on"), _Simson_
and others. The strange opinion of Luther, which, out of too great
respect, was adopted by a few later theologians (_Osiander_, [Pg 185]
_Gerhard_, _Tarnovius_), is only a modification of this. It is to the
effect, that the prophet had only ascribed to his own chaste wife the
name and works of an adulteress, and, hence, had performed with her,
before the people, a kind of play. (Compare, against this view,
_Buddeus_, _de peccatis typicis_ in the _Misc. s. t._ i. p. 262.) The
same opinion is expressed by _Umbreit_: "His own wife is implicated in
the general guilt, and hence she is a representative of the whole
people." In opposition to this view, compare _Simson's_ Commentary.

3. Others suppose that the prophet narrates events which took place
_actually_, indeed, but _not outwardly_. This opinion was, considering
the time at which it was advanced, very ably defended by _Jerome_ in
_Epist. ad Pammachium_, and in his commentary on chap. i. 8. According
to _Rufinus_, all those in Palestine and Egypt who respected the
authority of _Origen_, asserted that the marriage took place only in
spirit. The difficulties attaching to the first view were made
especially obvious by the ridicule of the Manicheans (_Faustus_ and
_Secundinus_ in _Augustine_, t. vi. p. 575) on this narrative. The most
accomplished Jewish scholars (_Maimonides_ in the _More Nebuch._ p. ii.
c. 46, _Abenezra_, _Kimchi_) support this opinion. Some new arguments
in defence of it have been adduced by _Marckius_.

Of these three views:--actually and outwardly; neither outwardly nor
actually; actually, but not outwardly,--the second must be at once
rejected. Those who hold it supply, "God has commanded me to tell you."
But there is not the slightest intimation of such an ellipsis; and
those interpreters have no better right to supply it in this, than in
any other narrative. There is before us action, and nothing but action,
without any intimation whatsoever that it is merely an invention.

But the following arguments are decisive in favour of the third, and
against the first view.

1. The defenders of an outward transaction rely, in support of their
view, upon the supposition, that their interpretation is most obvious
and natural;--that they are thus, as it were, in the _possession_ of
the ground, and in a position from which they can be driven only by the
most cogent reasons;--that if the transaction had been internal, it
would have been necessa