The Typology of Scripture

... viewed in connection with the whole series of the divine dispensations

PATRICK FAIRBAIRN, D.D.
PRINCIPAL, AND PROFESSOR OF DIVINITY, FREE CHURCH COLLEGE, GLASGOW

BOOK FIRST.

INQUIRY INTO THE PRINCIPLES OF TYPICAL INTERPRETATION, WITH A VIEW CHIEFLY TO THE DETERMINATION OF THE REAL NATURE AND DESIGN OF TYPES, AND THE EXTENT TO WHICH THEY ENTERED INTO GOD'S EARLIER DISPENSATIONS.

CHAPTER FIRST.

P. 17-58

HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL SURVEY OF THE PAST AND PRESENT STATE OF THEOLOGICAL OPINION ON THE SUBJECT.

The Typology of Scripture has been one of the most neglected departments of theological science. It has never altogether escaped from the region of doubt and uncertainty; and many still regard it as a field incapable, from its very nature, of being satisfactorily explored, or cultivated so as to yield any sure and appreciable results. Hence, it is not unusual to find those who otherwise are agreed in their views of divine truth, and in the general principles of scriptural interpretation, differing materially in the estimate they have formed of the Typology of Scripture. Where one hesitates, another is full of confidence; and the landmarks that are set up to-day are again shifted to-morrow. With such various and contradictory sentiments prevailing on the subject, it is necessary, in the first instance, to take an historical and critical survey of the field, that we may distinctly perceive what has been done in the past, and what remains yet to be done, in order to the establishment of a well-grounded and scriptural Typology.

I. We naturally begin with the Christian Fathers. Their typological views, however, are only to be gathered from the occasional examples to be met with in their writings; as they nowhere lay down any clear and systematic principles for the regulation of their judgments in the matter. Some exception might, perhaps, be made in respect to Origen. And yet with such vagueness and dubiety has he expressed himself regarding the proper interpretation of Old Testament Scripture, that by some he has been understood to hold, that there is a fourfold, by others a threefold, and by others again only a twofold sense in the sacred text. The truth appears to be, that while he contended for a fourfold application of Scripture, he regarded it as susceptible only of a twofold sense. And considered generally, the principles of interpretation on which he proceeded were not essentially different from those usually followed by the great majority of the Greek Fathers. But before stating how these bore on the subject now under consideration, it will be necessary to point out a distinction too often lost sight of, both in earlier and in later times, between allegorical and typical interpretations, properly so called. These have been very commonly confounded together, as if they were essentially one in principle, and differed only in the extent to which the principle may be carried. There is, however, a specific difference between the two, which it is not very difficult to apprehend, and which it is of some importance to notice in connection especially with the interpretations of patristic writers.

An allegory is a narrative, either expressly feigned for the purpose, or--if describing facts which really took place--describing them only for the purpose of representing certain higher truths or principles than the narrative, in its literal aspect, whether real or fictitious, could possibly have taught. The ostensible representation, therefore, is either invented, or at least used, as a mere cover for the higher sense, which may refer to things ever so remote from those immediately described, if only the corresponding relations are preserved. So that allegorical interpretations of Scripture properly comprehend the two following cases, and these only:

1. When the scriptural representation is actually held to have had no foundation in fact--to be a mere mythos, or fabulous description, invented for the sole purpose of exhibiting the mysteries of divine truth; or, 2. When--without moving any question about the real or fictitious nature of the representation--it is considered incapable as it stands of yielding any adequate or satisfactory sense, and is consequently employed, precisely as if it had been fabulous, to convey some meaning of an entirely different and higher kind. The difference between allegorical interpretations, in either of these senses, and those which are properly called typical, cannot be fully manifested till we have ascertained the exact nature and design of a type. It will be enough meanwhile to say, that typical interpretations of Scripture differ from allegorical ones of the first or fabulous kind, in that they indispensably require the reality of the facts or circumstances stated in the original narrative. And they differ also from the other, in requiring, besides this, that the same truth or principle be embodied alike in the type and the antitype. The typical is not properly a different or higher sense, but a different or higher application of the same sense.

Returning, then, to the writings of the Fathers, and using the expressions typical and allegorical in the senses now respectively ascribed to them, there can be no doubt that the Fathers generally were much given both to typical and allegorical explanations,--the Greek Fathers more to allegorical than to typical,--and to allegorical more in the second than in the first sense, described above. They do not appear, for the most part, to have discredited the plain truth or reality of the statements made in Old Testament history. They seem rather to have considered the sense of the latter true and good, as far as it went, but of itself so meagre and puerile, that it was chiefly to be regarded as the vehicle of a much more refined and ethereal instruction. Origen, however, certainly went farther than this, and expressly denied that many things in the Old Testament had any real existence. In his Principia (Lib. iv.) he affirms, that "when the Scripture history could not otherwise be accommodated to the explanation of spiritual things, matters have been asserted which did not take place, nay, which could not have taken place; and others again, which though they might have occurred, yet never actually did so." Again, when speaking of some notices in the life of Rebecca, he says-- "In these things, I have often told you, there is not a relation of histories, but a concoction of mysteries." [1] And, in like manner, in his annotations on the first chapters of Genesis, he plainly scouts the idea of God's having literally clothed our first parents with the skins of slain beasts--calls it absurd, ridiculous, and unworthy of God, and declares that in such a case the naked letter is not to be adhered to as true, but exists only for the spiritual treasure which is concealed under it. [2] 

Statements of this kind are of too frequent occurrence in the writings of Origen to have arisen from inadvertence, or to admit of being resolved into mere hyperboles of expression. They were, indeed, the natural result of that vicious system of interpretation which prevailed in his age, when it fell, as it did in his case, into the hands of an ardent and enthusiastic follower. At the same time it must be owned, in behalf of Origen, that however possessed of what has been called "the allegorical fury," he does not appear generally to have discredited the facts of sacred history; and that he differed from the other Greek Fathers, chiefly in the extent to which he went in decrying the literal sense as carnal and puerile, and extolling the mystical as alone suited for those who had become acquainted with the true wisdom. It would be out of place here, however, to go into any particular illustration of this point, as it is not immediately connected with our present inquiry. But we shall refer to a single specimen of his allegorical mode of interpretation, for the purpose chiefly of shewing distinctly how it differed from what is of a simply typological character. We make our selection from Origen's homily on Abraham's marriage with Keturah (Hom. vi. in Genes.). He does not expressly disavow his belief in the fact of such a marriage having actually taken place in real life, though his language most naturally bears that meaning; but he intimates that this, in common with the other marriages of the patriarchs, contained a sacramental mystery. And what might this be? Nothing less than the sublime truth, "that there is no end to wisdom, and that old age sets no bounds to improvement in knowledge. The death of Sarah (he says) is to be understood as the perfecting of virtue. But he who has attained to a consummate and perfect virtue, must always be employed in some kind of learning--which learning is called by the divine Word, his wife. Abraham, therefore, when an old man, and his body in a manner dead, took Keturah to wife. I think it was better, according to the exposition we follow, that the wife should have been received when his body was dead, and his members were mortified. For we have a greater capacity for wisdom when we bear about the dying of Christ in our mortal body. Then Keturah, whom he married in his old age, is, by interpretation, incense, or sweet odour. For he said, even as Paul said, 'We are a sweet savour of Christ.' Sin is a foul and putrid thing; but if any of you in whom this no longer dwells, have the fragrance of righteousness, the sweetness of mercy, and by prayer continually offer up incense to God, ye also have taken Keturah to wife." And on he goes to shew, how many such wives may be taken; hospitality is one, the care of the poor another, patience a third, each Christian excellence, in short, a wife; and hence it was, that the patriarchs are reported to have had so many wives, and that Solomon is said to have possessed them even by hundreds, he having received plenitude of wisdom like the sand on the sea-shore, and consequently grace to exercise the greatest number of virtues. We have here a genuine example of allegorical interpretation, if not actually holding the historical matter to be fabulous, at least treating it as if it were so. It is of no moment, for any purpose which such a mode of interpretation might serve, whether Abraham and Keturah had a local habitation among this world's families, and whether their marriage was a real fact in history, or an incident fitly thrown into a fictitious narrative, constructed for the purpose of symbolizing the doctrines of a divine philosophy. If it had been handled after the manner of a type, and not as an allegory, whatever shade of meaning might have been ascribed to it as a representation of gospel mysteries, the story must have been assumed as real, and the act of Abraham made to correspond with something essentially the same in kind--some sort of union, for example, between parties holding a similar relation to each other, as Abraham did to Keturah. In this, though there might have been an error in the special application that was made of it, there would at least have been some appearance of a probable ground for it to rest upon. But woven into the fine allegorical form it assumes under the hands of Origen, the whole, history and interpretation together, become like "the baseless fabric of a vision." For, what connection, either in the nature of things, or in the actual experience of the Father of the Faithful, can be shewn to exist between the death of one wife and the consummation of virtue in the husband; or the marriage of another and his pursuit of knowledge? Why might not the loss sustained in the first case as well represent the decay of virtue, and the acquisition in the second denote a relaxation in the search after the hidden treasures of wisdom and knowledge? There would evidently be as good reason for asserting the one as the other; and, indeed, with such an arbitrary and elastic style of interpretation, there is nothing, either false or true in doctrine, wise or unwise in practice, which might not claim support in Scripture. The Bible would be made to reflect every hue of fancy, and every shade of belief in those who assumed the office of interpretation; and instead of being rendered serviceable to a higher instruction, it would be turned into one vast sea of uncertainty and confusion.

In proof of this we need only appeal to the use which Clement of Alexandria, Origen's master, has made of another portion of sacred history which treats of Abraham's wives (Strom. L. I. p. 333). The instruction, which he finds couched under the narrative of Abraham's marriage successively to Sarah and Hagar, is, that a Christian ought to cultivate philosophy and the liberal arts before he devotes himself wholly to the study of divine wisdom. The way he takes to make out this is the following:--Abraham is the image of a perfect Christian, Sarah the image of Christian wisdom, and Hagar the image of philosophy or human wisdom (certainly a very ill-favoured likeness!). Abraham lived for a long time in a state of connubial sterility--whence it is inferred that a Christian, so long as he confines himself to the study of divine wisdom and religion alone, will never bring forth any great or excellent fruits. Abraham, then, with the consent of Sarah, takes to him Hagar, which proves, according to Clement, that a Christian ought to embrace the wisdom of this world, or philosophy, and that Sarah, or divine wisdom, will not withhold her consent. Lastly, after Hagar had borne Ishmael to Abraham, he resumed his intercourse with Sarah, and of her begat Isaac; the true import of which is, that a Christian, after having once thoroughly grounded himself in human learning and philosophy, will, if he then devotes himself to the culture of divine wisdom, be capable of propagating the race of true Christians, and of rendering essential service to the church. Thus we have two entirely different senses extracted from similar transactions by the master and the disciple; and still, far from being exhausted, as many more might be obtained, as there are fertile imaginations disposed to use the sacred narrative after the form of their own peculiar conceits.

It was not simply the historical portions of Old Testament Scripture which were thus allegorized by Origen and the other Greek Fathers, who belonged to the same school. A similar mode of interpretation was applied to the ceremonial institutions of the ancient economy; and a higher sense was often sought for in these, than we find any indication of in the epistle to the Hebrews. Clement even carried the matter so far as to apply the allegorical principle to the ten commandments, an extravagance in which Origen did not follow him; though we can scarcely tell why he should not have done so. For, even the moral precepts of the Decalogue touch at various points on the common interests and relations of life; and it was the grand aim of the philosophy, in which the allegorizing then prevalent had its origin, to carry the soul above these into the high abstractions of a contemplative theosophy. The Fathers of the Latin church were much less inclined to such airy speculations, and their interpretations of Scripture, consequently, possessed more of a realistic and unimaginative character. Allegorical interpretations are, indeed, occasionally found in them, but they are more sparingly introduced, and less extravagantly pushed. Typical meanings, however, are as frequent in the one class as in the other, and equally adopted without rule or limit. If in the Eastern church we find such objects as the tree of life in the garden of Eden, the rod of Moses, Moses himself with his arms extended during the conflict with Amalek, exhibited as types of the cross; in the Western church, as represented, for example, by Augustine, we meet with such specimens as the following:--"Wherefore did Christ enter into the sleep of death? Because Adam slept when Eve was formed from his side, Adam being the figure of Christ, Eve as the mother of the living, the figure of the church. And as she was formed from Adam while he was asleep, so was it when Christ slept on the cross, that the sacraments of the church flowed from his side." [3] So again, Saul is represented as the type of death, because God unwillingly appointed him king over Israel, as he unwillingly subjected his people to the sway of death; and David's deliverance from the hand of Saul foreshadowed our deliverance through Christ from the power of death; while in David's escape from Saul's hand, coupled with the destruction that befel Ahimelech on his account, if not in his stead, there was a prefiguration of Christ's death and resurrection. [4] But we need not multiply examples, or prosecute the subject farther into detail. Enough already has been adduced to shew, that the earlier divines of the Christian church had no just or well-defined principles to guide them in their interpretations of Old Testament Scripture, which could either enable them to determine between the fanciful and the true in typical applications, or guard them against the worst excesses of allegorical license. [5]

II. Overleaping the dark gulf of the middle ages, we come down to the period of the Reformation. At that memorable era a mighty advance was made, not only beyond the ages immediately preceding, but also beyond all that had passed from the commencement of Christianity, in the sound interpretation of Scripture. The original text then at last began to be examined with something like critical exactness, and a steadfast adherence was generally professed, and in good part also maintained, to the natural and grammatical sense. The leading spirits of the Reformation were here also the great authors of reform. Luther denounced mystical and allegorical interpretations as "trifling and foolish fables, with which the Scriptures were rent into so many and diverse senses, that silly poor consciences could receive no certain doctrine of any thing." [6] Calvin, in like manner, declares that "the true meaning of Scripture is the natural and obvious meaning, by which we ought resolutely to abide;" and speaks of the "licentious system" of Origen and the allegorists, as "undoubtedly a contrivance of Satan to undermine the authority of Scripture, and to take away from the reading of it the true advantage." [7] In some of his interpretations, especially on the prophetical parts of Scripture, he even went to an extreme in advocating what he here calls the natural and obvious meaning, and thereby missed the more profound import, which, according to the elevated and often enigmatical style of prophecy, it was the design of the Spirit to convey. On the other side, in spite of their avowed and generally followed principles of interpretation, the writers of the Reformation-period not unfrequently fell into the old method of allegorizing, and threw out typical explanations of a kind that cannot stand a careful scrutiny. It were quite easy to produce examples of this from the writings of those who lived at and immediately subsequent to the Reformation; but it would be of no service as regards our present object, since their attention was comparatively little drawn to the subject of types; and none of them attempted to construct any distinct typological system.

III. We pass on, therefore, to a later period--about the middle of the seventeenth century--when the science of theology began to be studied more in detail, and the types consequently received a more formal consideration. About that period arose what is called the Cocceian school, winch, though it did not revive the double sense of the Alexandrian (for Cocceius expressly disclaimed any other sense of Scripture than the literal and historical one), yet was chargeable in another respect with a participation in the caprice and irregularity of the ancient allegorists. Cocceius himself, less distinguished as a systematic writer in theology than as a Hebrew scholar and learned expositor of Scripture, left no formal ennunciation of principles connected with typical or allegorical interpretations; and it is chiefly from his annotations on particular passages, and the more systematic works of his followers, that these are to be gathered. How freely, however, he was disposed to draw upon Old Testament history for types of Gospel things, may be understood from a single example--his viewing what is said of Asshur going out and building Nineveh, as a type of the Turk or Mussulman power, which at once sprang from the kingdom, and shook the dominion of Antichrist (cur. Prior in Gen. x. 11.) He evidently conceived that every event in Old Testament history, which in any way resembled something under the New, was to be regarded as typical. And that, even notwithstanding his avowed adherence to but one sense of Scripture, he could occasionally adopt a second, appears alone from his allegorical interpretation of the eighth Psalm; according to which the sheep there spoken of, as being put under man, are Christ's flock--the oxen, those who labour in Christ's service--the beasts of the field, such as are strangers to the city and kingdom of God, barbarians and savages--the fowl of the air and fish of the sea, persons at a still greater distance from godliness; so that, as he concludes, there is nothing so wild and intractable on earth but it shall be brought under the rule and dominion of Christ.

It does not appear, however, that the views of Cocceius differed materially from those which were held by some who preceded him; and it would seem rather to have been owing to his eminence generally as a commentator than to any distinctive peculiarity in his typological principles, that he came to be so prominently identified with the school, which from him derived the name of Cocceian. If we turn to one of the earlier editions of Glass's Philologia Sacra, published before Cocceius commenced his critical labours (the first was published before he was born), we shall find the principles of allegorical and typical interpretations laid down with, a latitude which Cocceius himself could scarcely have quarrelled with. Indeed, we shall find few examples in his writings that might not be justified on the principles stated by Glass; and though the latter, in his section on allegories, has to throw himself back chiefly on the Fathers, he yet produces some quotations in support of his views, both on these and on types, from some writers of his own age. There seems to have been no essential difference between the typological principles of Glass, Cocceius, Witsius, and Vitringa; and though the first wrote some time before, and the last about half a century later than Cocceius, no injustice can be done to any of them by classing them together, and referring indifferently to their several productions. Like the Fathers, they did not sufficiently distinguish between allegorical and typical interpretations, but regarded the one as only a particular form of the other, and both as equally warranted by New Testament Scripture. Hence, the rules they adopted were to a great extent applicable to what is allegorical in the proper sense, as well as typical, though for the present we must confine ourselves to the typical department. They held, then, that there was a twofold sort of types, the one innate, consisting of those which Scripture itself has expressly asserted to possess a typical character; the other inferred, consisting of such as, though not specially noticed or explained in Scripture, were yet, on probable grounds, inferred by interpreters as conformable to the analogy of faith, and the practice of the inspired writers in regard to similar examples.  [8] This latter class were considered not less proper and valid than the other; and pains were taken to distinguish them from those which were sometimes forged by Papists, and which were at variance with the analogies just mentioned. Of course, from their very nature they could only be employed for the support and confirmation of truths already received, and not to prove what was in itself doubtful. But not on that account were they to be less carefully searched for, or less confidently used, because thus only, it was maintained, could Christ be found in all Scripture, which all testifies of him.

It is evident alone, from this general statement, that there was something vague and loose in the Cocceian system, which left ample scope for the indulgence of a luxuriant fancy. Nor can we wonder that, in practice, a mere resemblance, however accidental or trifling, between an occurrence in Old, and another in New Testament times, was deemed sufficient to constitute the one a type of the other. Hence, in the writings of the very able and learned men above referred to, we find the name of Abel (emptiness) viewed as prefiguring our Lord's humiliation; the occupation of Abel, Christ's office as the Shepherd of Israel the withdrawal of Isaac from his father's house to the land of Moriah, Christ's being led out of the temple to Calvary; Adam's awaking out of sleep, Christ's resurrection from the dead; Samson's meeting a young lion by the way, and the transactions that followed, Christ's meeting Saul on the road to Damascus, with the important train of events to which it led; David's gathering to himself a party of the distressed, the bankrupt, and discontented, Christ's receiving into his Church publicans and sinners. And many others of a like nature.

