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&c. or 4507.

Ant. Chris.

or 904.

A. M. 3001, translated, must be vain, if not presumptuous; for we know not the precise place to Chris, which the faithful shall be translated after the general judgment at the end of the world. 1003, &c. We know indeed, that in the house of our Heavenly Father there are many mansions, and that among these mansions places are prepared, for all who shall have loved and feared him, suitable to the attainments that they have made to render themselves "meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light;" we know likewise, that the glory and happiness, to be enjoyed in even the lowest of these places, surpass every thing of the kind, which we can at present conceive; but this is all that we know, or ever can know of the subject, in our present state of existence; and it is sufficient for those who ought to live by faith and not by sight.

It is indeed difficult to suppose that Enoch and Elijah in their glorified bodies are now in the place of the disembodied spirits of the faithful departed; and all attempts to ascertain where even that place is, have been equally vain with those which have been made to ascertain the situation of the regions of the blessed. That the faithful departed are not in the same state in which they shall be placed after the resurrection of the dead, is clearly the doctrine of Scripture; but whilst some have placed their intermediate place in the upper regions of the air, and others beyond the utmost limits of the solar system, the ancient fathers in general, and Bishop Horsley, with many other moderns of equal learning, have supposed that the intermediate state of departed souls is in a great cavity in the centre of the earth. All these opinions are equally groundless; or if there be any difference, in this respect, among them, the last is the most groundless of the three; for we have all the evidence which can be given us by that philosophy, of which the illustrious prelate was a great master, that the centre of the earth consists not only of matter solid, but of matter even more dense than any thing with which we are acquainted, except perhaps some of the metals.

But wherever the souls departed may be, we are sure that they are, to use Bishop Horsley's words, "in a place of safe keeping under the shadow of God's right hand;" but we can hardly suppose that Enoch and Elijah are with them. This indeed seems to have been the general opinion of the ancients, though others placed these prophets in the terrestrial paradise. The terrestrial paradise was perhaps preserved till the general deluge; but in that dreadful convulsion of nature it must have been swept from the face of the earth; and therefore the patriarch and prophet cannot be there now. The most probable opinion certainly would be, that they are in that heaven, to which all the blessed shall be translated after the judgment of the great day; but this opinion seems to be confuted by our Saviour himself, when he told Nicodemus (a) that "no man had then ascended up into heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man," who, when speaking on earth, "was in heaven." To me these words seem to indicate that there is some mansion in heaven, into which no man-not even Enoch or Elias-had then been admitted, but to which the blessed may be admitted afterwards. That place, it is likewise evident, is not what our Lord calls paradise in his promise to the penitent thief on the cross, and in which we have reason to believe that the souls of the faithful repose, in the felicity of well assured hope, till the day of the general resurrection; for our Lord's human nature-even his soul-was not in heaven till after he rose from the dead. This seems evident from his words to Mary Magdalene (b)"Touch me not, for I am not yet ascended to my father; but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God." His soul therefore had not been in heaven during the period that elapsed between his death and resurrection, nor, of course, had the penitent thief's, nor are those souls of the faithful, which are now in paradise; but Enoch and Elijah went not to paradise, for of the latter it is expressly said, that "he went up by a whirlwind into heaven," though (a) John iii. 13. (b) Ibid. xx. 17.

of 2 Chron.

certainly not into the highest heaven, nor probably even to that heaven, to which he From 1 Kings shall be admitted at the end of this world. We shall have a better opportunity, when viii, to the end we come to the History of the New Testament, to inquire into what is meant by the. many mansions of our Heavenly Father's House; but we may, I think, take it for granted, that the patriarch and prophet were translated into one of these, quite different from the paradise of disembodied spirits, and yet inferior to that, into which they shall be received at the judgment of the great day; for there is nothing in Scripture that can lead us to suppose that they shall be exempted from appearing with the rest of the human race" before the judgment-seat of Christ, when every man shall receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether good or bad."

