CHAPTER 15

What the Advent of Christ is meant to shew forth, and that (171) He is called God and Lord and High Priest of the God of the Universe by the Hebrew Prophets.

THIS then was the object of His coming to men, to bring back (b) that which had of old wandered away from the knowledge of the Father to its own way, and to crown that which was thought worthy of being made in His own image as a relation and a friend with the joy of His own life, and to show that the humanity was beloved by and belonged to the Father, since for its sake the Word of God Himself consented to become man. And now to speak briefly, the doctrine connected with our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, in its wonderful dispensation, shall be supported from the Hebrew prophecies, as presently their evidence will (c) shew; the new Scriptures shall prove the old, and the Gospels set their seal on the prophetic evidence.

But if this is so, it is now time to discuss His Name, why He is called Jesus and Christ, and saluted beforehand by name by so many prophecies. And first, let us inquire the meaning of the name Christ, before we begin a detailed collection of the prophetic passages connected with the present question I think it convenient to consider first the name "Christ," and to distinguish the conception it (d) conveys, so that we may be well acquainted with all the questions usually associated with the subject. - 192 - 

Another writer, you will remember, whose ideas spring from modern times and our own day, has said that Moses was the first of all lawgivers to appoint that those who were to act as priests to God must be anointed with prepared myrrh, since he thought that their bodies ought to smell sweet and have a good odour: for as everything ill-smelling is dear to vile and impure powers, so contrariwise the sweet-smelling is dear to the powers that love good. And he therefore made the law as well that the priests should use every day in the Temple prepared incense, (172) that sweet smells might abound. So that while the air was mingled with it, and dispersed evil smells, a kind of divine effluence might mingle with those who prayed. And that for the same reason flagrant anointing oil was made by the perfumer's art, for all to use who were going to take the leading place in the State on public occasions, and that Moses first gave the name of "Christ'' to those thus anointed. And that this chrism was not only conferred on chief priests, but afterwards on prophets and kings, (b) who alone were allowed to be anointed with the sacred unguent.

This account seems, no doubt, very obvious, but it is far removed from the actual intention of the divine and sublime prophet. For we may be sure that that wonderful man, and truly great Hierophant, knowing that the whole of earthy and material being was distinguished in its qualities alone, in no sense honoured one form above another, for he knew that all things were the product of one matter, never stable, having no firmness in its nature, which is (c) ever in flux, and hastening to its own destruction. He, therefore, made no choice of bodies for their sweetness, nor preferred the pleasure of the senses for its own sake. For this would be the condition of a soul fallen to the ground and under the power of bodily pleasure. There are, we know, many men effeminate in body, and in other ways vicious and lustful, who make use of superfluous unguents and a variety of things, but carry souls full of every horrible and offensive stench, while on the other hand the men of God, breathing out virtue, send forth a (d) fragrance that comes from purity, justice, and all holiness - 193 - far better than the scents of earth, and hold the smell of material bodies of no account.

And the prophet, well understanding this, had none of these ideas that have been suggested about unguents or incense, but presented the images of greater and divine things, so far as he could, in an outward way to those who could learn the divine in that way only and no other. And that is exactly what the divine oracle is reported to have expressed, when it said: "See thou make (all) things according to the type shewn in the Mount.": Therefore, when completing the symbols of the other things, which it is usual to call types, it appointed the anointing with the unguent. The account of it loftily and mysteriously expressed as it is, so far as I can explain it, had this meaning, that the only good and only truly sweet and noble, the cause of all life, and the gift bestowed on all in their being and their well-being, that this One Being was believed by the Hebrew reason to be the first cause of all, and Itself the highest and the All-Ruling and the All-Creating God.

It is thus the power of this Being, the all strong, the all-good, the source of all beauty in the highest unbegotten Godhead, the Divine Spirit (which by the use of a proper and natural analogy) it culls the (Oil of God), and therefore it calls one who partakes of it Christ and Anointed. Do not think of oil as. pity in this connection, nor as sympathy for the unfortunate, but as that which the fruit of the tree affords, something unmixed with any damp matter, nourisher of light, healer of toilers, disperser of weariness, that which makes those who use it of a cheerful countenance, streaming with rays like light, making bright and shining the face of him who uses it, as holy Scripture says: "That he may rejoice my face with oil."

