CANON FARRAR AND THE BOOK OF DANIEL.
In his late work on the
"Book of Daniel," found in
the "Expositor’s Bible," the Very
Rev. F. W. Farrar, D.D., F.R.S., Dean of Canterbury, Archdeacon of Westminister and late Fellow of Trinity College, has
the following:-
"If our Lord and His
Apostles regarded the Book of Daniel as containing the most explicit prophecies
of Himself and His Kingdom, why did they
never appeal or even allude to it, to prove that he was the promised Messiah?
How came it that neither Christ nor His Apostles ever once alluded, or even
pointed, to the Book of Daniel and the Prophecy of the Seventy Weeks, as
containing the least germ of evidence in favour of Christ’s Mission, or the
Gospel preaching?"
- Book of Daniel, pp. 103, 104. (1895).
This
is simply the reproduction of Kuenen in his "Prophets
of Israel," a work he ordered to be suppressed as death drew near. The assumption is that no such appeal was
made, and the conclusion is that the Book of Daniel has nothing to do with
Jesus Christ, or with any events under the
1. The debate of Jesus with the Jews, recorded in John. As
Messiah, asserting His judical supremacy and authority to hold the Messianic
judgment and bring to pass the resurrection and the life, which Daniel
predicted (Dan. 12: 2, 3; 7: 13), He said:
"I am the Resurrection and the Life." John 11: 25. Still more: "The
Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all
judgment to the Son, and hath given Him authority to execute judgment because
He is the Son of Man;" i.e., because He is the One described
in the Vision of Judgment in the Book of Daniel. Again, "The hour
is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God,
and they that hear shall live," John 5:
22, 25, 27 - a fact fulfilled in the resurrection of Lazarus and at the
crucifixion, and yet to be fulfilled in the last day. The "appeal" is direct to Dan. 7.,
with which Dan. 12. is
inseparably connected. All the reader
has to do is to attach Dan. 12. to the close of Dan. 7. and see the connection. So well was the allusion known, that to have named
the Book of Daniel would have been no less superfluous than to tell us to-day
that the recital of the resurrection of Lazarus may be found in the Gospel of
John. From the vision
in Dan. 7. the
title "Son of Man" -
"Bar Enash"
- given to Messiah, was taken and used by Jesus, the Jews and the Apostles,
84 times in the New Testament. The
appeal to the Book of Daniel to prove that Jesus was a the
"Son of Man" and "Son of God," i.e., Son of the "Father," the "Ancient
of Days," and therefore "Messiah,"
and that to Him the judgment the resurrection and the life were
committed, could not have been more direct. The Jews so understood it, and
"marvelled" that the Nazarene
assumed to Himself prerogatives pertaining only to God. It asserted no less than the supernatural
constitution of the person of Messiah as both God and Man, and, therefore, of
Jesus Himself. Jesus did "appeal," "allude"
and "point" to the Book of Daniel in
proof of His Messianic claims. It is a
Messianic book, and does predict events under the Roman or Fourth Prophetic
Empire, in spite of the Critics, and of Farrar, their second and third hand
imitator and repeater.
2. The answer to the High Priest. In a paroxysm of rage the High Priest, contesting
the claims of Jesus, vociferated, "I adjure thee
by the living God, that thou tell us whether thou be the
Messiah, the Son of God!" Caiaphas himself is
alluding and pointing to Dan. 7. as well as to other prophecies. Could the answer be misunderstood? "Hereafter ye
shall see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of power, and
coming in the clouds of heaven." Matt. 26: 63, 64. Vain the effort of the
critics, saying that the name of the book is not mentioned.
The whole Sanhedrin understood it, and
condemned Him to death for plasphemy. It is needless to say that Jesus identified
Himself with "Son of Man" in that
judgment scene. That He did so in His
Mount Olivet Discourse, two days previously, is self-evident. Matt. 24: 29-31.
3.
