In warning the Jewish church of the judgments which were about to fall upon it on account of its wilful perversion of divine goodness and truth, the prophets often use such language as the following;—that "the Lord maketh the earth empty,"—that he "maketh it waste and turneth it upside down;"—that "the land shall be utterly spoiled;" that "the earth mourneth and fadeth away; is utterly broken down; is clean dissolved; is moved exceedingly;" "shall reel to and fro like a drunkard;" "shall be removed like a cottage;" "is without form and void," "shall be burnt up;" "shall be darkened," and many more similar expressions. See Is. xxiv, 1, 3, 4, 19, 20;—Jer. iv, 23;—Nahum i, 5;—Amos viii, 9. In connection with the above passages, we often find such declarations as the following: "that the heavens had no light;" that "the sun and moon shall be darkened and the stars shall withdraw their shining;" that there shall be "wonders in the heavens, and in the earth blood and fire and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord come;"—Jer. iv, 23;—Joel ii, 10, 30, 31, and iii, 15.
I believe it is generally admitted that the above and similar prophecies, primarily refer to the judgments which were about to fall upon the Jewish church; and which would arrive at their full consumation, at the time of the first coming of our Lord, "when the Lord of Hosts," says Isaiah (xxiv, 23,) "shall reign in Mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and before his ancients gloriously." In regard to the passage in Joel, where it is said "I will show wonders in the heavens, &c." Peter distinctly declares, in his sermon on the day of pentecost, that "this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel," and then quotes the above and other passages. Now these prophecies, certainly cannot be understood literally for in this sense they were not fulfilled. It is true we are told, that at the time of the crucifixion, there was darkness over all the land, from the sixth