Multitudes of examples perfectly similar--that is, equally destitute of any proper foundation in principle--are to be found in writers of our own country, such as Mather, [9] Keach, [10] Warden, [11] J. Taylor, [12] Guild, [13] who belonged to the same school of interpretation, and who nearly all lived toward the latter part of the seventeenth century. Excepting the two first, they make no attempt to connect their explanations with any principles of interpretation, and these two very sparingly. Their works were all intended for popular use, and rather exhibited by particular examples, than theoretically expounded the nature of their views. They, however, agreed in admitting inferred as well as innate types, but differed--more perhaps from constitutional temperament than on theoretical grounds--in the extent to which they severally carried the liberty they claimed to go beyond the explicit warrant of New Testament Scripture. Mather in particular, and Worden, usually confine themselves to such types as have obtained special notice of some kind from the writers of the New Testament; though they held the principle, that "where the analogy was evident and manifest between things under the law and things under the gospel, the one were to be concluded (on the ground simply of that analogy) to be types of the other." How far this warrant from analogy was thought capable of leading, may be learned from Taylor and Guild, especially from the latter, who has no fewer than forty-nine typical resemblances between Joseph and Christ, and seventeen between Jacob and Christ, not scrupling to swell the number by occasionally taking in acts of sin, as well as circumstances of the most trifling nature. Thus, Jacob's being a supplanter of his brother, is made to represent Christ's supplanting death, sin, and Satan; his being obedient to his parents in all things, Christ's subjection to his heavenly Father and his earthly parents; his purchasing his birthright by red pottage, and obtaining the blessing by presenting savoury venison to his father, clothed in Esau's garment, Christ's purchasing the heavenly inheritance to us by his red blood, and obtaining the blessing by offering up the savoury meat of his obedience, in the borrowed garment of our nature, &c.

Now, we may affirm of these, and many similar examples occurring in writers of the same class, that the analogy they found upon was a merely superficial resemblance found between things in the Old and other things in the New Testament Scriptures. But with such a loose and shifting foundation, it was manifestly left open to any one to introduce the most frivolous conceits, and to caricature rather than vindicate its grand theme. Then, if such weight was fitly attached to mere resemblances between the Old and the New, even when they were altogether of a slight and superficial kind, why should not profane as well as sacred history be ransacked for them? What, for example, might prevent Romulus (seeing that God is in all history) assembling a band of desperadoes, and founding a world-wide empire on the banks of the Tiber, from serving, as well as David in the circumstances specified above, to typify the procedure of Christ in calling to him publicans and sinners at the commencement of his kingdom? As many points of resemblance might be found in the one case as in the other; and the two transactions in ancient history, as here contemplated, stood much on the same fooling as regards the appointment of God; for both alike were the offspring of human policy, struggling against outward difficulties, and endeavouring with such materials as were available to supply the wrant of better resources. And thus, by pushing the matter beyond its just limits, we reduce the sacred to a level with the profane, and, at the same time, throw an air of uncertainty over the whole aspect of its typical character. [14]

That the Cocceian mode of handling the typical matter of ancient Scripture so readily admitted of the introduction of trifling, far-fetched, and even altogether false analogies, was one of its capital defects. It had no essential principles or fixed rules by which to guide its interpretations--set up no proper landmarks along the field of inquiry--left room on every hand for arbitrariness and caprice to enter. It was this, perhaps, more than anything else, which tended to bring typical interpretations into disrepute, and disposed men, in proportion as the exact and critical study of Scripture came to be cultivated, to regard the subject of its typology as hopelessly involved in conjecture and uncertainty. Yet this was not the only fault inherent in the typological system now under consideration. It failed, more fundamentally still, in the idea it had formed of the connection between the Old and the New in God's dispensations--between the type and the thing typified--which it made chiefly to consist in mere external resemblances, to the comparative neglect of the great fundamental principles which are common alike to all dispensations, and in which the more vital part of the connection must be sought. It was this more radical error, which in fact gave rise to the greater portion of the extravagances that disfigured the typical illustrations of our older divines; for it naturally led them to make account of resemblances that were sometimes trivial, and sometimes only apparent. And not only so; but it also led them to misapprehend the immediate object and design of the types in their relation to the Old Testament worshippers. While these as types speak a language that can be distinctly and intelligently understood only by us, who are privileged to read their meaning in the light of gospel realities, they yet had, as institutions in the existing worship, or events in the current providence of God, a present purpose to accomplish, apart from the prospective reference to future times, and we might almost say, as much as if no such reference had belonged to them.

IV. These inherent errors and imperfections in the typological system of the Cocceian school, were not long in leading to its general abandonment. But theology had little reason to boast of the change. For the system that supplanted it, without entering at all into a more profound investigation of the subject, or attempting to explain more satisfactorily the grounds of a typical connection between the Old and the New, simply contented itself with admitting into the rank of types what had been expressly treated as such in the Scripture itself, to the exclusion of all besides. This seemed to be the only safeguard against error and extravagance. [15] And yet, we fear, other reasons of a less justifiable kind contributed not a little to produce the result. An unhappy current had begun to set in upon the Protestant Church, in some places, while Cocceius still lived, and in still more soon after his death, which disposed many of her more eminent teachers to slight the evangelical element of Christianity, and, if not utterly to lose sight of Christ himself, at least to disrelish and repudiate a system which delighted to find traces of Him in every part of revelation. It was the redeeming point of the older typology, which should be allowed to go far in extenuating the occasional errors connected with it, that it kept the work and kingdom of Christ ever prominently in view, as the grand scope and end of all God's dispensations. It felt, if we may so speak, correctly, whatever it may have wanted in the requisite depth and precision of thought. But towards the end of the seventeenth and the beginning of the eighteenth century, a general coldness very commonly discovered itself, both in the writings and the lives of even the more orthodox sections of the Church. The living energy and zeal which had achieved such important results a century before, either inactively slumbered, or spent itself in doctrinal controversies; and the faith of the Church was first corrupted in its simplicity, and then weakened in its foundations by the pernicious influence of a widely cultivated, but esssentially anti-Christian philosophy. In such circumstances Christ was not allowed to maintain his proper place in the New Testament, and it is not to be wondered at if he should have been nearly banished from the Old.

Vitringa, who lived when this degeneracy from better times had made considerable progress, attributed to it much of that distaste which was then beginning to prevail in regard to typical interpretations of Scripture. With special reference to the work of Spencer on the Laws of the Hebrews--a work not less remarkable for its low-toned, semi-heathen spirit, than for its varied and well-digested learning--he lamented the inclination that appeared to seek for the grounds and reasons of the Mosaic institutions in the mazes of Egyptian idolatry, instead of endeavouring to discover in them the mysteries of the Gospel. These, he believed, the Holy Spirit had plainly intimated to be couched there, and they shone, indeed, so manifestly through the institutions themselves, that it seemed impossible for any one to perceive the type, who recognised the antitype. Nor could he conceal his fear, that the talent, authority, and learning of such men as Spencer would gain extensive credit for their opinions, and soon bring the Typology of Scripture, as he understood it, into general contempt. [16] In this apprehension he was certainly not mistaken. Another generation had scarcely passed away when Dathe published his edition of the Sacred Philology of Glass, in which the section on types, to which we have already referred, was quietly dropt out, as relating to a subject no longer thought worthy of a recognised place in the science of an enlightened theology. The rationalistic spirit, in the strength of its anti-Christian tendency, had now discarded the innate, as well as the inferred types of the older divines; and the convenient principle of accommodation, which was at the same time introduced, furnished an easy solution for those passages in New Testament Scripture, which seemed to indicate a typical relationship between the past and the future. It was only an adaptation, called forth by Jewish prejudice or conceit, of the facts and institutions of an earlier age to things essentially different under the Gospel; but now, since the state of feeling that gave rise to it no longer existed, deservedly suffered to fall into desuetude. And thus the bond was virtually broken by the hand of these rationalizing theologians between the Old and the New in Scripture, and the records of Christianity, when scientifically interpreted, were found to have marvellously little in common with those of Judaism.

In Britain various causes contributed to hold in check this downward tendency, and to prevent it from reaching the same excess of dishonour to Christ, which it soon attained on the Continent. Even persons of a cold and philosophical temperament, such as Clarke and Jortin, not only wrote in defence of types, as having a certain legitimate use in Revelation, but also admitted more within the circle of types than Scripture itself has expressly applied to Gospel times. [17] They urged, indeed, the necessity of exercising the greatest caution in travelling beyond the explicit warrant of Scripture; and in their general cast of thought they undoubtedly had more affinity with the Spencerian than the Cocceian school. Yet a feeling of the close and pervading connection between the Old and the New Testament dispensations restrained them from discarding the more important of the inferred types. Jortin especially falls so much into the current of the older writers, that he employs his ingenuity in reckoning up so many as forty particulars in which Moses typically prefigured Christ. A work composed about the same period as that to which the Remarks of Jortin belong, and one that has had more influence than any other in fashioning the typological views generally entertained in Scotland--the production of a young dissenting minister in Dundee (Mr M'Ewen) [18]--is still more free in the admission of types not expressly sanctioned in the Scriptures of the New Testament. The work itself being posthumous, and intended for popular use, contains no investigation of the grounds on which typical interpretations rest, and harmonises much more with the school that had flourished in the previous century, than that to which Clarke and Jortin belonged. As indicative of a particular style of biblical interpretation, it may be classed with the older productions of Mather and Taylor, and partakes alike of their excellencies and defects.

