of Dr. Stonard's), and slight authorities, he has mangled and interpolated his author, who, if he is before obscure, becomes almost unintelligible from the various attempts which have been made to discover and unfold his meaning. We have been much gratified, therefore, by finding that Dr. Stonard, in adding one more name to the list of commentators on this passage, has adhered (not without a strict investigation) to the original text, and has given his readers a literal translation of it without the alteration of a single word.

Dr. Stonard has thought it becoming to enter with much minuteness into a critical examination of the alterations in the text proposed by Dr. Blaney and Mr. Faber; yet as he, and not his learned predecessors, is at present under our review we shall pass over this part altogether; and, reminding our readers that the Doctor takes the text exactly as he finds it (unless we except the pointing of one or two words), present them with his translation of this celebrated Prophecy;-which, as it consists of no more than four verses, they may be glad to have before them in one view.

"24. Seventy weeks are the determined period upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to put a stop to the transgression, and to seal the sin-offerings, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in the righteousness of the ages, and to seal vision and prophet, and to anoint an holy of holies.

"25. Know therefore and understand, from the going forth of the word to rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah shall be leader, there shall be seven weeks, and sixty and two weeks it shall be rebuilt, the street and the lane, but the times will be with straitness.

"26. And after the sixty and two weeks Messiah shall be cut off, and no one will be on his side; and he shall destroy the city and the sanctuary with the leader that cometh; and his end shall be with an inundation, for until the end shall be the war, the determined judgment of desolations.

"27. Yet will he confirm the covenant unto many one week; but in the midst of the week he will cause sacrifice and meat-offering to cease; afterwards upon the border of abominations shall be the desolator, and that until he shall be consumed, and the determined judgment shall have been poured upon the desolated." P. 118.

Our readers will not be displeased, upon perusing the above extract, to find that the effect of Dr. Stonard's labours is to confirm, in many respects, the translation in our Bible. This translation is so familiar to them that they will easily detect the points of difference. We shall direct their attention to two or three of the most important passages, where they will have an opportunity of forming their judgment of our author's mode of investigation.

In the 25th verse, we have the words, "until Messiah shall be leader" (ny) an expression which points out a determinate period. The substantive verb is not expressed; and Dr. Stonard properly remarks, that neither of the words has the emphatic . "The former," he says, "is evidently a proper name, and consequently could not regularly have the article prefixed." With regard to the latter, Dr. Stonard quotes the rule of Hebrew grammar, that "Hayediah is not prefixed to a noun, whether substantive or adjective, which is used as a predicate;" and adds, " since then it is not here prefixed to T, as that circumstance probably shews that the word is not to be taken in opposition with the preceding one, so does it shew, with equal probability, that it is to be taken as its predicate with the copula or verb substantive understood." By this mode of rendering the words, Dr. Stonard fixes a date for the fulfilment of one part of the prophecy, and it is of consequence, therefore, to ascertain that the criticism is correct. We would not willingly quarrel with it, yet we would venture to ask whether, according to the usual construction in Hebrew, the word in this case would not have been followed by a verb expressing the sense of leading in the infinitive, or by with the verb in the future tense?

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It is of the first importance to determine whether the period seven weeks," in the same verse, should be taken in connection with that of "sixty-two weeks," or be separated from it. Our translators have adopted the former mode of construction; and Dr. Stonard has brought very high authority to shew that, according to the idiom of the Hebrew language, the number sixty-nine could not be expressed in this form, and he therefore places a comma after "seven weeks," thereby making the other term represent the period during which the city should continue rebuilt. We have no doubt of this being correct, but must refer our readers to the author for the proof of it.

"The street and the lane," m . We mention these words on account of their affording an instance, the latter of them particularly, of Dr. Stonard's accurate investigation of the meaning of the Hebrew: they may properly, perhaps, be translated the broad and the narrow, and thence naturally as above, the street and the lane.

"Messiah shall be cut off." We should scarcely have thought it necessary to mention this expression, but as Dr. Blaney has introduced a most material alteration, by construing the verb in the active sense, and Mr. Faber has followed him, we sincerely rejoice at finding Dr. Stonard adopting that inter

pretation in which both Jews and Christians, translators and commentators had before agreed, and opposing the learned Professor with ingeinous and correct criticism. We will not join with Dr. Hales in the severe censure which he has passed upon Dr. Blaney, but we do feel that the interpretation to which we allude, is one of the most unfortunate and ill-judged instances of a bold departure from all authority upon record.

"And no one will be on his side," . This is another very favourable example of Dr. Stonard's talent for accuracy in criticism. The translation is not, indeed, original. Vatablus, in Pole's Synopsis, had rendered the words "et nullus erit pro eo, id est, nullus stabit a parte ejus." And Dr. Blaney has, in fact, adopted the same signification. But the manner in which Dr. Stonard has defended it is quite satisfactory. We must be permitted to quote his language in noticing the sense given to the words in our Bible.

"The rendering given by our English translators is, but not for himself; a solemn, awful, and pious rendering; calculated to excite in the reader the most devout, humble, and thankful sense of the spotless innocence of the person, whose cutting off is here predicted. But this rendering, though supported by other very learned men, must be given up as not reconcileable with the Hebrew idiom." P. 83.

