CHA P. IV. EMINENT CHARACTERS TYPICAL OF CHRIST. 1. ADAM. 2. MELCHIZEDEK. 3. ISAAC AND ISMAEL. 4. ISAAC. 5. JOSEPH. 6 MOSES. MARAH. MANNA. MASSAH AND MERIBAH. THE BRAZEN SERPENT. 7. AARON. 8. ELI THE life and office of the Meffiah are Eminent not only described by the ceremonial observances of the Law, but they are also darkly exhibited in a long succession of typical characters, from the very beginning of the world. In the fhadows of the Jewish church, the chofen people of God beheld the realities of the Gospel; and in the most illuftrious of the Patriarchs, they contem plated the attributes of the expected Saviour of the world. The Lord of Life has now accomplished his miffion, and has clearly fhewn himself to be the end of the Law of Mofes. The obfcurity of the Levitical difpenfation is removed, and all the K 3 ancient characters typical of Chrift SECT. ancient Scriptures are found to preach the II. advent of a fuffering Redeemera. I. Adam. 2. Melchize 1. The first typical delineation of Chrift occurs in the very beginning of the Pentateuch. As Adam is the head of the natural world, fo is Chrift of the spiritual; confequently, by exactly inverting the character of Adam, we obtain a complete defcription of the character of Christ. Death was the refult of Adam's tranfgreffion; life everlasting is the fruit of Chrift's perfect obedience. The first Adam was made a living foul; the last Adam a quickening spirit. As the one was prior to the other in point of time; fo does the natural state of man precede his fpiritual regeneration. All men bear the image of the earthy; and all real Chriftians bear the image of the heavenly. For, as Adam is the natural father of the whole human species; fo is Chrift the fpiritual father of many children b. 2. The next type of Chrift, which dedek. mands our attention, is the fingular character of Melchizedek, King of Salem, the a Luke xxiv. 27. b I Cor. xv. 21. Priest of the most high God. No mention CHAP. is made in Scripture either of the parents IV. or descendants of this prince; yet, even Abraham, the father of the faithful, owned his fuperior dignity by paying him tithes. of all, and by accepting his bleffing. Melchizedek, on the other hand, refreshed the fpirits of Abraham, when exhausted by temporal warfare, with bread and wine; as Chrift does, to this day, his fpiritual church militant, with the very fame facramental elements ©. The argument, which St. Paul deduces from the circumftances attending this typical character, is, that the Chriftian difpensation must be of a fuperior nature to the Mofaical, because Abraham, in whose loins Levi the ancestor of Mofes was, owned the fuperiority of Melchizedek, the type of Chrift, by paying tithes to him, and by accepting his bleffing. Confequently, if Abraham was his inferior, all his pofterity must be fo likewife, and among them the Sons of Levi, who compofed the Jewish priesthood. It appears, as if St. Paul meant to have entered more SECT. particularly into the typical resemblance between Melchizedek and the Meffiah, but was deterred from it, by the fpiritual dulnefs of the perfons to whom his Epiftle is addreffed. Chrift is called of God, an High-Pricft after the order of Melchize"dek. Of whom we have many things "to fay, and hard to be uttered, seeing ye "are dull of hearing. For when for the "time ye ought to be teachers, ye have "need that one teach you again which be "the first principles of the oracles of "God d" It has been fuppofed, and not without fome degree of probability, that Melchizedek was even more than a mere type; that he was a visible manifestation of the Son of God. Without venturing to decide upon fo obfcure a fubject, there is no reafon to doubt of the frequent corporeal appearance of the Meffiah, during the period of the Patriarchal and Levitical difpenfations. Whatever fentiments are entertained refpecting the mysterious character of Melchizedek, his illustrious antitype feems evidently to be the perfon spoken d Heb. v. 10. of of in the Hebrew Scriptures, under the CHAP. name of the Angel Jehovah. IV. 3. Ifmael. 3. We are informed by the fame infpired teacher, that the two fons of Abra- Ifaac and ham were typical of the Law and the Gofpel. "It is written, that Abraham had "two fons, the one by a bond-maid, the "other by a free-woman. But he, who "was of the bond-woman, was born after "the flefh: but he of the free-woman "was by promife. Which things are an : allegory for these are the two co"venants; the one from the mount Sinai, "which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar. For this Agar is mount Sinai "in Arabia, and anfwereth to Jerufalem which now is, and is in bondage with "her children. But Jerufalem, which is 66 above, is free, which is the mother of us "all. Now we, brethren, as Ifaac was, "are the children of promise f." It may be obferved, in addition to the foregoing declaration of St. Paul, that as Ifmael was born first, and then Isaac; fo See Gen. xviii. xxxii. 30. and xlviii. 16. Exod. iii. 2. ́and xiv. 19, 24. Judges ii. Dan, iii. 25, &c. Galat. iv. 22. |