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Israel "heard", but they did not "understand'; they "saw" but they did not "perceive",
and the seat of the trouble was not in the eye or the ear, but in the heart:
"For the heart of this people is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and
their eyes have they closed" (Acts 28: 27).
Pachunomai, "waxed gross", occurs in the N.T. only in Matt. 13: 15. The word is
used as early as the prophetic song of Moses, when he described the very symptoms and
disease from which Israel ultimately suffered. He spoke of the way in which the Lord
had found Israel in a waste and howling wilderness and how He had kept him as the
apple of His eye.
"But Jeshurun waxed fat, and kicked: thou art waxen fat, thou art grown thick, thou
art covered with fatness; then he forsook God which made him, and lightly esteemed the
Rock of his salvation" (Deut. 32: 15).
Derived from pachunomai is pachne, "frost", and pachnoo, "to freeze", and pachos,
"thick", a condition that described Israel at this time. To describe a specially dull-witted
fellow, we use the modern expression, "He has a skin as thick as an elephant"; thus we
can realize that such a "thick skinned" animal is a "pachyderm", and that the modern
figure and the ancient ascription are therefore akin.
The heart having "waxed gross" the ear became "dull". Bareos, the word translated
"dull", is derived from barus, a weight or burden, and when used metaphorically
indicates the hardening of the heart (Exod. 8: 15, 32; 9: 7, 34; 10: 1). Being used of
Pharaoh in Exodus it provided a dreadful object lesson for Israel as they heard the word
of the Holy Ghost. Isaiah uses the word in a good sense when he speaks of one who
"stoppeth his ears from hearing of blood" (Isa. 33: 15). He uses it also in the
statement, "Behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither His ear
heavy, that it cannot hear" (Isa. 59: 1). Had Israel heard with understanding and seen
with perception they would have been "converted" and "healed". Where Paul, quoting
Isaiah, said "hear" and "see", Peter said, "Repent ye therefore, and be converted"
(Acts 3: 19), and if the reader will consult the articles dealing with the healing of the
lame man and its prophetic import (Acts 3: and 4:, Volume XXVI, pp. 78-81) he will
see that this repentance and conversion is spoken of as "the healing" (Acts 4: 12), as the
word translated "salvation" actually means. When we remember the many miracles of
"healing" wrought by the Lord to bring Israel to repentance (see Matt. 11:) the close
association of these different elements of witness and Israel's failure to understand and
perceive becomes the more tragic.
The repentance, the conversion, the healing of Israel, was the threefold goal of the
ministry both of our Lord during His earthly life and of the apostles after His ascension.
That goal has never been completely set aside. Temporarily, Israel are not God's people,
but at last "All Israel shall be saved"; they shall look upon Him Whom they pierced and
mourn for Him, and at this repentance their conversion will become a fact, and the time
of restitution will have come. But that day is "not yet". A new dispensation has taken
the place of that which obtained through the Acts which, it is important to remember,