There was, therefore, a considerable unwillingness in this country to abandon the Cocceian ground on the subject of types. The declension came in gradually, and its progress was rather marked by a tacit rejection in practice of much that was previously held to be typical, than by the introduction of views avowedly different. It became the practice of theologians to look more into the general nature of things for the reasons of Christianity, than into the pre-existing elements and characteristics of former dispensations, and to account for the peculiarities of Judaism by its partly antagonistic, partly homogeneous relation to Paganism, rather than by any concealed reference it might have to the coming realities of the Gospel. As an inevitable consequence, the typological department of theology fell into general neglect, from which the Old Testament Scriptures themselves did not altogether escape. Those portions of them especially which narrate the history, and prescribe the religious rites of the ancient Church, were but rarely treated in a manner that bespoke any confidence in their fitness to minister to the spiritual discernment and faith of Christians. It seems, partly at least, to have been owing to this growing distaste for Old Testament inquiries, and this general depreciation of its Scriptures, that what is called the Hutchinsonian school arose in England--which, by a sort of recoil from the prevailing spirit, ran into the opposite extreme of searching for the elements of all knowledge, human and divine, in the writings of the Old Testament. This school possesses too much the character of an episode in the history of biblical interpretation in this country, and was itself too strongly marked by a spirit of extravagance, to render any formal account of it necessary here. It was, besides, chiefly of a physico-theological character, combining the elements of a natural philosophy with the truths of revelation, both of which it sought to extract from the statements, and sometimes even from the words and letters of Scripture. The most profound meanings were consequently discovered in the text of Scripture, in respect alike to the doctrines of the Gospel and the truths of science. One of the maxims of its founder was, that "every passage of the Old Testament looks backward and forward, and every way, like light from the sun; not only to the state before and under the law, but under the Gospel, and nothing is hid from the light thereof." [19] When such a depth and complexity of meaning was supposed to be involved in every passage, we need not be surprised to learn, respecting the exactness of Abraham's knowledge of future events, that he knew from preceding types and promises, that "one of his own line was to be sacrificed, to be a blessing to all the race of Adam;" and not only so, but that when he received the command to offer Isaac, he proceeded to obey it, "not doubting that Isaac was to be that person who should redeem man." [20]

The cabalistic and extravagant character of the Hutchinsonian system, if it had any definite influence on the study of types and other cognate subjects, could only tend to increase the suspicion with which they were already viewed, and foster a disposition to agree to whatever might keep investigation within the bounds of sobriety and discretion. Accordingly, while nothing more was done to unfold the essential and proper ground of a typical connection between Old and New Testament things, and to prevent abuse by making the subject more thoroughly understood in its fundamental principles, the more scientific students of the Bible came, by a sort of common consent, to acquiesce in the opinion, that those only were to be reckoned types to which Scripture itself, by express warrant, or at least by obvious implication, had assigned that character. We may take Bishop Marsh as the ablest and most systematic expounder of this view of the subject. He says,--"There is no other rule by which we can distinguish a real from a pretended type, than that of Scripture itself. There are no other possible means by which we can know that a previous design and a pre-ordained connection existed. Whatever persons or things therefore, recorded in the Old Testament, were expressly declared by Christ or by his apostles to have been designed as prefigurations of persons or things relating to the New Testament, such persons or things so recorded in the former, are types of the persons or things with which they are compared in the latter. But if we assert that a person or thing was designed to prefigure another person or thing, where no such prefiguration has been declared by divine authority, we make an assertion for which we neither have, nor can have, the slightest foundation." [21] This is certainly a very authoritative and peremptory decision of the matter. But the principle involved in this statement, though seldom so oracularly announced, has long been practically received. It was substantially adopted by Macknight, in his Dissertation on the Interpretation of Scripture, at the end of his Commentary on the Epistles, before Bishop Marsh wrote, and it has been followed since by Vanmildert and Coiiybeare in their Bampton Lectures, by Nares in his Warburtonian Lectures, by Chevalier in his Hulsean Lectures, by Home in his Introduction, and a host of other writers.

Judging from an article in the American Biblical Repository, which appeared in the number for January 1841, it would appear that the leading authorities on the other side of the Atlantic concur in the same general view. The reviewer himself advocates the opinion that "no person, event, or institution, should be regarded as typical, but what may be proved to be such from the Scriptures," meaning by that their explicit assertion in regard to the particular case. And in support of this opinion he quotes, besides English writers, the words of two of his own countrymen, Professors Stowe and Moses Stuart, the latter of whom says,-- "That just so much of the Old Testament is to be accounted typical as the New Testament affirms to be so, and no more. The fact, that any thing or event under the Old Testament dispensation was designed to prefigure something under the New, can be known to us only by revelation; and of course all that is not designated by divine authority as typical, can never be made so by any authority less than that which guided the writers of the New Testament." [22]

Now, the view embraced by this school of interpretation lies open to one objection, in common with the school that preceded it. While the field, as to its extent, was greatly circumscribed, and in its boundaries ruled as with square and compass, nothing was done in the way of investigating it internally, or of unfolding the grounds of connection between type and antitype. Fewer points of resemblance are usually presented to us between the one and the other by the writers of this school than are found in works of an older date; but the resemblances themselves are quite as much of a superficial and outward kind. The real harmony and connection between the Old and the New in the divine dispensations, stood precisely where it was. But other defects adhere to this modern typological system. The leading excellence of the system that preceded it was the constant reference it supposed the Scriptures of the Old Testament to bear toward Christ and the Gospel dispensation; and the practical disavowal of this may be said to constitute the great defect of the more exact and leaner system, which has now obtained the general suffrage of the learned. It drops a golden principle for the sake of avoiding a few lawless aberrations. With the narrow limits it sets to our inquiries, we cannot indeed wander far into the regions of extravagance. But in the very prescription of these limits, it wrongfully withholds from us the key of knowledge, and shuts us up to evils scarcely less to be deprecated than those it seeks to correct. For it destroys to a large extent the bond of connection between the Old and the New Testament Scriptures, and thus deprives the Christian Church of much of the instruction in divine things which they were designed to impart. Were men accustomed, as they should be, to search for the germs of Christian truth in the earliest Scriptures, and to regard the inspired records of both covenants as having for their leading object "the testimony of Jesus," they would know how much they were losers by such an undue contraction of the typical element in Old Testament Scripture. And in proportion as a more profound and spiritual acquaintance with the divine Word is cultivated, will the feeling of dissatisfaction grow in respect to a style of interpretation, that so miserably dwarfs and cripples the relation which the preparatory bears to the final in God's revelations.

It is necessary, however, to take a closer view of the subject. The principle on which this typological system is based, is, that nothing less than inspired authority is sufficient to determine the reality and import of any thing that is typical. But we can see no solid ground for such a principle. No one holds the necessity of inspiration to explain each particular prophecy, and decide even with certainty on its fulfilment, and why should it be reckoned indispensable in the closely related subject of types? This question was long ago asked by Witsius, and yet waits for a satisfactory answer. A part only, it is universally allowed, of the prophecies which refer to Christ and his kingdom have been specially noticed and interpreted by the pen of inspiration. So little necessary, indeed, was inspiration for such a purpose, that even before the descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, our Lord reproved his disciples as "fools and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets had spoken." And from the close analogy between the two subjects--for what is a type but a prophetical act or institution?--we might reasonably infer the same liberty to have been granted, and the same obligation to be imposed, in regard to the typical parts of ancient Scripture. But we have something more than a mere argument from analogy to guide us to this conclusion. For, the very same complaint is brought by an inspired writer against private Christians concerning their slowness in understanding the typical, which our Lord brought against his disciples in respect to the prophetical portions of ancient Scripture. In the epistle to the Hebrews a sharp reproof is administered for the imperfect acquaintance believers among them had with the typical character of Melchizedec, and subjects of a like nature--thus placing it beyond a doubt that it is both the duty and the privilege of the Church, with that measure of the Spirit's grace which it is the part even of private Christians to possess, to search into the types of ancient Scripture, and come to a correct understanding of them. To deny this, is plainly to withhold an important privilege from the church of Christ; to dissuade from it, is to encourage the neglect of an incumbent duty.

But the unsoundness of the principle, which would thus limit the number of types to those which New Testament Scripture has expressly noticed and explained, becomes still more apparent when it is considered what these really are, and in what manner they are introduced. Leaving out of view the tabernacle, with its furniture and services, which, as a whole, is affirmed in the epistles to the Hebrews and the Colossians to have been of a typical nature, the following examples are what the writers now referred to usually regard as having something like an explicit sanction in Scripture:--1. Persons or characters; Adam (Rom. v. 11, 12; 1 Cor. xv. 22); Melchizedec (Heb. vii.); Sarah and Hagar, Ishmael and Isaac, and by implication Abraham (Gal. iv. 22--35); Moses (Gal. iii. 19, Acts iii. 22--26); Jonah (Matth. xii. 40); David (Ezek xxxvii. 24, Luke i. 32., &c.); Solomon (2 Sam. vii.); Zerubbabel and Joshua (Zech. iii. iv. Hag. ii. 23), 2. Transactions or events; the preservation of Noah and his family in the ark (1 Pet. iii. 20); the redemption from Egypt and its passover-memorial (Luke xxii. 15, 16, 1 Cor. v. 7); the exodus (Matth. ii. 15); the passage through the Red sea, the giving of manna, Moses's veiling of his face while the law was read; the water flowing from the smitten rock; the serpent lifted up for healing in the wilderness, and some other things that befel the Israelites there (1 Cor. x. John iii. 14, v. 33, Rev. ii. 17). [23]

Now, let any person of candour and intelligence take his Bible, and examine the passages to which reference is here made, and then say, whether the manner in which these typical characters and transactions are there introduced, is such as to indicate, that these alone were held by the inspired writers to be prefigurative of similar characters and transactions under the gospel? as if in naming them they meant to exhaust the typical bearing of Old Testament history? On the contrary, we deem it impossible for any one to avoid the conviction, that in whatever respect these particular examples may have been adduced, it is simply as examples adapted to the occasion, and taken from a vast storehouse, where many more were to be found. They have so much at least the appearance of having been selected merely on account of their suitableness to the immediate end in view, that they cannot fairly be regarded otherwise than as specimens of the class they belong to. And if so, they should rather have the effect of prompting farther inquiry than of repressing it; since, instead of themselves comprehending and bounding the whole field of typical matter, they only exhibit practically the principles on which others of a like description are to be discovered and explained.

