The application of the prophecy to the evangelic history is plain and appropriate. Here is no double sense: no figurative language, but what is sufficiently intelligible to every reader of every country. The obscurities, by which I mean the expreffions that require a knowledge of local diction, and of local allufion, are few, and not of great importance. Nor have I found that varieties of reading, or a different construing of the original, produce any material alteration in the sense of the prophecy. Compare the common tranflation with that of Bishop Lowth, and the difference is not confiderable. So far as they do differ, Bishop Lowth's corrections, which are the faithful refult of an accurate examination, bring the description nearer to the New Testament history than it was before. In the fourth verse of the fifty-third chapter, what our Bible renders "stricken," he tranflates " judicially stricken:" and in the eighth verse, the clause " he was taken from prison and from judgement," the Bishop gives " by an oppreffive judgement he was taken off."

The

The next words to thefe, "who shall declare his generation?" are much cleared up in their meaning by the Bishop's version, "his manner of life who would declare," i. e. who would ftand forth in his defence? The former part of the ninth verse, " and he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death," which inverts the circumstances of Chrift's paffion, the Bishop brings out in an order perfectly agreeable to the event; " and his grave was appointed with the wicked, but with the rich man was his tomb." The words in the eleventh verse, " by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many," are in the Bishop's version "by the knowledge of him shall my righteous servant justify many."

It is natural to enquire what turn the Jews themselves give to this prophecy*. There is

* " Vaticinium hoc Esaie est carnificina Rabbinorum, de quo aliqui Judæi mihi confeffi funt, Rabbinos suos ex propheticis scripturis facile se extricare potuiffe, modo Efaias tacuiffet." Hulse Theol. Jud. p. 318, quoted

by Poole in loc.

B4

good

good proof that the ancient Rabbins explained it of their expected Meffiah*; but their modern expofitors concur, I think, in representing it as a description of the calamitous state and intended restoration of the Jewish people, who are here, as they say, exhibited under the character of a single person, I have not discovered that their exposition rests upon any critical arguments, or upon these in any other than a very minute degree. The clause in the ninth verse, which we render " for the tranfgreffion of my people was he stricken," and in the margin "was the stroke upon him," the Jews read, "for the tranfgreffion of my people was the stroke upon them." And what they alledge in support of the alteration amounts only to this, that the Hebrew pronoun is capable of a plural, as well as of a singular fignification; that is to say, is capable of their construction as well as ours †. And And this is all the variation contended for: the rest of the prophecy they read as we do.

The

tranfgreffion of my people was he fmitten to death." The addition of the words " to death," makes an end of the Jewish interpretation of the claufe. And the authority, upon which this reading (though not given by the prefent Hebrew text) is adopted, Dr. Kennicot has fet forth by an argument, not only so cogent, but so clear and popular, that I beg leave to tranfcribe the substance of it into this note. "Origen, after having quoted at large this prophecy concerning the Meffiah, tells us, that having once made use of this paffage, in a dispute against some that were accounted wife among the Jews, one of them replied, that the words did not mean one man, but one people, the Jews, who were fmitten of God, and dispersed among the Gentiles for their converfion; that he then urged many parts of this prophecy, to shew the abfurdity of this interpretation, and that he seemed to press them the hardest by this sentence-"for the tranfgreffion of my people was he smitten to death." Now, as Origen, the author of the Hexapla, must have understood Hebrew, we cannot suppose that he would have urged this last text as fo decisive, if the Greek version had not agreed here with the Hebrew text; nor that these wife Jews would have been at all distressed by this quotation, unless the Hebrew text had read agreeably to the words " to death," on which the argument principally depended; for by quoting it immediately, they would have triumphed

:

The probability, therefore, of their expofition is a fubject of which we are as capable of judging as themselves. This judgement is open indeed to the good sense of every attentive reader. The application which the Jews contend for, appears to me to labour under infuperable difficulties; in particular, it may be demanded of them to explain, in whose name or perfon, if the Jewish people be the fufferer, does the prophet speak, when he says, " he hath borne our griefs, and carried our forrows, yet we