CHAPTER XXVII.
THE JUDGMENT OF THE SERPENT—ISRAEL BLOSSOMS AND BUDS.
THE prophet goes on to speak of the judgment storm on the nations, and of the consequent deliverance and re-gathering of the children of Israel. " In that day the Lord, with his sword—a great and strong sword—shall punish leviathan, the piercing serpent—even leviathan, that crooked serpent—and shall slay the dragon that is in the sea." Leviathan, serpent, and dragon are figurative terms representative of the sin-power of the world in its latter-day manifestation in opposition to Christ. Leviathan is derived from the verb lavah (to join), and is of the same origin as Levi, the name of Leah's third son. " She conceived again and bare a son, and said, Now this time will my husband be joined unto me, because I have borne him three sons: therefore was his name called Levi"—that is, Joined (Gen. xxix. 34). From Psa. all the body, by joints and bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God" (Col. ii. 19). The body of the dragon or leviathan is nourished by its own "joints and bands," and is subject, not to Christ, but to its own head or heads—the Popes and Emperors who lord it over the world. It is in harmony with the derivation and doctrine pertaining to leviathan that the ecclesiastical hierarchies of Christendom should arrogate to themselves the position and privileges of Levi in Israel of old. It is this that has largely contributed to the strength of "his body" (Dan. vii. 11), which is to be " destroyed and given to the burning flame" in the judgment committed to the saints. The serpent has been the symbol of the sin-power of the world from the beginning because sin originated with the lie of the serpent in Eden. The seed of the serpent are always in conflict with the seed of the woman until the victory of the latter results in the entire abolition of sin from the earth. In Jesus' days he contended, as the personal Seed of the woman, with the " serpents and generation of vipers" who withstood him and finally compassed his death. Since then the " body of Christ" has continued the struggle, filling up the measure of his sufferings; and the last revelation of heaven exhibits the binding of " the dragon, that old serpent, which is the devil, and Satan " as a work associated with the conquest of Christ and his millennial reign on earth (Rev. xx. 2). We may take this apocalyptic unfolding as supplemental of Isaiah's prophecy under consideration. The dragon in the Old Testament scriptures is the symbol for the Egyptian, Babylonian, and other oppressors of Israel that were concurrent with the times in which the prophets wrote. Hence it is said, Ps. xliv. 19: " Thou hast sore broken us in the place of dragons." And again, Ezek. xxix. 3 : " I am against thee Pharaoh King of Egypt, the great dragon that lieth in the midst of his rivers." Here the Nile crocodile is the literal element in the case, emblematic of the Egyptian royalty in flesh-devouring manifestation against Israel. So likewise with the oppressor on the northern side of Israel: " Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon hath devoured me, he hath crushed me, he hath made me an empty vessel, he hath swallowed me up like a dragon, he hath filled his belly with my delicates, he hath cast me out. The violence done to me and to my flesh be upon Babylon, shall the inhabitants of Zion say, and my blood upon the inhabitants of Chaldea, shall Jerusalem say" (Jer. li. 34-5). In after years ROME became the dragon that devoured, crushed, emptied, swallowed up and cast out Israel. To Rome, through Pergamos migrated the old Babylonian idolatry, and, becoming there enthroned under lying labels and Christian phrases, persecuted the saints and the Jews after the manner of Egypt and Babylon of old. Hence it is symbolically exhibited by the spirit of God as " Sodom and Egypt" (Rev. xi. 8) and " Babylon the Great" (Rev. xvii. 5). And particularly is this symbol of a dragon applied to Rome, which actually used it on her military standards. In Rev. xii. xiii. much is revealed concerning the origin and uprise of the dragon in its pagan and anti-christian forms, and its relation to the saints, who are represented under the strikingly appropriate figure of a fugitive woman fleeing into the wilderness "from the face of the serpent" (Rev. xii. 14, 17). Taking our stand, then, with the prophet 700 years before Christ, we look down the ages, and we see the sword of the Lord destined to come upon the Egyptian, Babylonian and Roman oppressors of the saints and the Jews, until, at the climax in the time of the dead, he " shall slay the dragon that is in the midst of the sea." What this involves concerning the gathering of the modern nations against the mountains of Israel we have already frequently seen and need not now rehearse. But the context invites us to dwell on the great change that comes at that time over the fortunes of the saints and of Israel. "In that day sing ye unto her, A vineyard of red wine. I the Lord do keep it; I will water it every moment: lest any hurt it I will keep it night and day." The " true vine" is Christ; his accepted are the fruitful branches purged of the Father; the rejected are the outcast and withered fruitless branches to be gathered and burned in the fire (John xv.). This is the highest aspect of the vineyard of the Lord, introducing the members of Christ, and immortal Israelitish royalty and priesthood. But there is a national aspect likewise: " The vineyard of the Lord of Hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant; and he looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry" (Isa. v. 7). Because of this, God laid waste the vineyard, and gave it over to " briers and thorns.'' " I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it " (v. 6). Between this and " watering it every moment" there is a great contrast. Literal rain was withheld from the land, as in the days of Elijah; but even more dreadful was the taking away of the fructifying Word of God—*' doctrine that drops as the rain, and (inspired) speech that distils as dew, as small rain upon the tender herb and showers that water the grass" (Deut. xxxii. 