“THE hyssop that springeth out of the wall,” of which the wise king spoke (if it be correct to regard the asuf of the Arabs with the hyssop of the Bible), is a familiar sight in Jerusalem. Among its stems doves frequently build their nests. Our artist tells us that he often witnessed in the “holy” city the scene he has depicted for us. The asuf has a pretty flower, and bears a berry like a caper.
Hyssop is first mentioned in the Bible upon the occasion of God bidding Israel take a bunch of it and dip it in the basin wherein was the blood of the paschal lamb, and then, with the hyssop, sprinkle the side-posts and the lintels of their doors in Egypt. This command indicates that hyssop way common enough where Israel was in bondage. God did not bid His people obtain some very rare thing in order to carry on His command, which should ensure their safety, but a common little plant, which was within everyone’s reach. And thus in the work of redemption: the blood has been shed, and what we want with which to apply it is no great thing, but that which is at the hand of a child―the simplicity of faith!
The cedar of Lebanon is a figure of strength. The mighty and deeply-rooted tree and the hyssop are emblems of the great and the small things of earth. When the leper―type of the sinner―was cleansed (Lev. 14), both the great and the small were dipped in the blood of the sacrifice offered for his cleansing, together with scarlet wool-figure of man in his greatness; scarlet being the royal color of the Bible. A bird was sacrificed, and into its blood were dipped the cedar wood, the hyssop, and the scarlet wool, and also a living bird, and the blood was sprinkled by the priest on the unclean man.
The priest speaks to us of Christ who cleanses us from our sins in His own blood, and the living bird speaks of Christ alive to die no more. His blood has been once shed, and He lives forever. The cedar, the scarlet, and the hyssop, dipped in the blood of the sacrifice, teach us the nothingness of everything great or small on earth, and of all this world’s glory.
In the case of the purifying of any of the people of God who had sinned (Num. 19), we again read (vs. 6) of the cedar wood, and hyssop, and the scarlet. They were all to be burned in the burning of the sacrifice, the ashes of which, with water, became “a water of separation.... a purification of sin.”
We know that all the things of this earth, and all the glory of the world, have no place before God since the cross of His Son. When God the Holy Spirit applies to our erring souls the sufferings of Christ for sin, this is indeed as “a water of separation” to us. The great and the small, and the glory of the world, what are they but ashes to us when His sufferings are present to our souls!
He who applied the purifying water sprinkled it with hyssop upon the person whose purification was necessary.
King David prayed God, “Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin... Purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.”(Psa. 51:2, 72Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. (Psalm 51:2)
7Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. (Psalm 51:7).) David had transgressed against God, and felt the evil of his iniquities. He was God’s child and servant, but he had sinned, and he felt the solemn need of purification. The Christian who has sinned, in like manner needs cleansing, and “if we confess our sins, He (God) is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:99If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9).) Our water of purification is the suffering of Christ for our sins, brought home to our souls by the Spirit of God.
When our Redeemer was crucified, and cried, “I thirst,” one filled a sponge with vinegar— that sour wine so commonly drunk in Palestine—and put it upon hyssop, and lifted it to His mouth. In all probability they put the sponge upon a hyssop plant, placing it among its stalks, and attached that to a reed and gave Him to drink (Mark 15:3636And one ran and filled a spunge full of vinegar, and put it on a reed, and gave him to drink, saying, Let alone; let us see whether Elias will come to take him down. (Mark 15:36)).
The common little plant used by the ordinance of God for dipping and sprinkling was near to the Redeemer’s cross. It may have been springing out of the wall of Jerusalem, “outside the gate,” near Calvary, or it may have been “in the garden” “in the place where He was crucified.” Be that as it may, the Spirit of God has brought the hyssop close to us in the record of our Saviour’s sufferings and blood-shedding, and we are thus reminded of its sacred use in the shadows of olden days given to man ages before Christ’s death.
The dove is an emblem of the Holy Spirit. Under the figure of this bird of love and mourning the Holy Spirit of God descended and abode upon the loving, mourning Son of Man. In the fact of the dove building her nest in the asuf plants that spring up out of the walls of Jerusalem we seemed to hear a little voice reminding us of how the blessed Spirit of God directs our hearts to the memories of the precious blood of Christ, and in this spirit commend these few thoughts to our readers.