Having gone through a critical examination of the literal meaning of the prophecy, and previous to entering on an interpretation of it, our author lays down some preliminary positions for the better fixing and regulating of the interpretation. These, perhaps, should be quoted at length, but we shall content ourselves with noticing those which are most important, and may best enable the reader to form some judgment of Dr. Stonard's book. The seventy weeks, then, he pronounces to be, as they are generally understood to be, weeks of "proper or solar years," "beginning with the complete restoration of Jerusalem and the Jewish polity, and ending with the dissolution of the same," and "the six particulars mentioned in the 24th verse are comprehended within this term, and must be brought to pass at, or before its conclusion." The term of seven weeks, ver. 25, (as has been already mentioned) "is separate from, and prior to, the term of SEVENTY WEEKS, and concludes at the point where the other commences." "The Leader that shall come, ver. 26, is a different person from Messiah the Prince, in the 25th verse."-The 27th verse is supplementary to the history of the seventy weeks; and the week here mentioned is not the last week of the seventy, nor yet a week superadded to them, but comprehended among them." "The word until, ver, 25,

cannot be understood to refer to Messiah's birth, but to the period when he first acted, or shewed himself, as leader.” "The word after, ver. 26, must be taken, not for immediately after, but with a latitude, so as to comprehend all the remainder of the term of seventy weeks from the sixty-second week.

With regard to the beginning and ending of the great term of seventy weeks, Dr. Stonard remarks (and makes this circumstance the ground of his reasoning upon the subject) that the people and the holy city upon whom this period is determined, are the people and city, not of God, but of Daniel. Among other consequences from which, it will follow, that their restoration must have been such as the prophet himself contemplated.

"No man can suppose that Daniel would have considered his prayer answered by putting together certain rows of cottages, or streets of houses, even though they should be ceiled houses,' among and out of the ruins of Jerusalem, or by the mere erection of a Temple, unless the rites of religion were duly administered in it according to the sacred ordinances, or by the inhabitation of a Jewish people, unless governed and regulated by their proper laws and statutes of divine appointment. He certainly looked for a complete restoration of the city to its former size and pristine state, at least so far as to be a defenced or fortified city, which was essential to its character, as well as necessary to the security and well-being of its inhabitants, and for a temple, if not so magnificent as Solomon's, yet as holy in the perfect celebration of the divine worship, by a priesthood consecrated according to the order of the sons of Aaron, and for the redintegration of a polity both civil and ecclesiastical, altogether consistent with and agreeable to the institutions of Moses. Thus it also appears that the people and holy city of Daniel are not to be restrained either to the literal city, with Mr. Marshall and some other expositors, or to the figurative city, with Dean Prideaux and some others, but comprehend Jerusalem with its walls and fortifications, as well as its habitations, and the people under their proper national laws and government, with a priesthood duly celebrating all the sacred rites of worship. In conformity with this, it is to be observed, that the seventy weeks are suspended over the people of Daniel and over his holy city, alike over both; so that they are closely connected, and inseparably united, the figurative and the literal Jerusalem, under that term. A common point of commencement, consequently, must be assigned for their restoration, a common event must be fixed for the dissolution of both." P. 136.

Whether so much is to be inferred from the circumstance of the manner in which the city and people are spoken of by the angel, we will not say. If it be truly argued that the term of seventy weeks extends to the destruction of Jerusalem, it is well; but we request our readers to consider carefully the six particulars (ver. 25,) to be accomplished in that period, and then the

rest of the prophecy; and say, if this point is to be easily admitted. If so, there can be little doubt, that the period of seventy weeks was to commence when (to use our author's language) "Jerusalem should be completely rebuilt, both the broad street and the narrow lane, which by an allowable extension of their literal into a figurative meaning, may be presumed to comprehend all the parts, both the most important and the most minute, of the Jewish religion and polity;" and that it was to come to an end, not when they ceased to be the city and people of God (strictly. speaking) but at "the point of time decisively fixed for their joint and total destruction."

Having thus arranged the time included in the great period, it is requisite to fix the smaller one of seven weeks, which Dr. Stonard determines to be separate from and independent of the other; prior to it, and ending where that begins. We have already stated that he urges the nature of the Hebrew language, and its proper construction, against the uniting of the numbers seven and sixty-two-and thereby forming the total sixty-nine. He in this place goes into further argument upon this head, in order to shew that the two terms must be taken separately; and considered as having relation, each to a different event or series of events; that is to say, the one to the work of building the holy city; the other "to the existence and duration of the same, as a city actually built both in a literal and figurative sense, as we have before seen." P. 157.

Dr. Stonard proceeds to argue that—

"The mention of a restored or rebuilt state of things, immediately following the act of rebuilding, plainly indicates that the term during which such state of things is to continue, is to commence immediately on the completion of the act of rebuilding and the establishment of things in a restored state. But the seventy weeks.. begin with the complete restoration of Jerusalem to its former extent, and to its proper character as a defenced city, and of the people of Judah to their civil and ecclesiastical polity... Both the sixty-two weeks, and the seventy weeks, therefore, have the same point of commencement... The seven weeks constitute a separate term from that of the sixty-two..". P. 160. The same line of argument (for we cannot go over it again) proves, of course, that it is prior also to the seventy.

Dr. Stonard concludes upon this head.

"This arrangement of the seven weeks is a matter of prime importance in the interpretation of the prophecy, and will be found to remove many of those difficulties and inconsistencies which have so greatly perplexed and obscured it. It is the remark of the great Joseph Mede, that, if these seven weeks could be well bestowed, the chiefest difficulty were taken from the prophecy." P. 161.