as I find him quoted by Cornelius a Lapide, viz: "I knew not that he was the high priest, because, from his furious manner of speaking, he did not seem to be a high priest, but a tyrant." This sense is strictly consonant to reason and natural right!
Justice and righteousness are so inseparably connected with the proper character of a chief magistrate or ruler, that any notorious perversion of those necessary principles in the actual exercise of that official power with which a magistrate is entrusted for legal (and not for illegal) purposes, must unavoidably distinguish the contemptible hypocrite, the whited wall, from the honorable magistrate, and deprive the former of the respect which is due only to the latter! "Sittest thou to judge me according to the law, and commandedest me to be smitten contrary to law?" Thus the apostle clearly explained the fitness and propriety of the reproachful figure of speech (whited wall,) by which he had expressed the true character of the unworthy judge!
An appellation similar to this was given, even by our Lord himself, to the Scribes and Pharisees, who Were the teachere and magistrates of the people: "Wo unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which, indeed, appear beautiful outwardly, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness." Matt, xxiii. 27.—And, in the context, he calls them "blind guides," (v. 24,)—"hypocrites," (v. 25,) "full of hypocrisy and iniquity," (v. 28,)—"partakers in
the pontificate by purchasing it of the Romans, could deserve to be esteemed as the high priest of God!" It would be tedious to quote all the authorities that may be found to this purpose; the evidence, however, of the learned Dr. Whitby, as it includes more authorities than his own, is worthy of the reader's notice. "Dr. Lightfoot and Grotius," says he, " think as I do, that St. Paul does not go about to excuse his mistake, but rather saith, I know well enough that God's high priest is not to be reviled, but that this Ananias is a high priest, I know not, i. e. I do not own him as such who hath procured this title by bribery; our celebrated Rabbins having declared that such an one is neither a judge, nor to be honored as such," &c.
