Biblical commentary on the New Testament - The Christian ...

180 Matthew I. 22, 23.
simple grammatical explanation. Certain passages from tlie Old
Testament were quoted as prophecies in the New, which in
their original connexion, it was thought impossible to regard as
such ; then, in order that it might not seem as if the New Testament
writers quoted passages from the Old which did not contain
proj^hecies, as if they did, Iva rrAT/pw^f/, with such quotations,
was translated in the manner ahove named. If this difficulty he removed,
there r.emains no occasion for a departure from the literal
sense of the words.
But the difficulty can he removed hy our acknowledging in the
Old Testament prophecies a twofold reference to a present lower
subject, and to a future higher one. With this supposition, we can
everywhere adhere to the immediate, simple, grammatical sense of
the v/ords, and still recognize the quotations of the New Testament
as prophecies in the full sense. And it belongs to the peculiar adjustment
and arrangement of the Scripture, that the life and substance
of the Old Testament were intended as a mirror of the New
Testament life, and that in the person of Christ particularly, as the
representative of the New Testament, all the rays of Old Testament
ideas and institutions are concentrated as in their focus.* (Consult
the Author's dissertation : Eln Wort iiber tie/eren Schriftsinn,
Konigsberg, 1824. On the opposite side : Steudel in Bengel's
Archiv, B. iii., St. 2. Lastly, Kleinert's observations in Tholuck's
Literarischer Anzeiger, year 1831, No. 28.) This general character
of the old Testament shews itself in the passage here quoted from
Isa. vii. 14. The immediate, grammatical sense of the words of the
passage, necessarily requires a reference to some thing present, since
the napdh'og, virgin, who was to bring forth Immanuel, is repre-
sented by the prophet as a sign of King Ahaz ;—a reference to the
Messiah, born of a virgin centuries after, appears to answer no end
whatever for the immediate circumstances. It is most natural to
suppose, that by Tragdevog is meant the betrothed of the prophet,
called in Isa. viii. 3, ns-^as, as being his wife. (UaQdh'og, equivalent
to nwV?, unmarried ivoman, is indeed in itself different from ri^sna,
which necessarily denotes pure virginity ; but the word naVy, too,
may, and must, in this case, be taken for a pure Adrgin.) The pas-
* See Hamann, in the history of his conversion (Werke Th. i., S. 211. ff.): "I found
the unity of the divine will in the redemption by Jesus Christ, inasmuch as all history, all
miracles, all God's commands and works, tended to this centre." In Hamann's works, a
sphitual exposition, like that which the writers of the New Testament employ, may be
seen in a modern author. Bengel also says very truly (Gnomon ad. h. 1), "Scepe in N.
T. allegantur vaticinia, quorum contextum prophetarum tempore non dubium est, quin
auditores eorum ex inteniione divina interpretari debuerint de rebus jam turn pr£Esentibus.
Eadem vero inientio divina, longius prospiciens, sic formavit orationem, ut magis proprie
deinceps ea conveniret in tempora Messiae, et hanc, intentionem divinam apostoli nos docent,
nosque dociles habere deienV