MESSIAH, MESSIAS. The Hebrew word. n409 is in every instance of its use (thirty-nine times) rendered in the Sept. by the suitable term Xplar6s, which becomes so illustrious in the N. T. as the official designation of the Holy Saviour. It is a verbal noun (see Simonis, Arcanum Form. .11ebr. Ling., p. 92, sqq.), derived from nt.,.;/?, and has much the same meaning as the participle nvp (2 Sam. iii. 39, and occasionally in the Pentateuch), i. e., Anointed. The prevalent and all but universal (Is. xxi. 5 and Jer. xxii. 54 being perhaps the sole exceptions) sense of the root rrem, points to the consecration of objects to sacred pur poses by means of anointing oil. Inanimate objects (such as the tabernacle, altar, laver, etc.) are in cluded under the use of the verb ; but the noun rnfrn is applied only• to animate objects. The - • official persons (`the Christs of the O. T. ;' Perowme, Coherence of 0. and N. T.) who were consecrated with oil were Priests (Exod. xxviii. 41 ; Levit. iv. 3, 5, z6 ; Num. xxxv. 35), Kings (I Sam. ix. 16 ; xvi. 3 ; 2 Sam. xii. 7 ; I Kings i. 34), and Prophets (z Kings xix. 16). The great Antitype, the Christ of the N. T., embraced and exhausted in himself these several offices, which, in fact, were shadows of his threefold function as the Prophet, Priest, and King of his people. And it is the pre eminence which this combination of anointed offices gave him which seems to be pointed at in Psalm xlv. 8, where the great Messiah is anointed his fellows above the Christs of old, whether of one only function, as the priest Aaron, or the prophet Elisha, or the king Saul ; or of two func tions, as Melchizedec the priest and king, or Moses the priest and prophet, or David the king and prophet. In our Saviour Christ is uniquely found the triple comprehension, the recapitulation in himself of the three offices (see Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. i. 3, vol. f. p. 24, by Burton, Oxon. 1838). But not only were the ancient offices typical, the material of consecration had also its antitype, in the Holy Ghost (St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Catech.
x. 99 ; Catech. Newp., pp. 202, 203 ; St. Basil, contra Eunom. V. ; St. Chrysostom on Psalm xlv. ; Theodoret, Epit. divin. Decree. xi., p. 279 ; Theophylact. on Matt. i. ; CEcumenius on Rom. i., etc.) The prophecy of Is. lxi. (` The Spirit of the Lord Jehovah is upon me, be cause Jehovah bath anointed me') was expressly claimed by Jesus for fulfilment in the synagogue at Nazareth (Luke iv. 16-21) on his return to Galilee the power of the Spirit' (ver. r4), which he had
plenarily received at his recent baptism (ver. 1), and by which he was subsequently led into the wilder ness (ver. 1). This anointing of our Lord to his Messianic functions is referred to, in a general sense, in such passages as Is. xi. 2 and Acts x. 38. But from the more specific statement of St. Peter (Acts ii. 36), it would appear that it was not before his resurrection and consequent ascension that Christ was fully inducted into his Messianic dignities. He was anointed to his prophetical office at his baptism ; but thereby rather initiated to be, than actually made Christ and Lord. Unto these two offices of everlasting Priest and everlast ing King he was not actually anointed, or fully consecrated, until his resurrection from the dead' (Dean Jackson, Works, vii. 368). As often as the evangelists do instyle him Christ before his resurrection from the dead, it is by way of antici pation (Ibid., p. 296). On this point, indeed, the grammatical note of Gersdorf (Sprachchar, i. 39, 272), as quoted by Winer (Grant. des N. T. sprachid., iii. 18, p. ro7 ; Clark, p. 13o), is interesting : The four evangelists almost always write O Xpiarbs [the expected Messiah, like 6 epx6 /Leyor], while Paul and Peter employ Xpicrros, as the appellation had become more of a proper name. In the epistles of Paul and Peter, however, the word has the article when a governing noun precedes.' (For extremely elaborate tables, con taining every combination of the sacred names of Christ in the N. T., the reader is referred to the last edition of Bishop Middleton's Doctrine of the Greek Article, by H. J. Rose, B. D., App. ii. pp. 486-496). Respecting the official name itself, see JESUS CHRIST [Import of the designation, vol. ii., P. 542, col. 2]; we here simply add, that twice only in N. T. does the Hebrew form of it (Messias) occur, in John i. 41 and iv. 25 ; and twice only in the O. T. have our translators retained the same form (Messiah), in Dan. ix. 25 and 26. In these passages, both in the Greek of the evangelist [Mccro-fas, or (as Griesbach preferred to read) lelco-fas, more closely like the original] and in the Hebrew of the prophet [1:1+0p], there is an absence of the article—the word having, in fact, grown out of its appellative state, which so often occurs in the earlier books, into a proper name ; thus resembling the course of the Xptar6s of the Christian Scrip tures.