or elsewhere in the world. Lastly, the catholicity of the Christian dispensation, and the spirituality of its worship, seem incompatible with a return to the local narrowness and &quot;beggarly elements&quot; of the Jewish ritual and carnal ordinances, disannulled &quot;because of the unprofitableness thereof&quot; [FAIRBAIRN], (Gal 4:3, Gal 4:9; Gal 5:1; Heb 9:10; Heb 10:18). &quot;A temple with sacrifices now would be a denial of the all-sufficiency of the sacrifice of Christ. He who sacrificed before confessed the Messiah. He who should sacrifice now would solemnly deny Him&quot; [DOUGLAS]. These difficulties, however, may be all seeming, not real. Faith accepts God&#039;s Word as it is, waits for the event, sure that it will clear up all such difficulties. Perhaps, as some think, the beau ideal of a sacred commonwealth is given according to the then existing pattern of temple services, which would be the imagery most familiar to the prophet and his hearers at the time. The minute particularizing of details is in accordance with Ezekiel&#039;s style, even in describing purely ideal scenes. The old temple embodied in visible forms and rites spiritual truths affecting the people even when absent from it. So this ideal temple is made in the absence of the outward temple to serve by description the same purpose of symbolical instruction as the old literal temple did by forms and acts. As in the beginning God promised to be a &quot;sanctuary&quot; (Eze 11:16) to the captives at the Chebar, so now at the close is promised a complete restoration and realization of the theocratic worship and polity under Messiah in its noblest ideal (compare Jer 31:38-40). In Rev 21:22 &quot;no temple&quot; is seen, as in the perfection of the new dispensation the accidents of place and form are no longer needed to realize to Christians what Ezekiel imparts to Jewish minds by the imagery familiar to them. In Ezekiel&#039;s temple holiness stretches over the entire temple, so that in this there is no longer a distinction between the different parts, as in the old temple: parts left undeterminate in the latter obtain now a divine sanction, so that all arbitrariness is excluded. So that it is be a perfect manifestation of the love of God to His covenant-people (Eze. 40:1-43:12); and from it, as from a new center of religious life, there gushes forth the fulness of blessings to them, and so to all people (Eze. 47:1-23) [FAIRBAIRN and HAVERNICK]. The temple built at the return from Babylon can only very partially have realized the model here given. The law is seemingly opposed to the gospel (Mat 5:21-22, Mat 5:27-28, Mat 5:33-34). It is not really so (compare Mat 5:17-18; Rom 3:31; Gal 3:21-22). It is true Christ&#039;s sacrifice superseded the law sacrifices (Heb 10:12-18). Israel&#039;s province may hereafter be to show the essential identity, even in the minute details of the temple sacrifices, between the law and gospel (Rom 10:8). The ideal of the theocratic temple will then first be realized.




Next: Ezekiel Chapter 40</p>

<p>boiling places--boilers.

under the rows--At the foot of the rows, that is, in the lowest part of the walls, were the places for boiling made.

The happy fruit to the earth at large of God&#039;s dwelling with Israel in holy fellowship is that the blessing is no longer restricted to the one people and locality, but is to be diffused with comprehensive catholicity through the whole world. So the plant from the cedar of Lebanon is represented as gathering under its shelter &quot;all fowl of every wing&quot; (Eze 17:23). Even the desert places of the earth shall be made fruitful by the healing waters of the Gospel (compare Isa 35:1).




Next: Ezekiel Chapter 47</p>

<p>For--Since ye Jewish priests and people &quot;despise My name&quot; (Mal 1:6), I shall find others who will magnify it (Mat 3:9). Do not think I shall have no worshippers because I have not you; for from the east to the west My name shall be great among the Gentiles (Isa 66:19-20), those very peoples whom ye look down upon as abominable.

pure offering--not &quot;the blind, the lame, and the sick,&quot; such as ye offer (Mal 1:8). &quot;In every place,&quot; implies the catholicity of the Christian Church (Joh 4:21, Joh 4:23; Ti1 2:8). The &quot;incense&quot; is figurative of prayers (Psa 141:2; Rev 8:3). &quot;Sacrifice&quot; is used metaphorically (Psa 51:17; Heb 13:10, Heb 13:15-16; Pe1 2:5, Pe1 2:12). In this sense the reference to the Lord&#039;s Supper, maintained by many of the fathers, may be admitted; it, like prayer, is a spiritual offering, accepted through the literal offering of the &quot;Lamb without blemish,&quot; once for all slain.</p>

<p>heresies--Not merely &quot;schisms&quot; or &quot;divisions&quot; (Co1 11:18), which are &quot;recent dissensions of the congregation through differences of opinion&quot; [AUGUSTINE, Con. Crescon. Don. 2.7, quoted by TRENCH, Greek Synonyms of the New Testament], but also &quot;heresies,&quot; that is, &quot;schisms which have now become inveterate&quot;; &quot;Sects&quot; [CAMPBELL, vol. 2, pp. 126, 127]: so Act 5:17; Act 15:5 translate the same Greek. At present there were dissensions at the love-feasts; but Paul, remembering Jesus&#039; words (Mat 18:7; Mat 24:10, Mat 24:12; Luk 17:1) foresees &quot;there must be (come) also&quot; matured separations, and established parties in secession, as separatists. The &quot;must be&quot; arises from sin in professors necessarily bearing its natural fruits: these are overruled by God to the probation of character of both the godly and the ungodly, and to the discipline of the former for glory. &quot;Heresies&quot; had not yet its technical sense ecclesiastically, referring to doctrinal errors: it means confirmed schisms. ST. AUGUSTINE&#039;S rule is a golden rule as regards questions of heresy and catholicity: &quot;In doubtful questions, liberty; in essentials, unity; in all things, charity.&quot;

that . . . approved may be made manifest--through the disapproved (reprobates) becoming manifested (Luk 2:35; Jo1 2:19).</p>