Therefore the prophetic word by this analogy referring to the highest power of God, the King of kings and Lord of lords, calls Him the Christ and the Anointed, Who is the first and only one to be anointed with this oil in its fullness, and is the sharer of the Father's divine fragrance communicable to none other, and is God the Word sole-begotten of Him, and is declared to be God of God by His communion - 194 - with the Unbegotten that begat Him, both the First and the Greater. Wherefore in the Psalms the oracle says thus to this same Being anointed of the Father: (d) 

"7. Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever:
A sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom: 
8. Thou hast loved righteousness, and hated injustice:
Wherefore God, thy God,
Hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows."[[Ps. xliv. 7.]]

But the nature of the oil of olive is one, whereas the nature of the unguent shews a union of many in one. And so the original and unbegotten power of Almighty God, insofar as it is conceived of as simple, uncompounded, and unmingled with any other essence, is metaphorically compared with the simple essence of the olive oil. But insofar as it is inclusive of many ideas in the same, i. e. the (174) creative or kingly, the conceptions of providence, judgment, and countless others, such power as inclusive of many good qualities is more suitably likened to the unguent, which the holy Scriptures teach us that the true and only High Priest of God uses. And Moses himself having first been thought worthy to view the divine (realities) in secret, and the mysteries concerning the first and only Anointed High Priest of God, which were celebrated before him in His Theophanies, is (b) ordered to establish figures and symbols on earth of what he had seen with his mind in visions, so that they who were worthy might have the symbols to occupy them, previously to the full vision of the truth.

And when afterwards he set apart from all men on earth one man who was fit to act as priest to God Himself, he from the first called him Christ, transferring the name from its spiritual meaning, and shewed that He was greater than (c) the rest of mankind by the sweet-smelling unction, clearly and emphatically proclaiming that the whole nature of the begotten, much more human nature, lacks the power of the Unbegotten, and craves the fragrance of the better. But it is allowed to no man to reach the Highest and the First; this prize is given to the Only-begotten and the Firstborn - 195 - only. For those after Him there is only one way of grasping good, through the mediation of a second principle. So the symbol of Moses was of the Holy Spirit. "And there are diversities of gifts, hut the same spirit": of which Spirit he thought that prophets and kings before all others ought to be ambitious to partake, as being consecrated to God not for themselves only, but for all the people.

But now let us inquire somewhat more exactly about the symbols of Moses being symbols of the more divine(realities), and about the possibility of those who were endued with the Holy Spirit without the unction of earth being called Christs.

David in Ps. civ. when touching the stories of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the very men who were his godly ancestors, who lived before Moses' day, calls them Christs, for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, in which they shared, and for that alone. And when he tells how they were hospitably received by foreigners, and bow they found God was their Saviour when plots were laid against them, following Moses' account, he names them prophets also and Christs, although Moses had then not yet appeared among men, nor was his law about the prepared unguent laid down. Hear what the Psalm says:

"5. Remember the wonderful works, that he hath done, 
          His wonders and the judgments of his mouth
6. Ye seed of Abraham, his servants, 
          Ye children of Jacob, his chosen,
7. The Lord himself is your God,
          His wonders are in all the world.
8. He remembered his covenant for ever
          The law which he gave to a thousand generations,
9. Which he commanded to Abraham,
          And the oath which he sware unto Isaac,
10. And established it to Jacob for a law,
          And to Israel for an everlasting covenant.
11. Saying ' To you I will give the land of Canaan, 
          The lot of your inheritance.'—
13. And they went from one nation to another, 
          From one kingdom to another people.
14. He suffered no man to do them wrong, 
          And reproved kings for their sake: - 196 - 
15. 'Touch not my Christs,
          And do my prophets no harm.' "

So David wrote. And Moses informs us what kings He reproved, saying:

"And God afflicted Pharaoh with great plagues because of Sarra, Abraham's wife." 

