approved of such things or persons which he had formerly declared his dislike unto This while with them we look on as the import of the word here we cannot but wonder at the impudence and folly of that railing Jew Lipman who saith that Christians go contrary to the meaning of what is here said in affirming that God who before had not flesh and blood was changed to be flesh and blood or as another Copy hath it who was before only the Father and the Holy Spirit was afterward changed to be the Son In which objection of his is only much malice and impertinency inasmuch as by nothing that the Christians say nor by any consequence that can be drawn from what they say can it be concluded that they affirm any change or alteration in God or the Godhead with whom they profess to be no variableness neither shadow of changing either in his nature or any of his attributes all things remaining in him the eternal Trinity one God in three Persons as they were from eternity nor by Christs taking the Manhood into God was there any change of God into Man nor confusion of substance or alteration of person Again inasmuch as that he might pick a cavil against Christians he takes the word which here denotes Gods immutability in his Will Word Decree and purpose which with the Jews the Christians absolutely affirm as if it imported here immutability of nature or substance though that be most true also so that it is a cavil sought not offered to him either by the word as here used nor any thing by the Christians affirmed He had no occasion to say this but he having said it it was convenient to take some notice of it lest others of his Sect might applaud him in it and think to be true what he feigneth But of the concurrence of the other Jews in rendring the latter Verb in the same notion that our Translators do who render it are not consumed we take more notice because some learned Christians take it in another signification and would have it rendred And ye sons of Jacob do not desist or leave off to do evil so in Munster and the Tigurin Translations more lately And the Septuaginâ— of old seems so to have taken the word to signify reading this word with the two first of the following verse And ye sons of Jacob have not râ—câ—ded from the unjust dealings or wickedness of your Fathers as likewise the printed Arabick Version following that and the Syriack also And from the word in that notion rendred would flow a very convenient sense taking the whole verse as a confirmation of what is before said and that they certainly must expect that judgement denounced to come in its appointed time inasmuch as the Lord is unchangeable in his purpose of punishing incorrigible unrepenting sinners and they would not leave off their evil courses nor repent them of their sins nor desist from them But others and they the major part viz. all that follow the vulgar Latin and diverse others also of modern Interpreters prefer with the forementioned Jewish Writers the other notion of being consumed as more usual to the Verb in the Conjugation or form here used according to which our Translators render are not consumed but then in giving the meaning and connexion of the whole verse there is among those who embrace this signification of this word some difference Some taking it as speaking of the time past or present make the coherence with what goes before and the meaning to this purpose as may be collected out of them put together that doubtless it shall be so as he said he will come in judgement to those sinners For he the Lord who hath determined and pronounced that he will not leave impenitent sinners unpunished doth not change his will and purpose But how then is it that the Sons of Jacob whose Fathers and themselves have been great and obstinate sinners have not long since been or are not yet consumed It is from the same unchangeableness in God who as he is just so is likewise merciful and long suffering not willing the death of sinners but rather that they should come to repentance and therefore determined as to execute justice so not to be hasty in executing it but to give space for repentance that so the necessity and equity of his judgements executed on such as would not lay hold on his mercy by repentance while they had time allowed for it may appear and besides that he might shew how just he was in keeping promise and his Covenant made with their Forefathers Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in so long sparing for their sakes their rebellious posterity who would make no end of sinning So that it was not through any change in him that they have not yet been consumed but shall now be severely punished but from his mercy and their obstinacy opposing and rejecting it So that they cannot but say if they will rightly consider the matter it is of the Lords mercy that we are not consumed because his compassions fail not Great is thy faithfulness Lam. III. 22 23. This however they differ in expressions seems to be the scope that the most of Expositors will have these words to aim at There are that read them by way of interrogation or admiration For I the Lord change not and are not ye O Sons of Jacob consumed how wonderful a thing is it that the Lord being immutable in his judgement against refractory sinners they should not yet be consumed how hath mercy prevailed against judgement This falls in with what hath been already said and requires the same answer There may be proposed another way thus Expect certainly the execution of the judgement spoken of and that I will in due time call to an account sinners for I the Lord change not Of which that you may not doubt you