THE ROD OF THY
STRENGTH
(Psalm 110: 2; Num. 17: 1-10).
By
E. H. THOMAS (Colonel).
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THE “rod of strength” here mentioned
is the ancestral staff of
It
is a stout, straight bough of a tree in its natural and undressed state. It forms one of the recognized insignia
of rank and authority. It marks the
hereditary and lineally descended ruler.
The elder or head of each village, who is also the hereditary ruler of
the place, carries such a staff.
His father held it before him, and unless he be
deposed, it will be born in turn by his son. The sheik, the lineally descended
hereditary chieftain of each Bedouin tribe still carries this ancestral staff
as a badge of his dignity and power.
It also marks the priestly rank, to which it appertains equally with the
priestly. The cadi or judge in all religious matters, the mufti
or Mahometan bishop, and the ullamahs or teachers of religion who answer to
the priests, all bear this characterizing staff in virtue of their office.
This
to the Oriental mind is symbolical.
As the branch is the direct and natural offshoot of the parent tree, so
the man who owns the ancestral undressed branch is regarded as the lineal offspring
and head of the house of his father.
The reason why it became a priestly badge is to be found in the fact
that in patriarchal times each head of a house appears in the character of a
priest to his family. Noah offered
a sacrifice on leaving the
James Neil (in Palestine Explored)
writes: “There are two words in Hebrew for
‘tribe’:
one is shaivat, and means
‘sceptre,’ ‘mace’ or ‘club,’ such as is
borne by the tribal chief. The
other word is matteh, and sometimes requires to be translated by the word
‘rod’
or ‘staff.’ This ancestral staff of dignity is a
means of support, or walking stick, as we should say; and five times in the Old
Testament the word matteh is used figuratively: thus matteh lehem signifies
‘the stay or support of bread’ (Lev. 26: 26). In our Bibles,
through misapprehension of the Hebrew vowel points, which however form no part
of the inspired text we have in Gen. 47: 31, the word ‘bed-head’ which in Hebrew is mittah in place of ‘staff’ which is matteh”
(pp. 158, 162).
Paul in Heb. 11. states that upon the occasion familiar to us, Jacob
worshipped leaning upon the top of his staff. It seems that matteh, as distinguished
from shaivat,
means a tribe as literally descended from the Patriarchs. Shaivat means a tribe in its federal or corporate
capacity; matteh a tribe as a clan represented by a hereditary chieftain.
The next mention of the matteh brings us to
Horeb. Moses, standing before the
burning bush, hearing his high commission to bring Israel out of Egypt,
tremblingly objects: “But behold, they will not believe me not hearken to my voice.
… And Jehovah said unto him, ‘what is that in thy hand?’ And he said,
‘a staff’” (matteh)
(Ex. 4: 2).
This was in all probability Levi’s original staff; in any case in Exodus ch. 7 it is spoken of as “Aaron’s staff,” to whom both as the eldest
son of the priest it would by right belong.
In
reference to the wonders wrought by this staff in the presence of Pharaoh, it
will be observed that the magicians, Jannes and Jambres each carried such a rod
of staff, which they cast down in imitation of Aaron. “The
mural paintings on Egyptian monuments,” says WILKINSON, in his book The Ancient
Egyptians, “show that the use of
the matteh
as a badge of rank was prevalent in
We
again meet with this staff in the miraculous proof of Aaron’s calling to
the priesthood (in Num. 17).
For it is appropriately used in deciding which tribe had been chosen for
the hierarchy. Moses is directed to
take an almond-wood staff (matteh) from each one of the twelve
tribes and to write everyman’s name upon his staff who was the head or
prince of that tribe. Aaron’s
name was to be written upon the thirteenth staff, and these were all to be
“laid up in the tabernacle of the congregation
before Jehovah,” that is before the ark of testimony; that by the
blossoming of one of the thirteen it might be determined which tribe-prince the
Lord had chosen to be hereditary high priest.
