Page:Grace and Glory (Vos).djvu/18

14 taken as a whole, and the enactment of its principles on a smaller scale within the history of Israel. As the second Adam is greater than the first, and the paradise of the future fairer than that of the past, so the new-born Israel to the prophet's vision is a nobler figure and exists under far more favorable conditions than the empirical Israel of before. Once its Peniel-night is over, it will live in the light and feed upon the goodness of God, and be beautified through its religious embrace of Him. This thought is not unclearly suggested by the very figure of our text. Whatever may be the precise tree species designated by the word "berosh," here rendered as fir-tree, at any rate an evergreen is meant, a tree retaining its verdure in all seasons of the year, never failing in its power to shade and to refresh. The reason is none other than that for which in vs. 6 Israel in its beauty is compared to the olive-tree, a tree likewise perennially clothed with foliage. But there is still something else and far more wonderful about this tree. While by nature not a fruit-bearing tree in the ordinary sense, it changes itself into one before the eyes of the prophet. If nothing more than the idea of fruitfulness were intended, the figure of the olive-tree would have lain closer at hand. But the labor of the olive is a process of nature and bound to the seasons, and evidently what Hosea wishes to express is the concurrence in the same tree of miraculous fruitage, perennial yield, and never-failing shade, for the context emphasizes all three. It is evident that we are