e _Tuebinger
Pfingst-Programm_, 1820, p. 11. But in this latter explanation, one
thing has been overlooked--as, among the older interpreters, has been
well shown by _Calvin_,[1] and among the more recent, by _Tychsen_
(_progr. ad h. l._ p. 5)--viz., that the subsequent words, "Your sons,
your daughters, your old men, your young men, the servants, the
handmaids," contain a specification of the [Hebrew: bwr]; so that the
_all_, by which it is qualified, does not do away with the limitation
to a particular people, but only with the limits of sex, age, and rank,
among the people themselves. The participation of the Gentiles in the
outpouring of the Holy Ghost did not, in the first instance, come into
consideration in this place, inasmuch as the threatening of punishment,
with which the proclamation of salvation is connected, had respect to
the Covenant-people only. _Credner_ has been led into a strange error,
by pressing the words [Hebrew: kl-bvwr] without any regard to the
connection. He imputes to the prophet the monstrous idea, that the
Spirit of God, the fountain of all which is good and great, well
pleasing to God, and divine, is to be poured out upon all animals also,
even upon the locusts.--The foundation for the promise of the Holy
Spirit is formed by Gen. ii. 7, compared with i. 26. It supposes that
the spirit of man, as distinguished from all other living things [Pg
336] on earth, is a breath from God.--There is here, moreover, the same
contrast betwixt [Hebrew: bwr] and [Hebrew: rvH] as in Gen. vi. 3 and
Is. xxxi. 3: "The Egyptians are men, and not God; their horses are
flesh, and not spirit." (Compare other passages in _Gesenius'_
_Thesaurus_, _s. v._ p. 249.) _Flesh_, in this contrast, signifies
human nature with respect to its weakness and helplessness; the
_spirit_ is the principle of life and strength. As "your sons," etc.,
is a specification of all flesh, so, the words, "They prophesy, they
dream dreams, they see visions," are a specification of: "I pour out My
Spirit." From this, it is evident that the particular gifts do not here
come into consideration according to their individual nature, but
according to that essential character which is common to them as
effects of the Spirit of God. Hence it is obvious also, that we are not
at liberty to ask why it is just to the sons and daughters that the
prophesying is ascribed, etc. The prophet, whose object it is only to
individualize and expand the fundamental t