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more particularly into contact with the very books and passages on which the exposition of the Apocalypse must rest; whereas some of the most eminent interpreters of that book, even in Germany, though accomplished Grecians and New Testament critics, are without reputation or authority in Hebrew learning. The advantage which this gives him, is not merely in reference to the language and interpretation of the Old Testament, but to the order of investigation. Instead of beginning at the end of the New Testament, divining its import, and transferring the precarious conclusions thus obtained to the Old Testament, he has pursued the natural and rational order, first mastering the Hebrew prophets, and then applying the result of this investigation to a book which, in form and language, might almost be called a cento of Old Testament expressions. And this, too, not by reading up for the occasion, but by the patient, thorough, and successful toil of many years. Every one in the long series of his published works, has made a sensible advance in his preparation for the task which he has now undertaken and accomplished.

To this task he has long been looking forward, as he tells us in his preface, where we also learn that the immediate occasion of its execution was a long illness, by which his public labours were suspended, and during which he made the book of Revelation the constant subject of his thoughts, so that the outlines of his exposition were complete before his restoration, and he had only to fill in the details. A peculiar interest is imparted to this above his other works, by the synchronism of its composition with the late events in Germany, affording to the author's mind abundant confirmation of the truth of the predictions in this book of Scripture, and the correctness of his own mode of explaining them. The same cause has contributed to modify the form of his interpretation, so as to render it accessible to the whole class of educated readers, by transferring what is merely philological and critical from the text to the margin.

A book thus generated, could not fail to be highly interesting and instructive, whatever might be thought of the author's exegetical conclusions. And, accordingly, we find that, apart from the truth or falsehood of the meaning which he puts upon the prophecy, the volume is full of valuable matter. The text of the Apocalypse is adjusted with the utmost care and skill, according to the most approved principles and usages of modern criticism, with constant reference to the latest helps and best authorities. Of the text thus ascertained, we have a new translation, executed in that accurate yet spirited style for which the author is distinguished. We have, also, a translation, and, in many cases, a masterly exposition, of the most important passages, both of the Old and New Testament, cited as proofs or illustrations. This is a characteristic feature of the book, and of the author's habitual unwillingness to take for granted, or at second-hand, anything that requires or admits of direct and fresh investigation. The facility with which even eminent interpreters too frequently rely upon the labours or authority of others, as to these incidental but important matters, and content themselves with laying out their strength upon

the questions more immediately before them, renders more remarkable this incidental part of Hengstenberg's exposition, which, we do not hesitate to say, has added less, though much, to the bulk of the volume, than it has to its permanent and sterling value.

What has just been said applies, not only to the explanation of particular passages or texts, but also to the clear, and, in many cases, new and striking views incidentally presented, as to the scope and character of whole books, and their mutual relations. These are the more entitled to respect as the result of long-continued and profound investigation, not of mere generalities, but of the most minute details. As we have not room to exemplify this general statement by quotation, we must be content to justify it by referring to the various suggestions, scattered through the volume, with respect to the mutual dependence and close concatenation of the latest canonical epistles, which are still too commonly regarded as detached and independent compositions, and the corresponding mutual relations of the latest prophecies. These passages are particularly interesting from the skill with which some of the very repetitions and resemblances, adduced by sceptical critics as proofs of spuriousness and later date, are not only shown to warrant no such inference, but used as illustrations of the organic unity and settled plan which may be traced throughout the Scriptures, and which stamp it as a multiform but undivided whole.