Again, did our Lord never once "appeal,"
or so much as "allude" or "point" to the 70 weeks’ prophecy? "These are the
words I spake unto you while I was with you, that all things must be fulfilled
which were written in the law of Moses, and in the
Prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning Me. Then opened He their
understanding that they might understand the Scriptures, and said
unto them. Thus it is written,
and thus it behoved Messiah to suffer
and to rise again from the dead the third day. And, beginning at Moses and all the
Prophets, He expounded unto them, in all the Scriptures, the
things concerning Himself." Luke 24: 27, 44, 45. Here is a dispute between us and the Jews. They refuse to admit a suffering
Messiah. Only 5 days before this
exposition He had dignified Daniel as "Daniel the
Prophet," and, in keen foresight of the Higher Criticism of our
times, as well as in reproof of the critics of His own time, uttered these
words, - a crushing testimony Canon Farrar would take from the Lord’s own mouth
on the authority of two corrupted codices where the expression is omitted! That Daniel’s book was a part of the old Testament "Scriptures"
cannot be denied. Nor can it be denied
that the Book of Daniel, as we have it, was the standard Palestinian and Temple
text of the prophet, turned into Greek 250 years before Christ was born, and
accepted by the Jews, Christ and His Apostles, as part of the God-breathed and
closed canon of the Scriptures, authoritative in the mouth of Christ. Nor can the critics deny that the 70 weeks’
prophecy is the only prophecy in that book which fortells that Messiah should be "cut off" - a Messiah the critics would make
to be "Onias III., B. C. 170!" as Canon Farrar also does, as
a matter of course. Dan. 9: 26. Nor will it be denied that the rubric, "the Psalms," because of their place at the head
of this whole "Third Division" of the Jewish Scriptures, was a title
given to the whole of that division, in which the "Book of Daniel"
stood prominent. The conclusion is
irresistible that, since our Lord expounded "in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself,"
He did not omit to refer to Dan. 9: 26,
containing a signal prediction of His own death, and so did "appeal," allude"
and "point" to the 70 weeks’ prophecy
where that prediction occurs, and only there in Daniel’s book. It is the companion-piece of Isa. 53: 4-13; Zech. 11: 10-13; 13: 1, 7; Ps. 22: 1-21.
Had the Lord only "opened" the understanding of the critics, their
eyes would have seen things now forever hid from them.
4. But, more. Our Lord’s answer as to the destruction of
Jerusalem, His Advent and the End of the Age is built, step by step, on the Book
of Daniel, and appropriates even the terms used by the prophet in his
prediction of the 70 weeks. He combines
in His Olivet Discourse the events found in the closing parts, or Ends, of Daniel, Chapters 2., 7., 9., 11.,
and the whole of 12. - i.e., the events
under the Roman Empire - in one connected prophecy, uses again the title "Son of Man," again confirming His claims by the
Book of Daniel. It is His guide. In Matt. 23: 32,
introducing that discourse, and taking leave of the Temple, the words "Fill ye up the measure of your fathers" are a
direct allusion to the verb "lecalle,"
to "fill up" or "complete the
transgression" in Dan. 9: 24. He "points"
to the "abomination of desolation spoken of by
Daniel the prophet." Matt. 24: 15; Dan.
9: 27; 11: 31; 12: 11. He
interprets Daniel’s expression, "Unto the End, war,"
Dan. 9: 26, as "Until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled," Luke 21: 24, and in all shows that He is the
Messiah of the 70 weeks’ prophecy, and
will come in the clouds of heaven, raise the dead, destroy the Antichrist,
deliver Israel, judge the nations and bring His kingdom to victory. Thus did He "appeal" "allude"
and "point" to Daniel’s book, and
affirm that it contained explicit prophecies of "Himself"
and His "Kingdom," even of His "Messiaship." To those whose minds are warped by their
prejudices, false theories and false science, no book is darker than the Sacred
Scriptures.