have from a contrary effect and evidence of my immutability a proof for therefore ye Sons of Jacob are not consumed though the wicked have hitherto domineer'd and wickedness reigned yet you true Sons of Jacob that fear me as Jacob did have been preserv'd by virtue of my promise and mercy they have not been able to root you out But as we saw before that by a learned Jew it is noted that this Verb is to be rendred rather in the signification of the future and with respect to what was to come not to what was past or present so it is by some of good judgement and learning among Christians also taken that the words may be rendred Therefore or and ye Sons of Jacob shall not be consumed as part of the Prophecy of what should be to the godly when the Lord should come to execute his Judgement spoken of on the wicked and for making out the meaning to this purpose they understand by the Sons of Jacob the godly amongst the Jews they who being of the Faith of Jacob
which is to our present purpose will make it evident It is said Matt. III. 5 that Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region round about Jordan went out to John and were baptized of him It will not by any be thought that every person in those places did thus but a great multitude or store of them and if more had come or his preaching had prevailed on more John was ready to perform his office to them This is thought enough to justify the expression that all the Countrey came unto him and were baptized of him Here is not in our Prophet the word all expressed but indefinitely without any number mentioned said shall turn the heart of the fathers and the heart of the children but because where Christ summs up what is here said or gives the meaning of it he adds it viz. and shall restore all things it is by them looked on as here understood and the exceptions therefore taken that by Elias is not here meant John the Baptist because to restore all things is to convert to the true Faith all Jews and Hereticks c. which John did not effect and therefore Elias in person is yet to come and do it But if we suppose that all is to be here understood surely that by all were to be meant no more then we have said i. e. many of all sorts all that should hearken to his preaching and receive his Doctrine we may learn from the Angels describing of the same office of his that is here described by this that many of the children of Israel he should turn unto the Lord their God going before him in the spirit and power of Elias to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children The all and the many do then signify the same thing in this matter And these things being observed surely by what we read of John's performance it is evident that the words here spoken of this Eliah to be sent were in and by him so far even to wonder made good that to expect another to fulfill them in greater measure is not warranted by vertue of this Prophecy He was zealous in the highest degree in performing what he was sent to do and on very many did his endeavours take effect That they did not on more on all among them without exceptions prevail was not through any defect or default in him but because as the Scripture expressly declares concerning many of the Pharisees and Lawyers many of which yet came in unto him they rejected the counsel of God against themselves Luke VII 30 the like effects w ch our Saviour who came to convert them all and to save all complains his own preaching to have had among that same People through their obstinacy saying O Jerusalem Jerusalem that killest the Prophets and stonest them that are sent unto thee how often would I have gathered thy children together even as an Hen gathereth her Chickens under her wings und ye would not Matt. XXIII 37 Some are so far from thinking that on these words can be grounded any argument to prove that the Elias here meant was not John Baptist and that it is one yet to come at the end of the World before Christs last coming as that they look on them as an argument to prove the clean contrary because this Elias is to come before the great day of the Lord and to call to conversion and repentance for which was a fit season at Christs first coming but at the last day of his coming the day of Judgement is no farther time for repentance but for reward or execution of Judgement and punishment therefore that day not this must here be meant and this Elias one already come not one then to be expected What we have said will farther be confirmed by consideration of the next words in which is declared why he should be sent to convert them viz. lest saith the Lord I come and smite the Earth with a curse As the former words concerning the Mission the time and the office of the person here named Elijah the Prophet do as we have seen exactly agree to John the Baptist and so as that they cannot so be applied to any other so do these also which declare the end for which he should be sent at that time to perform that office no less agree with those in which in the Gospell we are shewed for what end John did perform his by preaching conversion and repentance viz. That being converted they might flee from the wrath to come Matt. III. 7 and the axe being now laid to the root of the trees they bringing forth good fruit might escape from being cut down and cast into the fire ver 10. that they might be as Wheat and gathered into the Lords Garner and not as Chaffe which he should burn with unquenchable fire ver 12. Add how the Angell explains it Luke I. 17 that he should and as appears c. III. accordingly did endeavour to do turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just