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diff --git a/old/50747-0.txt b/old/50747-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index b030b92..0000000 --- a/old/50747-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,18717 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Expositor's Bible; The Book of the -Twelve Prophets, Vol. 2 (of 2), by George Adam Smith - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license - - -Title: The Expositor's Bible; The Book of the Twelve Prophets, Vol. 2 (of 2) - -Author: George Adam Smith - -Editor: William Robertson Nicoll - -Release Date: December 23, 2015 [EBook #50747] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EXPOSITOR'S BIBLE; TWELVE PROPHETS, VOL. II *** - - - - -Produced by Charlene Taylor, David Tipple, Colin Bell, -Kevin Cathcart, Emeritus Professor of Near Eastern -Languages, University College Dublin and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This -file was produced from images generously made available -by The Internet Archive) - - - - - - -Transcriber’s notes - -This e-text includes Greek characters, Hebrew characters, uncommon -diacritics, and punctuation that will only display in UTF-8 (Unicode) -text readers: e.g. Μαλαχιας, מלאכיה, “malĕ’akhi”. If any of these -characters do not display properly, make sure that your text reader’s -“character set” or “file encoding” is set to Unicode (UTF-8). You may -also need to change the default font. - -A small number of obvious typos have been corrected. - -The spelling and punctuation of the book have not been changed. - -The footnotes have been renumbered from 1 to 1,560. Each footnote can -be found at the end of the chapter in which it is flagged. - -It is clear from the context that some Hebrew letters are missing from -Section 2 of Chapter VI of the book. These letters, enclosed in square -brackets, have been restored. - -An expression such as A^{B} is used in this text to represent A -followed by B as a superscript. For example, Xⁿ could be represented by -X^{n}. (The only letters that can be used as superscripts in UTF-8 are -lower-case i and n.) - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - THE EXPOSITOR’S BIBLE - - - EDITED BY THE REV. - - W. ROBERTSON NICOLL, M.A., LL.D. - - _Editor of “The Expositor”_ - - - THE BOOK OF THE TWELVE PROPHETS - - VOL. II.—ZEPHANIAH, NAHUM, HABAKKUK, OBADIAH, - HAGGAI, ZECHARIAH I.—VIII., “MALACHI,” JOEL, - “ZECHARIAH” IX.—XIV. AND JONAH - - BY - - GEORGE ADAM SMITH, D.D., LL.D. - - - NEW YORK - A. C. ARMSTRONG AND SON - 51 EAST TENTH STREET - 1898 - - - - -THE EXPOSITOR’S BIBLE. - -_Crown 8vo, cloth, price $1.50 each vol._ - - - FIRST SERIES, 1887-8. - - Colossians. - By A. MACLAREN, D.D. - - St. Mark. - By Very Rev. the Bishop of Derry. - - Genesis. - By Prof. MARCUS DODS, D.D. - - 1 Samuel. - By Prof. W. G. BLAIKIE, D.D. - - 2 Samuel. - By the same Author. - - Hebrews. - By Principal T. C. EDWARDS, D.D. - - - SECOND SERIES, 1888-9. - - Galatians. - By Prof. G. G. FINDLAY, B.A. - - The Pastoral Epistles. - By Rev A. PLUMMER, D.D. - - Isaiah I.—XXXIX. - By Prof. G. A. SMITH, D.D. Vol. I. - - The Book of Revelation. - By Prof. W. MILLIGAN, D.D. - - 1 Corinthians - By Prof. MARCUS DODS, D.D. - - The Epistles of St. John. - By Most Rev. the Archbishop of Armagh. - - - THIRD SERIES, 1889-90. - - Judges and Ruth. - By R. A. WATSON, M.A., D.D. - - Jeremiah. - By Rev. C. J. BALL, M.A. - - Isaiah XL.