That Enoch and Elijah were both men of most exemplary faith, piety, and virtue, and eminent ministers of God in their respective generations, is unquestionable; but our author uses very improper language, though I doubt not but his meaning was harmless, when he speaks of particular services rendered by them to God, for which he vouchsafed them exemption from mortality. Exemption from mortality, as we have already seen, was not the wages of any service which could have been rendered, even in paradise, by man to his Maker. It was then as it is now, the gift of God; but it was then suspended on man's observance of a positive command, and is now freely bestowed on all— Enoch and Elijah not excepted—" through Jesus Christ our Lord," who is equally the resurrection and the life-the resurrection of the body and the uninterrupted life of the soul. Enoch and Elijah were indeed exempted from that temporary death of the body, which in the New Testament is so far from being considered as any thing really dreadful, that it is compared to a state of placid sleep. The pain of dying has in its prospect something indeed frightful; but it is hardly to be supposed that the prophet and patriarch were exempted from this common lot of humanity merely in reward of the integrity of their conduct in the stations in which they had been respectively placed: for even they, with all their piety, and virtue, and zeal, were but unprofitable servants to God, because they had done only that which it was their duty to do, and because man cannot be profitable to his Maker.

Their translation therefore into heaven, without previously tasting death, was undoubtedly to serve some great purpose in that astonishing scheme of redemption, which was gradually unfolded from the fall of man until it was completed by the death, resurrection, and ascension of Christ; and part at least of that purpose is now clearly seen. In the ages of Enoch and Elijah, the people around them were sunk into the lowest state of irreligion and vice. These two faithful ministers of God had done every thing in their power, and under the influence of the Holy Spirit, as well by their example as by their precepts, to bring them back to their duty; they had warned them of " the judgments to be speedily executed upon them for all their ungodly deeds, which they had ungodly committed, and for all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners had spoken" against their Maker and his ministers; and Elijah had been himself the instrument of executing some of those judgments on Ahab and the prophets of Baal. But, though piety and virtue were generally rewarded, and profaneness, idolatry, and vice, punished even in this world-probably during the eras of both these prophets, but certainly in Israel during the era of Elijah; and though God was then not slack, in any sense of the word, "concerning either his promises or his threatenings," all the promises and threatenings of the prophets, and all the judgments, which had actually come on the people, were despised. In the days of Enoch, the obscure promise made to Adam of redemption, from that death which he had brought on himself and his posterity, appears to have been either not generally understood, or to have been generally forgotten. In the age of Ahab and Elijah, great part of the Hebrew Scriptures was not written; and it may be reasonably doubted whether any part of those Scriptures was ever re

Ant. Chris.

or 904.

A. M. 3001, ceived as canonical in the kingdom of Israel founded by Jeroboam, but the five books of &c. or 4507. Moses, and perhaps the book of Joshua These books seem not to have had their due 1003, &c. influence in that kingdom at any time, from the period of its revolt from the house of David, till its final and complete destruction by the Assyrian monarch; but it is very evident that during the idolatrous reigns of Ahab and his sons, the law of Moses was totally disregarded, except by a comparatively very small number. It is likewise to be remembered, that the sanctions of the Mosaic law were not spiritual but temporal, and that those, who knew not how death had come into the world, and were ignorant of the meaning of the promises made to Adam, to Noah, to Abraham, and to Isaac, and Jacob-promises which the worldly policy of the idolatrous kings and priests of Israel would not encourage the people to study-could hardly derive from their religion any steady conviction of a future state of retribution. It seems to have been therefore necessary, at both these periods, to afford the people a sensible proof, that there is verily a reward for the righteous in a state different from the present; and that proof was exhibited to them by the translation of Enoch and Elijah.

"The translation of Enoch, says Bishop Law (a), must have made the world about him sensible of the good Providence of God, inspecting and rewarding his faithful servants; and one would think it should have induced them to look up to a better state than the present, where all such might hope at length to see and enjoy their Maker. It was a lively and affecting instance of what man might have enjoyed had he kept his original innocence; as well as an earnest of the promised victory over the evil one, and that mankind were not to be left entirely in their present state, but, at some time or other, to be restored to the favour of their Maker, and behold his presence in bliss and immortality;" and surely the translation of Elijah should have had an equally salutary effect on the Israelites. It should have convinced their idolatrous sovereign with his profane priests and false prophets, that "there is verily a reward for the righteous, and a God of gods that judgeth the earth;" and it ought to have drawn the attention of the people, as it probably did draw the attention of many of them, to the import of those promises which were made to their father Abraham, that in his seed should all the nations of the earth be blessed.]

(a) Considerations on the Theory of Religion, part ii.

CHAPTER III.

FROM THE SIEGE OF SAMARIA, BY BENHADAD, TO THE
DEATH OF UZZIAH KING OF JUDAH.

THE HISTORY.

viii. to the end

NOTWITHSTANDING the great service which the prophet Elisha had done Ben- From 1 Kings hadad king of Syria, in curing Naaman the general of his forces of a confirmed leprosy, of 2 Chron. he still continued his enmity against Israel. Having raised an army with a purpose to besiege Samaria, he opened the campaign with stratagems of war; and, in hopes of surprising Jehoram's troops, laid here and there some ambuscades, which Elisha, by his spirit of prophecy, found out, and all along gave the king of Israel a timely intelligence of them. Benhadad at first suspected that his counsels were betrayed; but when he was informed by † one of his officers that Elisha (who was then at Dothan, a small city in the half-tribe of Manasseh, and not far from Samaria) must certainly have been at the bottom of all this, he sent a strong detachment to seize him, and invested the city that night.

On the morrow, when Elisha's servant saw the enemy surrounding the town, and knew of no forces to oppose them, †2 he expressed his fear and concern to his master; but, upon his master's prayer, * his eyes were opened, and he beheld a multitude of

+ It is not to be doubted but that Naaman, upon his return from Samaria, spread the fame of Elisha so much in the court of Syria, that some of the great men there might have the curiosity to make a farther enquiry concerning him; and being informed by se veral of his miraculous works, they might thence conclude, that he could tell the greatest secrets, as well as perform such wonders as were related of him; and that therefore, in all probability, he was the person who gave the king of Israel intelligence of all the schemes that had been contrived to entrap him. Patrick's Commentery.

+ This young man, it is supposable, had been but a little while with his master, no longer than since Gehazi's dismission, and therefore perhaps had not yet seen any great experiments of his power to work mi racles; or, if he had, the great and imminent danger he thought his master in (for, in all probability, he had learnt from the peopic of the town, that this vast body of men were come to apprehend him only),

might well be allowed to raise his fear, and shake his
faith. Pool's Annotations.

* It must be allowed that angels, whether they be
purely spiritual, or (as others think) clothed with
some material form, cannot be seen by mortal eyes;
and therefore, as Elisha himself, without a peculiar
vouchsafement of God, could not discern the heaven-
ly host which at this time encamped about him; so
he requests of God, that, for the removal of his fears,
and the confirmation of his faith, his servant might be
indulged the same privilege: Nor does it seem impro-
bable, that, from such historical facts as these, which
have descended by tradition, that notion among the
Greeks, of a certain mist which intercepts the sight of
their gods from the ken of human eyes, might at first
borrow its original. To this purpose we may observe,
that Honier makes Minerva bespeak Diomedes fight--
ing against the Trojans, who were assisted by some
other gods.

Ant. Chris.

A. M. 3001, horses and fiery chariots standing in array, and prepared to protect them; while (as his &c. or 1507. master continued his prayer) the men that beleagured the town were struck with blind1003, &c. ness; so that, by the prophet's persuading them that they were out of their way, and had mistaken the place they were bound to, they were led, in this bewildered condition, into the very midst of Samaria; where, at the prophet's request, God opened their eyes again to shew them the danger they were in.

or 904.

