III.

(We made proclamation before him as children, [156]p. 117.)

"Sicut pueri." This is not according to the Septuagint, hos paidi'on. It is not the Vulgate, of course; but its radical difference with that raises interesting inquiries: Is it a specimen of one of many African or old Italic versions? Does our author endeavour to translate from the Septuagint? May he not have had in hand a copy of Isaiah from among those which preceded the Septuagint?

The Septuagint reading finds its key in cap. lii. 7, and in the tenth verse, where the "Arm of the Lord" ("His Holy Arm") is introduced as the personal Logos Incarnate. The thirteenth and fourteenth verses predict the amazing sequel, and its practical and blessed results; and then begins cap. liii., "Who hath believed" our message. To whom is "the Arm of the Lord" revealed? "Going before Him (i.e., as heralds), we have proclaimed Him as a child, and, as it were, a root in a thirsty land; He has no form nor glory," etc. In other words, "We have prophesied of Him who is elsewhere predicted ("unto us a child is born") as one who from His childhood is as a rush without water,--prematurely withered,--a man of sorrows, and the Carpenter's Son."

It does not hint, therefore, the "obscurity" of the Messiah's birth, but rather what Irenæus insists upon, i.e., His (premature) old age; the worn and stricken appearance of senility in comparative youth. ¹ This is just what the messengers (Isa. lii. 7) had said in their proclamation (Isa. lii. 14) just before: "His visage was so marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men."