—LXVI. - By Prof. G. A. SMITH, D.D. Vol. II. - - St. Matthew. - By Rev. J. MONRO GIBSON, D.D. - - Exodus. - By Right Rev. the Bishop of Derry. - - St. Luke. - By Rev. H. BURTON, M.A. - - - FOURTH SERIES, 1890-91. - - Ecclesiastes. - By Rev. SAMUEL COX, D.D. - - St. James and St. Jude. - By Rev. A. PLUMMER, D.D. - - Proverbs. - By Rev. R. F. HORTON, D.D. - - Leviticus. - By Rev. S. H. KELLOGG, D.D. - - The Gospel of St. John. - By Prof. M. DODS, D.D. Vol. I. - - The Acts of the Apostles. - By Prof. STOKES, D.D. Vol. I. - - - FIFTH SERIES, 1891-2. - - The Psalms. - By A. MACLAREN, D.D. Vol. I. - - 1 and 2 Thessalonians. - By JAMES DENNEY, D.D. - - The Book of Job. - By R. A. WATSON, M.A., D.D. - - Ephesians. - By Prof. G. G. FINDLAY, B.A. - - The Gospel of St. John. - By Prof. M. DODS, D.D. Vol. II. - - The Acts of the Apostles. - By Prof. STOKES, D.D. Vol. II. - - - SIXTH SERIES, 1892-3. - - 1 Kings. - By Very Rev. the Dean of Canterbury. - - Philippians. - By Principal RAINY, D.D. - - Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther. - By Prof. W. F. ADENEY, M.A. - - Joshua. - By Prof. W. G. BLAIKIE, D.D. - - The Psalms. - By A. MACLAREN, D.D. Vol. II. - - The Epistles of St. Peter. - By Prof. RAWSON LUMBY, D.D. - - - SEVENTH SERIES, 1893-4. - - 2 Kings. - By Very Rev. the Dean of Canterbury. - - Romans. - By H. C. G. MOULE, M.A., D.D. - - The Books of Chronicles. - By Prof. W. H. BENNETT, M.A. - - 2 Corinthians. - By JAMES DENNEY, D.D. - - Numbers. - By R. A. WATSON, M.A., D.D. - - The Psalms. - By A. MACLAREN, D.D. Vol. III. - - - EIGHTH SERIES, 1895-6. - - Daniel. - By Very Rev. the Dean of Canterbury. - - The Book of Jeremiah. - By Prof. W. H. BENNETT, M.A. - - Deuteronomy. - By Prof. ANDREW HARPER, B.D. - - The Song of Solomon and Lamentations. - By Prof. W. F. ADENEY, M.A. - - Ezekiel. - By Prof. JOHN SKINNER, M.A. - - The Book of the Twelve Prophets. - By Prof. G. A. SMITH, D.D. Two Vols - - - - - THE BOOK - - OF - - THE TWELVE PROPHETS - - COMMONLY CALLED THE MINOR - - - BY - - GEORGE ADAM SMITH, D.D., LL.D. - - PROFESSOR OF HEBREW AND OLD TESTAMENT EXEGESIS - FREE CHURCH COLLEGE, GLASGOW - - - _IN TWO VOLUMES_ - - VOL. II.—ZEPHANIAH, NAHUM, HABAKKUK, OBADIAH, - HAGGAI, ZECHARIAH I.—VIII., “MALACHI,” JOEL, - “ZECHARIAH” IX.—XIV. AND JONAH - - _WITH HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL INTRODUCTIONS_ - - - NEW YORK - A. C. ARMSTRONG AND SON - 51 EAST TENTH STREET - 1898 - - - - - PREFACE - - -The first volume on the Twelve Prophets dealt with the three who -belonged to the Eighth Century: Amos, Hosea and Micah. This second -volume includes the other nine books arranged in chronological order: -Zephaniah, Nahum and Habakkuk, of the Seventh Century; Obadiah, of the -Exile; Haggai, Zechariah i.—viii., “Malachi” and Joel, of the Persian -Period, 538—331; “Zechariah” ix.—xiv. and the Book of Jonah, of the -Greek Period, which began in 332, the date of Alexander’s Syrian -campaign. - -The same plan has been followed as in Volume I. A historical -introduction is offered to each period. To each prophet are given, -first a chapter of critical introduction, and then one or more chapters -of exposition. A complete translation has been furnished, with critical -and explanatory notes. All questions of date and of text, and nearly -all of interpretation, have been confined to the introductions and -the notes, so that those who consult the volume only for expository -purposes will find the exposition unencumbered by the discussion of -technical points. - -The necessity of including within one volume so many prophets, -scattered over more than three centuries, and each of them requiring -a separate introduction, has reduced the space available for the -practical application of their teaching to modern life. But this is the -less to be regretted, that the contents of the nine books before us -are not so applicable to our own day, as we have found their greater -predecessors to be. On the other hand, however, they form a more varied -introduction to Old Testament Criticism, while, by the long range of -time which they cover, and the many stages of religion to which they -belong, they afford a wider view of the development of prophecy. Let us -look for a little at these two points. - -1. To Old Testament Criticism these books furnish valuable -introduction—some of them, like Obadiah, Joel and “Zechariah” ix.