DR. THOMPSON in
his work, The Land and the Book, alluding
to the fact that these staves were of almond-wood, observes that they were
“selected for the purpose from the tree which in
its natural development is the most expeditious of all; and not only do the
blossoms appear on it suddenly, but the fruit sets at once and appears
while the flowers are yet on the tree; buds, blossoms and almonds
together on the same branch as with this rod of Moses” (p.
319). To this may be added that the
staff’s miraculous fruitfulness was in striking agreement with its state
as a natural
undressed bough, and with its being the “mighty
staff” with which all the miracles of Moses and Aaron had up till
then been performed.
For
it seems clear that Aaron’s rod, thus laid up was indeed no other that
the wonder-working staff with which the “signs”
had been wrought in Egypt, at the Red Sea, and in the subsequent wilderness
journey. God, in giving Moses his
first commission, said of the staff he then held in his hand: “Thou shalt take this matteh in thy hand wherewith thou
shalt do signs” (Ex. 4: 17). It is twice called “the mighty staff” which is the meaning of the
expression “rod of God” according to
Hebrew idiom (Ex. 4:
20; 17: 9). At
the miraculous trial to ascertain whom the Lord had appointed priest, the matteh
taken to represent Aaron is called “the staff of
Levi” (Num. 17: 3) and the
“staff of Aaron” (17: 6),
although in the case of the twelve priests of the other tribes, it is said that
Moses was only to take a staff. We
are told, “every one of their princes gave him a staff apiece; for each prince one according to their houses even twelve
staves, and the staff of Aaron was among their
staves” (17: 6). At
the close of the trial of each of the twelve princes took back his own lifeless
matteh; but that of Aaron which blossomed and bare fruit was brought again into
the Holy of Holies “before the testimony”
or ark - in other words “before Jehovah -
“for a token against the rebels” (17: 10).
We
next hear of it when God is about to work another miracle by the hand of Moses
in the bringing water out of the rock at Meribah: “Then Jehovah spake unto Moses saying: take the staff”: and it is
added that Moses took the staff from before Jehovah as he commanded him (Num. 20: 7, 9). Hence we may clearly infer that
Aaron’s staff which budded was the self same almond-wood staff which
Moses had carried at Horeb and with which all the subsequent miracles were
wrought.
Let us view the 110th
Psalm in the light of these facts. We know that this Scripture refers to
Messiah from its very first verse.
When the Pharisees, in answer to the Master’s question, said that
they thought Christ was David’s son, Jesus said to them, “How then doth David in the spirit call him Lord, saying, The LORD said unto my Lord, sit thou at my
right hand until I make thine enemies a footstool for thy feet”
(Matt. 22:
41-46).
That
this is the most important Scripture in proof both of Christ’s priestly
office and the change in the Levitical law, may be gathered from the use made
of it in the Epistle to the Hebrews.
This Psalm represents Messiah by
Jehovah’s appointment as both
King and Priest for
The
other kings of
It
is this King-priest that the second verse of this Psalm declares: “Jehovah will send the rod of Thy strength out of
Now
this is most deeply significant, for in Num.
24: 17; Ps. 2: 9, where Messiah’s kingly power and ability
to break in pieces are in question the word shaivat
or sceptre is made use of. But here
the ancestral staff or matteh is the
word, and marks the priest as well as the king of lineal descent. It is here, therefore, most fitly said
to be given to Him who is described as bearing both offices and as being the
promised prince of David’s line.
We
read that this staff shall be sent out of
That
which answers to the miraculous proof of Aaron’s priesthood, in the case
of our Saviour, is undoubtedly His own resurrection. By this His Divine mission was
incontrovertibly established. He
was declared to be the Son of God with power according to the spirit of
holiness by the resurrection from among the dead (Rom.
1: 4). Just as the blossoming or coming to life
of Aaron’s almond-wood staff was the sign of his appointment by God, so
Christ Himself, the “Branch of Jehovah,”
was raised [out] from the dead, as a testimony to his unchangeable
priesthood.