2). Because of the iniquity of Israel, the spirit of God in the prophets was taken away, and there set in, a famine of hearing the word of the Lord. And at last, because of continued apostacy, the vineyard was given over to desolation. And now burnt up it is with fire ; It also is cut down ; And from the land hath perished, Because Thy face did frown. But all this is to be changed " in that day." " He shall cause them that come of Jacob to take root : Israel shall blossom and bud and fill the face of the world with fruit" (v. 6). With the return of Christ, " the true vine," and the " fruit of the earth" that belongs to him—the " children of the resurrection," the great change is fully inaugurated. Already there are the signs abroad that it is coming. A Jewish newspaper has borrowed the words of the last quotation as a motto for its title-page, and it preaches ZIONISM with fervour, though, of course, at the same time, it is adverse to the proposition that Jesus of Nazareth is the Messiah. The Jews know that a crisis has come in their history, in which the issue is between a resurrected Jewish State, and assimilation with the Gentiles as " gentlemen of the Jewish persuasion," as it is absurdly enough put ; but they know absolutely nothing of the true nature of the crisis; neither does Gentile Christendom. The Jew would have a Jewish State under the shadow of the Gentile dominions still in possession of the Holy places. And he knows nothing of an Israelitish kingdom which, in the immortal hands of Messiah and his subordinate princes, "shall not be left to other people." "Shall we end by having a theocracy ? " asked Dr. Herzl. " No, indeed," he answered. " Yea, verily," saith the Scripture. Christendom, likewise, has relegated the Kingdom of God to the skies, or " beyond the realms of time and space," or some equally imaginary region. Therefore neither Jew nor Christian perceive that the Zionist movement is but the prelude to the establishment of the coming Kingdom of God, that His will may be done on earth as it is in heaven. Isaiah, in another place, speaks pointedly of this universal lack of perception of the true nature of these times, and of the utter consternation of the kingdoms of the world when the matter becomes plain to them by the judgments of the Lord. Then their " thorns and briers" will be burned together ; for it is a divine maxim that the nations shall not be unpunished any more than Israel. The holy oracles have come to them, and are multiplied in millions of copies, and as industriously made void by the preachers, who only minister to the people what u they delight to have." So that it is right and just that all such should be deceived, and punished, after due warning, in the day of judgment to come. It is a very pertinent enquiry that is put forth by the prophet in verse 7 : " Hath he smitten him as he smote those that smote him ? or is he slain according to the slaughter of them that are slain by him? " To appreciate the full weight of the implied negative answer, we must know and meditate upon Israel's divine history, and compare the fate of rival powers with that of Israel. Where is Egypt ? Where is Assyria ? Where is great Babylon ? Where are Persia, Greece, and Rome—the world-empires of the past ? Gone, so that they are merely a memory. But where is Israel? Preserved though punished, and waxing mighty again to the consternation of " the Modern Pharaoh " and his Kingdom.
God has " debated with" Israel for his sins in the past, and there is still a time of trouble for Jacob ; but the purging of his iniquity is coming, when, recognising Jesus as his deliverer, he shall mourn and repent, as Joseph's brethren did of old in Egypt. But, before this, Isaiah saw a long period of desolation, and that the boughs of the vine of Israel should be broken off. " When the boughs thereof are withered, they shall be broken off, the women come and set them on fire; for it is a people of no understanding; therefore, he that made them will not have mercy on them, and he that formed them will show them no favour.'' Jesus, before he suffered, referred to this withering and breaking off. As they led him away to be crucified, and the women were weeping over him, he said : " Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children . . . for if they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry ?" (Luke xxiii. 31). Forty years afterwards came the breaking off. The women came and set them on fire. To paraphrase the language of the High Priest: " The Romans came and took away their place and nation; " and they burnt the city and the temple. What a grievous thing it is to lack understanding of God. Paul makes the matter the subject of exhortation to Gentile believers : " Thou wilt say, The branches were broken off, that I might be grafted in. Well, because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith. Be not high-minded, but fear. For if God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee" (Rom. xi.). And Paul goes on to speak of the promised restoration, of which Isaiah had spoken, by the same Spirit, eight hundred years before. But at last, said Isaiah, "the Lord shall beat off (the invader) from the river (Euphrates) unto the river (or brook) of Egypt, and ye shall be gathered one by one, Îź ye children of Israel. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the great trumpet shall be blown, and they shall come which were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and the outcasts in the land of Egypt; and shall worship the Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem.''
This is the solution of the Jewish Question and of the Eastern Question, both of which are so exercising the most thoughtful of men. Of proximate solutions depending upon the caprice of the flesh, whether Russian, French, German, or British, yea, and Jewish, there may be enough and to spare, but the condemnation of all these lies in the fact that they leave God out of account, and seek to seize on the inheritance of " the Heir" He has appointed. They are all foredoomed to failure and destruction in the tempest of his wrath; while, on the other hand, the gospel of the kingdom, wherever its still small voice can penetrate, actually invites men to " come out" from the camp of the adversary, and inherit for ever a place under Zion's King. Let those who are on His side sound out the truth as the Thessalonians did (1 Thess. i. 8), that they may find place with the apostles and prophets in the day of exaltation that is coming.
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