Finally, here. It is from Dan. 12: 3
our Lord takes His illustration of the righteous "shining
as the sun in the kingdom of their Father," when the "Son of Man" comes to reap the harvest. Matt. 13: 44. His illustration of the "Stone" grinding to powder is from Dan. 2: 34. His "Times and
Seasons" are Daniel’s "Iddanayya" and "Zimnayya,"
Dan. 2: 21; 7: 25; 12: 7: whose chronology
it was not for His disciples then to know. Acts 1:
7; 3: 19-21. Was it from an
uninspired novelist, a Maccabean romancer, a dreaming
Haggadist or story-framer, our Lord quoted such expressions?
5. And did the "Apostles"
never even "allude" to the Book of
Daniel, or the 70 weeks’ prophecy in confirmation of the Master’s claims? Peter, in his second Pentecostal word, not
only appeals to "all the prophets,"
Acts 3: 18, and so to Daniel, concerning the sufferings of Christ, but
expressly to the "Iddanayya"
and "Zimnayya"
of refreshing and restitution for Israel, in connection with the finishing of
Israel’s apostacy. Acts
3: 19-21; Dan. 9: 24. He boldly
says that "All the prophets, from Samuel and those that follow after"
- therefore Daniel - "have foretold these days."
Acts 3: 24. In his first Epistle (1
Pet. 1: 10, 11) he speaks of the prophets as "searching what and
what manner of time the holy
Ghost signified when He foretestified the sufferings
of Messiah and the glories after these," using the very verb (binthi) in Dan. 9: 2, and so "alludes"
and "points" to the 70 weeks’
prophecy. Dan. 9; 1-28. Paul’s description of the "Man of Sin," in 2 Thess. 2: 3-8, is drawn from Dan. 8: 11, 12; 11: 36, 37; 9: 27; 12: 7. The special "Iddanayya" and "Zimnayya,"
or "Times and Seasons,"
in 1 Thess. 5: 1,
are those named by Daniel, and the scene at the close of the Tribulation
(2 Thess. 1; 7, 8)
- the coming of the Lord with His mighty angels - is taken from Dan. 7: 13, and from its repetition in Matt. 24: 29-31; 25: 31-46. Still more, he vouches for the truth of the
historical parts of Daniel’s book by "appeal,"
"allusion" and "pointing" to Daniel and his companions, who
"stopped the mouths of lions," "quenched the violence of fire" and "escaped the edge of the sword" on the plains of Dura, to the brave Maccabees
whose heroism Daniel foretold (Heb. 11: 33-35; Dan.
6: 22; 3: 25; 2: 13; 11: 32), and to the resurrection in Dan. 12: 23. In 1 Cor. 15: 41 he takes
his star-illustration of the Resurrection-Glory from Dan.
12: 3. When, in Gal. 4: 4, he speaks of the "fullness of the time" when Messiah was born, he
alludes directly to the close of the 69th week, and so "appeals" and "points"
to the 70 weeks’ prophecy in confirmation of the Messiahship
of Jesus.
And
so to John’s testimony to the "Book of Daniel"
and the "70 weeks’ prophecy," in
connection with the Cloud-Comer and Destroyer of the Antichrist, it is simply
overwhelming. His Apocalypse rests on
"Daniel’s Book," on “the 70 weeks’ prophecy," the interval between
the 69th and 70th weeks, and the 70th week
especially, and on the Olivet Discourse, as already has been shown in previous
discussions. Especially in Rev. 14: 14-20 does he use the title "Son of Man," and develops in 7 acts the scene in Dan. 7: 13.
Thus,
both Jesus and His Apostles, notwithstanding Dean Farrar’s provoking
assumptions, did "appeal," "allude" and "point,"
many times and argumentatively, to the "Book of
Daniel" and to the "70 weeks’
prophecy" in direct confirmation of the Messianic claims of Jesus
as the Great Sufferer, the Raiser of the dead, the Giver of Life, and the Judge
of all mankind. "I am the Resurrection and the Life." To deny this is to deny the New Testament. It is
with Dean Farrar precisely, as with all perverters of the Truth, and all false
interpreters of prophecy, whether evangelical or rationalistic. They commit themselves to error, then
"stick to it," more anxious in regard of their own reputation than
to the truth and the honour of Christ.
