shepherds'. So had Isaac: Yea, we meet with a very ancient nation, and whose kings made a figure in both sacred and profane history, to whom the character of shepherd was an abomination 3. And therefore I call upon these rash assertors to produce particular instances, where kings in person fed their own flocks; or where a poem in praise of a king was ever called a pastoral. Homer indeed calls his Agamemnon, μeva λaw, shepherd of the people. Do we, on that account, call the Iliad a Pastoral? The case is the same here; the first public appearance of the female character is her being brought into the king's chambers:' And through the whole, her beloved is as much spoken of in the character of king, as of a shepherd. Am I then denying, some will say, the united character of king and shepherd in the person of Christ? God forbid: I glory in the union, and would have it still remembered; which the pastoral fancy I think does not. The scripture, I know, describes him as a shepherd; what is the use of a Homer or a Virgil to justify the description? Yea, it would seem from scripture, that the united character of king and shepherd was peculiar to Christ; and he himself appears to lay stress upon this, in St John x. 4-16. Let a parallel instance be produced from other kings. A vague way of affirming will not serve. It is not even so satis I Gen. xiii. 7. 3 Gen. xlvi. 34. 2 Gen, vi. 20. satisfying as the common, but lame method of accounting for Melchisedec's being both king and priest, from the testimony of Virgil, near two thousand years after, with his, so much quoted, one instance of Rex Anius, rex idem hominum Phœbique sacerdos Anius, king of men, and priest of Phoebus.' I should not have insisted so much on this, if I did not see such a valuable piece of scripture, as the Song of Solomon, debased by calling it a Pastoral, made up of fiction, and upon that plan quite unintelligible without it. Fiction is surely too harsh a word to apply to any thing of divine composition; and, if once it be admitted, there is no saying where the wild work may end. That Christ is our shepherd, and makes us to rest at noon, (in brightnesses), is literally true, and undoubtedly certain: why suppose, or bring in fiction? The church had had her shahar, her morning, twilight, greyness; and now longs for, and expresses her faith of and in that meridian brightness of light and illumination, which she expected from her shepherd; as she prays in the language of another of her bards, O shepherd of Israel, that leadest Joseph like a flock, shine forth';' agreeably to the prophetic promise, which the apocalypt saw realized in vision, in Revel. xxi. 23, 24. where the church is described resting literally in brightnesses, in an everlasting noon, kept up by that true source and *I Psalm 1xxx. 1. and Father of lights, with whom is no parallax 'nor tropic shadow '.' For why should I be as one that turneth aside by the flocks of thy companions ?-Any difficulty here may be thought to lie in the phrase thy companions,' or who they are; 'Targv σ8, in the Gr. of the LXX. the brew is 7, habrica. This is the first time that these companions are spoken of; and tho' they are only once more mentioned, the pastoral sense finds great use for them. It seems they were such as had flocks, and the church, the spouse, was afraid of being entangled (by Heb. Tegßaλλoμavn LXX. • ope'riens super se' Arias-covered, veiled, surrounded) among them. What could they be? The original word habar, by use, is to conjoin, associate, &c. and is often taken in an ill sense, as the corresponding Greek craig and 'raigia are, even so far as to signify enchantment, conjuration 3, &c. We have the word again applied to Christ, in Psalm xlv. 7. ' the oil of gladness above ( habarca, sin'gular) thy fellows,' as all the translations render it plural in what sense is the question. We have : ”, a key to this, I think, in Psalm xciv. 20. Shall the 'throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee, • be thy habar, συμπροσεται σοι, LXX. Compare 2 Cor. vi. 15. What concord, ouμwnois, has VOL. II. 1 St James i. 17. A a 'Christ 2 Chap. viii. 13. 3 Deut. xviii. 11.-a charmer. Ps. lviii. 5.-charmers charming wisely. Isaiah xlvii. 12.-with thine enchantments. Christ with Belial?' Belial, singular, like the habar in the xlvth Psalm: but such a singular as the devil's name '-' 'My name is legion, for we are many.' Belial, and such like, we know, were set up, or did set up themselves, to be fellows, associates, &c. with Christ. This was the core of rottenness in the heathen idolatry; and, on the foundation of this unlawful association, were built their charmings, enchantments, &c. But these fellows had not the prophetic oil, the oil of gladness: for I do not see that either the psalmist's expression, or the apostle's quotation of it, forbids this acceptation. Indeed we have a fellow mentioned to the Lord of hosts that cannot come under this intendment: 'A'wake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow 3. Here the Hebrew is "y ommithi, #λITY μo LXX. proximus meus, my neighbour, which rather confirms than contradicts what I am advancing. therefore, the Baals and who usurped the names, into the offices, of Christ, so were literally the antichrists of antiquity, had their worshippers, their flocks, and that too in great abundance. From these flocks, these fellowships of all such false usurping associates, the church prays here to be preserved, to be guided out of their reach, to be di 1 St Mark v. 9. s Zech. xiii. 7. These habri, or fellows, Molochs, and all such, and intruded themselves 2 Heb. i. 9. rected 41 St John ii. 18. rected, led to her beloved, the true, the real, the only shepherd'. VER. 8.-If thou knowest not, O thou fairest among women, go thy way forth by the footsteps of the flock, and feed thy kids beside the shepherds tents. בעקבי הצאן Her prayer, we see, is heard, and a direction granted: but by whom? Not by the virgins; as some paraphrasers allege, but bring no proof for it, as indeed they have none to bring. There is more in the direction than the virgins could grant. The address was to the beloved, and it is the beloved who answers it. He directs her to the footsteps of the flock amongst the paths, the 'heel-marks of the flock,' singular, and with the the emphatic, corresponding with the Greek article, the one particular flock, distinguished by another word, 'tzan,' from the flocks, herds (odri plural) of the companions. The Messiah, Christ, has his heel-marks, as in Psalm lxxxix. 51. they have ' reproached the footsteps of thy Christ;' and again, in Psalm lxxvii. 19.thy footsteps are not known, 'thou leddest thy people like a flock.' This flock, with their shepherd at their head, leading them out, leave footsteps, marks of their course in feeding, to be a direction to followers. And, as Christ's flock has existed from the beginning, these footsteps are old. So says Jeremiah, Ask 'for II St Peter ii. 25. A a 2 6 2 St John x. 3. |