Indeed, were it otherwise, nothing could be more arbitrary and inexplicable than the Typology of Scripture. For, what is there to distinguish the characters and events, which Scripture has thus particularized, from a multitude of others, to which the typical element might equally have been supposed to belong? Is there anything on the face of the inspired record to make us look on them in a singular light, and attribute to them a significance altogether peculiar respecting the future affairs of God's kingdom? So far from it, that we instinctively feel, if these really possessed a typical character, so also must others, which hold an equally, or perhaps even more prominent place in the history of God's dispensations. Can it be seriously believed, for example, that Sarah and Hagar stood in a typical relation to gospel times, while no such place was occupied by Bebekah, as the spouse of Isaac, and the mother of Jacob and Esau? What reason can we imagine for Melchizedec and Jonah having been constituted types--persons to whom our attention is comparatively little drawn in Old Testament history--while such leading characters as Joseph, Sampson, Joshua, are omitted? Or, for selecting the passage through the Bed sea, and the incidents in the wilderness, while no account should be made of the passage through Jordan, and the conquest of the land of Canaan?

We can scarcely conceive of a mode of interpretation which should deal more capriciously with the word of God, and make so anomalous a use of its historical matter. Instead of investing these with a homogeneous character, it arbitrarily selects a few out of the general mass, and sets them up in solitary grandeur, like mystic symbols in a temple, fictitiously elevated above the sacred materials around them. The exploded principle, which sought a type in every notice of Old Testament history, had at least the merit of uniformity to recommend it, and could not be said to deal partially, however often it might deal fancifully, with the facts of ancient Scripture. But according to the plan now under review, for which the authority of inspiration itself is claimed, we perceive nothing but arbitrary distinctions and groundless preferences. And though unquestionably it were wrong to expect in the word of God the precise method and order, which might naturally have been looked for in a merely human composition, yet as the product, amid all its variety, of one and the same Spirit, we are warranted to expect that there shall be a consistent agreement among its several parts, and that distinctions shall not be created in the one Testament, which in the other seem destitute of any just foundation or apparent reason.

But then, if a greater latitude is allowed, how shall we guard against error and extravagance? Without the express authority of Scripture, how shall we be able to distinguish between a happy illustration and a real type? In the words of Bishop Marsh: " By what means shall we determine, in any given instance, that what is alleged as a type, was really designed for a type? The only possible source of information on this subject is Scripture itself. The only possible means of knowing that two distant, though similar historical facts, were so connected in the general scheme of divine Providence, that the one was designed to prefigure the other is the authority of that book in which the scheme of divine Providence is unfolded. [24] This is an objection, indeed, which strikes at the root of the whole matter, and its validity can only be ascertained by a thorough investigation into the fundamental principles of the subject. That Scripture is the sole rule, on the authority of which we are to distinguish what is properly typical from what is not, we readily grant--though not in the straitened sense contended for by Bishop Marsh and those who hold similar views, as if there were no way for Scripture to furnish a sufficient direction on the subject, except by specifying every particular case. It is possible, surely, that in this, as well as in other things. Scripture may unfold certain fundamental views or principles, of which it makes but a few individual applications, and for the rest leaves them in the hand of spiritually enlightened consciences. The more so, as it is one of the leading peculiarities of New Testament Scripture rather to develope great truths, than to dwell on minute and isolated facts. It is a presumption against, not in favour of, the system we now oppose, that it would shut up the Typology of Scripture, in so far as connected with the characters and events of sacred history, within the narrow circle of a few scattered and apparently random examples. And the attempt to rescue it from this position, if in any measure successful, will also serve to exhibit the unity of design which pervades the inspired records of both covenants, the traces they contain of the same divine hand, the subservience of the one to the other, and the mutual dependence alike of the Old upon the New, and of the New upon the Old.

V. We have still, however, another stage of our critical survey before us, and one calling in some respects for careful discrimination and inquiry. The style of interpretation which we have connected with the name of Marsh could not, in the nature of things, afford satisfaction to men of thoughtful minds, who must have something like equitable principles as well as external authority to guide them in their interpretations. Such persons could not avoid feeling that, if there was so much in the Old Testament bearing a typical relation to the New, as was admitted on scriptural authority by the school of Marsh, there must be considerably more; and also, that underneath that authority there must be a substratum of fundamental principles capable of bearing what Scripture itself has raised on it, and whatever besides may fitly be conjoined with it. But some, again, might possibly be of opinion that the authority of Scripture cannot warrantably carry us so far, and that both scriptural authority, and the fundamental principles involved in the nature of the subject, apply only in part to what the followers of Marsh regarded as typical. Accordingly, among more recent inquirers we have examples of each mode of divergence from the formal rules laid down by the preceding school of interpretation. The search for first principles has disposed some greatly to enlarge the typological field, and it has disposed others greatly to curtail it.

1. Of the former class the chief examples are to be found in Germany; as it was there also that the new and more profound spirit of investigation began to develope itself. Near the commencement of the present century the religions of antiquity became there, as they had never been before, the subject of learned inquiry, and a depth of meaning was discovered in the myths and external symbols of these, which in the preceding century was not so much as dreamt of. Creuzer, in particular, by his great work (Symbolik) created quite a sensation in this department of learning, and opened up what seemed to be an entirely new field of research. He was followed by Baur (Symbolik und Mythologie), Gorres (Mythengeschichte), Muller, and others of less note, each endeavouring to proceed farther than his predecessors into the explication of the religious views of the ancients, by weaving together, and interpreting what is known of their historical legends and ritual services. These inquiries were at first conducted merely in the way of antiquarian research and philosophical speculation; and the religion of the Old Testament was deemed, in that point of view, too unimportant to be made the subject of special consideration. Creuzer only here and there throws out some passing allusions to it. Even Baur, though a theologian, enters into no regular investigation of the symbols of Judaism, while he expatiates at great length on all the varieties of Heathenism. By and bye, however, a better spirit appeared. Mosaism, as the religion of the Old Testament is called, had a distinct place allotted it by Grorres among the ancient religions of Asia. And at last it was itself treated at great length, and with, consummate ability and learning, in a separate work--the Symbolik des Mosaischen Cultus of Bahr (published in 1837-9.) This is still the great work in Germany on the meaning of the Mosaic symbols, although it is pervaded by fundamental errors of the gravest kind (on which we shall afterwards have occasion to remark), and not unfrequently falls into fanciful views on particular parts. Some of these have been corrected by Hengstenberg in the second volume of his Authentie des Pentateuchus, who has also furnished many good typical illustrations in his Christology and other exegetical works. Tholuck, in his Commentary on the Hebrews, has followed in the same tract, generally adopting the explanations of Hengstenberg, and still more recently (chiefly since the publication of our first edition), further contributions have been made by Kurtz, Baumgarten, Delitzsch. Even De Wette, in his old age, caught something of this new spirit; and after many an effort to depreciate apostolic Christianity by detecting in it symptoms of Judaical weakness and bigotry, he made at least one commendable effort in the nobler direction of elevating Judaism by pointing to the manifold germs it contained of a spiritual Christianity. In a passage quoted by Bahr (vol. i. p. 16, from an article of De Wette on the "Characteristik des Hebraismus"), he says,--"Christianity sprang out of Judaism. Long before Christ appeared, the world was prepared for his appearance: the entire Old Testament is a great prophecy, a great type of him who was to come, and has come. Who can deny that the holy seers of the Old Testament saw in spirit the advent of Christ long before he came, and in prophetic anticipations, sometimes more, sometimes less clear, descried the new doctrine? The typological comparison, also, of the Old Testament with the New, was by no means a mere play of fancy; nor can it be regarded as altogether the result of accident, that the evangelical history, in the most important particulars, runs parallel with the Mosaic. Christianity lay in Judaism as leaves and fruits do in the seed, though certainly it needed the divine sun to bring them forth."

Such language, and especially from such a quarter, indicates a decided change. Yet it must not be supposed, on reading so strong a testimony, as if every thing were already conceded; for what by such writers as De Wette is granted in the general, is often denied or explained away in the particular. Nor has any systematic treatise (so far as we know) yet appeared on the Continent, unfolding the grounds of a typological connection between the things of the Old and those of the New Testament dispensations, and laying its foundations broad and deep in the great principles of God's administration. Bahr confines himself almost entirely to the mere interpretation of the symbols of the Mosaic dispensation, and, therefore, even when his views are correct, has only supplied some materials for the construction of a sound typological system. Tholuck and other learned men still note it as a defect in their literature, that they are without any work on the subject suited to the existing position and demands of theological science.

It is to be observed, however, that this new current opinion among the better part of theologians on the Continent, leads them to find the typical element widely diffused through the historical and prophetical, as well as the more strictly religious portions of the Old Testament. No one who is in any degree acquainted with the exegetical productions of Hengsteiiberg and Olshausen, now made accessible to English readers, can have failed to perceive this, from the tone of their occasional references and illustrations. Their unbiassed exegetical spirit rendered it impossible for them to do otherwise; for the same connection, they perceived, runs like a thread through the whole, and binds all together. Indeed, the only formal attempt made to work out a new system of typological interpretation--the small treatise of Olshausen (published in 1824, and consisting only of 124 widely printed pages), entitled, Ein Wort uber tiefern Schriftsinn, has respect almost exclusively to the historical and prophetical parts of ancient Scripture. When he comes distinctly to unfold what he calls the deeper exposition of Scripture, he contents himself with a brief elucidation of the following points:--That Israel's relation to God is represented in Scripture as forming an image of all and each of mankind, in so far as the divine life is possessed by them--that Israel's relation to the surrounding heathen in like manner imaged the conflict of all spiritual men with the evil in the world--that a parallelism is drawn between Israel arid Christ as the one who completely realized what Israel should have been---and that all real children of God again image what, in the whole, is found imperfectly in Israel and perfectly in Christ, (p. 87-110.)