—xiv., -by the great variety of opinion that has prevailed as to their dates -or their relation to other prophets with whom they have passages in -common; some, like Zechariah and “Malachi,” by their relation to the -Law, in the light of modern theories of the origin of the latter; and -some, like Joel and Jonah, by the question whether we are to read them -as history, or as allegories of history, or as apocalypse. That is to -say, these nine books raise, besides the usual questions of genuineness -and integrity, every other possible problem of Old Testament -Criticism. It has, therefore, been necessary to make the critical -introductions full and detailed. The enormous differences of opinion -as to the dates of some must start the suspicion of arbitrariness, -unless there be included in each case a history of the development of -criticism, so as to exhibit to the English reader the principles and -the evidence of fact upon which that criticism is based. I am convinced -that what is chiefly required just now by the devout student of the -Bible is the opportunity to judge for himself how far Old Testament -Criticism is an adult science; with what amount of reasonableness it -has been prosecuted; how gradually its conclusions have been reached, -how jealously they have been contested; and how far, amid the many -varieties of opinion which must always exist with reference to facts -so ancient and questions so obscure, there has been progress towards -agreement upon the leading problems. But, besides the accounts of past -criticism given in this volume, the reader will find in each case an -independent attempt to arrive at a conclusion. This has not always -been successful. A number of points have been left in doubt; and even -where results have been stated with some degree of positiveness, the -reader need scarcely be warned (after what was said in the Preface to -Vol. I.) that many of these must necessarily be provisional. But, in -looking back from the close of this work upon the discussions which -it contains, I am more than ever convinced of the extreme probability -of most of the conclusions. Among these are the following: that the -correct interpretation of Habakkuk is to be found in the direction of -the position to which Budde’s ingenious proposal has been carried on -pages 123 ff. with reference to Egypt; that the most of Obadiah is to -be dated from the sixth century; that “Malachi” is an anonymous work -from the eve of Ezra’s reforms; that Joel follows “Malachi”; and that -“Zechariah” ix.—xiv. has been rightly assigned by Stade to the early -years of the Greek Period. I have ventured to contest Kosters’ theory -that there was no return of Jewish exiles under Cyrus, and am the more -disposed to believe his strong argument inconclusive, not only upon a -review of the reasons I have stated in Chap. XVI., but on this ground -also, that many of its chief adherents in this country and Germany have -so modified it as virtually to give up its main contention. I think, -too, there can be little doubt as to the substantial authenticity of -Zephaniah ii. (except