The Second Book. The Redeemed

The Result of the Redeemer’s Sufferings.

In the First Book we have had before us the work of the Redeemer set forth as it concerned His own glorious person. In this Second Book it is presented to us as it affects others. Here we see the results of His humiliation, and conflict, and victory—“The sufferings of Christ” and the blessings they procured for His redeemed people.

Chapter I. The Sign CAPRICORNUS (The Sea Goat)

The Goat of Atonement Slain for the Redeemed.

It is most noteworthy that this Second Book opens with the Goat and closes with the Ram: two animals of sacrifice; while the two middle chapters are both connected with fishes. The reason for this we shall see as we proceed.

Both are combined in the first chapter, or “Sign” of Capricornus.

In all the ancient Zodiacs, or Planispheres, we find a goat with a fish’s tail. In the Zodiacs of Denderah and Esneh, in Egypt, it is half-goat and half-fish, and it is there called Hu-penius, which means the place of the sacrifice.

In the Indian Zodiac it is a goat passant traversed by a fish.

There can be no doubt as to the significance of this sign.

In the Goat we have the Atoning Sacrifice, in the Fish we have the people for whom the atonement is made. When we come to the sign “Pisces” we shall see more clearly that it points to the multitudes of the redeemed host.

The Goat is bowing its head as though falling down in death. The right leg is folded underneath the body, and he seems unable to rise with the left. The tail of the fish, on the other hand, seems to be full of vigour and life.

The Hebrew name of the sign is Gedi, the kid or cut off, the same as the Arabic Al Gedi. Capricornus is merely the modern (Latin) name of the sign and means goat.

There are 51 stars in the sign, three of which are of the 3rd magnitude, three of the 4th, etc. Five are remarkable stars, α and β in the horn and head, and the remaining three, γ, δ, and ε, in the fishy tail. The star α is named Al Gedi, the kid or goat, while the star δ is called Deneb Al Gedi, the sacrifice cometh.

Other star-names in the sign, not identified, are Dabih (Syriac), the sacrifice slain; Al Dabik and Al Dehabeh (Arabic) have the same meaning; Ma’asad, the slaying; Sa’ad al Naschira, the record of the cutting off.

Is not this exactly in accord with the Scriptures of truth? There were two goats! Of “the goat of the sin-offering” it is written, “God hath given it to you to bear the iniquity of the congregation, to make atonement for them before the Lord” (Lev. x. 16, 17): of the other goat, which was not slain, “he shall let it go into the wilderness” (Lev. xvi. 22). Here is death and resurrection. Christ was “wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for our iniquities.” “For the transgression of MY PEOPLE was He stricken” (Isa. liii.). He laid down His life for the sheep.

In the first chapter of the First Book, we had the same Blessed One presented as “a corn of wheat.” Here we see Him come to “die,” and hence not abiding alone, but bringing forth “much fruit” (John xii. 24). The living fish proceeds from the dying goat, and yet they form only one body. That picture, which has no parallel in nature, has a perfectly true counterpart in grace; and “a great multitude, which no man can number,” have been redeemed and shall obtain eternal life through the death of their Redeemer.

It is, however, not merely the actual death which is set before us here. The first chapter in each book has for its great subject the Person of the Redeemer in prophecy and promise. The last chapter in each book has for its subject the fulfilment of that prophecy in victory and triumph, in the Person of the Redeemer: while the two central chapters in each book are occupied with the work which is the accomplishment of the promise, presented in two aspects—the former connected with grace, the latter with conflict.

Thus, the structure of each of the three books is an epanodos, having for its first and last members the Person of the Redeemer (in “A” in Prophecy; in “A” in Fulfilment), while in the two central members we have the work and its accomplishment (in “B” in grace; and in “B” in conflict).

It may be thus presented to the eye:—

Hence in Capricornus we must look for the prophecy of this Coming Sacrifice. As a matter of fact it did actually point out the time when the Sun of Righteousness should arise, and “the Light of the World” appear. For when this Promised Seed was born the Sun was actually in this sign of Capricornus! “The fulness of time was come,” and “God sent forth His Son TO REDEEM them that were under the Law” (Gal. iv. 4). The Sun was really amongst those very stars—Al Gedi, the kid, and Deneb Al Gedi, the sacrifice cometh—when this willing Sacrifice said, “Lo I come to do Thy will, O God.” The nights were at their darkest and their longest when Jesus was born. The days began immediately to lengthen when He, “the true light,” had come into the world.

Astronomers confess that the perverted legends of the Greeks give but “a lame account” of this sign, “and it offers no illustration of its ancient origin.”

Its ancient origin reveals a prophetic knowledge, which only He possessed who knew that in “the fulness of time” He would send forth His Son.

We now come to the three constellations which give us three pictures setting forth the death of this Sacrifice and of His living again.