surely in the forty days after he had seen the King, a new 'morning' must have risen upon them, [b Is. viii. 20.] and the halo of His glory shone around the well-remembered prophecy. It must always have been Messianically understood; [c Is. lii. 13 liii.] it formed the groundwork of Messianic thought to the New Testament writers [d Comp. St. Matt. viii. 17; St. Luke xxii. 37; Acts viii. 32; 1 Pet. ii. 22.] nor did the Synagogue read it otherwise, till the necessities of controversy diverted its application, not indeed from the times, but from the Person of the Messiah. [2 Manifestly, whatever interpretation is made of Is. iii. 13-liii., it applies to Messianic times, even if the sufferer were, as the Synagogue now contends, Israel. On the whole subject comp. the most learned and exhaustive discussions by Dr. Pusey in his introduction to the catena of Jewish Interpretations of Is. liii.] But we can understand how, during those forty days, this greatest height of Isaiah's conception of the Messiah was the one outstanding fact before his view. And what he believed, that he spake, when again, and unexpectedly, he saw Jesus.
Yet, while regarding his words as an appeal to the prophecy of Isaiah, two other references must not be excluded from them: those to the Paschal Lamb, and to the Daily Sacrifice. These are, if not directly pointed to, yet implied. For the Paschal Lamb was, in a sense, the basis of all the sacrifices of the Old Testament, not only from its saving import to Israel, but as that which really made them 'the Church,' [3 To those persons who deny to the people of God under the Old Testament the designation Church, we commend the use of that term by St. Stephen in Acts vii. 38.] and people of God. Hence the institution of the Paschal Lamb was, so to speak, only enlarged and applied in the daily sacrifice of a Lamb, in which this twofold idea of redemption and fellowship was exhibited. Lastly, the prophecy of Isaiah liii. was but the complete realisation of these two ideas in the Messiah. Neither could the Paschal Lamb, with its completion in the Daily Sacrifice, be properly viewed without this prophecy of Isaiah, nor yet that prophecy properly understood without its reference to its two great types. And here one Jewish comment in regard to the Daily Sacrifice (not previously pointed out) is the more significant, that it dates from the very time of Jesus. The passage reads almost like a Christian interpretation of sacrifice. It explains how the morning and evening sacrifices were intended to atone, the one for the sins of the night, the other for those of the day, so as ever to leave Israel guiltless before God; and it expressly ascribes to them the efficacy of a Paraclete, that being the word used, [a Pesiqta, ed. Buber, p. 61 b; comp. more fully in Yalkut p. 248 d.] Without further following this remarkable Rabbinic commentation, [b In i. p. 249 a.] which stretches back its view of sacrifices to the Paschal Lamb, and, beyond it, to that offering of Isaac by Abraham which, in the Rabbinic view, was the substratum of all sacrifices, we turn again to its teaching about the Lamb of the Daily Sacrifice. Here we have the express statement, that both the school of Shammai and that of Hillel, the latter more fully, insisted on the symbolic import of this sacrifice in regard to the forgiveness of sin. 'Kebhasim' (the Hebrew word for 'lambs'), explained the school of Shammai, 'because, according to Micah vii. 19, they suppress [in the A.V. 'subdue'] our iniquities (the Hebrew word Kabhash meaning he who
suppresseth).' [1 This appears more clearly in the Hebrew, where both words ('lambs' and 'suppressors') are written exactly the same, . In Hillel's derivation it is identified with the root = .] Still more strong is the statement of the school of Hillel, to the effect that the sacrifical lambs were termed Kebhasim (from kabhas, 'to wash'), 'because they wash away the sins of Israel.' [c And this with special reference to Is. i. 18.] The quotationjust made gains additional interest from the circumstance, that it occurs in a 'meditation' (if such it may be called) for the new moon of the Passover-month (Nisan). In view of such clear testimony from the time of Christ, less positiveness of assertion might, not unreasonably, be expected from those who declare that the sacrifices bore no reference to the forgiveness of sins, just as, in the face of the application made by the Baptist and other New Testament writers, more exegetical modesty seems called for on the part of those who deny the Messianic references in Isaiah.