the verses on Moab and Ammon) and iii. 1-13, of -Habakkuk ii. 5 ff., and of the whole of Haggai; or as to the ungenuine -character of the lyric piece in Zechariah ii. and the intrusion of -“Malachi” ii. 11-13_a_. On these and smaller points the reader will -find full discussion at the proper places. - -[I may here add a word or two upon some of the critical conclusions -reached in Vol. I., which have been recently contested. The student -will find strong grounds offered by Canon Driver in his _Joel and -Amos_[1] for the authenticity of those passages in Amos which, -following other critics, I regarded or suspected as not authentic. -It makes one diffident in one’s opinions when Canon Driver supports -Professors Kuenen and Robertson Smith on the other side. But on a -survey of the case I am unable to feel that even they have removed -what they admit to be “forcible” objections to the authorship by Amos -of the passages in question. They seem to me to have established not -more than a possibility that the passages are authentic; and on the -whole I still feel that the probability is in the other direction. If -I am right, then I think that the date of the apostrophes to Jehovah’s -creative power which occur in the Book of Amos, and the reference to -astral deities in chap. v. 27, may be that which I have suggested -on pages 8 and 9 of this volume. Some critics have charged me with -inconsistency in denying the authenticity of the epilogue to Amos while -defending that of the epilogue to Hosea. The two cases, as my arguments -proved, are entirely different. Nor do I see any reason to change -the conclusions of Vol. I. upon the questions of the authenticity of -various parts of Micah.] - -The text of the nine prophets treated in this volume has presented even -more difficulties than that of the three treated in Vol. I. And these -difficulties must be my apology for the delay of this volume. - -2. But the critical and textual value of our nine books is far exceeded -by the historical. Each exhibits a development of Hebrew prophecy of -the greatest interest. From this point of view, indeed, the volume -might be entitled “The Passing of the Prophet.” For throughout our nine -books we see the spirit and the style of the classic prophecy of Israel -gradually dissolving into other forms of religious thought and feeling. -The clear start from the facts of the prophet’s day, the ancient truths -about Jehovah and Israel, and the direct appeal to the conscience of -the prophet’s contemporaries, are not always given, or when given -are mingled, coloured and warped by other religious interests, both -present and future, which are even powerful enough to shake the -ethical absolutism of the older prophets. With Nahum and Obadiah the -ethical is entirely missed in the presence of the claims—and we cannot -deny that they were natural claims—of the long-suffering nation’s -hour of revenge upon her heathen tyrants. With Zephaniah prophecy, -still austerely ethical, passes under the shadow of apocalypse; and -the future is solved, not upon purely historical lines, but by the -intervention of “supernatural” elements. With Habakkuk the ideals of -the older prophets encounter the shock of the facts of experience: we -have the prophet as sceptic. Upon the other margin of the Exile, Haggai -and Zechariah (i.