From what has now been said it will be seen that, in our judgment, this would be a valuable addition to exegetical literature, independently of the principles on which the Apocalypse is there expounded, and the results to which the exposition leads, and to which we must now turn the attention of our readers. In so doing, we shall not confound them, or perplex ourselves, by any attempt at a comparison or parallel between the views of Hengstenberg and those of others, but simply state the former, leaving such as feel an interest in the history of the interpretation, to distinguish for themselves, as far as they are able and desirous, between things new and old. We may, however, note the fact in passing, that the writer most frequently cited in this work is Bengel, although there are occasional quotations from Vitringa, Bossuet, and the modern works of Ewald, Lücke, Bleek, and Züllig. Of the vast apocalyptic literature extant in the English language, the only trace we find is a rare quotation from Mede, or reference to him, and a correct, but very general, statement of the English millenarian doctrine as to one important passage. There is nothing more curious, indeed, in the theological literature of modern Germany, than the general silence, if not ignorance, of its learned men, as to the history of opinion in Britain and America, except where some eccentric or anomalous vagary of belief and practice has been accidentally, or otherwise, transplanted to the continent of Europe. It is sometimes as amusing as it is instructive to read thorough, clear, and masterly analyses of such fungus excrescences as Darbyism, Irvingism, Southcotism, &c., even in systematic works which are entirely blank as to the controversies and discussions which have agitated England and America for many generations, with respect to the doctrines of atone

ment and regeneration. In the present case, however, this blissful ignorance of Anglo-Saxon deeds and doctrines, on the part of one of the most learned Germans of the age, is an advantage, and a strong recommendation of the work, because, as we have said, it records the independent testimony of a great exegetical writer on a favourite subject of our own interpreters, yet without the least direct collision or collusion.

With respect to the author of the book of Revelation, Hengstenberg not only holds decidedly, but proves conclusively, that it was written by the man to whom a uniform tradition has ascribed it-John, the Apostle and Evangelist, the son of Zebedee, and the son of thunder. We mention this, which may to many seem a small thing in itself, or at least a work of supererogation, because a vast amount of misplaced ingenuity and learning has been spent by certain modern German critics in the effort to demonstrate that the book, if not the work of John Mark, which is Hitzig's paradoxical assumption, was composed by another and inferior John, or by some nameless writer of a later date. In this, as in other branches of apologetical theology, new forms of opposition call for new modes of defence, and the German front of infidelity can no more be resisted by the same means that disarmed the French philosophers and English deists, than a modern fortification can be carried by the rams and catapults of ancient warfare. The time was when all this might, however, have been left to be managed by the Germans in their own way, on the principle of letting the dead bury their dead. But now, when cheap translations of such books as those of Strauss are brought into extensive circulation, and made still more dangerous by the general tendency to German laxity of thought and principle with which the public mind is now infected, it would be something worse than folly to ignore the existence of the evil, or to despise the homogeneous remedy which Germany herself affords us, in the writings of her learned and pious men. To these remarks, which have a more important bearing on the general subject than on the particular question which occasioned them, we merely add, in reference to the latter, that while it is satisfactorily disposed of in the introduction, a more detailed discussion of it is contained in the supplementary dissertations which accompany the last volume, and to supply the place of what is usually called an Introduction. This inversion of the customary order was occasioned in the present case, as in that of the work upon the Psalms, by the impatience of the author or the public for the appearance of a part before the whole was finished.

Another controverted point, on which he takes decided ground, and forcibly maintains it, is the period of John's life at which the book was written. This he denies to be the reign of Galba, when Jerusalem was still standing, when the chief persecutions of the Christians were begun and carried on by Jews, and when the errors fostered in the Church were those of Jewish origin and character. In opposition to this chronological hypothesis, he clearly shows that the unanimous testimony of the ancients, properly so called, is, that the Revelation

was imparted during John's exile in the isle of Patmos, near the end of the long reign of Domitian, many years after the destruction of Jerusalem, when the Jews, as a nation and church, had ceased to exist; when their influence on Christianity was no longer felt, at least directly; and when the evils which assailed or threatened it, both of a physical and moral kind, proceeded from Gentile spite and heathenish corruption. The answer given to this question has, of course, a most important bearing on the whole interpretation, and virtually solves many minor exegetical problems.

We need scarcely say that Hengstenberg rejects with scorn the notion that the Book of Revelation is a mere poetical fiction, or an allegorical description either of past events or of the contemporary state of things, and regards it as being, in the highest sense, a prophecy, intended to exhibit, in the most impressive form, the future fortunes of the Church, under precisely the same inspiration which gives authority to the predictions of the Old Testament. As to the form of this great prophecy, he understands it to be borrowed from the Hebrew Scriptures, and especially from two of their most prominent and characteristic features, the ceremonial institutions of the law, and the symbolical imagery of the prophets. So far from understanding these in their original and proper import, as descriptive of a state of things like that which existed under the old economy, he supposes the apocalyptic prophet to have used them for the very reason that the old economy was gone for ever, and that its external forms might therefore be employed, without the danger, or at least without the necessity of misapprehension, to express the realities which they did in fact foreshadow.

