EZEKIEL 31

2 Son of man, speak unto Pharaoh king of Egypt, and to his multitude; Whom art thou like in thy greatness?

As Assyria fell, suddenly crushed from mighty power to utter powerlessness, so Egypt should be brought down.

The Sun King

... it has been ascertained that the name "Pharaoh" is not an individual, but a dynastic name of the Egyptian royal house, and is thus defined: Ph (the definite article the) ouro (king), which is derived from ra, the name of the sun; hence the origin of the heathen symbol of the sun to represent kingly power; and as in the minds of all the ancient heathen there was a semi-deified authority in the kingly office, the two ideas of kingship and the rule and authority of the Supreme Being were blended in one, hence the radical definition of the term, "Ph-ra-ouro"—Pharaoh—The Sun King, or a "king," "the sun" of his people, and also the additional title to deified, "Si-Ra, " "Child of the Sun."

The idea is undoubtedly derived from the Mosaic record of the creation of the sun and moon, as rulers in the arrangement of the physical heavenlies.

"And God made two great lights..."—(Gen. 1:16, 18)

David is thus metaphorically called a "sun," or light of Israel:

"When the Philistine giant thought to slay David, Abishai, the son of Zeruiah succoured him, and smote the Philistine and killed him. Then the men of David sware unto him, saying, Thou shalt go no more with us to battle, that thou quench not the light of Israel."—(2 Sam. 21:17.)

David's son and Lord, on the same principle, is the "sun" that lightens the world—kosmos. Of John, Zacharias prophesied:

"... through the tender mercy of our God, whereby the day-spring (margin, sunrising) from on high hath visited us, to give light to them that sit in darkness, and in the shadow of death (night-state), to guide our feet into the way of peace."—(Luke 1:76–79.)

"... The people which sat in darkness saw great light, and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death (night-state), light is springing up."—(Matt. 4:12, 16; Isaiah 9:1, 2.

"In him was life, and the life was the light of men; and the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it not. . . That was the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world."—(John 1:4, 9.) "I am the light of the world."—(John 8:12; 9:5; 12:35, 36; 3:19, 20; Isaiah 49:6; 1 John 2:8.)

We will not enlarge further on this beautiful scriptural symbol. As respresentative of the personal and multitudinous Christ, on the occasion of the transfiguration, it is said

"his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light"—(Matt. 17:2.)

This is the glory of the Father, manifested in His many sons and daughters in the kingdom, and it is then they become "as the sun when he shines in his power," as "the Sun of Righteousness," shining forth in power and light in the millennial day; for then the sun and moon of the nations will be ashamed. Yahweh Tz'vaoth shall reign in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem (Isaiah 24:23), the sun of an unclouded day of one thousand years; for at this time it has been said for the saints:

"Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father."—(Matt. 13:43.)

Bro. Sintzenich

The Christadelphian, Dec 1873

3 Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches, and with a shadowing shroud, and of an high stature; and his top was among the thick boughs.

8 The cedars in the garden of Elohim could not hide him: the fir trees were not like his boughs, and the chesnut trees were not like his branches; nor any tree in the garden of Elohim was like unto him in his beauty.

9 I have made him fair by the multitude of his branches: so that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of Elohim, envied him.

This country, in after ages, came to be denominated "the Garden of the Lord;" and the kings who reigned in it, "the Trees of Eden." It was no doubt termed the Lord's garden as a whole, from the fact of His having, in the beginning, planted a garden in it where He put the man; so that the name of a small part of Eden, came to be applied by his family in the time of Seth, Noah, Shem, Abraham, and Moses, to the whole region; more especially as the future paradise is to occupy a considerable portion of its ancient limits.

The plain of Jordan appears to have been part of Eden from the following texts. "Lot beheld all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere as the garden of the Lord. Then Lot chose him all the plain of Jordan and Lot journeyed east; and dwelled in the cities of the plain (Gen. 13:10-12); that is, in the East, or Eden.

There is a prophecy in Ezekiel, predicting the overthrow of the Egyptian Pharoah by the king of Babylon, "the mighty one of the heathen."

In setting forth the certainty of his overthrow, God recapitulates the power and dominion of the Ninevite dynasty of Assyria: which, however, was not able to withstand the king of Babylon, and therefore there was no hope for Egypt of a successful resistance. In the recapitulation, the Ninevite Assyrian is styled, "a cedar in Lebanon;" that is, his dominion extended over the land of the ten tribes of Israel, in which are the cedar-crowned mountains of Lebanon.

...These trees (Dan. 4:20-22) are representative of the royalties of Mesopotamia, Syria, Israel, &c., which the kings of Assyria had abolished (Isaiah 37:12-13); and which "could not hide him," or prevent him getting the ascendancy over them. It is clear, then, from the terms of this beautiful allegory, that the countries I have indicated are comprehended in Eden; that as a whole it is styled the garden of the Lord; and that the trees are the royalties of the land.

Elpis Israel