Whilst thus in these and in many other instances referring the statements met with in the Psalms to individuals living or dead at the time they were written, and to events then in progress or past, Villanovanus still imagines that everything said, besides its literal and immediate signification, is also typical of personages and events to come—a system of exposition that has been pushed beyond all reasonable lengths by ignorance and superstition since his day. We may indeed be well assured that the writers of the Hebrew Psalms knew no more of what would happen five or six centuries after they were dust than we know of what will be going on in the world five or six hundred years after we are no more. Prophets, Seers, Diviners, Fortune-tellers and the like are ignored by the science of our age, although under the first of these designations they are still acknowledged by pious persons in the history of the past, and in its bearing on the religion of the present. The excuse for this is that the Prophets of Israel were inspired, or exceptionally gifted, with the power of seeing into futurity. But God, as we now conceive God, makes no exceptions to his laws. As they are, so have they ever been, and so will they ever continue to be. Said not Servetus himself aright when he declared that out of man there was no Holy Spirit, or Spirit of Inspiration?
But it is not on the Psalms that Villanovanus’s exposition, remarkable as it is, appears the most noteworthy. It is when he comes to the writings of the Prophets, as they are styled, that he puts forth his strength and shows his learning. And it shall come to pass in the last days that Jehovah’s house shall be established on the top of the mountain, and all nations shall flow unto it, says Isaiah (ii. 2 et seq.). These words, according to our expositor, refer to the reign of Hezekiah. Literally seen, they speak of the accession of Hezekiah, and the return of the captive Israelites to Jerusalem, the Assyrians having suffered a signal defeat without a battle fought.
In like manner, commenting on the second verse of the fourth chapter of Isaiah, where it is said, In that day shall the branch of Jehovah be beautiful and glorious, he says it is still Hezekiah and events transpiring in his reign that are alluded to, the king nevertheless being to be seen as a type of Christ.
The remarkable fourteenth verse of chapter vii. of the same writer, of which so much has been made, Villanovanus refers immediately to the times in which it was written. Syria and Ephraim confederate, under their kings Rezin and Pekah, are at war with Judah and threatening Jerusalem, whose king, Ahaz, the Prophet comforts with the assurance that the invasion, however formidable it looks, will come to nothing, and bids him ask for a sign from Jehovah that such will be the case. But Ahaz declining to do so, the Prophet volunteers a forecast of what he declares will come to pass, saying, Behold, a virgin (Almah—a young marriageable woman) shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel; and before the child shall know good from evil [arrive at years of discretion] the land will be freed from its enemies. ‘The Aramæans,’ says Villanovanus, ‘have come up in battle array against Jerusalem, and the prophet speaks of a young woman who shall conceive and bear a son, the young woman being no other than Abijah, about to become the mother of Hezekiah—strength or fortitude of God—and Immanuel—God with us—before whose reign the two kings, the enemies of Judah, will have been discomfited.’
The For unto us a child is born, &c., of chapter ix., he further refers to Hezekiah, for it was in his reign that Sennacherib and the Assyrians suffered such a signal defeat, the angel of Jehovah, according to the account, having slain in one night an hundred and four score and five thousand of them.
For they shall cry unto the Lord of Hosts in the land of Egypt, and he will send them a Saviour and he shall deliver them (Ib. xix. 20). ‘The Saviour,’ says Villanovanus, ‘is still no other than Hezekiah. Egypt as well as Judah, oppressed by the Assyrians, is relieved when the great army of Sennacherib is wrecked by the angel of Jehovah.’
Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf be unstopped (Ib. xxxv. 5), i.e. ‘Liberation from the yoke of the Assyrians will do much towards giving the Jewish people clearer and better ideas of God.’
Comfort ye my people.... The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, &c. (Ib. xl. 1-3). ‘These are words addressed to Cyrus, praying him to open a way through the desert for Israel, returning from the captivity of Babylon;’ and the ninth verse, O Zion, that bringest good tidings ... say unto the cities of Judah, Behold your God, he says, ‘refers literally to Cyrus, who is here styled God; as does also the eighteenth verse, To whom will ye liken God (i.e. Cyrus), or what likeness will ye compare unto him? ‘In many striking ways,’ adds our expositor, ‘the prophet would lead the rude Jews, on their redemption from the Babylonian captivity, to cease from idolatry and to believe in God, the Creator of the world.’
He is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. Surely he hath borne our griefs ... he was wounded for our transgressions, &c. (Ib. liii.). ‘In these passages, which also involve a great mystery referable to Christ,’ says Villanovanus, ‘the Prophet laments over Cyrus, slain, as it were, for the sins of the people, who, however, will suffer still more under Cambyses, his successor, when the building of the Temple, now begun, will be interrupted.’
Arise, shine, for thy light is come.... They from Sheba shall come, and shall bring gold and incense, &c., (Ib. lx.), i.e. ‘taken literally, and as it stands, these words refer to the great days of the Second Temple, when Jerusalem was again in its glory.’