—viii.), although they are as practical as any of -their predecessors, exhibit the influence of the exilic developments -of ritual, angelology and apocalypse. God appears further off from -Zechariah than from the prophets of the eighth century, and in need -of mediators, human and superhuman. With Zechariah the priest has -displaced the prophet, and it is very remarkable that no place is -found for the latter beside _the two sons of oil_, the political and -priestly heads of the community, who, according to the Fifth Vision, -stand in the presence of God and between them feed the religious life -of Israel. Nearly sixty years later “Malachi” exhibits the working of -Prophecy within the Law, and begins to employ the didactic style of -the later Rabbinism. Joel starts, like any older prophet, from the -facts of his own day, but these hurry him at once into apocalypse; he -calls, as thoroughly as any of his predecessors, to repentance, but -under the imminence of the Day of the Lord, with its “supernatural” -terrors, he mentions no special sin and enforces no single virtue. The -civic and personal ethics of the earlier prophets are absent. In the -Greek Period, the oracles now numbered from the ninth to the fourteenth -chapters of the Book of Zechariah repeat to aggravation the exulting -revenge of Nahum and Obadiah, without the strong style or the hold upon -history which the former exhibits, and show us prophecy still further -enwrapped in apocalypse. But in the Book of Jonah, though it is parable -and not history, we see a great recovery and expansion of the best -elements of prophecy. God’s character and Israel’s true mission to the -world are revealed in the spirit of Hosea and of the Seer of the Exile, -with much of the tenderness, the insight, the analysis of character and -even the humour of classic prophecy. These qualities raise the Book of -Jonah, though it is probably the latest of our Twelve, to the highest -rank among them. No book is more worthy to stand by the side of Isaiah -xl.—lv.; none is nearer in spirit to the New Testament. - -All this gives unity to the study of prophets so far separate in time, -and so very distinct in character, from each other. From Zephaniah -to Jonah, or over a period of three centuries, they illustrate the -dissolution of Prophecy and its passage into other forms of religion. - -The scholars, to whom every worker in this field is indebted, are named -throughout the volume. I regret that Nowack’s recent commentary on the -Minor Prophets (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht) reached me too late -for use (except in footnotes) upon the earlier of the nine prophets. - - GEORGE ADAM SMITH. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1] Cambridge Bible for Schools, 1897 - - - - -CONTENTS OF VOL. II. - - - PAGE - - PREFACE v - - CHRONOLOGICAL TABLES _Facing p. 1_ in Volume I - - - _INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPHETS OF - THE SEVENTH CENTURY_ - - CHAP. - - I. THE SEVENTH CENTURY BEFORE CHRIST 3 - - 1. REACTION UNDER MANASSEH AND AMON (695?—639). - - 2. THE EARLY YEARS OF JOSIAH (639—625): JEREMIAH - AND ZEPHANIAH. - - 3. THE REST OF THE CENTURY (625—586): THE - FALL OF NINIVEH; NAHUM AND HABAKKUK. - - - _ZEPHANIAH_ - - II. THE BOOK OF ZEPHANIAH 35 - - III. THE PROPHET AND THE REFORMERS 46 - - ZEPHANIAH i.—ii. 3. - - IV. NINIVE DELENDA 61 - - ZEPHANIAH ii. 4-15. - - V. SO AS BY FIRE 67 - - ZEPHANIAH iii. - - - _NAHUM_ - - VI. THE BOOK OF NAHUM 77 - - 1. THE POSITION OF ELḲÔSH. - - 2. THE AUTHENTICITY OF CHAP. i. - - 3. THE DATE OF CHAPS. ii. AND iii. - - VII. THE VENGEANCE OF THE LORD 90 - - NAHUM i. - - VIII. THE SIEGE AND FALL OF NINIVEH 96 - - NAHUM ii. AND iii. - - - _HABAḲḲUḲ_ - - IX. THE BOOK OF HABAKKUK 115 - - 1. CHAP. i. 2—ii. 4 (OR 8). - - 2. CHAP. ii. 5-20. - - 3. CHAP. iii. - - X. THE PROPHET AS SCEPTIC 129 - - HABAKKUK i.