earlier commentators, especially to Origen, but are not willing by our own act and deed to tether ourselves to a stake by a rope which will let us advance to the limits of their traces and no further. But let us proceed to Dean Ellicott's application of his rule.

He says (p. 451):

"To conclude with an instance of its negative use, we may allude to an ingenious attempt to connect the circumstances mentioned by all the four evangelists in reference to our Lord and Barabbas with the sortition in reference to the two goats (Lev. xvi., 5, sqq.) on the day of Atonement. At first there seems a strange persuasiveness in the suggested relations of type to anti-type; nay, there might be thought to be some scriptural basis in the similar comparisons that are indicated or hinted at (comp. chap. xiii., 11, 12) in the Epistle to the Hebrews. The opinion of the early writers here interposes a salutary caution. We find that the ceremonies connected with the scape-goat, and the somewhat similar ceremonies in the cleansing of the leper (Lev. xiv., 2, et sqq.), were almost unanimously referred alone to Christ,-to Christ, as both dying for us, and by His resurrection living again for evermore. The circumstances of the case, it was justly argued, required a type which, to be complete, must necessarily be twofold, and which, to be fully significative, must present two aspects, as it were, of the same anti-typal mystery. If it be admitted that the scape-goat can, by inference, be deemed a scriptural type of Christ, it is probable that we shall reject the ingenious parallel, and accept the view taken by the earlier expositors."

Nothing can be fairer than the Dean's mode of stating the case; it is his rule itself to which we cannot give our assent. And we hope we shall always retain a grateful sense of his services to sacred literature, even while we are protesting against what we conceive to be his errors.

Let us first examine the theory of the fathers alluded to, and see whether it can stand a scrutiny. That the sacrificed goat represented our Lord in His death, everybody is agreed; but not so as regards the goat, which was let go into the wilderness "for Azazel," an expression which has not yet been satisfactorily explained, but is by some considered to be the name of an evil spirit, and is by the LXX. translated by т аπотоμπαίῳ, τοῦ ἀποπομπαίου εἰς ἄφεσιν, and εἰς τὴν ἀποπομπήν. The words of the LXX. may either be understood actively for the averter" or "for the [demon to be] averted;" or lastly, "for the [goat to be] dismissed," hirco emissario, as Schleusner has it.

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In page 429 of the Aids to Faith Dean Ellicott says, "The great exegetical difficulty in John xx., 17, appears modified, if not removed, by taking into consideration the tense of the verb äπтoν, not 'ǎчn."" The reader will find this worked out, we believe for the first time, in p. 433 of this Journal for July 1860. Dr. Donaldson, Gr. Gram., p. 414, notices the tense, but does not solve the exegetical difficulty of the yap.

And we suppose this latter sense is that which is indicated by the English translation "scapegoat," quasi "escape-goat." Such, however, is the difficulty of the words, that it is quite impossible to take them into account in our investigation, and we must, therefore, simply consider the facts.

But

Now, there is but one circumstance in our Lord's life, death and resurrection, that bears any resemblance to the scape-goat, and that is, the fact that he is spoken of in both the Old and New Testaments as "bearing" our sins and infirmities. this is either as removing them (Matt. viii., 17) or as bearing the pain and punishment of them, not as carrying them away to some other place. Surely He did not carry them to heaven, which is the idea involved in the theory of those who identify the scape-goat with our Lord in His resurrection. If any whither, He must have carried them to Hades, and left them there before rising and ascending to heaven. Again, the man who conducted the scapegoat into the wilderness, was rendered unclean by the contact; can it be supposed that our Lord was unclean in His resurrection? Not to mention that the act of release by the hands of a "fit man" is entirely lost from sight under this interpretation. Here, then, we have only one point of resemblance; and two points, which render that resemblance impossible to be more than accidental.

Another theory is, to regard the scape-goat as representing our Lord during His sojourn in the wilderness at His temptation; a view which simply divorces the two goats from each other entirely.

Archbishop Magee says that the ceremonies of the scapegoat are to be taken in connexion with the sacrificial system in general, and cannot have any particular explanation of their own, which sounds to us simply as an acknowledgment that he knows nothing about the matter, and cannot see his way through it.

But the fact is, that all these difficulties appear to us to arise from an entire misapprehension of the nature, purpose, and significance of types. That they had an immediate, local and moral, or spiritual significance, no one will deny; and this lies generally too near the surface to be mistaken. But as regards their future and eventual application we believe their import to be grossly mistaken. Their grand purpose was surely to furnish marks of identification of Jesus as the Messiah, whereas they are generally interpreted as having some mystical reference, which is only pwvâev ovveroîoi, vocal to the initiated. Take, for instance, that of the Paschal Lamb, which is far more generally used for the explanation of the real presence in the Eucharist, than as a means of identifying Jesus as the Messiah. Indeed, with the exception

of Hippolytus and the author of the Chronicon Paschale, commentators have generally been very busily occupied in doing what really amounts to endeavouring to prove Jesus not to have been the true Paschal Lamb; and were it not for the distinct statement of St. Paul that he was the Paschal Lamb, we should probably have had it stated in so many words, that the Passover had little more to do with His identification as the Messiah, than the ordinary morning and evening sacrifices. But we hope that the last two numbers of this Journal have begun to give a more rational and really more orthodox turn to this investigation.

But before we take up the consideration of the particular type for which we are contending, let us briefly pass in review the principal acknowledged types relating to our Lord, and carefully note the number and kind of points of resemblance which they severally afford.

