"What nation is there so great, who
hath God so nigh unto them, in all that they call upon him for?" - Deut.
4:7
WE learn from unexceptionable authority,
that "the Rabbi in the Talmud say, that the Messias shall be called Joden
Muren, for He shall be the Judge, as in Isaiah 11. Thus it is very plain that
the Irish name is derived from the Chaldee, Choshen Hemeshpot, or Joden
Muran." J. Heidegger, Prof Ling. Oriental. apud Keating.
F.R.A. Glover: The mention of the existence of this Official, so named, is constantly on
record in Irish history.
The words themselves, according to the
application made of them by the above authorities, are the highest prophecy
of The High Being whose advent was to be.
How is it possible to account for these
words of prophecy and its concomitant events being understood, or being at all,
in Ireland, at that time? .. the promise also of the perpetual sceptre, and the
promised return to the East, - all alike indicative of the expectation of the
Shiloh in the East, - but in the presence, there, of the mind, of what we know
would, under the circumstances, have been the mind of Jeremiah? This can
point only to Jeremiah.
Again, why was this Hebrew phrase
incorporated into the nomenclature of a foreign people? Does not this fact
exhibit strikingly the influence which the Hebrew introducer of this Office and
Title must have had with those whom he persuaded, in recognizing the office, as
well, to adopt a Hebrew name for it?
Whence this influence of this strange man
with this Baalitish people, in the things of God, but that it was felt, or
believed, he was a messenger of God? If they believed this, it must have been
because he declared he was. And who could have so declared, at that time, in
Ireland, but Jeremiah? He not only was, - he was so by special appointment, -
"prophet to the nations," but the prophet as well who had the duty to
perform "to plant and to build" the kingdom of the Lord wherever he
came: namely, that of resuscitated Judah, the perpetuity of which he had been
so expressly commanded to declare I? (Jer. 33:17, 21, 26)
Jeremiah, also, had been instructed,
commanded in a very especial manner, on two several occasions, (Jer. 23, 32) to
declare the advent of The Righteous Judge of Isaiah and the SHILOH Of Jacob
(Gen. 48:10), at whose appearance Judah should be saved, and Israel dwell
safely and, "out of the north Country," restored "to its own
land."
Now, the Jodhan Moran of Irish history was,
when first that name was assumed, the Prophetic Impersonation of this SHILOH;
that gatherer-up of all the promises "spoken by all the holy prophets
since the world began." (Acts 3:21) And the fact of an Official assuming, in
the Name of God, this highest of all earthly titles, showed, that he who
assumed it, and in assuming proclaimed it, and proclaimed the doctrine involved
in it, knew what he was about; and that he know also what, his duty it was, to
state. He who set up this office, in these words, could only have been
Jeremiah.
Keating says, "The famous Moran was one
of the chief judges of this kingdom (Ireland). When he sat upon the bench to
administer justice, he put his miraculous JODHAN MORAN about his neck "
[by a chain], "which had that wonderful power, that if the judge
pronounced an unjust decree, the breastplate would instantly contract itself,
and encompass the neck so close that it would be impossible to breathe; but, if
he delivered a just sentence, it would open itself and hang loose upon his
shoulders."
The Jodhan Moran is a character who appears
not only in the pages of Keating, but over and over again on the stage of Irish
History; but the gold insignia of the Office having been exhumed more than once
from the bogs of Ireland, into which they may have been cast, or buried, in
times of trouble, no more doubt can exist as to the reality of tho Office, than
of Tara itself, or of any other fact well authenticated by circumstantial
evidence. A golden collar or breastplate, supposed by Vallancey to be the
Jodhan Moran, was found, some years since, in the county of Limerick, twelve
feet deep in a bog. "It is made of thin plated gold, and chased in a very
neat and workmanlike manner; the breastplate is single, but the hemispherical
ornaments at the top are lined throughout with another thin plate of pure
gold." Collectan. Hibern. No. 13. The traditional memory of this chain or
collar (says O'Flanigan) is so well preserved to this day, that it is a common
expression for a person asseverating absolute truth to say, " I would
swear by Moran's chain for it." - Trans. of Gaelic Soc. vol. i. apud
Moore.
It seems then, thus, that there was once an
officer in Ireland, a chief justiciary, whose office not only gave him great
influence, but that it was, at one time, believed to be endowed - as was that
of the Hebrew High Priest - with miraculous powers.
