120 THE KEY OF MYSTERIES

explain the Psalm as referring to 'King Messiah', although his own opinion was different. The Lord Jesus Christ claims to possess the world-wide authority 1 promised in this Psalm. The words 'Kiss the Son' mean 'do Him homage as king'. The word rendered 'Son' in this last verse is not the same as that which is used at the beginning of the extract, it is the Aramaic בַּד instead of the Hebrew בַּר. Others render it 'the Pure One', for in Hebrew the word בֵּנ means 'pure', and this would also be very suitable in reference to the Lord Jesus, 'the Sinless Prophet' (النبي المعصوم). It is probably from a misunderstanding of this passage that the Druzes and others use بار as the appellation of what they style 'the first emanation of the Divine'. But there are no emanations from God; and this passage in the Psalms shows that the promised Messiah, the Word of God, is also the Son of God, in exact accordance with. the teaching of the New Testament.

In the forty-fifth Psalm the promised Messiah is addressed in the following words:—

Thy 2 throne, O God, is for ever and ever:
A sceptre of equity is the sceptre of thy kingdom.
Thou hast loved righteousness, and hated wickedness:
Therefore God, thy God, 3 hath anointed 4 thee
With the oil of gladness above thy fellows.

1 Matt. xxviii. 18; Acts i. 8. 2 Ps. xlv. 6-7.
3 Cf. John xx. 17. 4 Cf. Isa. lxi. 1; Luke iv. 17-18.
PROOF OF THE DEITY OF CHRIST 121

The Epistle to the Hebrews 1 declares that these verses are spoken in reference to the Lord Jesus Christ, and takes them as a clear testimony to His Deity. All attempts to explain them in any other way fail to account for the title of God given to the king who is here described. The rest of the Psalm describes the spiritual union between the Lord Jesus Christ and His Church as a wedding, just as is done in the Book of Revelation. 2

In the hundred and tenth Psalm the following passage occurs:—

The 3 LORD saith unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand
Until I make thine enemies thy footstool.

The New Testament in passage 4 after passage refers these words to the ascensions of the Lord Jesus Christ, and says that they were written about Him. The Lord Jesus himself mentions them as an inspired utterance of David and as referring to Himself; as it is written in the Gospel: 'While 6 the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them a question, saying, What think ye of the Christ? whose son is he? They say unto him, The son of David. He saith unto them, How

1 Heb. i. 8-9. 2 Rev. xxi. 2, 9-10; xxii. 17.
3 Ps. cx. 1. 4 Acts ii. 34-6; 1 Cor. xv. 25; Heb. i. 18.
5 Mark xvi. 19; 1 Pet. iii. 22; Rom. viii. 34; Eph. i. 20; Col. iii. 1; Heb. i. 3.
6 Matt. xxii. 41-6; cf. Mark xii. 35-7; Luke xx. 41-4.