The Mysterious and Prophetic History of Esau Considered, in Connection with the Numerous Prophecies Concerning Edom

By J. Harnage

The posterity of Jacob and Esau became, according to prophecy, distinct from the first. After an absence of four hundred years, the nation of Jacob returned into Arabia, but found no brothers in the Edomites, the sons of Esau, who kept themselves so distinct from the Israelites, that they refused to let t

• Language: English
• Publisher: TrueAdventureClassics
• Release date: Jan 27, 2024
• ISBN: 9798869154187

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The Mysterious and Prophetic

History of Esau Considered,

in Connection with the Numerous

Prophecies

Concerning Edom

J. Harnage

Originally published

1847

Contents

CHAPTER I. PRELIMINARY.—THE OLD WORLD.

CHAPTER II. THE NEW WORLD.—ESAU.

CHAPTER III. THE NEW WORLD—ESAU CONTINUED.

CHAPTER IV. THE NEW WORLD, ESAU, ETC

CHAPTER V. THE METALLIC IMAGE.

CHAPTER VI. THE THIRTEENTH OF REVELATIONS.

CHAPTER VII. THE TIIIRTEENTH OF REVELATIONS, CONTINUED.

CHAPTER VIII. THE THIRTEENTH OF REVELATIONS CONTINUED.

CHAPTER I. PRELIMINARY.—THE OLD WORLD.

In the latter days ye shall consider it perfectly. JEREMIAH xxiii. 20.

IN the history of the beginning of this world vouchsafed to us in the Holy Scriptures, the vivifying power and word of the Deity are indeed shown to preside, but He is Himself no where expressly portrayed. His exemplification is in His works. But the evil spirit, which disturbed the original plan of the new world, is rendered conspicuous, in the very first scene of it, by the portrait of the intellectual serpent. The general impression which the Scriptures leave upon our minds is this; that God desires His creatures to entertain a reverential love of His goodness, as well as a reverential awe of His justice, in His administration of the moral government of the world, and does not call upon us to abandon our notions of right and wrong, or the results of that gift of reason, which He has permitted to survive the fall.

After considering, therefore, the miraculous manner in which the Scriptures have been immutably preserved and handed down to us by a people who are themselves a standing miracle, the contemplative and piously disposed mind may feel sanctioned in proceeding, with sobriety of apprehension, to examine some of those parts of Holy Writ, which have hitherto been permitted to exercise the sceptic and amuse the witty; while the Sacred Volume, in no way concerned to guard against the cavilers, continues its course with simple narratives, extraordinary prophecies, and an open acknowledgement of mystery; yet with the information that there is a prescribed term, after which the mystery will be unfolded.

The prophecies are given to us as a well fraught mine; and the Book delivered by God’s own hand, in the fifth of Revelations, is sealed with seven seals, which can only be opened by the slain Lamb, that is, by the elucidations of the New Testament, published after the atoning blood had been shed. It is evidently the intent of prophetic language, not only to veil the subject which it portrays till the time of fulfilment, but often long after it: that they of an unconscious world may at a distant time look back, and by the help of history, and a common chronological table, ascertain with precision, and contemplate with awe, those fulfilments, which had for a long appointed time lain unobserved.

Proceeding therefore upon that apprehension, the endeavour will be to show by induction that the course of this intellectual serpent, or adversary, from the time of the fall to that of the deluge, and from thence to the present time, has been regularly and incontrovertibly, though abstrusely, given to us in the Bible; but that the development of those parts of the Old Testament which seem obscure, will depend upon our close inspection and right apprehension of the latter revelations of the New Testament.

According to Sir Isaac Newton, the design of God, when He gave the prophecies, was not to gratify men’s curiosities by enabling them to foreknow things, but that, after they were fulfilled, they might be interpreted by the event, and His own providence, not the interpreter’s, be manifested thereby to the world.— The event will prove the Apocalypse, and this prophecy, thus proved and understood, will open the old prophets ; and all together will make known the true religion and establish it.

From the above quotations, we may conclude that the superior mind of Sir Isaac Newton had, in the spirit of integrity, gone over the whole of the Apocalypse, and though unable to elicit any thing definite from the reserved parts, had imbibed from the matured communications as much information as secured his entire confidence in the remaining divisions of the scheme; while he at the same time foresaw, that, however pregnant either the early narratives or chronological prophecies may be, no part of them will be allowed to become manifest till the exactly appointed hour. And, by the way, this restricted progress of development may in some degree account for the partially permitted shutting up of the Scriptures)" and the fine circulation of such contumely as is usually cast upon the humble readers of Revelation, which, under Providence, may only act, as the cold winds do, in checking a too forward vegetation.

The promising view which Sir Isaac Newton has given of the usefulness of collating retrospective prophecy, is so far justified by the great probability of its truth, and the possibility of our proving it by a diligent investigation of both Testaments, that the sober mind may rationally attempt the task. It may hope, by such a comparison of the apparently recondite prophecies and seemingly simple narratives of Scripture, to be able eventually to discern the foredoomed cause or permission of many of those extraordinary events and fulfilments, which have silently taken place in the world, since the first ordinances issued by the Deity Himself upon the great event of the fall. For, unless we go back to that imbittered fountain head, and take exact account of every sentence then pronounced, and every narrative then given, in order to trace the after consequences from their beginning, we should still be utterly at a loss to account, upon any given or definite principle, for the acknowledged corruption of the old world, and that spirit of rebellion and evil imaginations, which survived the penal infliction of the flood, and began again in the notable first empire of the new world, Babylon. The rise of this idolatrous state among the offspring of Noah, a man approved of by God, a " preacher of righteousness,’ and who survived the descent from the ark three hundred and fifty years, must of itself arrest our attention. How could such a dereliction take place under the superintendance of the Deity and His chosen agent Noah? The striking anomaly of this case requires investigation; because common sense is at a stand, when, after the purgation of a wicked world, no visible amendment succeeds. But confidence in our holy Creator inclines us to reconsider the state of the case from the beginning, in order to see whether the cause of the defection is not enveloped in His own communications.

