nor merely the passive σωζόμενος, salvatus, delivered from suffering; but the word is used in a more general sense, endowed with ישׁע, salvation, help from God, as in Deu 33:29; Psa 33:16, or furnished with the assistance of God requisite for carrying on His government. The next two predicates describe the character of His rule. עני does not mean gentle, πραΰ́ς (lxx and others) = ענו, but lowly, miserable, bowed down, full of suffering. The word denotes “the whole of the lowly, miserable, suffering condition, as it is elaborately depicted in Isa 53:1-12” (Hengstenberg). The next clause answers to this, “riding upon an ass, and indeed upon the foal of an ass.” The ו before על עיר is epexegetical (1Sa 17:40), describing the ass as a young animal, not yet ridden, but still running behind the she-asses. The youthfulness of the animal is brought out still more strongly by the expression added to עיר, viz., בּן־אתנות, i.e., a foal, such as asses are accustomed to bear (עתנות is the plural of the species, as in כּפיר אריות, Jdg 14:5; שׂעיר העזּים, Gen 37:31; Lev 4:23). “Riding upon an ass” is supposed by most of the more modern commentators to be a figurative emblem of the peacefulness of the king, that He will establish a government of peace, the ass being regarded as an animal of peace in contrast with the horse, because on account of its smaller strength, agility, and speed, it is less adapted for riding in the midst of fighting and slaughter than a horse. But, in the first place, this leaves the heightening of the idea of the ass by the expression “the young ass's foal” quite unexplained. Is the unridden ass's foal an emblem of peace in a higher degree than the full-grown ass, that has already been ridden?[1]
And secondly, it is indeed correct that the ass was only used in war as the exception, not the rule, and when there were no horses to be had (cf. Bochart, Hieroz. i. p. 158, ed. Ros.); and also correct that in the East it is of a nobler breed, and not so despised as it is with us; but it is also a
- ↑ We may see how difficult it is to reconcile the emphasis laid upon the ass's foal with this explanation of the significance of the ass, from the attempts made by the supporters of it to bring them into harmony. The assertion made by Ebrard, that עיר denotes an ass of noble breed, and בּן־אתנות signifies that it is one of the noblest breed, has been already proved by Koehler to be a fancy without foundation; but his own attempt to deduce the following meaning of this riding upon a young ass from the precepts concerning the sacrifices, viz., that the future king is riding in the service of Israel, and therefore comes in consequence of a mission from Jehovah, can be proved to fail, from the fact that he is obliged to collect together the most heterogeneous precepts, of which those in Num 19:2; Deu 21:3, and 1Sa 6:7, that for certain expiatory purposes animals were to be selected that had never borne a yoke, have a much more specific meaning than that of simple use in the service of Jehovah.
