ness. In the Messianic era its fulfilment is to be found, not merely in the appearance of John, but also in the early portion of the ministry even of Christ and his apostles, inasmuch as this was a continuation and completion of that of John, and was intended to announce that the kingdom of heaven was at hand, and to prepare the way for its coming. But John is justly to be regarded as the precise object to which the prophecy points, since the idea was not merely relatively, but absolutely realised in him. He was the forerunner of the Lord, and that alone. Whatever of Christ's ministry therefore partakes of the same character may be reckoned as a part of his, whilst the special work of Christ belonged to the second promise, of the Lord coming to his temple and of the covenant angel.'—It is only in the Piel, that has the meaning "to sweep," "to preis an expression peculiar to Isaiah. We find it not only in chap. xl. 3, but also in chap. lvii. 14

10.

That by

and lxii.

(the Lord) we are to understand God, cannot for a moment be doubted. The proofs of this are the following: The constant use of with the article in this sense; the fact that it is preceded by, before me (the person who comes here, must be the one who sends his messenger before him); the evident allusion to the question, "where is the God of justice;" and lastly, the expression his temple, with reference to the temple of Jehovah. On doctrinal grounds, namely, to set aside the argument in support of the divinity of Christ, which the earlier expositors founded upon the fact that the temple is spoken of here as belonging to the Lord, who is identified with the messenger of the covenant, Faustus Socinus explained as meaning the royal palace. It is not difficult

1 Hofmann (Weissagung p. 361) objects to the ideal interpretation of on the ground that the expressions "suddenly" and "behold” both show that one particular prophet is intended. Reinke (der Prophet Maleachi) adduces the same expressions as favouring the reference to John the Baptist. But it is a universal truth, which is constantly being fulfilled again and again, that the Lord comes unexpectedly, whenever through his interposition a call to repentance is uttered in the ears of his people. "This 'suddenly,'" says Schmieder, "is repeated in every act and judgment of the Lord. The Lord of glory always comes as a thief in the night, to those who are asleep in their sins.'

to show that this is inadmissible.

Ver. 3 furnishes sufficient

proof to the contrary. The is spoken of there as the place for priests and sacrifices. At the same time there is some truth at the foundation of this erroneous interpretation, and that is our reason for mentioning it. There can be no doubt, that in this passage God is introduced as a king, and the temple as his palace. The king has long since taken his journey (añedýμnoev, Matt. xxi. 33, compare chap. xxv. 14); or, dropping the figure, his presence among his people has not been clearly manifested in blessings and punishments. He is now about to return and enquire into the conduct of all his servants and subjects during his absence, that he may reward and punish accordingly.

There can be no doubt as to the person intended by "the messenger of the covenant," who is called on other occasions "the angel of the Lord." That we are not to identify the messenger of the covenant with the messenger sent by the Lord before himself and with Elias, as Hitzig, Maurer, and others have done, is evident from the order in which the different events are narrated here; first, the messenger of the covenant comes; and then the Lord himself and the messenger of the covenant suddenly appear; compare the term "before" in chap. iv. 5, and also the expression, "whom ye delight in," which is parallel to "whom ye seek." They both point back to the words, "where is the God of justice?" in chap. ii. 17, in which this delight and desire are expressed. But even apart from this particular allusion, the wish for a preacher of repentance to come proceeds from a state of mind, the very opposite of that which distinguishes these "just persons who need no repentance." Again there would be something very unsuitable in connecting God with his earthly servant in such a way as this. The singular

בָא

also indicates the essential unity of the Lord and the messenger of the covenant. And our conclusion is still further confirmed by the parallel passages in Isaiah, where the voice is first heard, and then the glory of the Lord appears. These reasons are also to some extent decisive against the view expressed by Hofmann (Weissagung i. p. 359, Schrift beweis i. p. 162), that the angel of the covenant is "an antitype of Moses, a mediator between God and the nation, through whom God is about to enter into a new, more perfect and eternal

fellowship with Israel." The very fact that Hofmann is the first to entertain this opinion, creates a difficulty. The Holy Spirit would have expressed himself very obscurely if this were the meaning. But it is a sufficient reply, that, according to ver. 17, the wish of the nation (the angel of the covenant, whom ye desire) was not for the coming of a second Moses, but for the coming of God; not for the appearance of a reformer, but for the appearance of a judge; and in vers. 2-5 of this chapter it is not of reformation, but of judgment that the prophet speaks. A mediator by the side of the Lord, a mere counterpart of Moses, would not be distinguishable from "my messenger," from whom Hofmann would keep him distinct, though his mission is precisely the same. It is more difficult to explain the name, which is given here to the Angel of the Lord. Bauer and others, who adopt the rendering "the promised messenger," in direct opposition to the rules of the language, have been sufficiently refuted by Jahn. The "messenger of the covenant" is supposed by Jahn himself to mean "the messenger with whom the covenant was concluded." In his idea the covenant referred to is the Sinaitic. The early commentators, on the other hand, are unanimously of opinion that the new covenant is intended (Jer. xxxi. 31), the "messenger of the covenant" being equivalent to the "mediator of the new covenant" in Heb. ix. 15. The following is probably the correct explanation. We have already pointed out at p. 189 the reason why the prophet does not speak of the coming of the Lord only, but also of the divine messenger, who is essentially one with Him. It is to be found, namely, in the previous mention of the earthly messengers of God, both ordinary and extraordinary. The divine messenger is called the messenger of the covenant, because he is sent in the cause of the covenant, and his coming to bless, as well as to punish, is the result of the covenant. The two earthly messengers might have been called the same. But the prophet had a special reason for applying this term to the heavenly messenger, in the fact that his coming had been desired by the murmurers on the ground of the covenant. "The covenant" does not denote one single