6. We have dwelt at some length on
this matter here, because the "Book of Daniel"
is one of the great battlefields of the Higher Criticism, so called. The critics assail its Messianic character
with rare ferocity - unbuibus et rostris. They bury talons and break into the flesh,
clawing its vitals, i. e., its genuineness and
authenticity, its historic credibility, its miracles, its supernatural
prophecies, its integrity, its Messianity, its eschatology,
its reliability, its inspiration. The
whole question, whether these peerless pages were written by an exilic Daniel,
or are forged documents, compiled and re-dated by a Maccabean
novelist - a story book like Rasselas, or novel like
Ivanhoe, Daniel Deronda, or the Arabian Nights - lies
here. The denial of their genuineness and authenticity is the denial of the
"Book," and the conviction of New
Testament eschatology as a dream suggested by fables. No appeal to certain evangelical scholars who allow
a Maccabean origin, or partly so, and by their "typico-Messianic" theory seek to redeem themselves,
can avail to vindicate for the book a divine authority. The same device might be applied to every
apocryphal production. The book is a
unit, and so confessed by all. Its
author is one, and if its divine authority be denied, the "typico-Messianic" theory goes for nothing.
The
motive of the crusade against the book is the same as that of their assault on
every other book of the Bible. It is
wholly in the interest of what they call their "scientific method,"
whose first "working-rule" is the denial and exclusion
of the supernatural. Once admit the
genuineness and authenticity of the book, that it was
written in exile times by "the Prophet Daniel,"
and it is no longer possible to deny the reality of miracles and far-sighted
prophecy which history has verified. The
"scientific-method" and the "working-rule" go to the
"tomb of the Capulets." "Othello’s occupation’s gone!"
Half-and-half expedients are alike exegetically and critically
inadmissible. If genuine, it is
authentic. If not authentic, it is not
genuine. It is both. The proofs of its Messianity
and of its fulfilment so largely already are legion, and never can be
sterilized by critical devices. Its
language is a coin that can never be demonetized so long as the whole New
Testament eschatology is of par value with its image and its
superscription. The objective point of the whole criticism is the compromise
of the character of Christ and his conviction, either as a politician knowing
Daniel’s book to be a fable, yet yielding to the particular belief that it was
genuine, thus supporting his Messianic claims by fraud, or as a dupe, innocent
and victimized by the Jewish Scribes and false traditions, and ignorant of its
character. The outcome of the criticism is to undermine the authority of
Christ in His person and prophetic office, extinguishing His glory as the
"Light of the World" and reduce the Gospel to a system of
"Ethics," "Humanitarianism" and
"Sociology." The evidence of this is manifold. The
argument of the critics, that the Jewish belief in the divine authority
of Daniel’s book "proves only that it was in the Jewish
canon, and is of no more value than the story of the sojourn of Jonah in the
belly of the whale," is not only bad logic and an empty sneer, but spins
upon the pivot of the "working-rule," and hums and drones its old
objections against the character of Jesus, whose belief was that of the
Jews. And yet the sires and seed of such views as these are the
authorities Dean Farrar cites as his supports, reckless of the consequences to
all who are infected by them. It is a public disgrace to Christendom
that any man should be accepted as a Christian teacher who instructs the Church
that the Vision of the Son of Man in Clouds, Dan. 7.,
and the prophecy of "Messiah," Dan. 9., have nothing to do with Jesus
Christ. It gives the lie to Christ Himself.