For what end to make ready a People prepared for the Lord a People fit to receive him and to find mercy and Salvation from him at his coming Who will not at first hearing or reading perceive that those things said concerning the end of his preaching are the very same with what is said here of this person 's performing the office he is sent for viz. that he should do it to prevent lest the Lord should come and smite the Earth with a curse or utter destruction The same words which are given even by some of the Jews for explication of this expression of the Prophet will as appositely be used for summing up the meaning of those in the Gospell Such is that Exposition of R. Tanchâ—m ` The meaning saith he is He shall fairly perswade them that he may reduce any of them who may possibly be reduced to wit such who have not evil habits so firmly rooted in their minds that they cannot return from them till the punishment which shall seize on all the rebellious transgressors overtake them Surely this which he gives for the meaning of what is here said of this person here denoted by the title of Eliah for shewing for what end he should perform his office is manifestly the meaning of what is in the Gospell said concerning the end for which John was sent to preach repentance and did preach it and baptize unto it Not much different as to the purpose is that meaning which another among them gives of these words viz. Therefore he shall warn them that they may be brought to repentance against that day come that he may not smite the whole Land or the Land with a consumption and it be a curse Thus far well and so as to shew the end which this Eliah was to aim at to be altogether the same that John did aim at and labour to effect
then had not Esau who was descended as well of Abraham as Jacob had as much right to it and as great a share in it as Jacob his posterity as they Whereas by Gods loving Jacob and hating Esau his twin-brother 't was made manifest that there was more in it then so and that his peculiar love of Jacob and especial favors to his posterity were not for Abraham's desert alone but of free grace and mercy to them and therefore deserved all possible returns of love gratitude and obedience from them This he makes to be the meaning and connexion of the words which though in his way it may seem plain yet is there no need to leave the former interpretation for it Was not Esau Jacob's brother saith the Lord yet I loved Jacob and I hated Esau. This the Lord gives as an instance of his free love to the Israelites the posterity of Jacob that whereas Esau and Jacob were twin-brothers one as well as the other descended from Abraham both sons of Isaac by one mother twins born at the same time yet he loved one and did not love or hated the other and so derived that love and hatred to their posterity and accordingly shewed to them the tokens and effects thereof The Apostle S. Paul in Rom. IX 11 13. improveth this argument from hence that this love to the one and hatred to the other was declared when those children were not yet born neither had done any good or evil So that it could not be said one had deserved better then the other and therefore his love to one above the other must needs appear to be of ftee grace and choice electing one and rejecting the other and the distinction or difference that he made between them may be illustrated by the several advantages that by his love one had over the other in several matters concerning both their spiritual and temporal estate But the literal explication of the words here intended requires no more then the view of the particular effect of his love to Jacob's posterity and hatred to Esau's here instanced in viz. the utter desolation of Esau's Country and the restitution of Israel's when he had given them both into the hand of their Enemies to be punish'd for their sins that punishment proving to the one for their utter destruction to the other but as a fatherly chastisement to make them sensible of their errors and to amend them that so they might again be reconciled to him and taken into favor Of Esau therefore or his posterity the Edomites he saies that he declared his hatred to him or them called by his Name in that he laid his Mountains and his heritage wast for the Dragons of the wilderness His Mountains In Deut. II. 5 we read that God gave mount Seir unto Esau for a possession and so again Josh. XXIV 4 so that though the occasion of his going first thither out of the land of Canaan be expressed Genes XXXVI 7 to have been because their riches viz. his and his brother Jacob's were more then that they might dwell together and the Land could not bear them both yet it appears to have been by Gods designation and appointment that so Esau might take that Country w ch is described by naming its cheif mountain which was Seir for his possession and to his posterity and leave Canaan to Jacob which his posterity had after for their possession Mountains here put in the plural number intimates that in it were more Mountains or that it was a mountainous Country We need not here insist on that Note which some make that Gods giving at first to Esau a craggy mountainous Country and reserving for Jacob's posterity the more pleasant Country of Canaan was then a sign of Gods love to Jacob and hatred to Esau however true it be That which is here given us to look on particularly as a sign of his hatred to him being that those Mountains and that heritage that he then gave him and his posterity had hitherto possessed and flourished in he had now laid wast and dispossessing them thereof gave it to be inhabited by