And again he writes about the King of Gerar:

"And God came to Abimelech in a dream by night, and said, Behold thou diest for the woman thou hast taken; for she is the wife of Abraham." 

Of whom he says further on:

"And now give back the woman to her husband, for he is a prophet, and will pray for you." 

You see from these instances how David, or rather the Holy Spirit Who spoke through him, called the godly men of old and the prophets Christs, though they were not anointed with the earthly unguent. For how could they have been, since it was in after years that Moses commanded the unction of the High Priest?

Now listen to Isaiah prophesying in the clearest words thus about Christ, as one to be sent by God to men as their Redeemer and Saviour, and coming to preach forgiveness to those in bondage of spirit, and recovery of sight to the blind. For here again the prophet teaches that the Christ has been anointed not with a prepared unguent, but with the spiritual and divine anointing of His Father's Divinity, conferred not by man but by the Father. He says then in the person of Christ:

"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me. He has sent me to preach glad tidings to the poor, to proclaim liberty to the captives, to heal the broken in heart, and recovery of sight to the blind."

Let this point then be regarded as certain, that Isaiah, equally with David, prophesies that He that should come to mankind to preach liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind would not be anointed with a prepared unguent, but with an anointing of the power of His Father Unbegotten and Perfect. And according to the manner of - 197 - prophecy the prophet speaks of the future as past, and as one predicting about himself.

So far, then, we have learned that they who are called "Christs" in the highest sense of the term are anointed by God, not by men, and with the Holy Spirit, not with a prepared unguent.

It is now time to see how the teaching of the Hebrews shews that the true Christ of God possesses a divine nature higher than humanity. Hear, therefore, David again, where he says that he knows an Eternal Priest of God, and calls (c) Him his own Lord, and confesses that He shares the throne of God Most High in the 109th Psalm, in which he says as follows—

"The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, | till I make thine enemies the footstool of thy feet. | 2. The Lord shall send the rod of power for thee out of Zion, | and thou shalt rule in the midst of thine enemies. | 3. With thee is dominion in the day of thy power, | in the brightness of thy saints. | I begat thee from my womb before the Morning Star. 4. The Lord sware and will not repent, | Thou art a priest for ever, after the order of Melchizedek." | [[Ps. cix. i.]] 

And note that David in this passage, being king of the (d) whole Hebrew race, and in addition to his kingdom adorned with the Holy Spirit, recognized that the Being of Whom he speaks Who was revealed to him in the spirit, was so great and surpassingly glorious, that he called Him his own Lord. For he said "The Lord said to my Lord." Yea: for he knows Him as eternal High Priest, and Priest of the Most High God, and throned beside Almighty God, and His Offspring. Now it was impossible for Jewish priests to be consecrated to the service of God without anointing, wherefore it was usual to call them Christs. The Christ, then, mentioned in the Psalm will also be a priest. For how (177) could He have been witnessed to as priest unless He had previously been anointed? And it is also said that He is made a priest forever. Now this would transcend human nature. For it is not in man to last for ever,³ since our race is mortal and frail. Therefore the Priest of God, spoken of in this passage, Who by the confirmation of an oath received a perpetual and limitless priesthood from God, was - 198 - greater than man. "For the Lord sware," he said, "and will not repent, Thou art a priest after the order of Melchizedek." For as Moses relates that this Melchizedek was priest of the Most High God, not anointed with a prepared unguent, since he was priest of the Most High God long before the Institution of the Law, and far above the famous Abraham in virtue—for he says, "And Melchizedek, King of Salem, Priest of the Most High God, blessed Abraham." "And without any contradiction," says the apostle, "the less is blessed by the greater." As therefore, Melchizedek, whoever he was, is introduced as one who acts as priest to the Most High God, without having been anointed with a prepared unguent, He that is prophesied of by David as of the order of Melchizedek. is also spoken of as a great Being surpassing everyone in nature, as being Priest of the supreme God, and sharing the throne of His unbegotten power, and as the Lord of the prophet; and He is not simply "priest," but "eternal priest of the Father." And the divine apostle also says, examining the implications of these passages:

"17. Wherein God, willing more abundantly to shew to the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath: 18. That of two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation." 

