The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 3

V. Nolan-Stresses Day of Atonement and Jubilee Types

FREDERICK. NOLAN (1784-1864), noted linguist and theologian, was born in Dublin. He was a student at Trinity College, Dublin, and received a B.C.L. and a D.C.L. from Oxford, and later an LL.D. Ordained in 1806, and serving in several curacies, he is usually identified as the vicar of Prittlewell, Essex. He was prominent and active, became a fellow of the Royal Society in 1832, and preached the Bampton Lectures in 1833, the Boyle Lectures in 1834, and the Warburton Lectures in 1833-36. ⁴⁵ PFF3 608.4

Nolan was author of several works of a critical and expositional nature, as well as of some against the corruptions of the church of Rome. The leading titles were Inquiry into the Integrity of the, Greek Vulgate, or Received Text (1815), The Expectation Formed by the Assyrians that a Great Deliverer Would Appear about the Time of Our Lord’s Advent (1826), The Time of the Millennium Investigated (1881), The Analogy of Revelation and Science (1833), ⁴⁶ and The Chronological Prophecies (1837). ⁴⁷ In addition, he wrote numerous introductions to modern languages-French, German, Italian, Spanish, etc. Nolan was stanchly evangelical and strongly opposed to the pro-Catholic Oxford Movement. He frequently appeared before learned societies, as with “On the Antiquity and Connexion of the Early Cycles,” ⁴⁸ to which he annexes six chronological tables after the example of Scaliger and Petavius, in which the first year of Artaxerxes I appears as 465 B.C.” ⁴⁹ PFF3 608.5

1. SEVENTH SEAI, IMAGERY DERIVED FROM ATONEMENT

In his Time of the Millennium (1831), Nolan notes the 6,000-year argument, with the seventh thousand years as a Sabbath of rest, which originated with the rabbinical Jews, “passed into the Christian Church,” and was adopted by the early Fathers. ⁵⁰ These he cites in detail. ⁵¹ The imagery of the seventh seal, he contends, was derived from the great Day of Atonement and the Jubilee. ⁵² “The analogy between this description, and the service of the Temple, upon one of the most solemn festivals of the Mosaic ceremonial, is so obvious that it has often excited the attention of the antiquary and scholar.” ⁵³ PFF3 609.1

2. DAY OF ATONEMENT AND HOLY OF HOLIES

Nolan stresses the frequent allusions to the “Temple of God” opened in heaven, the ark of the tabernacle, the altar, and the incense.(Revelation 9 and 15.) These scenes, he insists, represent occurrences “within the precincts of the same celestial structure.” ⁵⁴ Reference is made not only to the “daily service” but to the “peculiar solemnity” of the services on the “great day of Atonement,“ performed “by the high priest, in the holiest place of the Temple,” and celebrated in the seventh month. ⁵⁵ PFF3 609.2

3. GREAT SABBATISM CALLED THE MILLENNIUM

Noting also the system of septenaries, with the sabbath of days, of weeks, and of months, the Jews also had their sabbaths of years, and a great sabbath of the septennial period termed the Jubilee. This commenced on the great Day of Atonement and was ushered in with the sound of trumpets. This was “considered a type of that great sabbatism to which we give the name of the Millennium.” ⁵⁶ Such is the “exact correspondence” between the earthly and the heavenly services of the tabernacle, PFF3 610.1

4. GOD’S THRONE IN HOLY OF HOLIES

On the tenth day of the seventh month the high priest went alone into the holy of holies with the golden censor, hidden from the congregation, and this holy of holies with its ark and mercy-seat represented God’s throne. ⁵⁷ Such is the “key to the mystic sense of the heavenly service,” with Christ as our ministering priest. ⁵⁸ PFF3 610.2

5. TRUMPETS HERALD ATONEMENT-JUBILEE

The opening of the seventh seal then indicates the opening of the millennium, and the Jubilee. ⁵⁹ And these transcendent events “are alike represented to commence with the great Day of Atonement. “Moreover, “an indissoluble link seems to bind them together in the rite of the sounding of the trumpets”-the Day of Atonement, and the Jubilee. ⁶⁰ PFF3 610.3

6. NOT CLEAR ON CHRONOLOGICAL PROPHECIES

In a later work, however, on The Chronological Prophecies (1837), Nolan writes without much clarity or conviction on the time periods. On Daniel 8:14 he remarks that instead of the simple word “day,” the compound expression “mornings and evenings” is used. Because of this he reduces the number 2300 by one half, or to 1150. ⁶¹ And the 666 and 1260 years he makes consecutive, “and computed from the destruction of Jerusalem.” ⁶² PFF3 610.4