Dismissing all consideration of the
marvelous from this case, the doctrine set forth, by this teacher, was good. It
inculcated the direct interference of Almighty God to overrule the acts of His
servants, for His people's good; for he who dispensed justice in the name of
The Righteous Judge was necessarily God's servant (Deut. 4:7); while the
promise which the title itself implied, was the highest then, or since known by
Revelation; namely, the coming of a GREAT ONE, - in Whose Name this Witness for
God presented himself to the People, - to bring in Universal Righteousness and
renovate the Earth (Acts 3:21): a doctrine which was, as we shall see,
proclaimed in the title itself of this grand officer of state.
The full import of this Phrase, can only be
arrived at, by quoting the chapter referred to by the Talmudist, and those
chapters in the Book of Jeremiah which declare the same truth of the same great
person, alleged, by the Talmudist, to be the Messiah.
The Judge in Isaiah 11, then, is, "a
Root out of the Stem of Jesse; and, a Branch is to grow out of his Roots; and
which, in that day, is to stand for an Ensign to the people: to it
shall the Gentiles seek, and his Rest shall be glorious." It is He who is
to be, THE RIGHTEOUS JUDGE. He is, to "set up the Ensign for the
nations," .. to assemble "the outcasts of Israel," and gather
together "the dispersed of Judah" from the "four corners of the
earth."
When? In the day in which THE STONE is to
return to the East, whence it came?
The same is He who is spoken of in Jeremiah
23, "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a
Righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute
JUDGMENT and JUSTICE (="The Righteous Judge") on the earth. In his
days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely: and this is the name
by which he" [the Righteous Judge] "shall be called, THE LORD OUR
RIGHTEOUSNESS."
When? In the day that the Stone is to return
to the East, whence it came?
And, again, when Jeremiah was in prison
(Jer.33:1) for foretelling the destruction of Judah, he was informed, and
instructed especially to set the testimony before the people, "Behold, the
days come, that I will perform that good thing which I have promised unto the
House of Israel "- (then already 180 years scattered and lost to sight, -
almost to memory, and never, even yet, restored or recovered) - "and to
the House of Judah:" then about to be cut off with a severity amounting,
to an entire excision of the males of the Royal Line of Judah, which also came
to pass; for there was no King of the House of Judah to resume the throne on
the return from the captivity. And yet, notwithstanding, the Prophet was
instructed to say, "In those days, and, at that time, will I cause the
Branch of Righteousness to grow up unto David; and he shall execute Judgment
and Righteousness in the land. In those days shall Judah be saved, and
Jerusalem shall dwell safely. And this is the name whereby he shall be called,
THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS. For thus saith the Lord, David shall never want a
man to sit upon the Throne of the House of Israel."
In those days! When? In the day
that the Stone which came from the East is to return to the East, whence it
came?
It is impossible not to see that these three
portions of Holy Writ are identical: and that, therefore, what appertains to
one of them, is inseparable from the other two; referring all of them, as they
do, to the same person, The Righteous Judge, The Branch of Judah; therefore, to
the same time, and to the same great event; and, therefore, to all its
concomitants. That event, which we call the second Advent of the Lord Jesus,
the Jews before Christ considered, even as the present "dispersed of
Judah" consider it, the Coming of Messiah; .. that Shiloh of Jacob, until
the time of Whose appearance, the sceptre of Judah was never to disappear from
the earth as a Reality and a Power (Gen. 49:10). So, if Jeremiah had been made
to pronounce its excision (Jer. 22: 28,30; 36:30), and was in prison because he
did so in obedience to the word of the Lord, he was called upon, at the same
time, in accordance with his own belief, to record and reiterate that it could
be no more than a partial eclipse of the promised perpetuity of enduring
continuance of the Royal Line; inasmuch as he was made to conclude the message
with the remarkable promises in the succeeding parts of the chapter. (Jer.