From this it follows, as a general principle of Hengstenberg's interpretation, that the names and numbers of this book are all symbolical; that no mere man, with the unavoidable exception of the prophet himself, is expressly mentioned by his proper title; that Antipas, and the Nicolaitans, and Jezebel, &c., are all enigmatical descriptions; and that the usual computations, as to years and centuries of real time, are (with the exception of the millennium) a mere waste of arithmetic. The simple statement of this theory will do doubt quite destroy the interest which may have been previously felt by some in the details of the interpretation. As the office which we have assumed is not that of an advocate or judge, but a reporter, we feel no obligation to defend or to determine the truth of this hypothesis. We only wish that we could spread before our readers, on a smaller scale and in a manageable compass, the remarkable display of biblical learning and analogical reasoning, by which the author himself here maintains it. As it is, however, we can only hint, that by combining the acknowledged cases of symbolical representation which the book contains, with the extraordinary proofs of unity and systematic purpose, which, if not in every instance novel, are at least presented in a new light, and urged with a new power, he succeeds in making out a case which nothing but the blindest prepossession can deny to be plausible, and which nothing but the clearest and the strongest counter evidence can demonstrate to be false.

Another law which governs his interpretation is derived not so much from an induction of particulars in this case, as from the whole course of his previous prophetic investigations. The result of these, as is well known to the readers of his other publications, is, that the Old Testament predictions, as a general thing, are not so much descriptions of particular events, as formulas exhibiting sequences or cycles of events, which may be verified repeatedly, the costume of the spectacle presented to the prophet being borrowed from one or more of the particular fulfilments, which, however, are themselves to be regarded as mere specimens or samples of whole classes, genera or species, comprehending many of the same kind. This principle is here applied to the Apocalypse, which is therefore represented as a panoramic view of the vicissitudes through which the Church was to pass until the end of time, presented not in chronological order, but by genera and species, showing all the kinds of change to be expected, rather than the actual experience of single periods.

Closely connected with this view of the subject of the book, is that which the author entertains as to its structure. The main fact which he assumes, in opposition to most interpreters, is that the Apocalypse is not a continuous prediction relating to successive periods, but a series of parallel predictions, each including the whole history of the Church from the beginning to the end, but differing from each other in the figurative mode of exhibition and in the prominence given to certain objects in the several different parts respectively. This may be reckoned the essential feature of his plan, from which it derives its peculiar character, and is therefore entitled to a more particular description. The principle itself is defended à priori, on the ground of prophetical usage or analogy, and a posteriori from the consistency and clearness of its exegetical results. The whole book is divided into seven 66 groups," the theme of all which is substantially the same, to wit, the fortunes of the Church hereafter-i.e. from the date of the Apocalypse itself; and each of which affords a view, not of a part, but of the whole. The differences between the groups are like those seen in the same landscape when surveyed from different points of observation, or through different media, or with very different degrees of light, so that what is dimly seen in one case is seen clearly in another; that which in one view occupies the foreground, is transported to the background in the next; the light is thrown on that which was before in shadow, and the mutual relations of the figures are indefinitely varied. Thus the devil is not introduced at all in the earlier scenes, although his agency must be assumed from the beginning.

The first group is that of the Seven Epistles, co-extensive with the first three chapters. The second is that of the Seven Seals, which occupies the next four chapters. Then comes the group of the Seven Trumpets, filling also four chapters. These three groups or series are considered as preparatory to the four which follow. Then the Three Foes of the Kingdom of God occupying three chapters (xii.-xiv.). The fifth group is that of the Seven Vials (ch. xv., xvi.), forming a prelude to the sixth (xvii.-xx.), in which the destruction of the Three Foes is predicted. The whole is wound up by the seventh group

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