1 "God here casts reproaches upon the Jews, and appeals to his covenant in opposition to their impious blasphemies, for their impious murmuring will not prevent him from fulfilling his promises, and bringing to pass in his own time what they imagine will never take place." Calvin.

act, but the covenant relation of God to Israel, which extends through every age. The violation of this covenant on the part of the people, and especially on that of the priests, was the principal theme of the previous addresses (chap. ii. 10, 11); and the violation of the covenant on the part of God was the principal burden of the complaints of the people. The coming of the covenant angel will prove these charges to be groundless, and demonstrate the reality of the covenant by the punishment of those who despise it.

The question still remains, is punishment to be regarded as the sole object of the predicted appearance of the covenant angel, as Jahn and others suppose? Certainly not. If it were, why should the messenger of the Lord be sent before him? And with what right could the divine messenger be called the messenger of the covenant, if he would merely do justice to one particular aspect of that covenant? Mere punishment is inconceivable, so far as the covenant-nation is concerned. Blessing must always accompany it, or rather the punishment itself, when looked at from another point of view, is really a blessing, inasmuch as it removes the ungodly out of the way, and thus gives free course to the manifestation of the divine mercy towards his purified nation. The fact that the messenger of the covenant also comes to bless is very obvious from vers. 4 and 6. It is so again in vers. 17, 18, and chap. iv. 1, where the mercy and righteousness of God are represented as equally manifested on the occasion of his coming. The only thing which has made it appear as though the sole object of his advent would be to punish is the fact that, so far as the men were concerned, with whom the prophet had immediately to do, punishment would necessarily be the result.

Let us now briefly glance, in conclusion, at the whole result. To the people's complaint, that the idea of a just God is at variance with what they see, the prophet replies, God will soon put an end to this apparent contradiction. Though he now appears to be absent, he will soon come in the person of his heavenly messenger, and, before that, will make known his covenant-faithfulness by sending earthly messengers. That this announcement received its ultimate fulfilment in the coming of Christ, in whom the Angel of the Lord, the Logos, was made

flesh, we need hardly stop to observe. It is also self-evident that this ultimate fulfilment is neither to be looked for in his state of humiliation, nor his state of exaltation alone, but that the two are rather to be regarded as constituting together an inseparable whole. The advent of Christ in humiliation contains the germ of all the blessings which he bestows, and all the punishment which he inflicts, in his subsequent exaltation.We have but one other remark to make; namely, that the emphatic repetition, "Behold he cometh, saith the Lord of hosts," is evidently intended to meet the doubts expressed as to his coming, and the open denial of the same, which are implied in chap. ii. 17.

Ver. 2. "And who endureth the day of his coming, and who shall stand when he appeareth? For he is like the refiner's fire, and like the lye of the washers."

The answer to the question, who? is not "very few," but "no one;" as in Is. liii. 1. The prophet is addressing the ungodly. Appealing to their consciences, he endeavours to convince them of the fearful contradiction between their moral character and their longing for the coming of the Lord, which must be particularly disastrous to them. We find a parallel passage in Amos v. 18, except that the persons alluded to there are openly ungodly, and are merely scoffing when they express a wish for the day of the Lord to come, "Woe to those who desire the day of the Lord! To what end is the day of the Lord for you? It is darkness, and not light." The resemblance between the expression, "who endureth the day of his coming," and Joel ii. 11, "the day of the Lord is great and very terrible, and who can endure it ()?" cannot be regarded as accidental, especially when we consider the fact that there is a similar verbal allusion to Joel in ver. 23. The prophet adopts the same course as in ver. 1, and takes his stand upon the authority of an honoured predecessor, who wrote centuries before, and announced the day of the Lord as a disastrous event for the covenant-nation itself; whereas these hypocrites looked upon the heathen, as the sole objects of the judicial righteousness of God. The term, "stand," is used as a contrast to the falling of the guilty, when overpowered by fear and dread in anticipation of coming events. This passage is hinted at in Eph. vi. 13, "that