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5_024.TXT
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and wear their own rags of righteousness, and not his
robe; only they desire to be called by the name of
Christians, to take away the reproach of being reckoned
Pagans or infidels.
\*Ver. 2. \\In that day shall the branch of the Lord be
beautiful and glorious\\, &c.] When the beauty of the
Jewish women shall be taken away, and their men
shall he slain; by whom is meant, not the righteous
and wise men left among the Jews, as Jarchi and
Aben Ezra; nor Hezekiah; which is the sense of some,
as the latter observes: but the Messiah, as Kimchi,
and so the Targum, which paraphrases the words
thus, \*"at that time shall the Messiah of the Lord be
"for joy and glory;"\* and the Septuagint understand
it of a divine Person appearing on earth, rendering the
words, %for in that day God shall shine in counsel with
glory upon the earth%; and so the Arabic version. Christ
is called %the branch%, not as God, but as man, not as a
son, but as a servant, as Mediator; and it chiefly re-
gards his descent from David, and when his family
was very mean and low; and a branch being but a
tender thing, it denotes Christ's state of humiliation
on earth, when he grew up as a tender plant before the
Lord, and was contemptible in the eyes of men: and
he is called the branch %of the Lord%, because of his
raising up, and bringing forth; see \\#Zec 3:8 6:12 Jer 23:5 Isa 11:1\\
and yet this branch
became %beautiful%, being laden with the fruits of divine
grace, such as righteousness, reconciliation, peace,
pardon, adoption, sanctification, and eternal life; as
well as having all his people as branches growing on
him, and receiving their life and fruitfulness from him:
and %glorious%, being the branch made strong to do the
work of the Lord, by his obedience and death; and
especially he became glorious when raised from the
dead, when he ascended up to heaven, and was exalted
there at the right hand of God; and when his Gospel
was spread and his kingdom increased in the Gentile
world, as it did, both before and after the destruction
of Jerusalem, the time here referred to; and which
will he in a more glorious condition in the last days;
and now he is glorious in the eyes of all that believe
in him, and is glorified by them; and when he comes
a second time, he will appear in his own and his father's
glory, and in the glory of the holy angels. \*\\And the
fruit of the earth [shall] be excellent and comely\\; not
the children of the righteous, as Jarchi; nor \^atyrwa\^
\^ydbe\^,?? %the doers of the law%, as the Targum; see \\#Ro 2:13\\
but the Messiah, as before, as Kimchi well
observes; called %the fruit of the earth%, to show that he
is not a dry and withered, but a fruitful branch, and
which should fill the earth with fruit; and because he
sprung from the earth as man, and was the fruit of a
woman, that was of the earth, earthly; and so this,
as the former, denotes the meanness of Christ in hu-
man nature, whilst here on earth; and yet he became,
as these words foretold be should, %excellent%: he ap-
peared to be excellent in his person as the son of God,
and to have a more excellent name and nature than the
angels, and fairer than the sons of men; to be excellent
as the cedars, and more excellent than the mountains
of prey; to have obtained a more excellent ministry
than Aaron and his sons; to be excellent in all his
offices of Prophet, Priest, and King; and particularly
in the fruits and blessings of grace, which grew upon
him, and came from him; see \\#De 33:13-16\\
%and comely%, in his person, as God and man, in the per-
fections of his divine nature, and in the fulness of his
grace; and so are his people, as considered in him,
who are made perfectly comely, through the comeli-
ness he puts upon them: and so he is \*\\for them that
are escaped of Israel\\; not beautiful and glorious; ex-
cellent and comely, in the view of all men, only them
that believe, who have seen his glory, and have tasted
that he is gracious; these are the remnant according
to the election of grace, the preserved of Israel, the
chosen of God, and precious, who were saved from
that untoward generation, the Jews, and escaped the
destruction of Jerusalem, and were saved in the Lord
with an everlasting salvation.
\*Ver. 3. \\And it shall come to pass, [that he that is] left
in Zion, and [he that] remaineth in Jerusalem\\, &c.] These
are the persons to whom Christ appears beautiful and
glorious, excellent and comely, who will be left, and
remain in Zion and Jerusalem; by which is meant the
Gospel church, or church as in the latter day; in
which these shall continue, abide by the truths and
doctrines of the Gospel, and the ordinances thereof,
and persevere unto the end; even when Christ shall
take his fan in his hand, and purge his floor of the
chaff; when the filth of the daughter of Zion shall be
washed away by the spirit of judgment and burning,
as in the following verse \\#Isa 3:4\\; when it shall be a shocking
and shaking time in the churches, and the hour of
temptation shall come, that shall try those that dwell
upon earth; these shall be pillars in the temple of
God, that shall never go out. The doctrine of the
saints' final perseverance is held forth in these words,
as their sanctification and election are in the following
clauses, which secure it to them: they \*\\shall be called
holy\\: in the original text it is added, %unto him%; either
the person left, it shall be said to him, that he is holy
or rather the branch; and Kimchi interprets it, %because
of him%; for these are accounted holy, through the
putation of the holiness of Christ unto them; and they
are really and inherently holy, through the grace of
Christ implanted in them; they are called to be holy,
to be saints, and they are called with a holy calling, and
unto holiness; and, in effectual vocation, principles of
grace and holiness are wrought in them, and which ap-
pear in their lives and conversations. The principal
meaning seems to be, that those who shall hold fast their
profession, and hold out, and persevere through the try-
ing dispensation in the latterday, they shall be remark-
ably holy; they shall shine in the beauties of holiness;
holiness shall be upon their horses' bells, and they them-
selves shall be holiness unto the Lord,
\\#Zec 14:20,21 Isa 35:8 60:21 Joe 3:17\\ \*\\[even] every one that
is written among the living in Jerusalem\\; or, %every one that
is written unto life% {m}, that is, unto eternal life, as the
Targum paraphrases the words; and it is the same
with heing ordained unto eternal life, \\#Ac 13:48\\ or
predestination unto life, which is a writing of the
names of God's elect in the book of life: this writing
{m} \^Myyxl bwtkh lk\^ %quicunque fuerit scriptus ad vitam%, Piscator;
%omnis scriptus ad vitam%, Cocceius.