the Dragons of the Wilderness Dragons So the Latine and so the most if not all latter Translations and so divers of the Jewish Expositors seem to take it But another learned Jew excepts against this rendring and saith that the Creatures by this name meant are not Serpents but Jackales a wild howling beast that lives abroad in desolate places and that whether the noun be put 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tannoth in the feminine form as here or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tannim in the masculine as Micah I. 8 and elsewhere it is all one as to the signification Compare this with Psal. XLIV 19 where is The place of Tannim and that with Psal. LXIII 10 where we read A portion for Foxes for Foxes and Jackales are not far different in kind or nature These Jackales will prey on dead bodies yea dig them out of their Graves if not well covered So that these words Psal. XLIV 19 may have this sense Thou hast caused or suffered us to be smitten in open wast unhabited Plains the place or habitation of Jackales where such wild beasts prey on the slain bodies none hindring them and so will it in sense be much like what is said Psal. LXXIX 2 A Jew that in that place of Micah in his Translation into Arabick so renders Tannim the masculine as the other would have it viz. Jackales 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Benat Awi yet here renders Tannoth the feminine by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Albume Owls why I know not Concerning the word see it more largely discoursed there on Micah But however there be this difference concerning the kind of the creature by this name signified all tends to the same purpose namely to denote that their Land should be so laid wast as that none but such creatures as live only in wast desolate places should for the future inhabit it and there should not be men to afright them or keep them thence An expression the like to which is elsewhere also used to signify the utter desolation of a place that was formerly well peopled and inhabited as Isai. XIII 21 22. and XXXIV 13 and Jer. IX 11 and X. 22 and II. 27 And therefore several ancient Translators seem to have thought it sufficient to give the meaning of the words by such expressions which might import that this Country should be laid wholly and utterly wast without particularly giving the signification of this word as the Chalde who renders it into wastness of the Wilderness or a wast wilderness the Syriack into habitations of the Wilderness the Greek into houses of the Wilderness which the printed Arabick version following by a plain mistake of the second letter of the word reading 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 renders into gifts of the Wilderness Not that they are to be
and following his steps deserved peculiarly to be called his Children or Sons according to what we learn in like kind whom properly to call Children of Abraham Galat. III. 7 and Rom. IX 7 and then the coherence will appear thus I will certainly come near to you in judgment against the sinners among you For I am the Lord and change not but am still as ever inexorable to obstinate impenitent sinners one that will in due time take vengeance on them however for a long time I have spared them but ye true Sons of Jacob ye whose heart is right with me and who lay hold on my Promise to him made and by walking in his steps approve your selves his genuine Children heirs of his Faith ye as you are not partakers of their sins so neither shall ye be of the judgements brought upon them I will make a way for your escape that ye perish not with them And that so he effected it is made evident by the history When the judgement here prophesied of had its execution and completion in the destruction of the City and Temple of Jerusalem and the wicked obstinate sinners of the Jews in it God provided for the escape and deliverance of such as had embraced the doctrine of Christ and yielded obedience to him so that they were not consumed as if God had not taken a special care for them they must necessarily have been And so taking by that day of the Lords coming to be meant the space as we have said on the first and second verses betwixt John Baptist's and Christ's beginning to preach and the destruction of the Temple and by that swift judgement the destruction of the wicked among the Jews together with their City and Temple and by the Sons of Jacob those that believed in Christ whom Jacob so long before waited for and transmitted the expectation of to his posterity and by what is said that they should not be consumed their escape and wonderful preservation from that so universal a destruction by their being from God warned to go out of the City while there was an opportunity offered which accordingly they did to a place called Pella so that there was not one Christian left in the City when it was destroyed but all escaped as Eusebius testifies in the 3 d book of his History Cap. 5. and Epiphanius de Ponderib Cap. 15. we cannot but see all that is here spoken from the beginning of the Chapter to the end of the 6 th verse to have been so fully made good by evidence of fact that there is no ground by vertue of this Prophecy to look for any thing yet to be expected which hath not been made good as the Jews that they may keep up themselves in their willing error of denying Christ yet to be come would have us do and that there is in them a full and satisfactory answer to that blasphemous murmuring and questioning in the last verse of the preceding Chapter God delighteth in them that do evil else why doth he suffer them to prosper