ten of Israel, is referred to Christ. As the true
Israel, Christ himself also represents himself in John i. 52; with a
reference to that which in Gen. xxviii. 12 is written, not of Jacob as
[Pg 236] an individual, but as the representative of the whole race, it
is said there: [Greek: ap'arti opsesthe ton ouranon aneogota, kai tous
angelous tou theou anabainontas kai katabainontas epi ton huion tou
anthropou.] All those declarations of the Old Testament, in which the
name of Jacob or Israel is used to designate the _election_, to the
exclusion of the false seed, the true Israelites in whom there is no
guile,--all those passages prepare the way for, and come near to the
one before us. Thus Ps. lxiii. 1: "Truly good is God to Israel, to such
as are of a clean heart;" and then Ps. xxiv. 6: "They that seek thy
face are Jacob," _i.e._, those only who, with zeal and energy in
sanctification, seek for the favour of God. In the passage before us,
the same principle is farther carried out. The true Israel is
designated as he in whom God glorifies, or will glorify himself,
inasmuch as his glorification will bear testimony to God's mercy and
faithfulness; comp. John xii. 23: [Greek: eleluthen he hora hina
doxasthe ho huios tou anthropou]; xvii. 5: [Greek: kai nun doxason me
su pater.] The verb [Hebrew: par] means in _Piel_, "to adorn," in
_Hithp._ "to adorn one's self," "to glorify one's self." Thus it occurs
in Judg. vii. 2; Is. x. 15; lx. 21: "Work of my hands for glorifying,"
_i.e._, in which I glorify myself; lxi. 3: "Planting of the Lord for
glorifying." There is no reason for abandoning this well-supported
signification either here or in chap. xliv. 23: "The Lord hath redeemed
Israel and glorified himself in Israel." If God glorifies himself in
His Servant, He just thereby gets occasion to glory in Him as a
monument of His goodness and faithfulness. Our Saviour prays in John
xii. 28: [Greek: Pater doxason sou to onoma.] The Father, by glorifying
the Son, glorifies at the same time His name. Those who explain
[Hebrew: atpar] by: _per quem ornabor_, overlook the circumstance that,
also in the phrase: "Thou art my Servant," the main stress does not,
according to the parallel passages, lie in that which the Servant has
to perform, but in His being the protected and preserved by God.

Ver. 4. "_And I said: I have laboured in vain, I have spent my strength
for emptiness and vanity; but my right is with the Lord, and my reward
with