The positions, it must be confessed, indicate a considerable degree of vagueness and generality; and the treatise, as a whole, is defective in first principles and logical precision, as well as fulness of investigation. Klausen, in the following extract from his Hermeneutik, pp. 334-345, has given a fair outline of Olshausen's views: "We must distinguish between a false and a genuine allegorical exposition, which latter has the support of the highest authority, though it alone has it, being frequently employed by the inspired writers of the New Testament. The fundamental error in the common allegorizing, from which all its arbitrariness has sprung, bidding defiance to every sound principle of exposition, must be sought in this, that a double sense has been attributed to Scripture, and one of them consequently a sense entirely different from that which is indicated, by the words. Accordingly, the characteristic of the genuine allegorical exposition must be, that it recognises no sense besides the literal one--none differing from this in nature, as from the historical reality of what is recorded; but only a deeper-lying sense (***) bound up with the literal meaning by an internal and essential connection--a sense given along with this and in it; so that it must present itself whenever the subject is considered from the higher point of view, and is capable of being ascertained by fixed rules. Hence, if the question be regarding the fundamental principles, according to which the connection must be made out between the deeper apprehension and the immediate sense conveyed by the words, these have their foundation in the law of general harmony, by which all individuals, in the natural as well as in the spiritual world, form one great organic system--the law by which all phenomena, whether belonging to a higher or a lower sphere, appear as copies of what essentially belongs to their respective ideas; so that the whole is represented in the individual, and the individual again in the whole. This mysterious relation comes most prominently out in the history of the Jewish people and their worship. But something analogous everywhere discovers itself; and in the manner in which the Old Testament is expounded in the New, we are furnished with the rules for all exposition of the Word, of nature, and of history."

The vague and unsatisfactory character of this mode of representation, is evident almost at first sight; the elements of truth contained in it are neither solidly grounded nor sufficiently guarded against abuse; so that, with some justice, Klausen remarks, in opposition to it,--"The allegorizing may perhaps be applied with greater moderation and better taste than formerly; but against the old principle, though revived as often as put down, viz. that every sense which can be found in the words has a right to be regarded as the sense of the words, the same exceptions will always be taken." If the Typology of Scripture cannot be rescued from the domain of allegorizings, it will be impossible to secure for it a solid and permanent footing. We must have done with what can be fitly called allegorizings, or a nearer and deeper sense. We simply add, that Klausen himself has no place in his Hermeneutics for typical, as distinguished from allegorical interpretations. In common with Hermeneutical writers generally, he regards these as substantially the same in kind; and the one only as the excess of the other. Some application he would allow of Old Testament Scripture to the realities of the Gospel, in consideration of what is said by inspired writers of the relation subsisting between the two; but he conceives that relation to be of a kind which scarcely admits of being brought to the test of historical truth, and that the examples furnished of it in the New Testament arose from necessity rather than from choice. Dr Davidson (in his Hermeneutics), we are glad to see, proceeds farther, justifies and approves of typical interpretations; though he still also speaks of allegorical interpretations, not as essentially different from typical, but only as " an excessive use of the true spiritual interpretation contained in the New Testament." (Pp. 68, 69).

2. But we must now refer more particularly to the sentiments of that class, whom the new turn of thought and inquiry has led greatly to curtail the typical matter of Scripture--to whom, undoubtedly, Klausen belongs. Here, however, we do not need to go to writers in a foreign tongue for our authorities; we have them in our own. Thus in the Connection and Harmony of the Old and New Testament, by Dr L. Alexander, 1841, while he follows Bahr in the mode of explaining some of the leading symbols of the Old Testament, and finds in them typical representations of the realities of the gospel, he declares himself opposed to any further extension of the typical matter of the Old Testament. Nothing in his view is typical which does not possess the character of a "divine institution;" or, as he more formally defines it, "symbolical institutes expressly appointed by God, to prefigure to those among whom they were set up certain great transactions in connection with that plan of redemption which, in the fulness of time, was to be unfolded to mankind." Hence all of what are called the historical types, even those which Marsh and his followers were wont to allow on account of the special explanations given of them in the New Testament, are entirely discarded; the use made of them in the New Testament is held to be "for illustration merely, and not for the purpose of building anything oil them;" it does not properly constitute them types.

This view has recently been taken up, and at much greater length defended, in a periodical work, which, though a production of America, is not unknown in this country--the Ecclesiastical and Literary Journal of Mr Lord. The part to which we more particularly refer is an article that appeared in No. XV., containing an elaborate review of the first edition of the Typology, and endeavouring to overthrow the views maintained in it, as "a monstrous scheme," not only "without the sanction of the word of God," but "one of the boldest and most effective contrivances for its subversion." This certainly is strong language, yet it is only a fair specimen of the harsh and contemptuous phraseology which pervades the article, and which too commonly characterizes both the pen and the school of the writer. We have no intention of taking any particular notice either of these or of the palpable misrepresentations with which they are not unfrequently accompanied. We mean simply to examine the grounds on which the reviewer principally rests his opposition to our typological principles, and succeeds so entirely to his own satisfaction in cutting off much from the typical category in Scripture that we hold to belong to it.

The process, indeed, is a very brief and simple one. He first sets forth a delineation of the nature and characteristics of a type, so tightened and compressed as to admit of nothing but what pertained to "the tabernacle worship, or the propitiation and homage of God;" this, in his judgment, embraces the entire sphere of the typical. And having thus oracularly settled the chief point (for he seems to think anything in the shape of proof quite unnecessary), it becomes an easy matter to discard whatever else may be called typical; for it is put to flight the moment he presents his exact definitions, and can only be considered typical by persons of dreamy intellect, who are utter strangers to clearness of thought and precision of language. In this way it is possible, we admit, and also not very difficult, to make out a scheme and establish a nomenclature of one's own; but the question is, does it accord with the representations of Scripture? and will it serve, in respect to these, as a guiding and harmonizing principle? We might, in a similar way, draw out a series of precise and definite characteristics of Messianic prophecy--such as, that it must avowedly bear the impress of a prediction of the future--that it must clearly and distinctly point to the person or times of Messiah--that it must be conveyed in language capable of no ambiguity or double reference--and then, with this sharp weapon in our hand, proceed summarily to lop off all supposed prophetical passages in which these characteristics are wanting--holding such, if applied to Messianic times, to be mere accommodations, originally intended for one thing, and afterwards loosely adapted to another. The rationalists of a former generation were great adepts in this mode of handling prophetical Scripture, and by the use of it dexterously got over nearly one-half of the passages which in the New Testament are represented as finding their fulfilment in Christ. But we have yet to learn, that by so doing they succeeded in throwing any satisfactory light on the interpretation of Scripture, or in placing on a Scriptural basis the connection between the Old and the New in God's dispensations.

How closely the principles of Mr Lord lead him to tread in the footsteps of these effete interpreters, will appear presently. But we must first lodge our protest against his account of the essential nature and characteristics of a type, as entirely arbitrary and unsupported by Scripture. The things really possessing this character, he maintains, must have had the following distinctive marks: They must have been specifically constituted types by God; must have been known to be so constituted, and contemplated as such by those who had to do with them; and must hare been continued till the coming of Christ, when they were abrogated or superseded by something analogous in the Christian dispensation. These are his essential elements in the constitution of a type; and an assertion of the want of these forms the perpetual refrain, with which he disposes of those characters and transactions, that in his esteem are falsely accounted typical. We demur to every one of them in the sense understood by our opponent, and challenge him, or any other person, to produce any scriptural proof of them, as applying to the strictly religious symbols of the Old Testament worship, and to them alone. These were not specifically constituted types, or formally set up in that character, no more than such transactions as the deliverance from Egypt, or the preservation of Noah in the deluge, which he denies to have been typical. In the manner of their appointment, viewed by itself, there is no more to indicate a reference to the Messianic future in the one than in the other. Neither were they for certain known to be types, and used as such by the Old Testament worshippers. They unquestionably were not in the time of our Lord; and how far they may have been so at any previous period, is a matter only of doubtful speculation, and nowhere of express revelation. Nor, finally, was it by any means an invariable and indispensable characteristic, that they should have continued in use till they were superseded by something analogous in the Christian dispensation. They might have partly stood; the redemption from Egypt, for example, did stand, in a transaction which was incapable of being so continued. It was a creative act, bringing Israel as a people of God into formal existence, and as such capable only of being commemorated, but not of being repeated, or rendered in itself perpetual. It was commemorated, however, in the passover-feast. In that feast the Israelites continually freshened the remembrance of it anew on their hearts. They in spirit re-enacted it as a thing that required to be ever renewing itself in their personal experience, precisely as Christians do now through the Supper in regard to the one great redemption-act of Christ upon the cross. This also, considered simply as an act in God's administration, is incapable of being repeated; it can only be commemorated, and in its effects spiritually applied to the conscience. Yet so far from being thereby bereft of an antitypical character, it is the central antitype of the gospel. Why should it be otherwise in respect to the type? The analogy of things favours it; and the testimony of Scripture not doubtfully requires it.

