Ill 



THE FULFILMENT OF PROPHECY 



I. GENERAL STATEMENT AS TO THE PROBLEM 



EVERY attentive reader of the Old Testament has observed 

 that the Hebrew prophets not only always find the 

 starting-point of their admonitions, threats, and promises 

 in the covenant relations already subsisting between 

 Jahveh and His people, but that their predictions as to the 

 future glory of God s kingdom are all cast in the mould of 

 the Theocracy under which they themselves lived. It is 

 certain that the prophets were alive to the imperfection 

 of the Old Testament dispensation ; that they longed 

 for a more direct and personal relation between God and 

 His people than that which was maintained by the 

 theocratic ordinances, that they looked for a time when a 

 new covenant should be established, according to which 

 the Law of Jahveh should be written on the hearts of the 

 people, when all should know Jahveh, when He should 

 forgive their guilt and remember their sins no more. 

 But while these features in their hopes clearly separate 

 the views of the prophets from the crass material expecta 

 tion of Judaistic thought, the fact remains, that whenever 

 any degree of definite colouring is given to the prophetic 

 images of the Messianic times, that colouring is drawn 

 from the theocratic institutions. In the writings of the 

 prophets all these institutions are idealised, spiritualised 

 but not in such a way as to deprive them of their char 

 ts 