or Where is the God of Judgment So that in respect to those who so spake and to whom these things were then spoken viz. the people of the Jews there is no need of looking farther Mean while what happened then to them is to all others for example to teach them that though God for a while in his forbearance and giving time to repent suffer the wicked to prosper yet he will doubtless in due time manifest his Justice in punishing them for their evil doings and if he do not in this life whether by personal judgements on particular persons or national on wicked Nations yet he certainly will after death and at that general terrible Judgement at the last day of which that severe judgement then on the Jewish Nation was so lively a figure and emblem as that it cannot but put all that will consider things in mind of it and warn them to expect it though it be not that which is here primarily meant And this seems the most plain and the litteral way of the expounding these words hitherto 7 ¶ Even from the daies of your Fathers ye are gone away from mine ordinances and have not kept them return unto me and I will return unto you saith the Lord of hosts But ye said Wherein shall we return Even from the daies of your Fathers ye are gone away from mine Ordinances The connexion of these words with the former is by Expositors differently given according to their different Expositions of those According to those that render the foregoing Verb in the notion of desisting or ceasing from evil these words will be a farther declaration of what was by it said viz. that they continued still to do as all along from the daies of their Fathers they had done and would not be brought to repent of their evil doings and forsake them which now yet they are exhorted to do and in the following words some of those their sins particularly enumerated According to those who render it in the notion of being consumed and take it in the sense of the time past or present they will be an amplification of Gods mercy in that they have not been nor are yet consumed by aggravation of their sins from their long and obstinate continuance in them without repentance of or turning from them which by the same unchangeable mercy they are called on yet to do But according to the latter way which we prefer of rendring it ye shall not be consumed there is not any such connexion to be looked after but the former part of this Chapter containing an answer to what was whether by impatient murmurers or sâ—offers objected against Gods justice and immutability of his methods in proceeding against wicked doers being in the sixth verse concluded he passeth to a new matter a distinct part of the Chapter a new contest against the People of that time for other sins by which they had provoked him to send on them already some previous judgements for removing which and preventing those more terrible ones mentioned in the foregoing verses and which he doth again before the end of this Prophecy put them in mind of he shews them the only way to be to return unto him by repentance and therefore in compassion to them calls on them so to do So R. Tanchum saith that though these words are not distinguished from the former in the writing yet in sense they are being an address to the People of that time alone So Junius and Tremellius look on it as a new contest or expostulation added to those former against contempt and profanation of his worship c. 1. v. 6. and c. 2.10 2 ly Against illegal Marriages Polygamy and Divorce thence to vers 17. 3 ly Against their murmuring repining or scoffing at his Justice and Judgements v. 17. of that second Chap. with an answer hitherto And now 4 ly here against sacrilegious detention of
being pure and zealous of good works by being an holy Nation and so shewing forth the praises of him who hath called them out of darkness into his marvellous light By having these conditions in them must they approve themselves his special treasure Ordinary stones will not pass for Jewels with him nor rubbish and dirt for treasure in the day of tryal though till then they may not be perhaps discovered This distinction between the Jews here spoken to is said should be in the day which he should make or bring on them or the day wherein he should do what he determined to do or said he would do for both these senses are the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Asher ani Oseh capable of and so are by some in the one by others in the other way rendred all much to the same purpose In the day which I shall make or bring to pass so R. Tanchum and some in Vatablus and so the Greek In the day of Judgement wherein I shall execute judgement on the wicked saith Kimchi They shall be to me in the day wherein I do or make for a peculiar saith the Vulgar Latin not as the Doway Version renders in the day that I do to my peculiar The same way others take and that so those words should be rendred by themselves indefinitely viz. in the day which I make or shall make or wherein I do i. e. will certainly do And the word peculiar not governed of that just in place before it viz. do or make but be referred to the foregoing viz. they shall be to me may be confirmed by their coming again in the same manner c. IV. 3 in the day that I shall do or make without any thing added after it Yet doth the ancient Syriack Version make the last word to be governed of that immediatly preceding it as ours do though rendring that otherwise then ours viz. a congregation they shall be mine in the day when I shall make a congregation So the Latin Translator points it although possibly by otherwise distinguishing the words it might