I. According to the ordinary view the points of resemblance between our Lord and the Paschal Lamb are only three:

(1). Guiltlessness and nonresistance, which indicate analogy of nature between the type and antitype, but which are not peculiar to the Paschal lamb, and therefore are scarcely worthy of a place here, where we are considering rather the distinctive features of the Paschal sacrifice.

(2). No bones were broken in either case.

(3). Both victims were partaken of after death, the one really, the other mystically in the sacrament. To which (4) those who hold with us, that the last supper was not a passover, can add, that our Lord expired at the very moment of the commencement of the Paschal sacrifice. Hence, too, we can add (5) that our Lord was set apart on the tenth day of Nisan, and (6) that his resurrection corresponded to the offering of the sheaf of firstfruits. But all these three last points of resemblance are utterly lost by the ordinary view.d

II. Our Lord himself referred to the brazen serpent elevated by Moses in the wilderness, as a type of himself. The points of resemblance are two only.

(1). Elevation upon a wooden support, probably a cross in both cases.

(2). Cure in the one case of bodily, in the other of spiritual disease by the faithful contemplation of the object elevated for the purpose.

III. The sacrifice of Isaac-begging pardon of Dean Ellicott's first rule-is generally acknowledged to be a type of that of our Lord. The points of resemblance are four.

See the Editor's note in page 184 of the last number.

d Compare Mr. Parker's letter in pages 449-453 of our January number. NEW SERIES.-VOL. I., NO. II.

A A

(1). Miraculous though not identical conception in each But this is more like the conception of John the Baptist than that of our Lord, and will scarcely bear pressing.

case.

(2). The victim in each case given up to sacrifice by his father, is an only son. Or this may perhaps be considered as affording two separate points of resemblance.

(3). Isaac bore the wood on which he was to have been offered, our Lord bore his cross.

(4). There was a resurrection from the dead in each case; that of Isaac, who suffered a symbolical death in the substituted ram being figurative, ev πapaßoλy, (Heb. xi. 19), that of our Saviour real.

IV. The sign of Jonah is referred to by our Lord as the only one which would be given to the Jews of his day. The points of resemblance are three.

(1). Three days in a real or symbolical grave.

(2). Resurrection from that grave.

(3). Each was a voluntary sacrifice for the safety of others. V. The high priest is treated in the Epistle to the Hebrews as a type of Christ. The points of resemblance are three.

(1). Divine calling, as of Aaron through Moses, and of our Lord by a voice from heaven at his baptism.

(2). Mediatorship between God and Man.

(3). Entrance into the unseen with blood.

These are the principal and most striking scriptural types, and in none of them do we find, according to the ordinary explanations, more than four points of resemblance, one of which is generally faint or uncertain. We may now proceed to the consideration of the ceremonies of the great day of atonement, which present to our mind a type as close and striking as any. The points of resemblance are these.

(1). The two prisoners before Pilate correspond to the two goats in number.

(2). One of the goats and one of the prisoners were selected for death, the other for release.

(3). This death and release were actually carried into execution.

(4). As the two goats, so also were the two prisoners exact counterparts of each other. Jesus was the Messiah, Barabbas was the representative of the kind of Messiah, which the Jews expected and desired.

(5). Even if Origen's statement, that some MSS. of St. Matthew in his day read "Jesus Barabbas" as opposed to "Jesus called Christ," be not relied on, there yet remains a very singular coincidence of name betweenthe two. Barabbas,

son of the Father, stands in a remarkable antithesis to the Son of man, who claimed God as his Father.

(6). The next point is not altogether one of resemblance, but also in some degree of contrast, yet comes equally under the laws of association, and rather indicates an interruption and incompleteness of the ceremony as regards a great portion of the Jewish nation, although as regards Christians it is complete and the parallel holds in every respect. The Jewish nation did not confess its sins by the mouth of the priest over the head of the scape-goat, but, at the instigation of the priest, deliberately took its greatest sin upon itself. "His blood be upon us and upon our children!"

The Jewish nation thus divided itself into two great portions, those who died with Jesus, the sacrificed goat, confessing their sins, and those who lived with Barabbas, the polluted scape-goat, taking their sin on their own heads. And as identified with Barabbas, the scape-goat, the portion of the scape-goat they have had ever since. They are wanderers in the wilderness of the world, everywhere separated from the rest of mankind and nowhere identified with the people among whom they live, a kind of living scape-goat, representing the mystical body of the outlaw, whom they preferred, just as the Church of Christ represents the mystical body of him, in whom every member of it suffers a symbolical death and resurrection at his baptism.

Now here is an explanation of a most important ceremony in the Jewish economy, that could hardly have been left without some striking fulfilment, which makes it point to Jesus as the Messiah in a manner more close and more remarkable than any other according to the current explanations, seeing that the points of resemblance are actually six in number. Is it just, is it reasonable to reject it for no other reason than that it has only lately been thought of? Even the "fit man," by whom the scapegoat was conducted into the wilderness, finds his antitype either in Pilate himself, or in the person or persons sent by him to release Barabbas from prison, though we have thought this additional point of resemblance scarcely worthy of being classed as a seventh among the rest, lest we should lay ourselves open to a charge of over minute criticism.

But let us suppose for a moment, that this interpretation had been current from the first, and in vogue among the fathers? What use would Julian the apostate and the other early opponents of Christianity have made of it? They would have treated the history of Barabbas as simply inserted for the purpose of proving Jesus to be Messiah, and have declared that such coincidences did but prove Christianity to be a "cunningly devised