Their greatness and glory appear from the circumstance that, around his
scion, the whole heathen world, which hitherto was hostile and
pernicious to the Church of God, will gather. The Suffix in [Hebrew:
nttiv] can refer only to David, or the family of David. From the
connection with chap. liii., it appears that it is in his descendant,
the righteous One, to whom the heathen and their kings do homage, that
David will attain to the dignity here announced. [Hebrew: ed] has no
other signification than "witness." Every true doctrine bears the
character of a witness. The teacher sent by God does not teach on his
own authority, [Greek: a me eoraken embateuon], but only witnesses what
he has seen and heard. With a reference to, and in explanation of the
passage before us, Christ says to Pilate, in John xviii. 37: "For this
end was I born, and for this cause I came into the world, that I should
bear _witness_ unto the truth." And the passages, Rev. i. 5: "And from
Jesus Christ who is the faithful witness," and Rev. iii. 14: "These
things says the Amen, the faithful and true witness," likewise point
back to the passage before us; compare farther, John iii. 11, 32, 33.
In John xviii. 37, Rev. i. 5, His being a witness is, just as in the
passage before us, connected with His being a King; so that the
reference to this passage cannot be at all doubtful. It is
intentionally that [Hebrew: ed] is put at the head. It is intended to
intimate that the future dominion of the Davidic dynasty over the
heathen world shall be essentially different from that which, in former
times, it exercised [Pg 349] over some neighbouring people. It is not
based upon the power of arms, but upon the power of truth. He in whom
the Davidic dynasty is to centre shall connect the prophetic with the
regal office; just as already, in the prophecy of the Shiloh, in Gen.
xlix. 10, the prophetic office is concealed behind the royal. The
contrast to the first David can the less be doubtful, that, while
[Hebrew: ed] is never applied to him, it is just the subsequent
[Hebrew: ngid] which, in a series of passages, is ascribed to him. In 2
Sam. vi. 21, David himself says that the Lord appointed him to be
_ruler_ over the people of the Lord, over Israel; in 2 Sam. vii. 8,
Nathan says: "I took thee from the sheep-cot to be _ruler_ over my
people, over Israel;" comp. 1 Sam. xxv. 30; 2 Sam. v. 5. In those
passages, however, David is always spoken of as a ruler over Israel; so