—ii. 4. - - XI. TYRANNY IS SUICIDE 143 - - HABAKKUK ii. 5-20. - - XII. “IN THE MIDST OF THE YEARS” 149 - - HABAKKUK iii. - - - _OBADIAH_ - - XIII. THE BOOK OF OBADIAH 163 - - XIV. EDOM AND ISRAEL 177 - - OBADIAH 1-21. - - - _INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPHETS OF - THE PERSIAN PERIOD_ - (539—331 B.C.) - - XV. ISRAEL UNDER THE PERSIANS 187 - - XVI. FROM THE RETURN FROM BABYLON TO THE - BUILDING OF THE TEMPLE (536—516 B.C.) 198 - - WITH A DISCUSSION OF PROFESSOR KOSTERS’ THEORY. - - - _HAGGAI_ - - XVII. THE BOOK OF HAGGAI 225 - - XVIII. HAGGAI AND THE BUILDING OF THE TEMPLE 234 - - Haggai i., ii. - - 1. THE CALL TO BUILD (CHAP. i.). - - 2. COURAGE, ZERUBBABEL! COURAGE, JEHOSHUA AND - ALL THE PEOPLE! (CHAP. ii. 1-9). - - 3. THE POWER OF THE UNCLEAN (CHAP. ii. 10-19). - - 4. THE REINVESTMENT OF ISRAEL’S HOPE (CHAP. ii. - 20-23). - - - _ZECHARIAH_ - (_I.—VIII._) - - XIX. THE BOOK OF ZECHARIAH (I.—VIII.) 255 - - XX. ZECHARIAH THE PROPHET 264 - - ZECHARIAH i. 1-6, ETC.; EZRA v. 1, vi. 14. - - XXI. THE VISIONS OF ZECHARIAH 273 - - ZECHARIAH i. 7—vi. - - 1. THE INFLUENCES WHICH MOULDED THE VISIONS. - - 2. GENERAL FEATURES OF THE VISIONS. - - 3. EXPOSITION OF THE SEVERAL VISIONS: - - THE FIRST: THE ANGEL-HORSEMEN (i. 7-17). - - THE SECOND: THE FOUR HORNS AND THE FOUR - SMITHS (i. 18-21 ENG.). - - THE THIRD: THE CITY OF PEACE (ii. 1-5 ENG.). - - THE FOURTH: THE HIGH PRIEST AND THE SATAN (iii.). - - THE FIFTH: THE TEMPLE CANDLESTICK AND THE - TWO OLIVE-TREES (iv.). - - THE SIXTH: THE WINGED VOLUME (v. 1-4). - - THE SEVENTH: THE WOMAN IN THE BARREL (v. 5-11). - - THE EIGHTH: THE CHARIOTS OF THE FOUR WINDS (vi. 1-8). - - THE RESULT OF THE VISIONS (vi. 9-15). - - XXII. THE ANGELS OF THE VISIONS 310 - - ZECHARIAH i. 7—vi. 8. - - XXIII. “THE SEED OF PEACE” 320 - - ZECHARIAH vii., viii. - - - “_MALACHI_” - - XXIV. THE BOOK OF “MALACHI” 331 - - XXV. FROM ZECHARIAH TO “MALACHI” 341 - - XXVI. PROPHECY WITHIN THE LAW 348 - - “MALACHI” i.—iv. (ENG.). - - 1. GOD’S LOVE FOR ISRAEL AND HATRED OF EDOM (i. 2-5). - - 2. “HONOUR THY FATHER” (i. 6-14). - - 3. THE PRIESTHOOD OF KNOWLEDGE (ii. 1-9). - - 4. THE CRUELTY OF DIVORCE (ii. 10-16). - - 5. “WHERE IS THE GOD OF JUDGMENT?” (ii. 17—iii. 5). - - 6. REPENTANCE BY TITHES (iii. 6-12). - - 7. THE JUDGMENT TO COME (iii. 13—iv. 2 ENG.). - - 8. THE RETURN OF ELIJAH (iv. 3-5 ENG.). - - - _JOEL_ - - XXVII. THE BOOK OF JOEL 375 - - 1. THE DATE OF THE BOOK. - - 2. THE INTERPRETATION OF THE BOOK. - - 3. STATE OF THE TEXT AND THE STYLE OF THE BOOK. - - XXVIII. THE LOCUSTS AND THE DAY OF THE LORD 398 - - JOEL i.—ii. 17. - - XXIX. PROSPERITY AND THE SPIRIT 418 - - JOEL ii. 18-32 (ENG.). - - 1. THE RETURN OF PROSPERITY (ii. 19-27). - - 2. THE OUTPOURING OF THE SPIRIT (ii. 28-32). - - XXX. THE JUDGMENT OF THE HEATHEN 431 - - JOEL iii. (ENG.). - - - _INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPHETS OF - THE GRECIAN PERIOD_ - (FROM 331 ONWARDS) - - XXXI. ISRAEL AND THE GREEKS 439 - - - “_ZECHARIAH_” - (_IX.—XIV._) - - XXXII. “ZECHARIAH” IX.—XIV. 449 - - XXXIII. THE CONTENTS OF “ZECHARIAH” IX.—XIV. 463 - - 1. THE COMING OF THE GREEKS (ix. 1-8). - - 2. THE PRINCE OF PEACE (ix. 9-12). - - 3. THE SLAUGHTER OF THE GREEKS (ix. 13-17). - - 4. AGAINST THE TERAPHIM AND SORCERERS (x. 1, 2). - - 5. AGAINST EVIL SHEPHERDS (x. 3-12). - - 6. WAR UPON THE SYRIAN TYRANTS (xi. 1-3). - - 7. THE REJECTION AND MURDER OF THE GOOD - SHEPHERD (xi. 4-17, xiii. 7-9). - - 8. JUDAH _versus_ JERUSALEM (xii. 1-7). - - 9. FOUR RESULTS OF JERUSALEM’S DELIVERANCE - (xii. 8—xiii. 6). - - 10. JUDGMENT OF THE HEATHEN AND SANCTIFICATION - OF JERUSALEM (xiv.). - - - _JONAH_ - - XXXIV. THE BOOK OF JONAH 493 - - 1. THE DATE OF THE BOOK. - - 2. THE CHARACTER