LITMIR.BIZ

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them that fear Him. " I am Jehovah," He says, " I change not ; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed."

      And this infinite grace and " love of Jehovah " toward the children of Israel find their parallel also in the experience of the Church.

      Why did God call us from among Jew and Gentile during this present dispensation to be "a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation"? Was it because we were better or wiser than the rest of the world ? Oh, no, " for ye see your calling, brethren," says the Apostle, echoing the warnings which were given to Israel of old, "how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called, but God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty, and base things of the world, and things which are despised hath God chosen, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence." Was it for our goodness or righteous- ness ? Oh, no ; " but God commendeth (or displays) His own lovt toward us " (Rom. v. 8) a love inconceivable by man " in that while we were yet sinners," utterly lost and utterly wretched, " Christ died for us."

      Israel's history and God's dealings with them is no encouragement to the Christian to think lightly of sin and of backsliding from God, for we see that God is a jealous God, visiting the sins of His people even more than on the sins of the world; but it also displays the marvellous faithfulness of Jehovah and His love towards His redeemed, which all the many waters of their sins and backslidings cannot quench.

      THE INTERREGNUM AND "AFTERWARD" 7

      In the second verse we get a glimpse of the innate worthlessness of Israel and all such as are typified by poor Gomer. Sin, in her case, as it always does, im- plied a certain kind of bondage, so that she had to be bought back from the sharer of her guilt. But what is the price she is valued at ? Just half the price of a dead slave (Exod. xxi. 32), 1 with an homer and a half of barley thrown into the bargain. The redemption price which the great God actually pays for those as worth- less as this poor woman is more than tongue can tell. It cannot be estimated by all the precious but corrup- tible things known to man. It cannot be valued with the gold of Ophir, with the precious onyx or the sapphire ; the gold and the crystal cannot equal it, and "the exchange of it shall not be for vessels of fine gold." It is nothing less than the precious blood of Christ, " as a lamb without blemish and with- out spot."

      We must touch on one more significant item in the symbolism before we proceed with the verbal prophecy.

      Having bought Gomer back, the prophet gives her a charge. " And I said unto her, Thou shalt abide (or remain) for me many days … so will I also be towards thee." There was to be a neutral period. She was no more to follow sin, but she was not yet to enter into her conjugal rights. Meanwhile her husband would be her guardian, and ultimately there would be a full restora- tion of the fellowship implied in the marriage relation- ship. The symbolical significance of this is, I believe, as follows. A remnant of the nation was brought back

      1 Keil, in /oc., thinks, however, that the "homer" and "lethech," which together made fifteen baths or ephas of barley, might also be valued at fifteen shekels, so that the silver and barley together may perhaps have been equal to the full price, or rather the full amount of compensation for a slave if gored to death.

      8 THE INTERREGNUM AND "AFTERWARD"

      from Babylon after the seventy years' bondage, and then commenced the neutral period during which Israel is neither guilty of their old besetting sin of idolatry which, as already explained, is regarded as spiritual adultery nor are they living in fellowship with Jehovah ; for, although there has been an outward return, there has never yet taken place that national change of heart for which God is waiting before He can return unto them in mercies. Indeed, soon after the commencement of this period Israel, though no longer guilty of idolatry, showed how their heart was still alienated from God by disowning Him who is " the brightness of His glory and an exact representation of His very Being." But there is hope in their end. Israel, though sitting desolate and, to human view, forsaken, abides through these " many days "for God, who will yet fully restore the blessings of the relationship into which He once entered with them, even as He announces through this same prophet : " I will betroth thee unto Me for ever ; yea, I will betroth thee unto Me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in lovingkindness, and in mercies. I will even betroth thee unto Me in faithfulness : and thou shalt know Jehovah " (Hosea ii. 19, 20).

      We now come to the verbal message which explains the symbolism of the first part of this chapter. The connection will be seen at a glance if we compare the words addressed to Gomer in verse 3, " Many days shalt thou abide for me," with the first words of verse 4, " For many days shall the children of Israel abide." Israel, then, stands in relation to this woman as anti- type to type, and the many days of the neutral condition of Gomer was but a foreshadowing of the "many days" of the neutral condition of Israel in relation to Jehovah and to idolatry. The fourth verse is, I might say, the great prophecy in the Old Testa-

      THE INTERREGNUM AND "AFTERWARD" 9

      ment with regard to the Interregnum, a period covered by the image of Daniel ii. and the New Testament expression, "the times of the Gentiles" the time during which the sceptre is departed from Judah, and representative governmental power is entrusted to the Gentile nations until those times are fulfilled, and Zion becomes the centre of government for the earth, and the place whence God's law will go forth, as never before, to all nations.

      It is of interest to observe that the most authoritative Jewish commentators have themselves admitted that the fourth verse of our chapter gives a graphic description of the present condition of the Jewish people. I translate the following passage from one of the greatest of Rabbinic writers. 1 Speaking on the expression " many days," he says : " These are the days of this present captivity, in which we are in the power of the Gentiles, and in the power of their kings and princes, and we are ' without a sacrifice and without an image,' i.e., without a sacrifice to God, and without an image to false gods ; and ' without an ephod, and without teraphim,' t.e., without an ephod to God, by means of which we could foretell the future, as with the Urim and Thummim ; and without teraphim to false gods. And this is the present condition of all the children of Israel in this present captivity."

      To this interpretation every critical Bible student, whether Jew or Christian, must subscribe. We shall see presently what this admission on the part of a great non-Christian Jew implies.

      1 Kimchi, commonly called by the Jews " Redak," from the initial letters of " Rabbi David Kimchi," was born in Narbonne in 1160, and died about 1235. So great was his fame that the Jews applied to him, by a play of words, a Talmudic saying (Aboth. iii. 17), adapted to mean, " No Kimchi, no understanding of the Scriptures."

      io THE INTERREGNUM AND "AFTERWARD"

      The order of the words in the fourth verse is some- what different in the original from what it is in the A.V. It begins with the expression, " many days :> " Many days shall the children of Israel abide" and then it goes on to describe the special conditions under which they will abide. The words " Yamim rabbim " ("many days") are a Hebrew idiom denoting a long, indefinite period, embracing days, years, centuries, or even millenniums, and the first item in this remarkable prophecy really is, that for a long, unmeasured period the children of Israel would " abide," that is, remain or continue to exist. I have elsewhere dealt fully with the marvel of the continued existence of the Jewish nation, 1 but I would here in passing simply remind my readers that if the Jewish people, in spite of all the forces which have for many centuries been brought to bear against them with terrible severity, still lives, it is to testify to the truth of this and other statements of the Word of God. God has said, " Many days shall the children of Israel abide," and therefore no force in the universe is able to move them. God has called them

      1 See my book, "The Jewish Problem." "The world has by this time discovered," said Lord Beaconsfield, " that it is impos- sible to destroy the Jews. The attempt to extirpate them has been made under the most favourable auspices and on the largest scale ; the most considerable means that man could command have been pertinaciously applied to this object for the longest period of recorded time. Egyptian Pharaohs, Assyrian kings, Roman emperors, Scandinavian crusaders, Gothic princes, and holy inquisitors have alike devoted their energies to the fulfilment

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