be rendred they shall be to me in the day which I make a congregation R. Salomo Jarchi seems to give an Exposition different from all these to this purpose In the day which I make a reserved treasure i. e. which I have treasured and laid up with me therein to perform or pay my recompence And if it were so understood the expression would agree with that Act. I. 7 wherein speaking of those times in which they expected that Christ should restore the Kingdom to Israel he calleth them times and seasons which God had put in his own power But whatever differences may be betwixt Expositors as to the rendring the words the day in them spoken of is still the same viz. the day of the Lords coming mentioned before in this Chapter in the second third and fifth verses and again in the following Chapter in the first second and third verses namely the day wherein God should execute his Judgements on the Nation of the Jews for working revenge upon his enemies and redemption to those that fear him and revere his Name Though such discrimination shall be fully made between all the godly and the wicked at Christs second coming the general day of Judgement to which therefore what is here spoken is by divers referred yet certainly here what is said respects more particularly the Nation of the Jews and the time of that nationall judgement denounced against them What hath been before said and what is here said and what shall be after said in this Prophecy will not be so properly applied and clearly understood by applying it to any other mean while may the words well be accommodated to any other People with whom it shall be so at any time as it was then with the Jews and whom God shall in like kind visit with a national judgement or excision what to them happened being to others for example and likewise to that great day of discrimination the day of the general judgement yea likewise to the day of death as for what concerns particular men but still those whom the words seem properly to concern as here spoken to and of are the Nation of the Jews then in being in their own Country a Nation separate from others and bearing then the name of the Lords People In that day when the Lord shall do such things he will shew by making a manifest difference who are his and who are not his his shall be separated from the rest as his own peculiar from such as he will not own nor regard and when he executeth judgement in fury on others he will spare them and keep them that those evils which destroy the wicked shall not touch them as a man spareth his own son that serveth him These words are a farther declaration of Gods exceeding great favor and compassion to those whom he would own and look on as his peculiar in terms of greatest elegance and height of expression The compassionate affection of a Father is great to any child though he be unprofitable to him yea hurtful to him how much more when he is profitable to him and honoreth him so notes R. Tanchum and to the same purpose Kimchi and other Expositors also There is another thing also here by some taken notice of in the expression which may well be added as making for the amplification of Gods goodness and the consolation of those that fear and honor him viz. that he saith he will spare them which imports that though there be found in them defects and they have done and spoken things that they ought not and which in rigor of Justice might deserve punishment yet as long as their hearts are right with him and they sincerely honour and obey him and have reverent thoughts of him he will forgive their transgressions and in great mercy save them when he will shew no mercy to the wicked but according to their deserts in severity deal with them 18 Then shall ye return and discern between the righteous and the wicked between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not Then shall ye return and discern between c. Then when that day shall come such an alteration of things shall there be that though you now think all things go alike to all or rather for the worse to those that most serve God yet then you shall change your minds and discern that God did alwaies observe the actions of men and put a difference between the righteous and the wicked those that served him and those that served him not though till now he did not make it so apparent to men of corrupt judgements Some difference here is betwixt Interpreters in rendring and expounding these words some following a reading that is in some Copies of the Vulgar Latin viz. convertimini and be converted or return give us to take it as an exhortation to
and so likewise to have that notion in the title of Antiochus Epiphanes who he thinks was not called so much illustrious as terrible But this neither makes much for or against our purpose in giving the meaning To the day spoken of may well agree either of those Epithetes it was terrible and dreadfull and therefore notable and perhaps there was anciently that communication of significations between those roots in the Hebrew as to justify both 6 And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children and the heart of the children to their fathers lest I come and smite the earth with a curse And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children and the heart of the children to their fathers c. As in the former verse we had him whom God in mercy would send to them for preventing their utter destruction described by his title of Eliah the Prophet and by the time of his coming before the coming of the great and dreadfull day of the Lord so in this we have him described by his office viz. that he should turn the