In the first verse of the third chapter of Genesis we read, now the serpent (or a certain serpent) was more subtil than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. This intellectual being, introduced at the beginning of the world, is evidently meant to be an object of our close attention and serious consideration.

Accordingly, a correspondent and systematic representation is continued, either by narrative or by symbols which cannot be mistaken, to the last book of our parentally warning Scriptures. But the canon of Scripture is closed, and from the mystery which still hangs over it, as well as from its occasionally retentive language, we yet remain so far deficient in a general knowledge, or free admission, of the actual existence and present operations of this adumbrated spirit, and so various and undecided are the opinions respecting the serpent of the third of Genesis, that, if the context of Scripture and the experience of the world did not consecutively establish his inimical existence, the sceptic might be listened to when he gravely asks if there is such a being. But if the statement of different theological scholars be correct, that in scriptural language the term Seraph means both Angel and Serpent; knowing as we do by scriptural representation that Satan is a fallen angel and was once of great power in heaven, and that in the Hierarchy of Angels the Seraphim are Spirits of the highest class ; and adverting at the same time to the circumstance that among natural serpents there is a class which have wings, a distinguishing attribute usually ascribed to angels, but which, when it belongs to the natural serpent, still leaves him subject to go upon his belly during his life,-—is not the prophetic character of the serpent of Genesis, according to the scope of scriptural language on subjects designedly meant to be ambiguous, sufficiently applicable to either? Does it not agree also with the pointed rendering of Bishop Horsley, now a certain serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field? or as in conformity with the double meaning of the word Seraph the passage might be read, now a certain angel was more subtil ? And, for further assistance and insight into the ambiguity of this one figure in Genesis, why is it not followed down to the illustrations of the New Testament, where we find that the antichrist is of a triune nature and acts occasionally in separate divisions? This subsequent development in the Revelations must surely relieve much of the perplexity, felt in considering the one comprehensive figure of the serpent or antichrist of the third of Genesis.

But Scripture acknowledges itself to be partially mysterious, retentive and veiled, in certain statements ; and it is discernable that it is so in the deviously placed yet connected chapters. Every cursory or sceptical reader therefore is like a common observer of the human frame ; he sees indeed the flesh and feels the bones, which satisfies him of the certainty of its existence, but he remains ignorant of the inward mechanism of the nervous system, the wonders of which are known only to the fine investigation of the anatomist, who recognises therein a receptacle for the living, animating soul, which, the moment it departs, leaves its house of flesh to the dust.

That God breathed, or sowed, this vital, animating and good principle into Adam, is one of our first instructions in the Old Testament; but we find it promulgated, by induction from the illustrations of the New Testament, that Satan can sow bad seed, the tares, among the wheat; and such a mixture evidently forms the warfare of the world, an important truth too plainly given by Divine Authority to be set aside. Upon this therefore we may proceed, and more especially as by retrospect it accounts for the early corruption of the old world, and the great prevalence of evil and incongruity in the present, according to the curse inflicted on the earth.

Writers the most friendly to Revelation, and most anxious to afford instruction to the Christian mind, descant at large upon the great diffusion of moral evil and the consequent anomalous state of the world; but they do not, by tracing out the obscure but important intimations of Scripture, inform us with sufficient plainness, perhaps we may say sufficient conciseness, how these wonders came about. This silence in writers at once learned and friendly argues that there is still in Scripture a partial reserve, and, as we may conceive, a necessary one, till the coming of the so often mentioned fulness of time, and the latter days, when, as it has been apprehended, a more ready perception of the full meaning of Scripture may be allowed. Such an increase of knowledge may be a necessary help in the conflict of the last days, when infidelity, division, controversy, and the demon ‘of discord are to rear their heads, and a more awakened, direct, and influential faith in the word of God will be requisite to strengthen His true servants for the rencounter.

It cannot therefore, at this surprising juncture, this season of perplexity in the heart of the Christian church, be either irrelevant, or presumptuous, to attempt such a further investigation of the portrait of the serpent, given in the third of Genesis, as may by induction bring us of these latter days to a clearer and more determinate recognition of his immediate and extensive operations in the world. The knowledge of his power and influence has indeed been stated in Scripture, but the subject is in part a latent one ; nevertheless in the analogous case of Edom, the word of God declares, by the mouth of different prophets, I will make Edam so bare that he shall not be able to hide himself.

We do not yet sufficiently account for the phenomenon of the heathen superstition, or that of the Mahometan blasphemy, each flourishing and predominant in direct opposition to the expressed will of the revealed God, eighteen hundred years after a visible fulfilment of His word and the merciful call of the gospel. But if God, in His latent communications, has accounted for this state of the world, shall the servant of Scripture, who desires more knowledge than he already possesses, shrink from the trouble of investigation in order to obtain it? We are told by the highest authority to search the Scriptures ; and our inspired teacher, St. Paul, exhorts us to prove all things.

In the endeavour to do this, so as to accord in any degree with the historical system of Scripture, some of both the early and latter events of the world must occasionally be adverted to. We begin with the appearance of Adam and Eve,