David Baron

“ Beautiful were the gifts and graces which Christ received as man; but beautiful beyond all beauty must be those glorious scars with which He allowed His whole body to be riven, that throughout the whole frame His love might be engraven. ”

“ It is Christ that died, yea, rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God; who also maketh intercession for us" (Rom. viii. 33, 34) . Satan's malice and hatred against the Church and the individual believer in Christ is as great as it is against Israel. And he still appears as " the accuser of the brethren," before God and before our own conscience; but with such an " Advocate with the Father " as " Jesus Christ the Righteous," who has Himself become " the propitiation for our sins " (i John ii. I, 2) , we need fear neither his fury nor his malicious accusations. ”

“ As many as are justified in Messiah's righteousness are also being regenerated and sanctified by His blessed Spirit, and there is not one arrayed in the beautiful robe of His perfection who does not also make it the aim of his life to perfect holiness in the fear of God now, and who shall not in the end be conformed to His image, and be actually and fully like Him in character. ”

“ Man, in his own name, and on the ground of his own merits, has no approach and no standing in the presence of God he must find his moral fitness outside of himself if he desires to " ascend into the hill of the Lord, and to stand in His holy place." ”

“ Satan, therefore, might well have sought the rejection of Israel as the priestly nation, or to impugn the holiness of God's character in receiving the worship and services of those so morally defiled.
But, blessed be God, the adversary may accuse, but it is not in his power to condemn. He that sitteth as Judge,, to justify or condemn, is the Lord. And note, it is the Divine Angel Himself, who in the 2nd verse is expressly called " Jehovah," who pleads the cause of His people. ”

“ And the process which the prophet witnesses in the case of Joshua as the representative of the Jewish nation, answers also to the experience of each individual believer.
By nature, dear reader, " we are all " whether we be Jew or Gentile " as one that is unclean " in God's sight, and " all our righteousness " the very best moral outfit which we can manufacture for ourselves is, " as a polluted garment" (Isa. Ixiv. 6) , not only of no avail, but, together with our sins, must be " taken away." ”

“ But, while this is in the main true, the fact that Satan was there to accuse invests the symbolic transaction, which is here presented to the prophet's spiritual sight, with a judicial character, and the high priest may be regarded also as " standing " on his trial before the Angel of Jehovah as Judge. [3]
Ha-Satan, which, with or without the definite article, is a proper name for the Evil One, is the same who in the New Testament is described as our " adversary " the devil, the Hebrew term having etymologically the sense of " enemy," or " adversary," and the Greek that of " accuser." ”

“ But we have also to remember that the Aaronic priest hood, summed up as it was in the person of the high priest, while appointed to meet Israel's felt need of a Mediator between them and God, was at the same time designed not only to foreshadow some of the aspects of the everlasting priesthood of Him Who ever liveth to make intercession for us, but to be also a continual reminder of God's purpose with the nation as a whole, and, symbolically at least, ever to keep before them the significance of priesthood, which is to be "chosen " ”

“ Finally, " when the high priest came forth from the sanctuary and appeared again unto the people, he first dispatched the scapegoat bearing all their iniquities into the wilderness, and then united with them in offering the burnt-offering unto the Lord. And such shall be the result of the Second Advent of our Saviour. Then shall sin be completely put away, and every trace of it removed for ever. In one sense sin is already put away it is no more imputed unto them who believe in Jesus; but sin itself remaineth, yea, and will remain, until He comes again. ”

“ I do see myself insensible and hardened, a slave to sloth, rarely, alas! praying unable even to utter a groan for the Church, while my untamed flesh burns with devouring flame " [5] the great Reformer dreamt that Satan appeared to him with a long scroll, in which were carefully written the many sins and transgressions of which he was guilty from his birth, and which the evil one proceeded to read out, mocking the while that such a sinner as he should ever think of being called to do service for God, or even of escaping himself from hell. ”

“ In Matthew, which is primarily " the Jewish Gospel," and was very probably in the first instance written in Hebrew or Aramaic (though afterwards rewritten by the same evangelist in Greek) , we have the promised Malkha Meshicha the theocratic " King Messiah " presented to us, and the fulfilment of the prophecy, " Behold, I will raise unto David a Righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth," gradually unfolded before us. In keeping with its primary design is its very style. The keynote throughout is " that it might be fulfilled." ”

“ Keil says: "The stone is the symbol of the Kingdom of God." Hengstenberg explains it as "the Kingdom or people of God, outwardly insignificant when compared with the great mountain (chap. iv. 7) which symbolises the power of the world "; and Kohler regards the stone as signifying Israel, "which nation was entrusted to the care of the high priest Joshua, that, by the due discharge of his high priestly office, the purity and freedom from iniquity required by God should be attained by the people." ”

“ And this " robe of righteousness," which is ours first of all by faith, and which is the only ground of our standing before God, becomes also a blessed subjective experimental reality to the Christian.
In this world men walk in a vain show, and there is often no inward correspondence between their actual character and the robe of office which they wear. There are kings who are not kingly, princes who are by no means princely, and priests who are far from being priestly ”

“ Just as a gifted painter, who wished to immortalize for a family the complete likeness of the father who had been its glory, would avoid any attempt at combining in a single portrait the insignia of all the various offices he had filled; at re presenting him in the same picture as general and as magistrate; as man of science and as father of a family ”