"Should a wise man utter vain
knowledge and fill his belly with the east wind?" Job. 15: 2. The flukes of the truth and divine
authority of Daniel’s book are too firmly anchored in the Rock of Ages to
suffer the book to be endangered by the assumptions, conjectures, exclusions,
illicit processes of the critics, and their scientific method. The inerrant "Teacher sent from God" stands before us as the Interpreter
of the Old Testament. Beginning with Moses, He expounded the Law
in His Sermon on the Mount, and its ceremonial teaching in His sacrifice upon
the cross. Beginning with Isaiah, in
the Synagogue, He expounded the prophets, showing that they spake of Him.
Beginning with David, He expounded the Psalms
down to His dying day. A Critic He was against the higher critics of His
time who would deny to Daniel the rank of a "prophet,"
and against the critics of our time who do deny to Daniel and to Moses the
authorship of "Scriptures" dictated by
Himself. A critic He was against the lower
critics who sought to break the Scripture and make vain the Word of God by
their traditions; A Critic He was against Satan himself, who first re-dated the
90th Psalm, then falsely quoted
it. In all things, moral,
religious, textual and critical, He asserted His superiority, and confounded
the Scribes and the priests. From Him,
and by His Spirit, the Apostles learned and read and understand the Old
Testament, and for us, to-day, He is our Teacher, if we will but hear His
voice. It is enough to know that the whole question of the
supernatural - of miracles and prophecy - comes at last to be no less than one
concerning the person and authority of Jesus Himself, a question whose solution
depends upon the recognition of a personal God on the one hand, able to produce
such a Person, and, on the other hand, upon the credibility of human testimony,
which cannot be discredited by lack of this or that man’s experience, or lack
in this or that age, nor by any preconceived conclusions or assumptions built
on special grounds. To this it comes at last. "Christ or the
critics - which?" and to a true believer the answer can neither be
difficult nor doubtful. Each man must
choose for himself, and with the full consciousness that "whosoever shall fall on this Stone shall be broken, but on
whomsoever it shall fall it will grind him to powder!"
- NATHANIEL WEST,
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Blest prophet! Second to no seer,
Whose eyes beheld the coming day,
To whom the sacred task was given
To paint the End, and point
the Way!
The world’s whole future thou hast seen,
The march of empires, ages down;
Their conflict, victory and crown.
The wars of twice a thousand years,
Five hundred more, and more to come,
Earth’s kingdoms scattered like
the chaff,
For one alone to find the room!
For
The Persian, Greek, and Roman line
To set a throne in
The blood-stained Horns that gore
the world.
The Teuton, Bourbon, bold to
scoff,
Islam, Tiara, downward hurled
Braganza, Saxon, Romanoff.
Secrets of terror thou hast told,
Of glory, too, so strange to tell:
Visions beside the rushing streams,
Time’s footfall measured by the hand
That wheels the orbs in orbits high,
The Seasons, Ages, Epochs, Ends,
The calendar of history:
Messiah, first upon the cross,
Then hidden long from mortal view;
Messiah coming on the clouds
To judge the Gentiles and the Jew.
The Risen Saints thine eyes beheld,
The Antichrist sent to his doom;
Delivered
The "Kingdom, Power and Glory" come!
O prophet of thy people, great!
Above thy grave, to Shushan
lent,
Thy "Kitab Emeth," "Book of truth,”
Is thine eternal monument!
In vain the critic plies his art,
To fiction make of heaven-born words
Immortal still the "words" remain
Thine own, the angel’s and the Lord’s.
Rest undisturbed, till yonder morn
Awakes the "many"
from the dust;
Within thy lot thou then shalt stand
In resurrection
of the just.
In brightness, like the golden sun,
And glittering as the largest star,
Splendor shall crown thy labor done,
Nor age-long years its brightness mar.
"Hayi-Olam",
streaming in from God,
"Zohar," the
gleam that fadeth never;
Thy portion these, with Jesus near,
Amen, Forever and forever!
Thy Hope our Hope, thy Faith our Faith,
Thy people on our heart in prayer,
One day
our eyes the joy will see,
And then with thee the glory share!
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