And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
Ver. 7. And the cow and the bear shall feed.] An allegorical description of greatest confidence and innocence, saith Junius. Bears are angry and vindictive creatures; so are the best by nature, Tit 3:3 till tamed and domesticated by God's distinguishing grace. As for those semiperfectae vertutis homines, as an ancient calls them, temporaries and hypocrites, who do only the outward works of duty, without the inward principle, it may be said of them, as the civil law doth of those mixed beasts, elephants, camels, &c., Operam praestant, natura fera est, they do the work of tame beasts, yet have the nature of wild ones.
Their young ones shall lie down together.] Heb., Their children, i.e., say some, a children after parents shall do thus, and their children after them from age to age; not revolting any more to barbarism.
And the lion shall eat straw.] Not men and other sensitive creatures, as now. b This, say the Chiliasts after some Rabbis, shall be literally fulfilled in that golden age of Christ's personal reign upon earth; a mere fancy, first vented by Papias, a man of some holiness, but ingenii pertenuis, of very little judgment, saith Eusebius.
a Arcularius.
b Conversi non vivent ex rapto: sed legitime partis reculis contenti erunt. Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History l. 3. c. 39. 1:295,297.