And again:

"21. For those priests were made without an oath: but this with an oath by him that said unto him: 'The Lord sware and will not repent, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.'" 

And:

"23. They truly were many priests, because they were not suffered to continue by reason of death. 24. But this man because he continueth ever hath an unchangeable priesthood. 25. Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them."

In this a divine Power is represented as being in existing things, and underlying things that are only grasped by the mind, Which according to the Hebrew oracles is Priest to the God of the Universe, and is established in the office of - 199 - priesthood to the Most High, not by earthy and human unguent, but by holy and divine virtue and power. The Object of the Psalmist's prophecy therefore is presented distinctly as an eternal Priest, and Son of the Most High God, as begotten by the Most High God, and sharing the throne of His Kingdom. And the Christ foretold by Isaiah has been shewn not to have been begotten by man but by the Father, and to have been anointed by the Divine Spirit, and to have been sent to deliver men from captivity. This Being, then, it was that Moses had seen by the help of the Divine Spirit, when he established figures and symbols of Him, as suitable for men, anointing and hallowing the priest selected from among men with prepared unguents as yet, and not with the Holy Spirit, and calling him Christ and anointed, as a representation of the true. And who could give better evidence of this than Moses himself? In his own writings he distinctly says that the God and Lord Who answered him bade him establish a more material worship on earth according to the spiritual and heavenly vision that had been shewn him, which should form an image of the spiritual and immaterial worship. And so he is said to have sketched a kind of copy of the order of the angels of heaven and the powers divine, since the oracle said to him, "Thou shalt make all things according to the pattern shewed thee in the Mount." So then he introduces the High Priest, as he did all the other elements, and anointed him with earth-born unguents, working out a Christ and a High Priest of shadow and symbol, a copy of the Heavenly Christ and High Priest.

Thus I think I have clearly proved that the essential Christ was not man, but Son of God, honoured with a scat on the right hand of His Father's Godhead, far greater not only than human and mortal nature, but greater also than every spiritual existence among things begotten.

But moreover, according to what was previously said, the same David in Ps. xliv., using as inscription the words "Concerning the beloved, and those to be changed," - 200 - speaks of one and the same Being as God and King and Christ, writing thus:

" 1. My heart has uttered a good matter: I declare my works to the King: My tongue is the pen of a ready writer, 2. Thou art more beautiful than the sons of men." 

To which he adds:

" 6. Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever, a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom: 7. Thou hast loved righteousness and hated iniquity, wherefore God, even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows." 

Now look a little more carefully, and see how in the inscription of the Psalm he prefaces that the subject is " concerning the beloved," adding the words "for instruction" to prepare the hearers for what he is about to say. He shews also the reason of the Incarnation of the Word, with the words:

" For the end, for the changed, with a view to understanding, for the beloved."

And whom could you better regard as "those to be changed," for whom the Psalm is spoken, than those who are going to be changed from their former life and conversation, to be transformed and altered by Him Whom the prophecy concerns? And this was the beloved of God, on whose behalf the Psalm's preface advises us to have understanding with regard to the prophecy. And if you were at a loss about the Person of this Beloved One, with whom the prophecy in the Psalm is concerned, the word that faces you at the very beginning will inform you, which says: "My heart hath produced a good word." It may surely be said that by this is meant the Word that was in the beginning with God, Whom the great Evangelist John shewed forth as God, saying: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." And the words, "My heart hath produced a good word," if it be spoken in the person of the Supreme God and Father, would suggest the Only-begotten Word of God, as being the Son of the Father, not by projection, nor by division, or scission, or - 201 - diminution, or any conceivable mode of bodily birth; for such ideas are blasphemous, and very remote from the ineffable generation. And we must understand this according to our previous interpretation; as when it was said that He was born from the womb of God before the Morning Star, and we understood it figuratively, so we must understand this similar statement only in a spiritual sense. For in the words "My heart has produced a good word," the (180) Holy Spirit inspires this saying also as purely spiritual. To which it seems right forme to add what I am accustomed to quote in every question that is debated about His Godhead, that reverent saying: "Who shall declare his generation?" even if the holy Scriptures are wont in our human and earthly language to speak of His Birth, and use the word "womb."

