In like manner, in the war against Benjamin, according to divine direction, Judah goes up first to the battle, forms the vanguard. Judges xx. 18. The intentional identity of the expression used here and in chap. i., leads us to the supposition that the words, "Judah shall go up," have, in both passages, the same foundation.
From both of these events, we are led to expect that Judah may be called to occupy a still more important position. The announcement of Jacob regarding Judah, to which the words, "Judah shall go up," refer, finds, in these events, evidently but a poor beginning of its complete fulfilment. All, however, which was required in the meantime, was the indication, by gentle touches, of the position which Judah was called to occupy in future times. It is just God's way to take time in carrying out His elections; all human conditions must first disappear. After these two intimations, at the end of the time of Joshua (for Judges i. 1, 2, belongs to that period; the words, "And it came to pass after the death of Joshua," do not refer to what follows immediately after, but only to the contents of the book as a whole), and at the beginning of the time of the Judges, Judah retires out of view. During the whole period of the Judges, Ephraim held the supremacy. Under David, the validity of the election suddenly appeared, and the announcement of Jacob found a glorious fulfilment; but again, such an one only as pointed to a still more glorious fulfilment in the future. Before this took place, however,—before Shiloh came, to whom the obedience of the people was promised, the lamp of Judah was once more to be extinguished, so that, to human eyes, it should be invisible for many centuries.
In 1 Chron. xxviii. 4, David says: "And the Lord God of Israel chose me out of all the house of my father to be king over Israel for ever; for He hath chosen Judah to be the ruler, and in the house of Judah, the house of my father, and in the house of my father. He liked me to make me king over all Israel." David here points to an event by which Judah was raised to be the ruling tribe; and such an election is nowhere else to be found than in Gen. xlix. We cannot for a moment suppose that Judah was elected only in, and with, the election of David. Against such a supposition militates the fact, that even the election of David's house is represented in history as being distinct from the election of David himself; for in 1 Sam. xvi. the decree of God is first made known, that one of Jesse's sons is to be king; and it is only afterwards that we are told which of them is to be chosen. The expression too, "He hath chosen Judah to be the ruler," is decisive against it; for this expression has an evident reference to the sceptre and lawgiver in Gen. xlix. But if any doubt should still remain, it would be entirely removed by the parallel passage in 1 Chron. v. 2, where, in the words, "For Judah was mighty among his brethren, and of him the prince was to come," there is an allusion, which cannot be mistaken, to Gen. xlix.
There cannot be a doubt that David gave to his son the name Solomon, because he hoped that, in his just and peaceful reign, he would be a type of the Shiloh whom the nation should willingly obey, just as, in his own reign, there had been the first grand fulfilment of what Jacob had prophesied of Judah's lion-courage, and lion-strength,—of Judah's sceptre and lawgiver. We have here the counterpart of the fact, that the children of Israel, after the first occupation of the country, gave to the seat of the sanctuary the name of Shiloh. In the case of Solomon, both the name and the substance point to Shiloh. With regard to the name, three out of the four letters of which the name שלמה consists, are common to it with Shiloh. The signification is precisely the same; so also is the form. In שלמה as well as in שילה we meet with the very rare case of the ן at the end being thrown off. In Ewald's Grammar, § 163, these two names are, for this reason, pointed out and placed immediately beside each other. And, with regard to the agreement in the substance, we refer to 1 Chron. xxii. 9, where Nathan says to David: "Behold, a son shall be born to thee, who shall be a man of rest, and I will give him rest from all his enemies round about; for his name shall be Solomon, and I will give peace and quietness unto Israel in his days." We refer, further, to 1 Kings v. 4, where Solomon says to Hiram: "And now the Lord my God hath given me rest round about; there is neither adversary nor evil obstacle." We refer, finally, to 1 Kings v. 4, 5 (iv. 24, 25): "He had dominion over all the region on the other side of the river, from Tiphsah even to Gaza, over all the kings on the other side of the river, and he had peace from all his servants round about. And Judah and Israel dwelt safely, every man under his vine and fig-tree, from Dan even to Beersheba, all the days of Solomon."[18]
But if any further doubt should remain as regards the typical relation in which Solomon stands to Shiloh, it would be removed by Ps. lxxii., which discards the very idea that Solomon could be anything more than a type,—that any hope had ever been entertained of his being himself the Shiloh. Even David's Messianic Psalms bear witness against such an opinion. In harmony with the words of our Lord in Matt. xii. 42, "A greater than Solomon is here," Solomon In this Psalm points beyond himself. In his own just and peaceful dominion, he beholds a type of the kingdom of the Prince of Peace, who, by His justice and love, shall obtain dominion over the world, and whom all kings shall worship, and all the heathen shall serve. How closely this Psalm is connected with Gen. xlix. is pointed out by Ezekiel, in a passage of which we shall immediately treat.
In ver. 9 of Ps. lx., which was composed by David, the words, "Judah is my lawgiver"—equivalent to, Judah is my, i.e., Israel's ruling tribe—point to Gen. xlix. 10, according to which the lawgiver shall not depart from Judah; just as ver. 13, "Give us help from the enemy," alludes to Deut. xxxiii. 7, where it is said of Judah, "Be thou a help to him from his enemies," and ver. 14, to Num. xxiv. 18.
That the Prince of Peace spoken of in Is. ix. 5, under whom there is "no end to the increase of government and of peace," refers to the Peaceful One, to whom the nations render obedience, will not be doubted by those who have recognised the connection in which Solomon and Ps. lxxii. stand to the Shiloh. Nor will such fail to recognise an allusion to the Shiloh in all the other passages of the Prophets, in which the Messiah is described as the Author of rest and peace; e.g., Mic. iv. 1-4; Is. ii. 2-4; Zech. ix. 10; and the less so, the more clearly it appears, from passages of Ezekiel, what influence Gen. xlix. exercised over the prophetic consciousness. Isaiah significantly alludes to it in other passages also. In chap. xxix. 1, 2, he says: "Woe to Ariel, (i.e., Lion of God), the city where David encamped! Add ye year to year, let the feasts revolve. And I distress Ariel, and there shall be heaviness and affliction, but it shall be unto me as Ariel;"—the meaning of which is: Jerusalem will, in times to come, endure heavy affliction (through Asshur), but the world-conquering power of the kingdom of God will manifest itself in her deliverance. The name Ariel is emphatically placed at the beginning, and, in it, the Prophet gives to the congregation of God a guarantee for her deliverance. That which Jacob had said of Judah, who, to him, appeared as the invincible lion of God, is here applied to Zion, the city where David encamped, the centre of the kingdom of Judah.
Ezekiel, in his lamentation over the princes of Israel who, in his time, were standing just at the brink of the abyss, says in chap. xix. 2: "Thy mother was a lioness, who lay down among lionesses, and brought up her whelps among young lions." The mother is the congregation of Judah. The image of the lion points to the blessing of Jacob, and its fulfilment in history. "Judah once couched in a threatening position, endangering his adversaries,[19] in the midst of lions, i.e., among the other powerful kingdoms fond of conquests." (Hävernick.)
In Ezek. xxi. 15, 18 (10-15), the Lord, with an evident allusion to Gen. xlix. 10, announces the (temporary) destruction of the sceptre of His son (i.e., Israel or Judah), a sceptre which despises all other sceptres.
In vers. 30-32 (25-27) of the same chapter, Ezekiel foretells, in the name of the Lord, a complete overturning of all relations, a total revolution, in which the Davidic kingdom especially is brought down, a condition of affairs in which rest and safety will not anywhere be found. This state of things is to continue "until He comes to whom is the judgment; to Him I will give it."