[484] Porrum & cepe, nefas violare & frangere morsu. O sanctas gentes quibus hæc nascuntur in hortis Numina. Juvenal. satyr. 25.
[485] Diod. Sicul. l. 5. c. 27.
CHAP. VIII.
The several manners of Divine Revelation.
As Idolatry originally sprang from mistaking of Scripture; so Witch-craft and Sorcery, (which holdeth near affinity with Idolatry) seemeth to have had its first beginning from an imitation of Gods Oracles. God spake in divers manners, Heb. 1. 1. By dreams, by Urim, by Prophets, 1 Sam. 28. 6, 7. when the Lord would by none of these answer King Saul, then he sought to a Witch. To these might be added Gods speaking from between the Cherubims, his answering by Visions, Angels, and Voices: but the chief manners of revealing himself, observed by the Hebrew Writers, are four, which they term[486] four degrees of Prophecy, or Divine Revelation: somewhat therefore being spoken of these, I purpose to explain the several sorts of unlawful divinations mentioned in Scripture.
[486] P. Fagius in Exod. 28.
The first degree was נבואה Nebuah, Prophecy. This was when God by certain visions and apparitions revealed his Will.
The second was רוח הקדש Ruach Hacodesch, The inspiration of the Holy Ghost, whereby the party was inabled without Visions or Apparitions, to prophesie: some shewing the difference between those two add,[487] that the gift of Prophecy did cast a man into a trance or extasie, all his senses being taken from him; but the inspiration of the Holy Ghost was without any such extasie, or abolition of the senses, as appeareth in Job, David, Daniel. Both these degrees, as likewise Urim and Thummim ceased in the second Temple, whence their ancient Doctors say, [488] that after the latter Prophets Haggai, Zachary, and Malachy were dead, the Holy Ghost went up or departed from Israel. Howbeit, they had the use of a voice or eccho from Heaven. In which speech we are not to understand that the Holy Ghost wrought not at all upon the creatures, or that it wrought not then in the sanctification of men, as in former times, but that this extraordinary enabling men to prophesie by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, then ceased; and in this sense the Holy Ghost was said to have departed from Israel. Unto this common received opinion, that passage might have reference, Acts 19. We have not so much as heard whether there hath been an Holy Ghost or no. That they did not doubt the distinction of persons, appeareth clear, if that be true which some have noted,[489] that the ancient Jews before Christ were so catechised in that point, that they observed the Mystery of the Trinity in the name יהוה Jehovah, for though the name consisted of four letters in number, whence it was called τετραγράμματον Quadriliterum, yet there were but three sorts of Letters in the name: י Jod signified the Father, who was the beginning of all things: ו Vau is a conjunction copulative, and denoted the third person in Trinity, which proceedeth from the Father and the Son, ה He signifieth the Son of God. The Rabbines have a saying, that God made all things, in litera ה He. They may allude to this, that he made all things by his Word: he said, Let there be thus and thus, and it was so: but they may also allude to the second person in Trinity. And furthermore, they note that ה He, is doubled in this name, to demonstrate both Natures of our blessed Saviour.
[487] D. Kimchi. Præfat. in Psal.
[488] Talmud. in Sanhedrin, c. 1.