hority
of heaven-anointed kings. The words "I will be his Father, and he
shall be My son" seemed to imply a peculiar and unique relationship
between God Himself, the true King of Israel, and His earthly
representative. The comment ascribed to David himself is significant:
"Is this the manner of _man_, O Lord God?" No mere human sovereignty,
however glorious or firmly settled, would satisfy such a prophecy as
this.

The thoughts of the pious in Israel must have dwelt often and deeply in
after-time upon this promise and its connection with the Divine calling
of the sacred nation and her mission in the world. It is remarkable
how persistently this thought of the permanence and supernatural
character of the Davidic sovereignty recurs in the prophetic
writings--even when the crown had passed to an unworthy head, or seemed
to have been plucked off for ever. Jeremiah, when the clouds are
gathering thickly round the doomed city, foretells that the covenant of
David will be as lasting as that of "the day and the night in their
season," and that the seed of David will be unnumbered "as the host of
heaven and the sand of the sea" (Jer. xxxiii.). Ezekiel from his
far-off exile {45} by the waters of Babylon, while he proclaims the
Divine sentence against the degenerate son of David--"Remove the mitre,
and take off the crown: this shall be no more: ... I will overturn,
overturn, overturn it, ... until He come Whose right it is"--predicts
the time when Judah and Ephraim shall be one, and "David My servant
shall be their prince for ever" (Ezek. xxi. 26, 27, xxxvii. 15-28).
Haggai, in the days of the Return, continues the promise to the
uncrowned prince, Zerubbabel--"I have chosen thee, saith the Lord of
hosts" (Hag. ii. 23).

It is not to be wondered at that in the Psalter, the inspired response
of worshipping Israel to the revelation of God, we should find Psalms
that rejoice in this indestructible and royal hope, Psalms that look
beyond present failures and imminent perils to a perfect fulfilment of
what God had spoken "sometime in visions to His saints." Thus the 2nd
Psalm tells triumphantly of the Divine "law" or "decree" concerning
David's son, and sees in it the assurance of a world-wide empire, the
discomfiture of the raging of the nations and the gathering of the
kings of the earth:

Thou art My son, this day have I begotten thee.

{46}

Desire of Me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance: