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Jerusalem; and may well therefore be called the north parts. And thou shalt come up against my people Israel as a cloud to cover the land; it shall be in the latter

Zech. ix, 11-14. "As for thee also, by the blood of thy "covenant, I have sent forth thy prisoners out of the pit, where"in is no water. Turn you to the strong hold ye prisoners of "hope; even to-day do I declare that I will render double unto thee: When I have bent Judah for me, filled my bow with "Ephraim, and raised up thy sons, O Zion, against thy sons, O "Greece, and made thee as the sword of a mighty man. And "the Lord shall be seen over them, and his arrows shall go forth "as the lightning; and the Lord God shall blow the trumpet, "and shall go with whirlwinds of the south."

Here is the return of Judah and Ephraim (the Jews and the ten tribes) at the latter day. The passage received but a very partial, if any degree of accomplishment, in the return of the Jews from Babylon. For but a few, if any of Ephraim then returned. God did not then fill his bow with Ephraim. The event must be still future: And by the blood of the covenant, (the entail of the covenant with Abraham,) it will ere long be fulfilled. The Jews and Israel are indeed like prisoners in a dry pit. But they are prisoners of hope. God has promised to recover them. And he will fulfill his promise. And at that period God will find occasion to raise up the sons of Zion against the sons of Greece; and he will make the former like the sword of a mighty man. Grotius gives this paraphrase to this part of the passage, "I will animate the Jews against the troops of Antio chus." But those scenes of warfare, were but a type of the scene still future between Antichrist and the Jews, as has been noted. Accordingly Bishop Newcome, upon the above passage of Grotius, observes, "It is true, that Judas Maccabæus gained some advantages over the Syrians. But the language of this prophecy seems too strong for these events; and may remain to be fulfilled against the present possessors of the countries called Javan, or Greece." When we consider that Antiochus, in his wars against the Jews after their restoration from Babylon, was a lively type of Antichrist, in his attack upon the Jews to take place after their final restoration; and when we consider that the armies of Antiochus were considerably composed of Grecians, and that the nations of Greece, or of Asia Minor, are to be in the final coalition of Antichrist against the Jews and Israel, we shall discover that the prophecy quoted had a primary and typical fulfilment in the success of the Maccabees against Antiochus; but it is to receive its great fulfilment in some power to be raised up against Antichrist in his final expedition against the Jews in Palestine. And this probably will prove to be the coalition indicated in Ezek. xxxviii, 13, by Sheba, Dedan, and the mer• chants of Tarshish, with all the young lions thereof.

days; and I will bring thee against my land, that the heathen may know me, when I shall be sanctified in thee, O Gog, before their eyes. Thus saith the Lord God, Art thou he, of whom I have spoken of old times by my servants the prophets of Israel, who prophesied in those days, many years, that I would bring thee against them? As though the Most High comes out to view the combined armies, and addresses their chief; Art thou that mighty being, so long foretold by the various prophets in Israel, to do such wonderful things in the last days? Most portentous address!

"And it shall come to pass at the same time, when "Gog shall come against the land of Israel, saith the "Lord God, that my fury shall come up into my face. "For in my jealousy, and in the fire of my wrath, "have I spoken. Surely in that day there shall be a "great shaking in the land of Israel; so that the fishes "of the sea, and the fowls of heaven, and the beasts of "the field, and all the creeping things, that creep upon "the earth, shall shake at my presence; and the moun"tains shall be thrown down, and the steep places shall "fall, and every wall shall fall to the ground. And I "will call for a sword upon him throughout all my "mountains, saith the Lord God; every man's sword "shall be against his brother. And I will plead "against him with pestilence, and with blood; and I "will reign upon him and upon his bands, and upon the "many people, that are with him, an overflowing rain, "and great hail-stones, fire and brimstone. Thus will "I magnify myself, and sanctify myself; and I will be "known in the eyes of many nations; and they shall "know that I am the Lord."

Here we have the tremendous scene of the vintage* on Gog, and his vast armies. The judgments, at the same time, will be executed on the cities of the nations, and on all the enemies of the cause of Christ through the Christian world. Here is the battle of that great day of God Almighty, the seventh vial.t

Isai. lxiii, 1,- Rev. xiv, last part.

