From Book: A New Literal Translation From the Original Greek of All the Apostolical Epistles, Essay VIII,
"Concerning The Right Interpretation of the Writings in which the Revelations of God are Contained", p. 702, 1841.

And this he was to do as a sign and a wonder upon Egypt and Ethiopia, Isa. xx. 2, 3. ; that is, as it is explained, ver. 4, to shew by action, that the king of Assyria would lead away the Egyptians prisoners, and the Ethiopians captive, young and old, naked and barefoot, even with their buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt. — B. Lowth, in his note on Isa. xx. 3, thinks it probable that Isaiah was ordered to walk naked and barefoot three days, to shew that within three years after the defeat of the Cushites and Egyptians by the king of Assyria, the town should be taken. For he thinks the time was foretold, as well as the event; and that the words three days may have been lost out of the text at the end of ver. 2, after the word barefoot, a day being put for a year, according to the prophetic rule.

In like manner Jeremiah was ordered, chap. xix. 1, to get a potter's earthen bottle, and with the ancients of the people and of the priests, ver. 2, to go to the valley of Hinnom, and prophesy in their hearing that Jerusalem was to be destroyed. And that his prophecy might have a strong impression on the imagination of the men who were with him, he was ordered, ver. 10, ' to break the bottle in the sight of these men; 11. And to say unto them, Thus saith the Lord of Hosts, Even so will I break this people and this city, as one breaketh a potter's vessel that cannot be made whole again.'

The same prophet was ordered, Jer. zxvii. 2, to make bonds and yokes, and put them on his own neck, and to send them to all the neighbouring kings, by the messengers whom they had sent to Jerusalem to persuade Zedekiah to enter into the confederacy which they had formed against the king of Babylon ; and by that symbolical action the prophet was to signify to them, that the issue of the confederacy would be certain captivity to them all. But we are told, chap, xxviii. 10, that the false prophet Hananiah took the yoke from off the prophet Jeremiah's neck, and broke it, and spake in the presence of all the people, saying, ' Thus saith the Lord, Even so will I break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, from the neck of all nations, within the space of two full years.'

Once more, Jeremiah having written in a book his prophecy concerning the destruction of Babylon, recorded Jer. li, he gave it to Serajah, ver. 60, and ordered him when he came to Babylon with Zedekiah to read it, and having read it, to bind a stone to it, and cast it into the midst of Euphrates. Ver. 64, ' And thou shall say, Thus shall Babylon sink, and shall not rise from the evil that I will bring upon her.'

With the same design of speaking by significant actions, Ezekiel was ordered to delineate Jerusalem upon a tile, and to besiege it by building a fort against it, raising a mount, and setting a camp with battering rams against it round about. This siege the prophet was to continue four hundred and thirty days, and during the continuance thereof he was to eat and drink by measure : and his bread was to be baked, that is, prepared, vcr. 15, ' with dung ; — the fuel with which he was to prepare his bread was to be dung. By these symbolical actions the prophet shewed that Jerusalem was to be besieged, and that during the siege the inhabitants were to be punished with a grievous famine, Ezek. iv. — In the following chapter the prophet was ordered, ver. 1, to shave his head and beard, and with a balance to divide the hairs thereof into three parts, and, ver. 2, when the days of the siege were fulfilled, he was to burn with fire a third part of the hairs in the midst of the city : next, he was to take a third part and smite about it with a knife ; and the remaining third part he was to scatter in the wind, except a few hairs which he was to bind in the skirts of his garment. The meaning of these symbolical actions God explained to the Israelites as follows: — Ver. 11, 'Because thou hast defiled my sanctuary with all thy detestable things, and with all thine abominations ; therefore will I also diminish thee ; neither shall mine eye spare, neither will I have any pity. 12. A third part of thee shall die with the pestilence, and with famine shall they be consumed in the midst of thee ; and a third part shall fall by the sword round about thee ; and I will scatter a third part into all the winds : and I will draw out a sword after them. 13. Thus shall mine anger be accomplished, аnd I will cause my fury to rest upon them, and I will be comforted. 15. So it shall be a reproach and a taunt, an instruction and an astonishment, unto the nations that are round about thee, when I shall execute judgments in thee, in anger, and in fury, and in furious rebukes. I the Lord have spoken it.' For the illustration of the foregoing allegorical action, I will here transcribe B. Lowth's note on lsa. vii. 20. ' In the same day shall the Lord shave with a razor that is hired, namely, by them beyond the river, by the king of Assyria, the head and the hair of the feet : and it shall also consume the beard.' — "To shave with the hired razor the head, the feet, and the beard, is an expression highly parabolical ; to denote the utter devastation of the country from one end to the other, and the plundering of the people from the highest to the lowest, by the Assyrians, whom God employed as his instrument to punish the Jews. Ahaz himself, in the first place, hired the king of Assyria to come to help him against the Syrians, by a present made to him of all the treasures of the temple as well as his own : and God himself considered the great nations whom he thus employed as his mercenaries, and paid them their wages. Thus he paid Nebuchadnezzar, for his services against Tyre, by the conquest of Egypt, Ezek. xxix. 18-20. The hairs of the head are those of highest order in the state ; those of the feet or the lower parts are the common people ; the beard is the king, the high-priest, the very supreme in dignity and majesty. The eastern people have always held the beard in the highest veneration, and have been extremely jealous of its honour. To pluck a man's beard is an instance of the greatest indignity that can be offered, Isa. l. 6. The king of the Ammonites, to shew the utmost contempt of David, ' cut off half of the beards of his servants ; and the men were greatly ashamed ; and David bade them tarry at Jericho till their beards were grown,' 2 Sam. x. 4, 6. &c."

Once more, God ordered Ezekicl, chap. xii. 3, to prepare stuff for removing, and to go forth with it at even in the sight of the people, as they who go forth into captivity, and, having digged through the wall in their sight, to carry his stuff out thereby upon his shoulders in the twilight, with his face covered that he might not see the ground. — The prophet having performed these actions in the sight of the people, when they said to him, What dost thou ? God ordered him to reply, ver. 11, 'I am your sign : like as I have done, so shall it be done unto them : they shall remove and go into captivity. 12. And the prince that is among them shall bear upon his shoulder in the twilight, and shall go forth : they shall dig through the wall to carry out thereby : he shall cover his face that he see not the ground with his eyes. 13. My net also will I spread upon him, and he shall be taken in the snare : and I will bring him to Babylon, to the land of the Chaldeans ; yet shall he not see it, though he shall die there. 14. And I will scatter towards every wind, all that are about him to help him,' &c.

From these examples of significant actions, concerning which God declared that they were commanded to be done for the purpose of prefiguring future events, we may conclude, that those uncommon actions which be commanded without declaring the purpose for which they were commanded, had, like the others, a typical meaning.

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