OF THE BOOK. - - 3. THE PURPOSE OF THE BOOK. - - 4. OUR LORD’S USE OF THE BOOK. - - 5. THE UNITY OF THE BOOK. - - XXXV. THE GREAT REFUSAL 514 - - JONAH i. - - XXXVI. THE GREAT FISH AND WHAT IT MEANS—THE PSALM 523 - - JONAH ii. - - XXXVII. THE REPENTANCE OF THE CITY 529 - - JONAH iii. - - XXXVIII. ISRAEL’S JEALOUSY OF JEHOVAH 536 - - JONAH iv. - - INDEX OF PROPHETS 543 - - - - - _INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPHETS OF THE SEVENTH CENTURY_ - - - - - CHAPTER I - - _THE SEVENTH CENTURY BEFORE CHRIST_ - - -The three prophets who were treated in the first volume of this work -belonged to the eighth century before Christ: if Micah lived into the -seventh his labours were over by 675. The next group of our twelve, -also three in number, Zephaniah, Nahum and Habakkuk, did not appear -till after 630. To make our study continuous[2] we must now sketch the -course of Israel’s history between. - -In another volume of this series,[3] some account was given of the -religious progress of Israel from Isaiah and the Deliverance of -Jerusalem in 701 to Jeremiah and the Fall of Jerusalem in 587. Isaiah’s -strength was bent upon establishing the inviolableness of Zion. Zion, -he said, should not be taken, and the people, though cut to their -roots, should remain planted in their own land, the stock of a noble -nation in the latter days. But Jeremiah predicted the ruin both of City -and Temple, summoned Jerusalem’s enemies against her in the name of -Jehovah, and counselled his people to submit to them. This reversal -of the prophetic ideal had a twofold reason. In the first place the -moral condition of Israel was worse in 600 B.C. than it had been in -700; another century had shown how much the nation needed the penalty -and purgation of exile. But secondly, however the inviolableness of -Jerusalem had been required in the interests of pure religion in 701, -religion had now to show that it was independent even of Zion and of -Israel’s political survival. Our three prophets of the eighth century -(as well as Isaiah himself) had indeed preached a gospel which implied -this, but it was reserved to Jeremiah to prove that the existence of -state and temple was not indispensable to faith in God, and to explain -the ruin of Jerusalem, not merely as a well-merited penance, but as -the condition of a more spiritual intercourse between Jehovah and His -people. - -It is our duty to trace the course of events through the seventh -century, which led to this change of the standpoint of prophecy, and -which moulded the messages especially of Jeremiah’s contemporaries, -Zephaniah, Nahum and Habakkuk. We may divide the century into three -periods: _First_, that of the Reaction and Persecution under Manasseh -and Amon, from 695 or 690 to 639, during which prophecy was silent or -anonymous; _Second_, that of the Early Years of Josiah, 639 to 625, -near the end of which we meet with the young Jeremiah and Zephaniah; -_Third_, the Rest of the Century, 625 to 600, covering the Decline and -Fall of Niniveh, and the prophets Nahum and Habakkuk, with an addition -carrying on the history to the Fall of Jerusalem in 587—6. - - - 1. REACTION UNDER MANASSEH AND AMON (695?—639). - -Jerusalem was delivered in 701, and the Assyrians kept away from -Palestine for twenty-three years.[4] - -Judah had peace, and Hezekiah was free to devote his latter days -to the work of purifying the worship of his people. What he exactly -achieved is uncertain. The historian imputes to him the removal of the -high places, the destruction of all Maççeboth and Asheras, and of the -brazen serpent.