Jehoram, finding so great a number of the enemy lying at his mercy, would have gladly put them to the sword; but Elisha by all means dissuaded him from it, alleging, that as he would scarce be so cruel as to kill in cold blood, even prisoners that were taken in war, much less should he touch those who were brought into his hands by the Providence of God, and therefore he rather advised him to treat them with all manner of civility, and let them go; which accordingly the king did.

But, || how signal soever this piece of service and generosity to Benhadad was, it did not prevail with him to relinquish the old grudge and malice which he had conceived against Israel; for, not long after, he laid close siege to Samaria, and reduced the city to such distress, that an ass's head was sold *2 for fourscore pieces of silver, and three

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Iliad v. Which Virgil has imitated, in making Venus speak thus:

Aspice namque omnem, quæ nunc obducta tuenti Mortales hebetat visus tibi, et humida circum Caligat, nubem eripiam: &c. Le Clerc's Commentary.

Æneid 2.

*Though, according to the rigour of the laws of arms, a conqueror is at liberty to put, whatever enemies fall into his hands, if he pleases, to the sword; yet the laws of humanity and compassion, of honour and good nature, should always restrain us from treat ing, with the utmost severity, such as surrender them selves and implore our mercy; for, so says the tragedian," Quod non vetat lex, hoc vetat fieri pudor." Senec. Troad. So the philosopher, "Equi bonique natura parcere etiam captivis jubet." Senec. de Clement. lib. i. c. 18. and so the divine, "Hostem pugnantem necessitas perimat, non voluntas. Sicut bellanti et resistenti violentia redditur, ita victo et capto misericordia jam debetur." Aug. ad Bonifac. ep. i. But, besides the humanity and charity of the thing, there was this prudence and policy in the kind treatment of the Syrians, that, by this means, their hearts might be mollified towards the Israelites, that, upon their return, they might become, as it were, so many preachers of the power and greatness of the God of Israel, and not only be afraid themselves, but dissuade others likewise from opposing a people that had so invincible a protector. Calmet's Commentary, and Pool's Annotations.

Several heathens have observed, that "injuries are more gloriously overcome by benefits, than requited by pertinacious and mutual hatred ;" but the sense of benefits in bad natures does not last long: for no sooner do we read of the kind treatment which the Syrians received, 2 Kings vi. 23. but it immediately foliows, that the king of Syria "gathered all his host, and went up and besieged Samaria;" which does not

so well agree with what is said in the preceding verse, viz. that the bands of the Syrians came no more into the land of Israel." But now, as we can hardly think, that any author whatever would contradict himself in the same breath, so we may suppose, either that the Syrians quite retreated for this time, and laid aside all thoughts of war, though afterwards they altered their minds, and broke out again into hostilities; or (what seems more plain) that their bands made no more incursions and inroads, but that they were resolved to fall upon the Israelites at once, with a regular and formed army, and to besiege Samaria. For in this sense Josephus takes it, when he tells us, that, after this time, "Adad" (for so he calls Benhadad) "never entered into any underhand practice against the king of Israel, but resolved to make open war upon him, in confidence of his greater strength and numbers." Jewish Antiq. lib. ix. c. 2.

* If we reckon these pieces of silver, or shekels, at fifteen pence a-piece, they come to five pounds Sterling, a vast price for that which had on it so little meat, and that unclean according to the law, Lev. xi. 26. In times of famine, however, and extreme necessity, the Jews themselves were absolved from the observation of the law; nor do there want instances in history, where other people, upon the same occasion, have been reduced to the like distress, if what Plutarch (in the life of Artaxerxes) tells us be true, viz. that, in that prince's war with the Caducii, an ass's head could scarce have been purchased at the price of sixty drams, i. e. two pounds and five shillings of our money. Calmet's Commentary, and Prideaux's Connection, in the Preface.

What we in this place call pulse, our translation has rendered doves dung; but interpreters have been at a great loss to devise upon what account the inhabitants of Samaria should be obliged to buy so small a quantity of it (for a cab was the least measure the Jews had for dry things) at so dear a rate. For food, for salt, for firing, for dunging their lands within the walls, several interpreters have severally applied it: but, upon a small examination, it will appear, that

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