For such expressions are connected with mental imagery alone, and are accordingly subject to the laws of metaphor. And so the words, "My heart hast produced a good word," (b) may be explained as referring to the constitution and coming into being of the primal Word, since it would not be right to suppose any heart, save one that we can understand to be spiritual, to exist in the case of the Supreme God.

One might also say that the Psalmist referred to "the Word that was in the beginning with God, "a Word rightly named "good" as being the offspring of a Father All-Good. And if we read a little further on in the Psalm we shall find that the subject of the prophecy, this very "beloved of God," is anointed, once more not as by Moses, nor as by any human being, but by the Most High and Supreme God and (c) Father Himself. As he says further on, "Wherefore God, even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows." And by what name else could one call Him that is here acknowledged to have been anointed by the Supreme God Himself, but Christ? So we have here in this passage two names of the subject of the prophecy, Christ and the Beloved, the author of this (d) anointing being one and the same: and it shews the reason why - 202 - He is said to be anointed with the oil of gladness, which will be plain to you, when we proceed a little further, and still more if you take into account the whole intention of the passage. For the Psalm addresses the subject of the prophecy, Christ the Beloved of God, in the words quoted a little before, in which it was said: "Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever: a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy Kingdom. Thou hast loved righteousness and hated injustice: therefore God, even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows." See, then, if these words are not addressed directly to God: He says,

"For thou, o( Qeo&j," instead of w} Qee/. "Thy throne is for ever and ever, and a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy Kingdom." And then, "Thou, O God, hast loved righteousness and hated injustice; therefore God, even Thy God, hath anointed thee," and established Thee as Christ above all. The Hebrew shews it even more clearly, which Aquila most accurately translating has rendered thus: "Thy throne, God, is for ever and still, a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy Kingdom. Thou hast loved justice and hated impiety: wherefore God, thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness apart from thy fellows." Instead therefore of "God, thy God" the actual Hebrew is, "O God, thy God." So that the whole verse runs: "Thou hast, O God, loved justice and hated impiety: therefore in return, O God, the highest and greater God, Who is also thy God"—so that the Anointer, being the Supreme God, is far above the Anointed, He being God in a different sense. And this would be clear to any one who knew Hebrew. For in the place of the first name, where Aquila has "Thy throne, O God," clearly replacing o( Qeo&j by Qee/, the Hebrew has Elohim. And also for "Therefore, O God, he has anointed thee" the Hebrew has Elohim, which Aquila shewed by the vocative w} Qee/.

Instead of the nominative case of the noun, which would be "Therefore God, even thy God, hath anointed thee—" the Hebrew with extreme accuracy has Eloach, which is the vocative case of Elohim, meaning "O God," whereas the - 203 - nominative Elohim means "God." So that the interpretation which says "Therefore, O God, thy God hath anointed," is accurate.

And so the oracle in this passage is clearly addressing God, and says that He has been anointed with the oil of gladness beyond any of those who have ever borne the same name as He. Therefore in these words you have it clearly stated that God was anointed and became the Christ, not with prepared unguent nor at the hands of man, but in a way different from other men. And this is He Who was the Beloved of the Father, and His Offspring, and the eternal Priest, and the Being called the Sharer of the Father's Throne. And Who else could He be but the Firstborn Word of God, He that in the beginning was God with God, (182) reckoned as God through all the inspired Scriptures, as my argument as it proceeds further will abundantly prove?

Now after this preliminary study of the coming into being and the appellation of the Christ, it remains for us to take up our previous subject, and consider in what a number of prophetic predictions the Christ was foretold by name.