“ Mark gives no genealogy, because a servant needs not such recommendation, he being judged by his work alone.
(3) But, if Matthew is the Gospel of the King and the Kingdom, and Mark that of the perfect Servant, the prominent feature of our Lord in the Gospel of Luke, which probably was primarily intended for the cultured Greek world, is that of " the Son of Man In it Christ is por trayed as the Man par excellence the true Man, who is both the ideal and the representative of the race; the second Adam, who, in contrast to the first, who brought sin and ruin to the race, is the Saviour of men. ”

“ The great Advocate bases His plea on Israel's behalf, first on the ground of Jehovah's immutable choice. "Jehovah rebuke thee, O Satan"
The verb yigar, from ga ar (" to rebuke," " to reprove ") , " when applied to God, who accomplishes all things by His own power, includes the idea of actual suppression "; and in this case it " involved a withering rejection of the blasted spirit and his accusations, as when Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit and he departed out of his victim." ”

“ I have caused thine iniquity to pass," are meant to set forth the blessed fact that God " will remove the iniquity of that land in one day"
Standing thus as the high priest and mediator of the people, it is the nation of Israel which is on its trial. If he is rejected, they are rejected; if he is justified, they are accepted. ”

“ So has the Holy Spirit, in order to preserve for mankind the perfect likeness of Him who was its chosen Representative, God in man, used means to impress upon the minds of the writers, whom He has made His organs, four different images. ”

“ The high priest is in the sanctuary, the building of which had already com menced, and is engaged in some part of his priestly duty or prayer for mercy (on behalf of the people) . The Angel of Jehovah comes down and condescends to appear in the Temple, as a proof of His favour, attended by a company of angels (ver. 7) . Satan, the sworn enemy of the Church of God, looks on with jealous eyes, . ”

“ Gabriel arranged the couch, Michael spread a silken cover over it, and Zagziel put a silken pillow under Moses head. At God's command Moses crossed his hands over his breast and closed his eyes, and God took his soul away with a kiss."
On the other hand, there is just a possibility that the expression "the body of Moses," in Jude, is used in an allegorical sense of the Jewish people; in which case the reference would certainly be to this vision.
" It is true that no instance can be cited in which the body of Moses, or any similar expression, is used of the people of Israel ”

“ There are also different legendary accounts of contests between Moses himself and the Angel of Death, whom he put to flight when he came to take his soul by striking him with his rod, on which the ineffable name Jehovah was inscribed. In the end (so one legend proceeds) God Himself, accompanied by Gabriel, Michael, and Zagziel (the former teacher of Moses) , descended to take Moses soul. ”

“ Already in the narrative of the infancy there are hints of the Light which is to enlighten all nations; in the parable of the Good Samaritan and the recital of the mission of the seventy, there is the promise of the advancing outreach of the Divine mercy to men of every nation and tongue; and in the call of Zacchaeus, the parable of the Pharisee and the publican, and the salvation of the penitent robber, we have tokens of a grace which reaches out to the uttermost. The author does not aim at being a theologian ”

“ Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner-stone, a sure foundation; he that believeth shall not make haste"; and to Ps. cxviii. 22:
"The stone which the builders refused (or despised ) is become the head-stone of the corner."
There may have been some allusion to the foundationstone of the Second Temple the eben shetiyah, as it was afterwards called " the very foundation as well as the centre of the world," about which there are many traditions, true and false, absurd and beautiful, in the Talmud and in later Jewish Midrashim ”

“ And what Israel shall be nationally in the day when, stripped of their own filthy garments, they are clothed in machalatsoth (the new priestly outfit) , and, with the fair mitre with qodesli layehovaJi on their foreheads, go forth as " the priests of Jehovah " and as " the ministers of our God " among the nations that also all believers in Christ are already now as individuals. ”

“ So it will be with Israel. The fountain for sin and for uncleanness has been opened in the wounds of their Messiah nineteen centuries ago, but " in that day," when the Spirit of grace and of supplications is poured out upon them as a nation, " the eyes of the blind shall be opened"
(Isa. xxxv.) ”

“ For the same reason also the genealogy in this Gospel traces back Christ's earthly descent only as far as Abraham, for the aim of the Evangelist is to unfold the thesis laid down in the ist verse, which is in itself a summary and fulfilment of all the Messianic hope of the Old Testament: " The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.
(2) But if " Behold thy King" (Zech. ix. 9) is the key note of the Gospel of Matthew, the inscription written by the Spirit of God on the Gospel of Mark is, " Behold My Servant." ”

“ If we may digress for a moment from the interpretation of this familiar figure, and its primary significance in relation to Israel, and make an application of it to the individual believer in Christ, we would remind the reader, first, that we have a picture here of what, and where, we were in our natural condition. It is true, as Keil contends, that " fire is a symbol of punishment, not of sin," but in a very real and terrible sense sin is its own punishment ”

“ Isaiah introduces Him as the Tsemach Yehovah (Branch of Jehovah}, but he also designates Him PKri Jia-arets (" Fruit of the earth") , which, as the construction demands, must be regarded as another title of the Tsemach, and which brings before us more particularly His human nature, and His relation to our earth.
He is " the Servant " in Zechariah, and is pointed to as the One who will bring in a perfect righteousness, on the ground of which Israel shall be justified and the iniquity of the land be removed " in one day " ”

“ Dr. C. H. H. Wright's Zechariah and his Prophecies; and to Dean Alford's note on the passage in Jude, where they will find the subject fully discussed. For my own part, while not committing myself to the allegorical interpretation of the passage in Jude, which may have reference to a very early tradition about a dispute about the literal body of Moses not recorded in any writing now extant, there can be no doubt that the incidents and the words of the vision we are considering were in the Apostle's mind when he wrote his short epistle. ”