This
is the view given us by the Apostle Paul regarding the call of Christ. “No man
taketh the honour unto himself, but when he is
called by God, even as was Aaron. So Christ also
glorified not Himself to be made a High-Priest; but
He who spoke to him: ‘Thou art my Son,
this day have I begotten thee’” (Heb.
5: 4, 5).
Now these words of the Second Psalm refer to Messiah’s
resurrection, for the same are quoted by Paul at Antioch in connection with the
statement, “He hath raised up Jesus again”
(Acts 13: 33). Out Lord Himself says the same thing;
for when the Jews demanded a sign in proof of His authority to purge the
temple, He said to them “Destroy this temple,
and in three days I will raise it up”; and
He spake thus of the temple of his body (John 2:
19, 21). Twice upon other occasions, when the
Pharisees and Sadducees came and asked for a sign or miracle to establish His
Messianic claims, he replied, “An evil and
adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and
there shall no sign be given to it but the sign of the prophet Jonah,”
that is, as our Lord explains, His own resurrection from the dead on the third
day (Matt. 12:
38-40; 16: 4). This is still the one sign, the one
token against the rebels to this day in
Christ’s
ascension on high and continued session on the Father’s throne was
prefigured by the laying up of “Aaron’s rod
again before the testimony,” that is, in the Holy of Holies, which
we are told is a type of heaven (Heb. 9: 7-12).
The bring out of the rod once more from “before
Jehovah” to work further miracles, foreshadows our Lord’s coming with power and great glory amid
fresh miraculous signs.
But
this is not a popular theme. Even
among Evangelical believers a frame of mind is prevalent which causes them to
discourage any dealing with this topic.
They will either reply that they refrain from the study of unfulfilled
prophecy, or that this is a speculative and unpractical doctrine with nothing
practical at all in it. The truth
is that the bulk of teachers and hearers do not want to be true. They will gladly sing “Safe in the arms of Jesus.” “Jesus, lover of my soul,” and so on, they will
willingly go on listening to rudimentary truths; they are up in arms upon the
smallest suspicion of unorthodoxy; and, either knowing or thinking themselves
to be safe, the shop, business of profession flourishing, and health fairly
good, the prevailing idea is: “the lines are
fallen to me in pleasant places” rather than “even so come Lord Jesus.”
Listen
to the testimony which the late Joseph Rabinowitz so plaintively uttered in
1896 a short time before his death.
He writes: “The Spirit is suggesting to
me to warn my Jewish brethren from communication with such Europeans as call
themselves Christians only because after they die they are interred in a
Christian cemetery according to Christian rite, when their life and tendency
are altogether in a heathenly manner against Jehovah and His Anointed One. I am more and more convinced that for
Jews truly converted to Christ there is no place among the adherents of
existing churches in
And
with regard to the unconverted generally, to whom in this rapidly closing
dispensation of this “Gospel of the grace of God”
a gospel is being offered, may we not ask ourselves if the ill-success of
missionary effort is not mainly due primarily to this suppression of the “blessed hope” involving as it is bound to do
those evils in our midst, complained of by Rabinowitz? To say nothing of the disastrous
impression made among the heathen abroad by the conduct of nominal [and
regenerate] Christians.
This
latter point has always been the bitter regret of missionaries, many of whom
prefer to hold aloof from their countrymen in consequence, to show that they
themselves at least are separated to the Lord.
In
a word: the Church, viewed as a corporate professing body has failed (as
mankind has done in every dispensation) in the trust committed to it. As a result, the time is near when
professing Church testimony will, as a wild olive be broken off, and
Israelitish testimony again grafted in (Rom.
11: 23).
Mark
the words: “Thy people shall be willing in the
day of Thy power”; that is when the Lord shall “take unto Himself His great power, and reign” (Rev. 11: 17). The nations shall be angry, but the Rod
of His strength will go forth and He shall break them in pieces as a
potter’s vessel. No more mocking
and scourging, no more spitting and buffeting then! Sinners shall be consumed out of the
earth and the wicked shall be no more (Ps. 104: 35).