in order that. The words "all this was done," and the uniform usage of the N. T., forbid any other. Nor, if rightly viewed, does the passage require any other. Whatever may have been the partial fulfilment of the prophecy in the time of Ahaz, its reference to a different time, and a higher deliverance, is undeniable: and then, whatever causes contributed to bring about all this, might be all summed up in the fulfilment of the divine purpose, of which that prophecy was the declaration. The accomplishment of a promise formally made is often alleged as the cause of an action extending wider than the promise, and purposed long before its utterance. And

of course these remarks apply to every passage where the phrase is used. Such a construction can have but one meaning. If such meaning involve us in difficulty regarding the prophecy itself, far better leave such difficulty, in so doubtful a matter as the interpretation of prophecy, unsolved, than create one in so simple a matter as the rendering of a phrase whose meaning no indifferent person could doubt. The immediate and literal fulfilment of the prophecy seems to be related in Isa. viii. 1-4. Yet there the child was not called Emmanuel: but in ver. 8 that name is used as applying to one of far greater dignity. Again, Isa. ix. 6 seems to be a reference to this prophecy, as also Micah v. 3. 23. the virgin] the words are from the Septuagint. Such is the rendering of the LXX. The Hebrew word is the more general term, "the young woman," and is so translated by Aquila. they shall call] This indefinite plural is surely not without meaning here. Men shall call i. e. it shall be a name by which He shall be called -one of his appellations. The change of person seems to shew, both that the prophecy had a literal fulfilment at the time, and that it is here quoted in a form suited to its greater and final fulfilment. The

a (magi) Dan.

6.

Hebrew has, thou shalt call' (fem.). Emmanuel] i. e. God (is) with us. In Isaiah, prophetic primarily of deliverance from the then impending war; but also of final and glorious deliverance by the manifestation of God in the flesh.

25.] With regard to the much-controverted sense of this verse we may observe, (1) That the prima facie impression on the reader certainly is, that knew her not was confined to the period of time here mentioned. (2) That there is nothing in Scripture tending to remove this impression, either (a) by narration,—and the very use of the term, "brethren of the Lord" (on which see note at ch. xiii. 55), without qualification, shews that the idea was not repulsive: or (b) by implication, for every where in the N. T. marriage is spoken of in high and honourable terms; and the words of the angel to Joseph rather imply, than discountenance, such a supposition. (3) On the other hand, the words of this verse do not require it: the idiom being justified on the contrary hypothesis. See my Greek Test. On the whole it seems to me, that no one would ever have thought of interpreting the verse any otherwise than in its prima facie meaning, except to force it into accordance with a preconceived notion of the perpetual virginity of Mary. It is characteristic, and historically instructive, that the great impugner of the view given above should be Jerome, the impugner of marriage itself: and that his opponents in its interpretation should have been branded as heretics by afterages, See a brief notice of the controversy in Milman, Hist. of Latin Christianity, i. 72 ff. he called] i. e. Joseph; see ver. 21.

CHAP. II. 1-12.] VISIT AND ADORATION OF MAGI FROM THE EAST.

1. Bethlehem of Judæa] There was another Bethlehem in the tribe of Zebulun,

b Gen. xxv. 6. 1 Kings iv.

near the sea of Galilee, Josh. xix. 15. The name Bethlehem-Judah is used, Judges xvii. 7, 8, 9: 1 Sam. xvii. 12. Another name for our Bethlehem was Ephrath; Gen. xxxv. 19; xlviii. 7; or Ephrata, Micah v. 2. It was six Roman miles to the south of Jerusalem, and was known as 'the city of David,' the origin of his family, Ruth i. 1, 19.

in the days of Herod] HEROD THE GREAT, son of Antipater, an Idumæan, by an Arabian mother, made king of Judæa on occasion of his having fled to Rome, being driven from his tetrarchy by the pretender Antigonus. This title was confirmed to him after the battle of Actium by Octavianus. He sought to strengthen his throne by a series of cruelties and slaughters, putting to death even his wife Mariamne, and his sons Alexander and Aristobulus. His cruelties, and his affectation of Gentile customs, gained for him a hatred among the Jews, which neither his magnificent rebuilding of the temple, nor his liberality in other public works, nor his provident care of the people during a severe famine, could mitigate. He died miserably, five days after he had put to death his son Antipater, in the seventieth year of his age, the thirtyeighth of his reign, and the 750th year of Rome. The events here related took place a short time before his death, but necessarily more than forty days; for he spent the last forty days of his life at Jericho and the baths of Callirrhoe, and therefore would not be found by the magi at Jerusalem. The history of Herod's reign is contained in Josephus, Antt. books xiv.xvii.

It would be useless to detail all the conjectures to which this history has given rise. From what has been written on the subject it would appear, (1) That the East may mean either Arabia, Persia, Chaldæa, or Parthia, with the provinces adjacent. See Judges vi. 3: Isa. xli. 2; xlvi. 11: Num. xxiii. 7. Philo speaks of "the Eastern nations, and their leaders the Parthians." In all these countries there were magi, at least persons who in the wider sense of the word were now known by the name. The words in ver. 2 seem to point to some land not very near Judæa, as also the result of Herod's enquiry as to the date, shewn in "two years old." (2) If we place together (a) the prophecy in Num. xxiv. 17, which could hardly be unknown to the Eastern astrologers, and (b) the assertion of Suetonius "that there prevailed an an.

cient and consistent opinion in all the East, that it was fated that at that time those should go forth from Judæa who should rule the empire :"-and of Tacitus, to the same effect and nearly in the same words, and (c) the prophecy, also likely to be known in the East, of the seventy weeks in Daniel ix. 24;-we can, I think, be at no loss to understand how any remarkable celestial appearance at this time should have been interpreted as it was. (3) There is no ground for supposing the magi to have been three in number (as first, apparently, by Leo the Great, A.D. 450); or to have been kings. The first tradition appears to have arisen from the number of their gifts: the second, from the prophecy in Isa. lx. 3. Tertullian seems to deduce it from the similar prophecy in Ps. lxxii. 10, for, he says, the Magi were most commonly kings in the East.