33:17, 20-26)
Here, then, is the authority for Jeremiah to
pronounce, as he would set up the Stone of Jacob any where, and anoint it with
oil again, as it had been anointed aforetime (Gen. 28:48), at Bethel, that, God
would not leave it until He had done by it, and those to whom it should belong
and should belong of right, all of which He had spoken to our Father, Jacob
(Gen. 28:15): viz. that the sceptre should abide with it, until the time of its
return to the place whence it came; .. the time that Shiloh, The Righteous
Judge, should come to manifest Himself to the nations, to restore Jerusalem to
Judah, and "their own Land, to Israel." Now all this knowledge was
evidently in the mind of him, who, in the Name and in the Character of the
Branch of Jesse, set up, in The Righteous Judge, the witness for GOD in
Ireland: the witness to Him Who was to come, in fulfillment of the words of
Isaiah and of the prophet Jeremiah, before spoken in Judea.
Who then, we ask, could have done that, at
that time, and have dared to conceive of the Stone, and to pronounce of
it, and connect with it, the words and promise of the Legend, but
this very Prophet, Jeremiah, himself? - he, who alone knew, and was able to see
through, the mystery Of the CUT-OFF, and to-be-resuscitated House of Judah? ..
"cut off," for the breaking of Sabbaths, themselves; .. for promising
to the Lord and keeping it not, in breaking the law of the Sabbatical year to
their slaves (Jer. 34); .. for despising the Prophets; .. for cutting up the word
of the Lord and burning it in the fire (Jer 36:23); .. for these and like
things "cut off," but to be resuscitated. "King (Jer. 33:17-18) and
priest", "not by bow, nor sword, nor battle, nor horses, nor
horsemen" (Hos 1:7) - by what then? - by influence (Jer. 15:11) -
"by the Lord their God;" (Hos 1:7) because God would not fail Jacob,
whom He had promised, nor Abraham whom He had loved; (Deut 7:8) nor David, to
whom Nathan had been commanded to say, "Thine house and thy kingdom shall
be established for ever before thee: thy throne shall be established for
ever." (2 Sam. 7:16)
Here, then, are two very extraordinary
things; with respect to the Man, and with respect to the Stone. What we have
chiefly to consider, as concerning the man, in connexion with the Legend of the
Stone is, that the phrase, "The Righteous Judge," is itself, a
Prophecy of His future appearance to restore Israel to "his own," and
"his own" to Israel. He who knew of The Righteous Judge, must have
known the concomitants of the Prophecy: for, by the parallel passages quoted,
that is all contained in the proper knowledge of this one phrase: and none knew
this so well as Jeremiah; Isaiah having been dead, and the Prophet having twice
given forth the same grand prophecy of Isaiah, with amplifications.
The Righteous Judge, of the Root of Jesse,
would be in the East; and the Stone was to go back to the East; until when, a
Sceptre was to continue with it: that is, until Shiloh, The Branch, The
Righteous Judge, would be manifested. What is, then, the Legend of the Stone,
supposing it to have been pronounced by a proper authority, but a paraphrase of
the prophecy, "The Sceptre shall not depart from Judah until Shiloh
come?"
There are, thus, unmistakable indications of
a Prophet having been in Ireland at that remote time: and what Prophet of the
Lord but Jeremiah, - consecrated the "Prophet to the Gentiles"
in his mother's womb, - could have had any business there? He had; and he was able
to go there.
And while he had also, as we have already
seen, good reasons for going somewhere, Jeremiah's peculiar doctrine
is found in Ireland, where he is, also, said to have gone: a doctrine, which,
in so far as we can see, could hardly have been taken there by any but himself.
Thus, he, and the business which he had to do somewhere, appear on the Scene,
in Ireland, at Tara, at the very time that he was free to go where he listed:
which business, as done at Tara, nobody else beside himself could have had, at
that time, either knowledge, or authority, or power to do, as we now discover,
and consequently, know, it to have been done.
Hence, it is concluded, with entire
conviction of the truth of the conclusion, that, if the accounts of the
presence of the Jodhan Moran in Ireland be true, Jeremiah the Prophet, and
Jeremiah alone, was, could be, the only then living being, who was able to
know, do, and say, and be justified in saying at that time, that, which the
account declares to have been known, done, and said, with respect to the Stone
of Destiny, then, at Tara, in Ireland: and that he accordingly was there, and
did it.
It will, consequently, be clear, from the
foregoing, that the fact of the Prophet Jeremiah having been in Ireland,
requires no other evidence to establish it, than that of this one fact, even if
it stood alone; viz. the certainty of the existence of this Official with this
significant Title, to illustrate and give sense to the Legend of the Stone.
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