Christs personall reigne on earth, one thousand yeares with his saints the manner, beginning, and continuation of his reigne clearly proved by many plain texts of Scripture, and the chiefe objections against it fully answered, explaining the 20 Revelations and all other Scripture-prophecies that treat of it : containing a full reply to Mr. Alexander Petrie ... who wrote against ... Israels redemption / by Robert Maton.

TO THE READER.

Courteous Reader,

THere are two main obstacles which de∣barre men from the apprehension of Gods word: the one, a strange lan∣guage; the other, a strange interpreta∣tion. The first is proper to Papists; the other is common to Protestants and Papists: and is indeed the more dange∣rous, seeing an unknowne tongue doth onely bide the truth from the unlearned, and so may somewhat easily be avoy∣ded: but a false interpretation doth equally deprive both the wise and the simple of it: and so causeth the blind to leade the blinde. For whatsoever text of Scripture is ex∣pounded any otherwise then God meant by it, it is accor∣ding to its interpretation, the word of man, and not of God, and consequently in adhering to such interpretati∣ons, we believe not what God saith, but what man doth make him say. Now of Scriptures that are misunderstood, some are so difficult, that it is not possible to give a peremptory interpretation of them, of which sort are some passages in

Daniel, in the Revelation, and here and there in other parts of the Scripture) and in these we should either con∣fesse our ignorance, or deliver our thoughts as evidences on∣ly of our desire to attaine to the perfect knowledge of Gods word. Others againe are so plaine, that every common and ordinary understanding, if left to it selfe, cannot choose but take them in their true sense; and not in that which is thrust upon them by a false glosse. And of these some have been a long time controverted; and others have as long past unsuspected, amongst which are the many Prophecies which God hath reveal'd touching the future restauration of the Jewes, and the personall reigne of our Lord Jesus Christ on earth. And surely whatsoever was the ground of the misinterpretation of these Prophecies at the first, (whe∣ther an hatred of the Jewes, whom alone in their proper sense they doe concerne, or some sinister and selfe-respects) whatsoever, I say, was the ground of it at the first, the con∣tinuance of it hath been occasioned by the inconsiderancie of the ungrounded application of the words [Jew and Is∣raelite] indifferently to the Jewes and Gentiles: and of the words [Israel, Sion, and Jerusalem] to the Church of the Gentiles, when as there is not one text in all the Scripture, wherein a Gentile is cal'd a Jew, or an Israelite; or wherein the Church of the Gentiles is cal'd, Israel, Sion, or Jerusalem. Those texts, Rom. 2. ver. 28. and 29. and chap. 9. ver. 6. and 7. are both by Piscator and Pareus understood of the Jewes only. And these words Gal. 6. ver. 16. [upon the Israel of God] are both by the ordinary and interlineary glosses understood likewise of the Jewes onely: so that it is, as if the Apo∣stle had said, And as many as walke according to this rule, peace be on those Gentiles and mercy, and peace and mercy on those Jewes. And surely if

that text be not thus distinctly understood of the faithfull Jewes and Gentiles; there will either be a tautologie in the words: or else the last words must be understood of the Israel in blindnesse, to whom the Apostle doth here also wish mercy, according to that which he saith of them, Rom. 10. ver. 1. That his hearts desire and prayer to God for Israel was, that they might be saved. And that the Tribes of the children of Israel, Rev. 7. ver. 4. are proper∣ly to be understood, Ribera and others acknowledge, and Pa∣reus though he enclines to an allegorical interpretation of them in his commentaries on the Revelation, yet in his explication of the 18. doubt of the 11. chap. to the Rom. he thus resolutely determines against it. Quod Oraculum ad literam de conversione Judaeorum planè intelli∣gendum videtur, quoniam Israelitae signati in fron∣tibus, ibi disertè discernuntur a (signatis) gentibus, populis, & linguis reliquis, ver. 9. Which Prophecie, saith he, doth plainely seeme to be understood of the conver∣sion of the Jewes according to the letter: because the sealed Iewes, are expressely distinguisht from the (sealed) Na∣tions, people, and tongues, ver. 9. To which we may adde, and because the sealing of these Jewes all at once, before the execution of the ensuing plagues, doth imply that they should be all living when the plagues begin, and while the plagues continue, as we find them at the sounding of the fift Trumpet, chap. 9. ver. 4. And because also the plagues are not ordinary plagues, but extraordinary: not such plagues in which the sealed persons are to be any way sha∣rers with the unsealed; but such plagues as were brought on Pharaoh and his people, when Israel was wholly exemp∣ted from them. Moreover St. Paul, Gal. 4. ver. 25. &c. is so farre from making Jerusalem that was then (Je∣rusalem in her legall and Mosaicall estate) a type of

Heaven, or of the Christian Church; that he plainely af∣firmes she was an enemy to the children of promise, the children of Jerusalem which is above, ver. 26. that is, of Ierusalem which is to be restor'd from above: for see∣ing Interpreters acknowledge, that this free Ierusalem, is not to be understood of a Ierusalem which is locally in Heaven; but of a Ierusalem on earth: cal'd Ierusa∣lem which is above, in respect of its originall and spiri∣tuall endowments from thence, as Pareus observes: seeing I say, they acknowledge thus much, they might, in my con∣ceit, have seene as well, that it could not be understood of the Church of the Gentiles, the Christian Church that now is. First, because this could not be cal'd Jerusalem, un∣lesse Jerusalem had been a type of it; which the Apostle denies. Secondly, because the Apostle, ver. 25. distingui∣sheth [Jerusalem in bondage] as well in time, as in con∣dition, from the [free Ierusalem] calling her [Ieru∣salem that now is] which argueth that the [free Jeru∣salem] was not then; and consequently could not be meant of the Christian Church then also in being. And thirdly, the Prophecie which he alledgeth, ver. 27. out of Isaiah chap. 54. ver. 1. * Rejoyce thou barren that bearest not, * 1.1 &c. doth infallibly declare, that he meant by the [free Ierusalem,] which is the mother of us all, the Ieru∣salem, which shall be rebuilt and inhabited by Christ him∣selfe at his comming from Heaven with all the Saints. For first, this barren and desolate Jerusalem, is oppos'd to the Gentile Nations, ver. 3. who are not said to be her seed, or naturall people: but to be inherited by her seed, that is, to be held tributaries by the Jewes, as other Prophe∣cies doe abundantly testifie. And secondly, this barren Jerusalem, ver. 6, 7. is called, a wife of youth, when she was refused: and said to be forsaken, but for a mo∣ment

