PREFACE. In the passage of scripture, of which the following Dissertation treats, the prophetical evidence of christianity is subjected to the test of chronological computation. If it stand that test, when fairly, though strictly applied, through a clear and consistent interpretation, the unbeliever, there is reason to hope, may be awakened, if not converted, and the objector, if not satisfied, silenced. On the other hand, a total failure under the application must be a stunning and almost deadly blow to the cause, which, having challenged the severity of so searching an ordeal, is found unable to endure in the hour of proof. Certainly no apprehension of such a fatal result was entertained by Sir Isaac Newton, who ventures to speak of this prophecy, as the foundation of the christian religion*: and in all ages of the * "To reject his (i. e. Daniel's) prophecies, is to reject the christian religion. For this religion is founded upon HIS PROPHECY CONCERNING THE MESSIAH." By that particular prophecy he unquestionably means this of the seventy weeks: for this is emphatically THE PROPHECY CONCERNING THE MESSIAH: who is not mentioned by the same name elsewhere in the book of Daniel. Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel, p. 25. church it has been esteemed by well-instructed christians, as fundamental to the "building up of themselves on their most holy faith," at least so far as its prophetical evidences are concerned, and consequently, as capable of sustaining the pressure of any weight that can be brought to bear upon it. It must however be confessed, that the explications of this prophecy, which have been given. and maintained by the most learned and laborious expositors, are very various and discordant ; insomuch that there are now few particulars of it, in which the student does not find himself obliged to decide between conflicting opinions supported by great ingenuity and erudition, as well as zeal. So long ago, as the time of Jerome those opinions were numerous, and that learned father thought it hazardous to decide between them. "I am well aware," saith he*, "that this subject has been repeatedly discussed by men of profound learning to the best of their abilities†, and yet they have formed different judgments upon it. Therefore, since it is dangerous to decide between the masters of the church and to prefer one before * Hieronymi Comment. in Danielem, Op. Tom. 5, p. 725, Ed. Basil. + The edition I use, reads pro raptu ingenii sui; I conjecture the true reading to be captu, and have rendered accordingly. another, I will content myself with setting down their several opinions, leaving it to the discretion of the reader to determine whose exposition he may think fit to follow." This was doubtless a very safe determination; and by adopting it I might with no great trouble have made a larger volume than the present; but I think with any thing else than satisfaction to the reader. For Jerome himself afterwards states or recounts no less than seven opinions; those of Africanus, Eusebius, Hippolytus, Apollinarius Laodicenus, Clemens Alexandrinus, Origen, and Tertullian. Pererius numbers up fifteen, and having refuted them all, left a sixteenth, as Frischmuth observes, to be refuted by others. Mr. Faber also notices the interpretations of fourteen expositors and adds his own, from which I find myself obliged to record my dissent, when I propose a new one. If indeed the seventy weeks had been one of those prophetic visions, in which the subjects of prediction are shadowed out in types and symbols, such discrepances would be less surprising. But here we have a precise and plain declaration concerning times and events to come, delivered in proper and unadorned language, and affording, as it should seem, no great scope for critical ingenuity to strike out diversities, much less oppositions of significations. The difficulties arising from two or three various readings of small importance, from one or two singular and uncommon words, and from any questions founded on the connexion of the sentences and their several clauses, are wholly inadequate to account for that great variety and even contrariety of opinions entertained and expressed by christian critics and commentators of all ages: whence it may be argued, that, exclusively of the language and style of the prophecy, there must be some serious causes of doubt and error in the substance of it, out of which such manifold and wide disagreements have sprung. Those causes are discernible in the number of periods, or terms of weeks, which, taken together both principal and subordinate, amount to no less than seven, and in the difficulty of distinguishing and adjusting them in such a manner, as to bring them to a consistency with one another, with the facts appointed to each, and with true chronological dates. For mistakes herein not only affect the proper assignment of historical events to their corresponding predictions; but being, by the resolute attempts of commentators to fabricate a meaning conformable to their own opinions, reflected on the prophecy itself, they become the occasion of producing or adopting forced constructions and erroneous translations, and even of proposing groundless conjectures, or bringing forward various readings of such slight authority as to be little less dangerous than mere conjectures, and fastening them on the sacred text. Such treatment of this divine oracle is the more to be lamented, perhaps I ought to say, the less to be excused, since there is reason to think, that no inconsiderable portion of its obscurity may be the effect of design in its original construction. If this be true, it is certain, that a laborious and patient investigation of what we find actually written is the only means calculated to produce a true interpretation, as well as alone consistent with humility and sober piety; while the less gentle methods above mentioned can lead to nothing better than plausible error, and as they remove one difficulty, will probably leave or create others. Although it was undoubtedly the intention of the Divine Spirit to make his prophetic communications, by their completion, testimonies to the truth of revelation, and in the mean time also to raise in the minds of men an awful expectation of "the things that are coming and shall come," yet nothing could be farther from purpose than to enable the students of his sacred records to enact the parts of inspired pro his phets by foreseeing and foretelling with certainty |