hearts of the father◠to the children and the heart of the children to their fathers to which are added the good effects which should be produced by his performance of that office viz. the preventing of Gods coming and smiting the Earth with a curse These words are referred to by the Angel Luke I. 16 17. with a farther explication of them and applyed to John the Baptist thus and many of the children of Israel shall he turn unto the Lord their God and he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just to make ready a People prepared for the Lord. That these words are there referred to is manifest and the person spoken of so expresly declared to be John the Baptist called therefore Eliah because he should come in the spirit and power of Elias that there can be no reason why that should be doubted or disputed of among Christians or Elias in person or any other by that name called should be expected by vertue of them as before we have said As concerning the meaning of the words by which his office is expressed whatever they think concerning the person it will be indifferent to all to enquire They must have the same meaning whosoever they are applyed to whether by Jews or Christians For the meaning of them therefore we may look what they do or ought to agree in comparing them one with another To which enquiry it will be convenient to premise an observation concerning that word or preposition which in our Translation is rendred to and is in the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Al viz. that it is as Grammarians observe and examples convince of divers uses and significations It signifies most usually above over on but not only so but withall to with for by near against in and other like of which examples accurre in the Hebrew Text. And according to the words with which it is joyned and the thing spoken of is the signification thereof to be discerned and distinguished Again concerning the appellations and titles of fathers and children that they are not only attributed to those that are so by nature but to others also who for other respects or relation one to another have those names given them as older people that of fathers younger that of children and so learned men or teachers are looked on as common fathers in respect to their disciples or such as learn of them or are instructed by them and the like This concerning the nature of those words being observed will help us to judge of such Expositions as are given of the whole sentence The signification of the forementioned preposition which our Translators choose to give it in this place is to or unto which it often manifestly hath elsewhere as Joshua II. 8 she came up 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Alehem to them and I Sam. II. 11 went 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to his house with many other places And it is likewise embraced by most of Interpreters but then accordingly as they apply it to fathers and children and their different understanding of what is meant by them do they differ in giving the meaning They that understand them of such as should be them together in present being whether natural fathers and children or others who might be called by that title as ours seem to do take his office so as here described to consist in taking away such discords and differences as should be betwixt them and settling peace and love and charity among them so as that their hearts should be propense and kindly affectioned one to another and they should be of one heart and one soul among themselves as it is said of the believers Act. IV. 32 and with one consent hearken to God and receive the truth preached to them So that this disposition and behaviour which it is here said it should be the work of the promised Elijah to work in their hearts may seem as a learned Jew observes contrary to that which in the Prophet Micah is described as being found among them in his time Chap. VII 6 the son dishonoureth the Father or that which on their not hearkning to him our Saviour saith should be in after times the father shall be divided against the son and the son against the father Luke XII 53 Such dissensions among them in those times here spoken of are observed to have been caused and fomented by the several Sects that were among them as of Sadduces and Pharisees and the like which had such ill influence as to banish those due respects which ought to have been betwixt parents and children superiors and inferiors or whosoever under the title of father and son may be comprehended and that love and charity which should have been betwixt all orders and degrees of men whose hearts Eliah i. e. John Baptist coming in the spirit and power of Eliah should be sent to reduce if possible to better order to mutual agreement among themselves and joynt obedience to God This seems to have been the ancientest understanding of the words among the Jewish Doctors who summe up the meaning of them in other words saying That he should be sent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lehashvoth hammachloketh to compose dissention or reconcile differences 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Leasoth shalom binehem to make peace between them that they might all agree in the profession of one Religion and thus seem the Greek Interpreters to have understood them who instead of the second member of the sentence and the heart of the children to their fathers put for the meaning of it and the heart of a man or every one to his neighbour Against this Exposition I know not what may be excepted yet do others taking the forementioned preposition