31 July 1815

Jug. True

Ch 2 Zacharias

5

When he had recovered his speech then it must have been—then for the first time if at all that the matter of this vision was made known to them. It consisted in a visit from an Angel, between whom and the priest a conversation had been passing, all the time the people had been close by, sniffing up the incense. Though between them and the Angel there was nothing but a wall, and that not without apertures, or the smell of the incense could not have reached them, no one of them either saw the heavenly messenger or so much as heard his voice. But if to any persons these particulars were ever made known, they were not unless by accident—and in this or that instance the same persons by whom his speechlessness, and the general fact of his having seen a vision, were made known in dumb show, as above. For it was not ‘until the day that these things,’ were to have ‘been performed were, ... performed’ +

JB footnote: ‘ + p.2’. i.e. the birth of this old woman's son, that according to the Angel, Zacharias was to be ‘able to speak’—and of course the word of the Angel would in this particular receive as punctual an accomplishment as in any other.

Accordingly, when, the promised child being born, the time came for the performing on it the ceremony of circumcision, and therefore bestowing on it a name, then it was that the fathers ‘mouth was opened.’ ║

JB footnote: ‘ ║p.4’. ‘His tongue was loosed, and he spake and praised God. And fear came in all that dwelt round about them.’