To say nothing of other passages of Scripture which bear less explicitly, though to our mind very materially upon the subject, our Lord himself, at the celebration of the last passover, declared to his disciples, "With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer; for I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God." (Luke xxii. 15, 16.) There is a prophecy (what else can the words mean?) as well as a memorial in this commemorative ordinance, --a prophecy, because it is the rehearsal of a typical transaction, which is now, and only now, going to meet with its full realisation. Such appears to me the plain and unsophisticated import of our Lord's words. And the Apostle Paul is, if possible, still more explicit: "For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us; therefore let us keep the feast," &c. (1 Cor. v. 7, 8.) What, we again ask, are we to understand by these words, if not that there is in the design and appointment of Grod an ordained connection between the sacrifice of Christ and the sacrifice of the Passover, so that the one, as the means of redemption, takes the place of the other? In any other sense the language would be only fitted to mislead, by begetting apprehensions regarding a mutual correspondence and connection which had no existence. But what says our opponent? "Christ is indeed said to be our passover, but it is by a metaphor, and indicates only, that it is by his blood we are saved from everlasting death, as the first-born of the Hebrews were saved by the blood of the paschal lamb from death by the destroying angel." Why could not the apostle have so expressed himself if that was all he meant? If there was no real connection between the earlier and the later event, and the one stood as much apart from the other as the lintels of Goshen in themselves did from the cross of Calvary, why employ language that forces upon every unbiassed mind the reality of a proper connection? Simply, we believe, because it actually existed; and our "exegetical conscience" refuses to be satisfied with Mr Lord's mere metaphor. But when he states further, that the passover, having been "appointed with a reference to the exemption of the first-born of the Israelites from the death that was to be inflicted on the first-born of the Egyptians, it cannot be a type of Christ's death for the sins of the world, as that would imply that Christ's death also was commemorative of the preservation from an analogous death,"--a child might tell him, that he confounds between the passover as an original redemptive transaction, and as a commemorative ordinance, pointing back to the original institution, and perpetually rehearsing it. It is as a festal solemnity alone that there can be anything commemorative belonging either to the Paschal sacrifice or to Christ's. Viewed, however, as redemptive acts, there was a sufficient analogy between them: the one redeemed the firstborn of Israel (the élite of its families), and the other redeems "the Church of the first-born, whose names are written in heaven."

There is the same sort of trifling with the testimony of Scripture in most of the other instances examined by the reviewer. Christ, for example, calls himself, with pointed reference to the manna, "the bread of life" and in Rev. ii. 17, an interest in his divine life is called "an eating of the hidden manna "but it is only "by a metaphor," precisely as Christ elsewhere calls himself the vine, or is likened to a rock. As if there were no difference between an employment of these natural emblems and the identifying of Christ with the supernatural food given to support his people, after a typical redemption, and on the way to a typical inheritance. It is not the simple reference to a temporal good on which, in such a case, we rest the typical import, but this in connection with the whole of the relations and circumstances in which the temporal was given or employed. Jonah was not, it is alleged, a type of Christ; for he is not called such, but only "a sign;" neither was Melchizedec called by that name. Well, but Adam is called a type (*** ***, Rom. v. 14), and baptism is called the antitype to the deluge (*** ***, 1 Pet. iii. 21). True, but then, we are told, the word in these passages only means a similitude; it does not mean type or antitype in the proper sense. What, then, could denote it? Is there any other term more properly fitted to express the idea? And if the precise term, when it is employed, still does not serve, why object in other cases to the want of it? Strange, surely, that its presence and its absence should be alike grounds of objection. But if the matter is to come to this mere stickling about words, shall we have any types at all? Are even the tabernacle and its institutions of worship called by that name? Not once; but, inversely, the designation of antitypes is in one passage applied to them: "The holy places made with hands, the antitypes of the true," (*** ***, Heb. ix. 24.) So little does Scripture, in its teachings on this subject, encourage us to hang our theoretical explanations on a particular epithet! It varies the mode of expression with all the freedom of common discourse, and even, as in this last particular instance, inverts the current phraseology; but still, amid the variety, it indicates with sufficient plainness a real economical connection between the past and the present in God's dispensations,---such as is commonly understood by the terms type and antitype; and it is not for want of scriptural evidence if any fail to perceive it.

Our reviewer furnishes us still further with a specimen of his dialectical skill, in the remarks he makes on the passage in Galatians respecting Sarah and Isaac on the one side, and Hagar and Ishmael on the other. He begins, as usual, with telling us, that there is nothing typical expressed in the characters and relations there mentioned; for they are not any of them called types; nor, we may add, if they had been, would it have brought us a whit nearer the mark. "It is only said," he continues, "that that which is related of Hagar and Sarah is exhibited allegorically; that is, that there are other things that, used as allegorical representatives of Hagar and Sarah, exhibit the same facts and truths. The object of the allegory is to exemplify them by analogous things; not by them to exemplify something else, to which they present a resemblance. It is they that are said to be allegorized, that is, represented by something else; not something else that is allegorized by them. They are accordingly said to be the two covenants, that is, like the two covenants; and Mount Sinai is used to represent the covenant that genders to bondage; and Jerusalem from above, that is, the Jerusalem of Christ's kingdom, the covenant of freedom or grace. And they accordingly are employed [by the apostle] to set forth the character and condition of the bond and the free woman, and their offspring. He attempts to illustrate the lot of the two classes who are under law and under grace; first, by referring to the different relations to the covenant, and different lot of the children of the bond and the free woman; and then, by using Mount Sinai to exemplify the character and condition of those under the Mosaic law, and the heavenly Jerusalem, to exemplify those who are under the gospel. The places from which the two covenants are proclaimed are thus used to represent those two classes; not Hagar and Sarah to represent those places, or the covenants that are proclaimed from them." Now, this parade of petty criticism--professing to explain all, and yet leaving the main thing totally unexplained--is introduced, let it be observed, to expose an alleged "singular neglect of discrimination," in the use we had made of the passage. We had, it seems, been guilty of the extraordinary mistake of supposing Hagar and Sarah to be themselves the representatives in the apostle's allegorization, and not, as we should have done, the objects represented. Does any of our readers, with all the advantage of the reviewer's explanation, recognise the importance of this distinction? Or can he tell how it serves to explicate the apostle's argument? His mind must be differently constituted from ours if it has not well-nigh driven from his mind any distinct conception of the real subject of discourse. In itself it might have been of no moment, though it is of some for the apostle's argument, whether Hagar and Sarah be said to represent the two covenants of law and grace, or the two covenants be said to represent them; as in Heb. ix. 24, it is of no moment whether the earthly sanctuary be called the antitype of the heavenly, or the heavenly of the earthly. There is in both cases alike a mutual representation, or relative correspondence; and it is the nature of the correspondence, inferior and preparatory in the one case, spiritual and ultimate in the other, which is chiefly important. It is that (though entirely overlooked by the reviewer) which makes the apostle's appeal here to the historical transactions in the family of Abraham suitable and appropriate to the object he has in view.

We shall gather into a few sentences what, at different places in the former edition, we actually said respecting this passage in Galatians. We first stated, in a quotation from Bishop Marsh, that though the apostle here calls his reference to the historical transactions an allegorizing of them, he did not convert them into allegory in the ordinary sense. He did not treat them as fabulous; he did nothing more, in fact, than represent one class of characters and relations as types, and the other as antitypes. As Tholuck also justly remarks in regard to it, that the allegorizing presented is "nothing else than the typical meaning, and the typical exposition here also admits of a perfect justification." [25] Then, secondly, in opposition to Dr Alexander, we affirmed that the apostle's reference to the things connected with Hagar and Sarah conld not have been for illustration merely, or with the design simply of presenting an apt similitude; it must have proceeded on the ground of a real, valid, and divinely-appointed connection between the things compared. For how else could the apostle have introduced it with a call to the Galatians to hear the law?" "Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?" Could he have honestly made such an appeal in respect to a mere play of fancy, or anything not strictly binding on the conscience? It is a summons to hear the authoritative word of God; which necessarily implies, that the transactions referred to in the case of Hagar and of Sarah were of the nature of a revelation, purposely ordered and arranged to teach on the narrower and lower sphere of domestic life, what was afterwards to take place nationally and spiritually in connection with the covenants of law and grace. But this, in our view, is all one with saying that the one was expressly designed to be to the spiritual eye a type and foreshadowing of the other. Lastly, as to the specific import of the passage, we had substantially said before, and we now repeat, that the tenor of the apostle's statement, and the place it holds in his train of argument, not only warrant, but even oblige us to regard the two mothers as the representatives of the two covenants, rather than inversely; for it is by the mothers and their natural offspring he intends to throw light on the covenants and their respective tendencies and results. It was the earlier that exemplified and illustrated the later, not the later that exemplified and illustrated the earlier; otherwise the reference of the apostle is misplaced, and the reasoning he founds on it manifestly inconclusive.

One specimen more of our reviewer's criticism, and we shall leave him. Among the passages of Scripture we had referred to, as indicating a typical relationship between the old and the new in God's dispensations, is Matth. ii. 15, where the Evangelist speaks of Christ being in Egypt till the death of Herod, "that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Out of Egypt have I called my Son." The allusion to this passage in our introductory chapter was never meant to convey the idea that it was the only Scriptural authority for concluding a typical relationship to have subsisted between Israel and Christ. And any one reading for information, and not for objection, might have found in other parts of the work a good deal of Scriptural authority besides this, bearing on the subject. It was, however, referred to as one of the passages most commonly employed by typological writers in proof of such a relationship, and in itself most obviously implying it. But what says our reviewer? "The language of Matthew does not imply that it (the passage in Hosea) was a prophecy of Christ; he simply states, that Jesus continued in Egypt till Herod's death, so that that occurred in respect to him which had been spoken by Jehovah by the prophet, Out of Egypt have I called my Son; or, in other words, so that that was accomplished in respect to Christ which had been related by the prophet of Israel." Had we not good reason for saying that our author's principles inevitably led him, as an interpreter of Scripture, to tread in the footsteps of the rationalists? One might suppose that it was a comment of Paulus or Kuinoel that we were here presented with, and we transfer the paraphrase of the latter to the bottom of the page, to shew how entirely they agree in spirit. [26] If the Evangelist simply meant what is ascribed to him, was he so unskilled in the ordinary use of language as not to be able plainly to express it? Or, if the words he employs distinctly indicate such a connection between Christ and Israel, as gave to the testimony in Hosea the force of a prophecy (which must be the impression of every unbiassed reader), what shall we say of the arbitrary and sophistical sense, which the reviewer thinks himself entitled to put even on the words of inspiration? And this, too, from one who hardly knows how to express his astonishment that such a work as the Typology should have appeared "at a period when the principles of language are more thoroughly investigated than in any former age, and the whole body of the learned hold, that the sacred volume, like other writings, is to be interpreted by the laws of philology!" "Physician, heal thyself!" It is no solitary example of rationalistic interpretation of which our reviewer has here been guilty. The antagonistic position he has taken up against all historical and prophetical types of necessity requires a similar mode of getting rid of a great many other applications of the Old Testament in the New. But as we mean to treat of this separately, and at some length, in a subsequent part of the work, we shall not further refer to it here. And, in conclusion, we trust we have said enough to shew that, while we hold the school of Marsh to have erred by way of defect in limiting the typical matter of ancient Scripture to what has been specially noticed as typical in Scripture itself, it was still fully justified in finding express warrant in Scripture for a good deal of such matter beyond the province of religious symbol and sacrificial worship. There are principles of interpretation authorised and sanctioned in New Testament Scripture, which furnish ample ground for maintaining the existence of a typical connection, to a considerable extent, between the old and the new, in respect also to the historical and prophetical portions of the old,--a typical connection substantially alike, though, we do not say in all respects perfectly agreeing, to that attaching to the institutions and services of religion. Even among these there were some shades of diversity as to the precise form and kind of correspondence between type and antitype; and other diversities naturally arose when the connection passed into the region of history and prophecy. This was implied in the first edition of the Typology. But, I admit, it was not with sufficient distinctness exhibited. And, among the improvements introduced into the present edition, will be found both a more clear and orderly enunciation of the fundamental principles of the subject, and a more discriminating exhibition of the differences between one portion of what is typical and another.