<p>upon . . . forehead . . . name--as harlots usually had. What a contrast to &quot;HOLINESS TO THE LORD,&quot; inscribed on the miter on the high priest&#039;s forehead!

mystery--implying a spiritual fact heretofore hidden, and incapable of discovery by mere reason, but now revealed. As the union of Christ and the Church is a &quot;great mystery&quot; (a spiritual truth of momentous interest, once hidden, now revealed, Eph 5:31-32), so the Church conforming to the world and thereby becoming a harlot is a counter &quot;mystery&quot; (or spiritual truth, symbolically now revealed). As iniquity in the harlot is a leaven working in &quot;mystery,&quot; and therefore called &quot;the mystery of iniquity,&quot; so when she is destroyed, the iniquity heretofore working (comparatively) latently in her, shall be revealed in the man of iniquity, the open embodiment of all previous evil. Contrast the &quot;mystery of God&quot; and &quot;godliness,&quot; Rev 10:7; Ti1 3:16. It was Rome that crucified Christ; that destroyed Jerusalem and scattered the Jews; that persecuted the early Christians in pagan times, and Protestant Christians in papal times; and probably shall be again restored to its pristine grandeur, such as it had under the CÃ&amp;brvbrsars, just before the burning of the harlot and of itself with her. So HIPPOLYTUS [On Antichrist] (who lived in the second century), thought. Popery cannot be at one and the same time the &quot;mystery of iniquity,&quot; and the manifested or revealed Antichrist. Probably it will compromise for political power (Rev 17:3) the portion of Christianity still in its creed, and thus shall prepare the way for Antichrist&#039;s manifestation. The name Babylon, which in the image, Dan 2:32, Dan 2:38, is given to the head, is here given to the harlot, which marks her as being connected with the fourth kingdom, Rome, the last part of the image. Benedict XIII, in his indiction for a jubilee, A.D. 1725, called Rome &quot;the mother of all believers, and the mistress of all churches&quot; (harlots like herself). The correspondence of syllables and accents in Greek is striking; &quot;He porne kai to therion; He numphe kai to arnion.&quot; &quot;The whore and the beast; the Bride and the Lamb.&quot;

of harlots--Greek, &quot;of the harlots and of the abominations.&quot; Not merely Rome, but Christendom as a whole, even as formerly Israel as a whole, has become a harlot. The invisible Church of true believers is hidden and dispersed in the visible Church. The boundary lines which separate harlot and woman are not denominational nor drawn externally, but can only be spiritually discerned. If Rome were the only seat of Babylon, much of the spiritual profit of Revelation would be lost to us; but the harlot &quot;sitteth upon many waters&quot; (Rev 17:1), and &quot;ALL nations have drunk of the wine of her fornication&quot; (Rev 17:2; Rev 18:3; &quot;the earth,&quot; Rev 19:2). External extensiveness over the whole world and internal conformity to the world--worldliness in extent and contents--is symbolized by the name of the world city, &quot;Babylon.&quot; As the sun shines on all the earth, thus the woman clothed with the sun is to let her light penetrate to the uttermost parts of the earth. But she, in externally Christianizing the world, permits herself to be seduced by the world; thus her universality or catholicity is not that of the Jerusalem which we look for (&quot;the MOTHER of us all,&quot; Rev 21:2; Isa 2:2-4; Gal 4:26), but that of Babylon, the world-wide but harlot city! (As Babylon was destroyed, and the Jews restored to Jerusalem by Cyrus, so our Cyrus--a Persian name meaning the sun--the Sun of righteousness, shall bring Israel, literal and spiritual, to the holy Jerusalem at His coming. Babylon and Jerusalem are the two opposite poles of the spiritual world). Still, the Romish Church is not only accidentally and as a matter of fact, but in virtue of its very PRINCIPLE, a harlot, the metropolis of whoredom, &quot;the mother of harlots&quot;; whereas the evangelical Protestant Church is, according to her principle and fundamental creed, a chaste woman; the Reformation was a protest of the woman against the harlot. The spirit of the heathen world kingdom Rome had, before the Reformation, changed the Church in the West into a Church-State, Rome; and in the East, into a State-Church, fettered by the world power, having its center in Byzantium; the Roman and Greek churches have thus fallen from the invisible spiritual essence of the Gospel into the elements of the world [AUBERLEN]. Compare with the &quot;woman&quot; called &quot;Babylon&quot; here, the woman named &quot;wickedness,&quot; or &quot;lawlessness,&quot; &quot;iniquity&quot; (Zac 5:7-8, Zac 5:11), carried to Babylon: compare &quot;the mystery of iniquity&quot; and &quot;the man of sin,&quot; &quot;that wicked one,&quot; literally, &quot;the lawless one&quot; (Th2 2:7-8; also Mat 24:12).</p>