in respect of the everlasting and immovable kind∣nesse with which she shall be received, which cannot pos∣sibly be meant of the Gentiles, to whom the Lord was not married, and whom he tooke not for his people, till this wife of youth was refused and forsaken. And because she was to be a long time barren and desolate after her destru∣ction by the Romans, therefore the Apostle, Heb. 13. ver. 14. saith of her, For here wee have no continu∣ing City, but wee looke for one to come, which Ci∣ty to come, is the City the Prophet here speakes of, as re∣married, and more fruitfull after her barren and desolate estate, then before: and which the Apostle calls, [Jeru∣salem which is above] and the [free Jerusalem,] and of which also he saith, Heb. 12. ver. 22. But ye are come unto Mount-Sion, and unto the * 1.2 City of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innume∣rable company * 1.3 of Angels, to the * 1.4 generall As∣sembly and Church of the first-borne, which are written in Heaven, &c. which doubtlesse may well be ap∣plyed to the Church triumphant on earth under Christ her Head, with whom the Angels shall come, and on whom they shall visibly attend at his next appearing: but not to the Church now militant on earth, as Piscator and Pa∣reus apply this also. And this may serve as a [Lydius lapis,] as a touch-stone to shew how unadvisedly the words [Jew, Israel, Sion, and Jerusalem] are figuratively expounded, of the faithfull in generall. And indeed seeing the Iewes before the incarnation of Christ, did never call the Converts of the Gentiles, Iewes, but al∣wayes Proselytes: it is not likely, that the Apostles would then begin to call them Iewes; when the believing Iewes themselves were (in respect of their Faith) to be called Christians, and not Iewes. Neither is it likely, that

the words [Israel, Iudah, Sion, Jerusalem, &c.] should have been so often us'd in the Prophets, without a∣ny intimation of a figurative sense, yea with such evi∣dent circumstances and contents shewing the contrary, if they had been mystically intended: this also I say, is no∣thing likely, seeing in the Revelation the mysticall sense of Sodom and Egypt, but once spoken of; and of Baby∣lon, but seldome mentioned, is plainely intimated unto us in the 11. and 17. chap. And for my owne part I am perswaded, that the mysticall interpretation of the plaine Prophecies which concerne the Iewes future restaurati∣on in their owne Land, and our Saviours and the Saints visible reigne over them and all other Nations hath been the occasion of the various and unsatisfactory inter∣pretations of most part of the Revelation, and of some part of Daniels visions: and that Divines will neither concurre in Judgement, nor come neare the truth in much of these obscure Prophecies, till they agree upon the proper exposition of the foresaid plaine Prophecies; as Mr. Mede that renowned Author calls them, in the 293. and 294. pages of his Comment, on the Apocalyps, where he commends this to the consideration of them that are lear∣ned, and able to judge of the mysteries of Divinity, to wit, Whether it be not the best and easiest way of dealing with the Iewes; not to wrest the most cleare Prophecies touching the affaires of Christs second and glorious comming, to his first: but to perswade them, that they are to expect no other Messias, to ac∣complish all those things, then that Iesus of Naza∣reth, whom their fore-fathers crucifyed—For while we thus wrest those most cleare Prophecies, saith he, the Iewes deride us, and are the more hardned in their unbeliefe. And doubtlesse this, and the Idolatry

of Papists are the principal motives, which keep us at such a distance in affection, that the ordinary meanes of salvati∣on, the preaching of the Gospel, is neither exercised by us amongst them, nor sought unto by them amongst us. But yet these stumbling blocks shall neither hinder, nor delay the ex∣traordinary meanes of their salvation, at their generall conversion. For the * 1.5 time is set, in which the Spirit shall be poured on them from on high: and in which their so plentifully and so plainely foretold deliverance shall be ful∣ly accomplished at the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ. And therefore, beloved Reader, seeing thou knowest these things before, beware that thou be not still led away with the errour of an unwarrantable (and indeed pernicious) interpretation, by reason whereof the way of truth is evill spoken of; but grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, to whom be glory both now and for ever. Amen. Farewell.

Thine in the service of the Lord, ROBERT MATON.

Notes

• * 1.1

  ••••sa. 49. ver. 〈◊〉〈◊〉 14, 15, •••• &c.
• * 1.2

  Psal. 46. v. 4. Psal. 48. v. 1. 2. Psal. 87. v. 3. Isa. 60. v. 14. Ezek. 48. v. 35.
• * 1.3

  Mat. 16. ver. 27. 2 Thess. 1. v. 7. ••oh. 1. v. 51.
• * 1.4

  ••ph. 1. v. 10, 11.13, 14. Rev. 10. v. 7. ••oh. 10. v. 16.
• * 1.5

  Isa. 32. ver. 13, 14, 15.