The Bible -- What it is, and how to interpret it, continued

We pass to the second part of the subject: "How to interpret the Bible." We get an introduction to this in the words of Paul to Timothy - "The Scriptures are able to make thee wise unto salvation" (II Tim. 3v 15). Here we have apostolic authority for the statement that the Scriptures "make wise" How is this effect produced? Obviously, by the communication of ideas to the mind. But how are these ideas communicated? There is only one answer: by the language it employs. Hence, it ought not to be a matter of difficulty to determine how the Scriptures are to be interpreted. It ought to be easy to maintain that, with certain qualifications, the Bible means what it says. And it is so. This emphasis of a very simple and obvious truth may seem superfluous, but it is rendered necessary by the prevalence of a theory which practically neutralises this truth as applied to the Bible. By this theory, it is supposed and assumed that the Bible is not to be understood by the ordinary rules of speech, but is couched in language used in a nonnatural sense, which has to be construed, and rendered, and interpreted in a skilled manner. What we mean will be apparent, if we suppose it were said to an orthodox friend, "The Bible, as a written revelation from God, must be written in language capable of being understood by those to whom it is sent." To this abstract proposition there is no doubt he would agree. But suppose his attention were directed to the following statements of Scripture: "The Lord God shall give unto him (Jesus) the throne of his father David" (Luke 1v 32), "and he shall be ruler in Israel" (Micah 5v 2), and "shall reign over them in Mount Zion" (Micah 4v 7). For the same Jesus that ascended to heaven shall come again in like manner as he ascended (Acts 1v 11). "He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth. Yea, all kings shall fall down before him: all nations shall serve him" (Psa. 72v 8, 11.) for he shall come in the clouds of heaven, and there shall be given unto him a kingdom, glory and dominion, that all peoples, nations, and languages may serve and obey him (Dan. 7v 13-14), and "the moon shall be confounded, and the sun ashamed when the Lord of Hosts shall reign in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, and before his ancients gloriously" (Isaiah 24v 23).

And suppose, on the reading of these statements, the remark were made, "It seems plain from this that Christ is coming to the earth again, and that on his return, he will set aside all existing rule upon the earth and reign personally in Jerusalem, as universal king," - what would he say? It is not a matter of surmise. The answer is supplied by thousands of cases of actual experience. "Oh! no such thing!" is the instant response; "what the prophet says is spiritual in its import. Jerusalem means the church, and the coming of Christ again to reign means that the time is coming when he will be supreme in the hearts and affections of men."

This is the method of treating the words of Scripture to which we have referred. It cannot be justified on the plea that the Bible directs us so to understand its words. There are, in fact, no formal instructions on the subject. The Bible comes before us to tell us certain things, and it performs its office in a direct and sensible way, going at once to its work without any scholastic preliminaries, taking it for granted that certain words represent certain ideas, and using those words in their current significance. The best evidence of this is to be found in the correspondence between its terms, literally understood and the events they relate to. The events which form the burden of them are fortunately, in hundreds of cases, open to universal knowledge in such a way that there can be no mistake about them, and themselves supply an accessible easily applied and recognizable standard for determining the bearing of Scripture statements.

Take a prophecy: -

"I will make your cities waste, and bring your sanctuaries into desolation, and I will not smell the savour of your sweet odours, and I will bring the land into desolation; and your enemies which dwell therein shall be astonished at it, and I will scatter you among the heathen and will draw out a sword after you; and your land shall be desolate and your cities waste" (Lev. 26v 31-33). "And thou shalt become an astonishment, a proverb, and a byword among all nations whither the Lord shall lead thee" (Deut. 28v 37).

There is no dispute about the mode in which this has been fulfilled. The sublimes" spiritualisticism is bound to recognise the fact that the subject of these words is the literal nation of Israel and their land, and that in fulfilment of the prediction they contain, the real Israel were driven from their real, literal. (26) land, which became really and literally desolate, as it is this day, and that Israel has become a literal byword and a reproach throughout the earth. This being so, on what principle are we to reject a literal construction of the following? -

"I will take the children of Israel from among the heathen, whither they shall be gone, and will gather them on every side, and bring them into their own land. And I will make them one nation in the land upon the mountains of Israel, and ONE KING shall be king to them all; and they shall be no more two nations, neither shall they be divided into two kingdoms any more at all" (Ezek. 37v 21, 22).

It is usual, with this and other similar predictions of a future restoration of Israel and their reinstatement as a great people under the Messiah, to contend that they mean the future glory and extension of the Church. That such an understanding of them can be maintained in the face of the fulfilled prophecies of Israel's calamities will not be contended for by the reflecting mind.

Take another instance: -

"But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel" (Micah 5v 2).

How was this fulfilled? Turn to Matthew 2v 1: -

"Now Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of Herod the King."

The fulfillment of the prophecy was in exact accordance with a literal understanding of the words employed, as every one is aware.

In Zechariah, chap. 9v 9, we read: -

"Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem; behold, thy king cometh unto thee: he is just and having salvation, lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt, the foal of an ass."

It is difficult to conjecture what the spiritualistic method of interpretation would have made of this as a still unfulfilled prophecy. That it would have expected the Messiah to condescend so far as to ride on the literal creature mentioned in the prophecy, is highly improbable in view of the surprised incredulity with which the idea is received that Christ will sit upon a real throne, and be personally present on earth during the coming age. All conjecture is excluded by the fulfilment of the prophecy in a way that compels a literal interpretation,

Matt. 21v 17 - "Jesus sent two disciples, saying unto them, Go into the village over against you, and straightway ye shall find an ass tied, and a colt with her; loose them and bring them unto me . . . And the disciples went and did as Jesus commanded them, and brought the ass and the colt, and put on them their clothes, and they set him thereon.