It will not, I presume, be denied, that seventy weeks may be a just version of the numeral note at the beginning of verse 24: and it seems only a reasonable presumption beforehand, that if no more than seventy are specified at the outset, no more than seventy will be found to be specified in the sequel: and this conclusion is so far confirmed by the sequel, that no number greater than seventy appears to be mentioned in the course of the prophecy, though others may be so which are less; and still more, that how many numbers soever smaller than seventy may be specified in the course of the prophecy, yet all put together are only equal to seventy, or at the utmost to seventy and one half. It would seem to be a natural inference from this relation of the numbers to each other, that seventy -the number premised at the outset-is the total, and the numbers less than seventy, mentioned in the sequel, are its component parts. In this case, it would naturally be to be expected that the several smaller numbers, specified in the sequel, put together, should

might have been repeated at the head of verse 26. Translated back into Hebrew, the Septuagint version of verse 26. must

ואחרי שבעה ושבעים ששים have stood in which the second_and-ושנים

to kaipous: and our our followed by some word to answer to erÔV. Now both these might have been derived upon the whole from verse 25. or the beginning of verse 26 -with the exception of the two words answering to kaupoùs and to éτv respectively. As to the second of these, w in Hebrew is capable of being rendered in Greek by dúo or by érv, for it may denote both. The repetition of this word by any means in the text would account for the rv at once. As to the other, answering to kaupoùs, which in Hebrew would be 'ny or Dny, this word actually appears, as a various reading, in Kennicott in loco; to whom I refer the reader.

just be equivalent to the one larger number, premised at the outset; for it would naturally be to be expected that the whole should be equal to its parts.

Now as the whole number specified at the outset is seventy, but the minor numbers mentioned in the sequel are seven, and sixty and two, and one—all together equal to seventy; then if there was any relation between these numbers to each other, and if the numbers were only distinct-that the prophecy did not contain less than seventy weeks might justly be taken for granted; but whether it might not contain more would admit of a question. Considering the modes of speaking in general, and particularly the idiom of the Hebrew language, no one could undertake to say beforehand that even though the true number of weeks always intended were seventy, and some other number small and insignificant in comparison of seventy; it would not always have been expressed by seventy, in any general statement premised to the whole; especially when that general statement at the outset was about to be followed by the definition of particulars in the sequel -which would shew the number that was actually intended. No one, therefore, could undertake to say beforehand, that the general statement of seventy weeks, which occurs at the head of the prophecy, on the principle of expressing in round numbers, what might really be meant of the round number and a fraction, might not possibly be intended of seventy weeks and one half, and would not have been similarly expressed if it was. And this possible sense of the general statement at the outset, is so far shewn, by the numbers in detail which follow, to be the actual sense; that besides the seven weeks, and sixty and two weeks, and one week, all together equal to seventy weeks, which therein occur, an allusion is found to an half

week which is either included in the one week, or distinct from it. In the one case, the number of weeks is seventy, in the other, it is seventy and an half. And as the last of these cases is just as possible, and just as agreeable to the prima facie sense and meaning of the original, as the first; we may take it for granted, for any thing that has yet appeared to the contrary, that though the prophecy cannot contain less than seventy weeks, it may contain as many as seventy and an half.

Again, supposing the sum total of weeks contained in the prophecy to have been thus determined as neither less than seventy nor greater than seventy and an half; the next consideration would seem to be, Whether these weeks were continuous or interrupted? Whether they were to be regarded as forming all together an unbroken series and succession of weeks, of the number in question, or only in parts? It cannot be denied that the determination of this point is a very necessary preliminary to any future exposition of the prophecy it cannot be denied too that great diversity of opinion has existed and may exist about it: that some expositors of the prophecy, both ancient and modern, have treated the weeks as continuous, others as discontinuous; and that the greatest difference of results has been introduced into their respective schemes of interpretation accordingly.

Now though it is barely possible that the weeks might have been intended to be discontinuous; it is much more probable that they were always designed to be continuous. Arguing on the principles of common sense, and from the obvious, prima facie construction of language; we can conceive no reason why such and such a number of weeks should be said to be determined for such and such purposes; if these purposes were not always intended to be brought to pass

and accomplished within these weeks, and, consequently, (if these weeks may only be assumed to denote a certain space of time,) the weeks to be as definite as the purposes which were to be accomplished within them. Now a definite time, considered in relation to definite purposes, must be continuous: for the time being as fixed as the purposes, and each determinately related to the other, it is manifest that the time and the purposes must begin and proceed pari passu; the one can no more be interrupted than the other: while the purposes are pendent, the time must be current, and while the time is current, the purposes must be pendent; and neither can be fully accomplished, or come to an end, before or without the other.

This connection between the time assigned for the transaction of such and such effects, and the purposes always intended to be brought to pass within it, is clearly implied by the turn which the version of Theodotion, and it would seem that of Aquila, in conformity to the idiom of the Greek language, have here given to the words of the original at the commencement: ßdoμήκοντα ἑβδομάδες συνετμήθησαν ἐπὶ τὸν λαόν σου, καὶ ἐπὶ τὴν πόλιν τὴν ἁγίαν, ΤΟΥ συντελεσθῆναι ἁμαρτίαν, κ, τ. λ.: that is, Seventy weeks have been determined upon thy people, and upon the holy city, for the sake of such and such purposes. A set time had been prescribed for set purposes; and the one as determinate as the other. The connection between the two things is likewise implied in the version which appears to have been given almost unanimously to the original of the word determined; ekpionav in the Septuagint and one of the Hexapla, edokiμáo Onσav in another of the Hexapla, præfinitæ sunt in the Arabic, morabuntur in the Syriac, determined in our own Bible. The Vulgate alone has rendered it by abbreviatæ sunt, and Theodotion by

συνετμήθησαν : between which and the former it would be difficult to say which was more agreeable to the literal sense of the original *. But whether the version be ἐκρίθησαν, or ἐδοκιμάσθησαν, οι συνετμήθησαν, or determined, one thing is plainly implied in each case; the appointment of a set time for corresponding purposes, and therefore the time as definite as the purposes and, consequently, the time regarded in relation to the purposes, continuous; especially, if the purposes, for which it is supposed to be set, are themselves connected, and all of such a nature as to be accomplished at once, or in regular succession one after another; which is the case with the purposes specified in the prophecy, as will more fully appear hereafter.

Among the most natural presumptions, then, which we might bring with us to the consideration of this celebrated prophecy, this would be one; that if it consisted of a determinate number of weeks, devoted to certain corresponding purposes, and these weeks only denoted a certain lapse and succession of time; they would be found to be continuous-this lapse and succession of time, while it lasted, must be regular and uninterrupted. Nor is it a ground of objection to the reasonableness of this presumption, prima facie, that the whole number of weeks is divided into parts; if those parts are only equal to the whole. There may be reasons for dividing the whole into these parts, or there But the fact of the division proves nothing, may not. while the parts may precede and follow each other in such an order as to make up one continuous whole.

*The original verb is incidit, concidit, and so definivit, determinavit, or the like. Referred to this sense, which is that of cutting in two, or cutting to pieces, ouvréμvew, in the sense

of to cut short or abridge, abbreviare, is as much derivative or secondary, as to define, to determine, to prescribe, or the like. Hilario, ut supra, renders it by incisæ sunt.