Notes

1 Opera, vol. ii. p. 88, Ed. Delarue.

2 Ibid. p. 29.

3. On Psalm xli.

4. On Psalm xlii.

5. Those who wish to read farther regarding the typical and allegorical interpretations of the Fathers may consult Bishop Marsh's Eleventh Lecture on the Interpretation of the Bible, Davidson's Hermeneutics, or Klausen's Hermeneutik, where the subject is treated with some diversity, and also at some length. The major part of our readers perhaps may be of opinion that they have already been detained too long with the subject, believing that such interpretations are for ever numbered among the things that were. So we had ourselves almost begun to think. And yet we have lived to see a substantial revival of the allegorical style of interpretation in a work that has only of late been issuing from the press, and a work that bears the marks of an accomplished and superior mind. We refer to that portion of Mr Worsley's Province of the Intellect in Religion, which treats of the Patriarchs in their Christian import, and the Apostles as the completion of the Patriarchs. It is impossible not to regret that one who can think and write so well, and who has unfolded such spiritual and elevated views of the divine life, should in this part of his scheme of doctrine lay for himself so fanciful a foundation, and while maintaining the reality of the facts recorded in patriarchal and apostolical history, should yet transfigure them into something entirely ideal and visionary. His notion respecting the Patriarchs briefly is, that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob respectively "present to us the eternal triune object" of worship,-- Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; that the marriages of the Patriarchs symbolize God's union with his church, and with each member of it; and especially is this done through the wives and children of Jacob, at least in regard to its practical tendency and sanctifying results. In making out the scheme, the names of the persons are peculiarly dwelt upon as furnishing a sort of key to the allegorical interpretation. Thus Leah, whose name means wearisome and fatiguing labour, was the symbol of "services and works which are of little worth in themselves--labours rather of a painful and reluctant duty, than of a free and joyful love." "She sets forth to us that fundamental repulsiveness or stubhornness of our nature, whose proper and ordained discipline is the daily task-work of duty, as done not to man, nor to self, but to God." Afterwards, Leah is identified with the ox, as the symbol of stubbornness and wearisome labour; and so "with Leah the ox symbolizes our task-work of duty, and our capacity for it," while the sheep (Rachel signifying sheep), symbolizes "our labours of love, i. e. our real rest, and capacity for it."--(P. 71, 113, 128.) One may guess from this specimen what ingenuities require to be plied before the author can get through all the twelve sons of Jacob, so as to make them symbols of the different graces and operations of a Christian life. We object to the entire scheme,--1. Because it is perfectly arbitrary. Though Scripture sometimes warrants us in laying stress on names, as expressive of spiritual ideas or truths connected with the persons they belonged to, yet it is only when the history itself lays stress on them, and even then they never stand alone, as the names often do with Mr Worsley, the only keys to the import of the transactions; so that where acts entirely fail, or where they appear to be at variance with the symbolic ideal, the key were still to be found in the name. Scripture nowhere, for example, lays any stress upon the names of Leah and Rachel; while it very pointedly refers to the bad eyes .of the one, and the attractive comeliness of the other. And if we were inclined to allegorize at all, we should deem it more natural, with Justin Martyr (Trypho, c. 42,) and Jerome (on Hos. xii. 3,) to regard Leah as the symbol of the blear-eyed Jewish church, and Rachel of the beloved church of the gospel. Even this, however, is quite arbitrary, for there is nothing properly in common between the symbol and the thing symbolized--no real bond of connection uniting them together. And if by tracing out such lines of resemblance, we might indulge in a pleasing exercise of fancy, we can never deduce from them a revelation of God's mind and will. 2. But farther, such explanations offend against great fundamental principles--the principle, for example, that the Father cannot be represented as entering into union with the Church, viewed as distinct from the Son and the Spirit; and the principle that a sinful act or an improper relation cannot be the symbol of what is divine and holy. In such a case there never can be any real agreement. Who, indeed, can calmly contemplate the idea of Abraham's connection with Hagar, or Jacob's connection with the two sisters and their handmaids--in themselves both manifestly wrong, and receiving on them the stamp of God's displeasure in providence--should be the chosen symbol of God's own relation to the Church? How very different an allegorizing of this sort is from anything sanctioned in Scripture will be shewn in the sequel. As for the correspondence between the apostles and the patriarchs individually--which Mr Worsley, in his last volume, endeavours to make out as necessary to the full symbolic exhibition of divine truth and righteousness--it appears to us so entirely destitute even of the semblance of verisimilitude, that any refutation is unnecessary. The mere facts that, according to his scheme, Peter, the first of the apostles, answers to Simeon, the least favourably known and most unimportant of the heads of Israel, and Andrew to Judah; while Simon Zelotes, the all but unknown apostle, represents a higher phase of the Christian life than Simon the son of Jonas--such facts shew how fanciful the scheme is which Mr Worsley has here been labouring to build, and how completely the evangelical narrative has been made to assume the form of his own preconceived notions.

6. On Gal. iv. 26.

7. On Gal. iv. 22.

8. Philologia Sac. Lib. II. P. I. Tract. II. sect. 4. Vitringa Obs. Sac. Vol. II. Lib. VI. c. 20. Witsius De Econom. Lib. IV. c. 6.

9. The Figures and Types of the Old Testament.

10. Key to open the Scripture Metaphors and Types.

11. The Types unveiled, or the Gospel picked out of the Legal Ceremonies.

12. Moses and Aaron.

13. Moses unveiled.

14. In the reference made above to the beginnings of David's kingdom, it will be understood that the characters he associated with himself are simply viewed in the light contemplated by the writers we now contend against. My own conviction is, that 1 Sam. xxii. 2, if rightly interpreted, would present those who gathered themselves to David as spiritually the better sort in Israel--those who were partly made bankrupt by oppression; and partly were grieved and vexed in their minds at the existing state of things.

15. The following critique of Buddeus, which belongs to the earlier part of last century, already points in this direction: "It cannot certainly be denied that the Cocceians, at least some of them, have carried this matter too far. For, besides that they everywhere seem to find images and types of future things, where other people can discern none, when they come to make the application to the antitype, they not unfrequently descend to minute and even trifling things, nay, advance what is utterly insignificant and ludicrous, exposing holy writ to the mockery of the profane. And here it may be proper to notice the fates of exegetical theology; since that intemperate rage for allegories which appeared in Origen and the Fathers, and which had been condemned by the schoolmen, was again, after an interval, though under a different form, produced anew upon the stage. For this typical interpretation differs from the allegorical only in the circumstance, that respect is had in it to the future things which are adumbrated by the types; and so, the typical may be regarded as a sort of allegorical interpretation. But in either way the amplest scope is afforded for the play of a luxuriant fancy and a fertile invention."--I. F. Buddei Isagoge II. hist. Theolog. 1830.

16. Obs. Sac. Vol. II. p. 460, 461. 

17. Clarke's Evidences, p. 420, sq. Jortin's Remarks on Ecclesiastical History, Vol. I. p. 138-152.

18. Grace and Truth, or the Glory and Fulness of the Redeemer displayed, in an attempt to explain the Types, Figures, and Allegories of the Old Testament, by the Rev. W. M'Ewen.

19. Hutchinson's Works, Vol. I. p. 202.

20. Ibid. Vol. VII. p. 325.

21. Lectures, p. 373.

22. Stuart's Ernesti, p. 13,

23. We don't vouch, of course, for the absolute completeness of the above list. Indeed, it is scarcely possible to know what would be regarded as a complete list--some feeling satisfied with an amount of recognition in Scripture which seems quite insufficient in the eyes of others. There have been those who, on the strength of Gen. xlix. 24, would insert Joseph among the specially mentioned types, and claim also Sampson, on account of what is written in Judges xiii. 5. But scriptural warrants of such a kind are out of date now--they can no longer be regarded as current coin. On the other hand, there are not a few who deem the scriptural warrant insufficient for some of those we have specified, and think the passages, where they are noticed, refer to them merely in the way of illustration. The list, however, comprises what are usually regarded as historical types, having the authority of Scripture, by writers belonging to the school of Marsh. The arguments of those who would discard them altogether, shall he considered under next division.

24. Lectures, p. 372.

25. Das Alte Testament im Neuen, p. 38.

26. Ut adeo hic recte possit laudari, quod dominus olim interprete propheta dixit, nempe: ex AEgypto vocavi filium meum.