If further proof were required that, when John pointed the bystanders to the Figure of Jesus walking towards them, with these words: 'Behold, the Lamb of God,' he meant more than His gentleness, meekness, and humility, it would be supplied by the qualifying explanation, 'Which taketh away the sin of the world.' We prefer rendering the expression 'taketh away' instead of 'beareth,' because it is in that sense that the LXX. uniformly use the Greek term. Of course, as we view it, the taking away presupposes the taking upon Himself of the sin of the world. But it is not necessary to suppose that the Baptist clearly understood that manner of His Saviourship, which only long afterwards, and reluctantly, came to the followers of the Lamb. [1 This meets the objection of Keim (i. 2, p.552), which proceeds on the assumption that the words of the Baptist imply that he knew not merely that, but how, Jesus would take away the sin of the world. But his words certainly do not oblige us to think, that he had the Cross in view. But, surely, it is a most strange idea of Godet, that at His Baptism Jesus, like all others, made confession of sins; that, as He had none of His own, He set before the Baptist the picture of the sin of Israel and of the world; and that this had led to the designation: 'The Lamb of God. Which taketh away the sin of the world.'] That he understood the application of His ministry to the whole world, is only what might have been expected of one taught by Isaiah; and what, indeed, in one or another form, the Synagogue has always believed of the Messiah. What was distinctive in the words of the Baptist, seems his view of sin as a totality, rather than sins: implying the removal of that great barrier between God and man, and the triump in that great contest indicated in Gen. iii. 15, which Israel after the flesh failed to perceive. Nor should we omit here to notice an undesigned evidence of the Hebraic origin of the fourth Gospel; for an Ephesian Gospel, dating from the close of the second century, would not have placed in its forefront, as the first public testimony of the Baptist (if, indeed, it would have introduced him at all), a quotation from Isaiah, still less a sacrificial reference.
The motives which brought Jesus back to Bethabara must remain in the indefiniteness in which Scripture has left them. So far as we know, there was no personal interview between Jesus and the Baptist. Jesus had then and there nothing further to say to the Baptist; and yet on the day following that on which John had, in such manner, pointed Him out to the bystanders, He was still there, only returning to Galilee the next day. Here, at least, a definite object becomes apparent. This was not merely the calling of His first disciples, but the necessary Sabbath rest; for, in this instance, the narrative supplies the means of ascertaining the days of the week on which each event took place. We have only to assume, that the marriage in Cana of Galilee was that of a maiden, not a widow. The great festivities which accompanied it were unlikely, according to Jewish ideas, in
the case of a widow; in fact, the whole mise en scene of the marriage renders this most improbable. Besides, if it had been the marriage of a widow, this (as will immediately appear) would imply that Jesus had returned from the wilderness on a Saturday, which, as being the Jewish Sabbath, could not have been the case. For uniform custom fixed the marriage of a maiden on Wednesdays, that of a widow on Thursday. [1 For the reasons of this, comp. 'Sketches of Jewish Social Life,' p. 151.] Counting backwards from the day of the marriage in Cana, we arrive at the following results. The interview between John and the Sanhedrin-deputation took place on a Thursday. 'The next day,' Friday, Jesus returned from the wilderness of the Temptation, and John bore his first testimony to 'the Lamb of God.' The following day, when Jesus appeared a second time in view, and when the first two disciples joined Him, was the Saturday, or Jewish Sabbath. It was, therefore, only the following day, or Sunday, [a St. John 1. 43.] that Jesus returned to Galilee, [2 This may be regarded as another of the undesigned evidences of the Hebraic origin of the fourth Gospel. Indeed, it might also be almost called an evidence of the truth of the whole narrative.] calling others by the way. 'And the third day' after it [b St. John ii. 1.] that is, on the Wednesday, was the marriage in Cana. [3 Yet Renan speaks of the first chapters of St. John's Gospel as scattered notices, without chronological order!]
If we group around these days the recorded events of each, they almost seem to intensify in significance. The Friday of John's first pointing to Jesus as the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world, recalls that other Friday, when the full import of that testimony appeared. The Sabbath of John's last personal view and testimony to Christ is symbolic in its retrospect upon the old economy. It seems to close the ministry of John, and to open that of Jesus; it is the leave-taking of the nearest disciples of John from the old, their search after the new. And then on the first Sunday, the beginning of Christ's active ministry, the call of the first disciples, the first preaching of Jesus.
As we picture it to ourselves: in the early morning of that Sabbath John stood, with the two of his disciples who most shared his thoughts and feelings. One of them we know to have been Andrew (v. 40); the other, unnamed one, could have been no other than John himself, the beloved disciple. [4 This reticence seems another undesigned evidence of Johannine authorship.] They had heard what their teacher had, on theprevious day, said of Jesus. But then He seemed to them but as a passing Figure. To hear more of Him, as well as in deepest sympathy, these two had gathered to their Teacher on that Sabbath morning, while the other disciples of John were probably engaged with that, and with those, which formed the surroundings of an ordinary Jewish Sabbath. [5 The Greek has it: 'John was standing, and from among his disciples two.'] And now that Figure once more appeared in view. None