+ Rev. xvi, 17, to the end,

The next chapter, Ezek. xxxix, is taken up in repeating and enlarging on the predictions of this destruction of Gog and his bands. In verse 6, the judgment is extended. And I will send a fire on Magog, and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles. The empire of Gog, the nations of his government, will be burnt in the same fire. And the wicked and carelesspeople of distant lands will perish. As in other prophecies; The cities of the nations fell. To the isles he will repay recompense. The beasts and fowls are in this chapter invited to come and partake of the supper of the great God, the sacrifice, about to be made for them; as in Rev. xix, 17, where the same figure is used upon the same occasion, being borrowed from this passage. The stench of the unburied carcasses of the bands of Gog fills various parts of the land. Seven months are occupied in burying their carcasses, and cleansing the country.

The military apparatus of these slaughtered hosts furnishes the nation of Israel with a sufficiency of fuel for seven years. And the account closes thus; Then shall they (the church of Israel) know that I am the Lord their God, who caused them to go into captivity among the heathen: But I have gathered them into their own land, and have left none of them any more there; (in heathen lands;) neither will I hide my face any more from them; for I have poured out my Spirit upon the house of Israel, saith the Lord God.

Thus ends the infidel Power of the last days. After he shall have filled a considerable part of the world, for many years, with carnage and terror, he shall come to his end, and none shall help him.* He is thus slain, and his body destroyed, and given to the burning flame.† The beast, that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit, thus goeth into perdition. And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet, that wrought miracles before him, these both were cast alive into the lake of fire, burning with brimstone.§

* Dan. xi, last part.
Rev. xvii, 8, 11.

+ Dan. vii, 11.
§ Rev. xix, 20, 21.

The nine succeeding chapters of this prophet, which close the book of Ezekiel, present a description of the Church of God in the Millennium, under the similitude of a vast capacious temple and city, whose name thenceforth shall be, THE LORD IS THERE.

SECTION III.

Mr. Faber's Opinions concerning Gog and Magog

considered.

SINCE the writing of the preceding section, I have learned, that Mr. Faber supposes the Gog in Ezekiel not to be the same with Antichrist; but to be the power that is to rise at the close of the Millennium; the Gog and Magog in Rev. xx, 8. To evince this point he has labored for nearly twenty pages. I have endeavored to weigh his arguments; and I think them inconclusive. I will state my reasons for disbelieving his scheme upon this point; and make some remarks upon his arguments. My reasons for disbelieving his scheme that Ezekiel's Gog is not Antichrist, but that all, which this prophet says upon this subject, is to be fulfilled at the close of the Millennium, are the following;

1. The attack made by Gog and his bands upon the land of Judah and Israel, is evidently an event intimately connected with their return from their long dispersion. In the latter years thou shalt come into the land, that is brought back from the sword, and gathered out of many people, against the mountains of Israel, which have been always waste; but it is brought forth out of the nations, and they shall dwell safely all of them.* Could the bringing back of Israel, here spoken of, have been a thousand years before this invasion of Gog, which occasioned the address? Again. Gog attacks Israel, to take a spoil and to take a prey, to turn thine hand upon the desolate places, that are now inhabited,

* Ezek. xxxviii, 8.

and upon the people gathered out of the nations.

Surely this gathering of Israel must have been of recent date; and those places having been desolate a recent event; and not an event of a thousand years before; and an event as it were unknown to them; as must have been the case, if the address be to a power at the close of the Millennium.

2. One cbject of the judgments upon Gog is stated to be, that the nations may know that Israel had been dispersed for their wickedness. And the heathen shall know that the house of Israel went into captivity for their iniquity; because they trespassed against me; therefore I hid my face from them, and gave them into the hand of their enemies.† Can this apply, as the reason for gathering the Gog and Magog at the close of the Millennium and of the world, that the heathen may know that God, some thousands of years before, had dispersed Israel for their sins? The reason perfectly applies at the time of the overthrow of Antichrist. Israel then will have recently returned from their long dispersion for their sins. But it does not apply at all at the time of his overthrow of the apocalyptic Gog and Magog.

3. This Gog in Ezekiel is the very power long predicted by the prophets in Israel, to make this attack. Thus saith the Lord God, Art thou he, of whom I have spoken of old times by my servants of Israei, who prophesied in those days, many years, that I would bring thee against them? But Mr. Faber has in his last volume clearly shown, that it is Antichrist before the Millennium, who is so abundantly predicted in the prophets, to attack the Jews, upon their restoration. But the apocalyptic Gog and Magog were never expressly predicted in the prophets.

4. The destruction of Gog in Ezekiel is said to be, that the house of Israel may know God is their God. So the house of Israel shall know that I am the Lord their God from that day and forward.§ Can this

* Verse 12. + Chap. xxxix, 23. See also verse 8-21.
Chap. xxxviii, 17.
§ Chap. xxxix, 22,

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