2. his star] There is a question, whether this expression of the magi, we have seen his star, points to any miraculous appearance, or to something observed in the course of their watching the heavens. We know the magi to have been devoted to astrology: and on comparing the language of our text with this undoubted fact, I confess that it appears to me the most ingenuous way, fairly to take account of that fact in our exegesis, and not to shelter ourselves from an apparent difficulty by the hypothesis of a miracle. Wherever supernatural agency is asserted, or may be reasonably inferred, I shall ever be found foremost to insist on its recognition, and impugn every device of rationalism or semi-rationalism; but it does not therefore follow that I should consent to attempts, however well meant, to introduce miraculous interference where it does not appear to be borne out by the narrative. The principle on which this commentary is conducted, is that of honestly endeavouring to ascertain the sense of the sacred text, without regard to any preconceived systems, and fearless of any possible consequences. And if the scientific or historical researches of others seem to contribute to this, my readers will find them, as far as they have fallen within my observation, made use of for that purpose. It seems to me that the preliminary question for us is, Have we here in the sacred text a miracle, or have we some natural appearance which God in His Providence used as a means of indicating to the magi the birth of His Son? Dif

ferent minds may feel differently as to the answer to this question. And, seeing that much has been said and written on this note in no friendly spirit, I submit that it is not for any man to charge another, who is as firm a believer in the facts related in the sacred text as he himself can be, with weakening that belief, because he feels an honest conviction that it is here relating, not a miracle, but a natural appearance. It is, of course, the far safer way, as far as reputation is concerned, to introduce miraculous agency wherever possible: but the present Editor aims at truth, not popularity.

Now we learn from astronomical calculations, that a remarkable conjunction of the planets of our system took place a short time before the birth of our Lord. In the year of Rome 747, on the 29th of May, there was a conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in the 20th degree of the constellation Pisces, close to the first point of Aries, which was the part of the heavens noted in astrological science as that in which the signs denoted the greatest and most noble events. On the 29th of September, in the same year, another conjunction of the same planets took place, in the 16th degree of Pisces: and on the 5th of December, a third, in the 15th degree of the same sign. Supposing the magi to have seen the first of these conjunctions, they saw it actually in the East; for on the 29th of May it would rise 3 hours before sunrise. If they then took their journey, and arrived at Jerusalem in a little more than five months (the journey from Babylon took Ezra four months, see Ezra vii. 9), if they performed the route from Jerusalem to Bethlehem in the evening, as is implied, the December conjunction, in 15° of Pisces, would be before them in the direction of Bethlehem, 1 hour east of the meridian at sunset. These circumstances would seem to form a remarkable coincidence with the history in our text. They are in no way inconsistent with the word star, which cannot surely (see below) be pressed to its mere literal sense of one single star, but understood in its wider astrological meaning: nor is this explanation of the star directing them to Bethlehem at all repugnant to the plain words of vv. 9, 10, importing its motion from 8.E. towards s.w., the direction of Bethlehem. We may further observe, that no part of the text respecting the star, asserts, or even implies, a miracle; and that the very slight apparent incon

sistencies with the above explanation are no more than the report of the magi themselves, and the general belief of the age would render unavoidable. If this subservience of the superstitions of astrology to the Divine purposes be objected to, we may answer with Wetstein, We must infer therefore that these men came to their conclusion from the rules of their art: which though beyond all doubt futile, vain, and delusive, might yet be sometimes permitted to hit on a right result. Hence appears the wonderful wisdom of God, who used the wickedness of men to bring Joseph into Egypt,-who sent the King of Babylon against the Jews by auguries and divinations (Ezek. xxi. 21, 22), and in this instance directed the magi to Christ by astrology."

It may be remarked that Abarbanel the Jew, who knew nothing of this conjunction, relates it as a tradition, that no conjunction could be of mightier import than that of Jupiter and Saturn, which planets were in conjunction A.M. 2365, before the birth of Moses, in the sign of Pisces; and thence remarks that that sign was the most significant one for the Jews. From this consideration he concludes that the conjunction of these planets in that sign, in his own time (A.D. 1463), betokened the near approach of the birth of the Messiah. And as the Jews did not invent astrology, but learnt it from the Chaldæans, this idea, that a conjunction in Pisces betokened some great event in Judæa, must have prevailed among Chaldæan astrologers.

It is fair to notice the influence on the position maintained in this note of the fact which seems to have been substantiated, that the planets did not, during the year B.C. 7, approach each other so as to be mistaken by any eye for one star : indeed not "within double the apparent diameter of the moon." I submit, that even if this were so, the inference in the note remains as it was. The conjunction of the two planets, complete or incomplete, would be that which would bear astrological significance, not their looking like one star. The two bright planets seen in the east,-the two bright planets standing over Bethlehem,-these would on each occasion have arrested the attention of the magi; and this appearance would have been denominated by them his star.

in the east] i. e. either in the Eastern country from which they came, or in the Eastern quarter of the heavens.