Page:Visions and Prophecies of Zechariah (Baron, David).djvu/105

 high priest may be regarded also as " standing " on his trial before the Angel of Jehovah as Judge.

Ha-Satan, which, with or without the definite article, is a proper name for the Evil One, is the same who in the New Testament is described as our " adversary " the devil, the Hebrew term having etymologically the sense of " enemy," or " adversary," and the Greek that of " accuser."

He is represented as standing at Joshua's " right hand," which is supposed by many to have been the usual position of the accuser in judicial procedure, the ground of the conjecture (for there is no positive proof of such a custom among the ancient Jews) being Ps. cix. 6, where we read, " Set a wicked man over him, and let an adversary ( Satan ) stand at his right hand." Another suggestion is that Satan took the place usually taken by the protector (Ps. xvi. 8, cix. 31, cxxi. 5), "to show that Joshua, or those he represented, had none to save them, and that he himself was victorious." The passage itself, however, tells us clearly that he stood there " Fsitno " to act as adversary, or " be Satan," to him " that he," as an old writer observes, " who is called Satan, might thus fill up the measure of his name."

Here we are brought face to face with one of those mysteries of revelation which must be classed among the things which " we know not now," nor can as yet fully understand namely, the position of Satan in God's economy in general, and his relation to the moral govern ment of this world, and to man in particular.

How and why, we may not yet fully know, but the fact is clearly brought before us in Scripture that the great adversary of God and man is permitted to appear before God, not only in His earthly courts of the Temple, as in this vision, but in heaven, as " the accuser of the brethren."

And it is especially in his r61e as the accuser that the