[5] That his measures were drastic is probable from -the opinions of Isaiah, who was their inspiration, and proved by the -reaction which they provoked when Hezekiah died. The _removal_ of the -high places and the concentration of the national worship within the -Temple would be the more easy that the provincial sanctuaries had been -devastated by the Assyrian invasion, and that the shrine of Jehovah was -glorified by the raising of the siege of 701. - -While the first of Isaiah’s great postulates for the future, the -inviolableness of Zion, had been fulfilled, the second, the reign of a -righteous prince in Israel, seemed doomed to disappointment. Hezekiah -died early in the seventh century,[6] and was succeeded by his son -Manasseh, a boy of twelve, who appears to have been captured by the -party whom his father had opposed. The few years’ peace—peace in -Israel was always dangerous to the health of the higher religion—the -interests of those who had suffered from the reforms, the inevitable -reaction which a rigorous puritanism provokes—these swiftly reversed -the religious fortunes of Israel. Isaiah’s and Micah’s predictions of -the final overthrow of Assyria seemed falsified, when in 681 the more -vigorous Asarhaddon succeeded Sennacherib, and in 678 swept the long -absent armies back upon Syria. - -Sidon was destroyed, and twenty-two princes of Palestine immediately -yielded their tribute to the conqueror. Manasseh was one of them, and -his political homage may have brought him, as it brought Ahaz, within -the infection of foreign idolatries.[7] Everything, in short, worked -for the revival of that eclectic paganism which Hezekiah had striven to -stamp out. The high places were rebuilt; altars were erected to Baal, -with the sacred pole of Asherah, as in the time of Ahab;[8] shrines to -the _host of heaven_ defiled the courts of Jehovah’s house; there was a -recrudescence of soothsaying, divination and traffic with the dead. - -But it was all very different from the secure and sunny temper which -Amos had encountered in Northern Israel.[9] The terrible Assyrian -invasions had come between. Life could never again feel so stable. -Still more destructive had been the social poisons which our prophets -described as sapping the constitution of Israel for nearly three -generations. The rural simplicity was corrupted by those economic -changes which Micah bewails. With the ousting of the old families from -the soil, a thousand traditions, memories and habits must have been -broken, which had preserved the people’s presence of mind in days of -sudden disaster, and had carried them, for instance, through so long -a trial as the Syrian wars. Nor could the blood of Israel have run so -pure after the luxury and licentiousness described by Hosea and Isaiah. -The novel obligations of commerce, the greed to be rich, the increasing -distress among the poor, had strained the joyous temper of that nation -of peasants’ sons, whom we met with Amos, and shattered the nerves of -their rulers. There is no word of fighting in Manasseh’s days, no word -of revolt against the tyrant. Perhaps also the intervening puritanism, -which had failed to give the people a permanent faith, had at least -awakened within them a new conscience. - -At all events there is now no more _ease in Zion_, but a restless fear, -driving the people to excesses of religious zeal. We do not read of the -happy country festivals of the previous century, nor of the careless -pride of that sudden wealth which built vast palaces and loaded the -altar of Jehovah with hecatombs. The full-blooded patriotism, which at -least kept ritual in touch with clean national issues, has vanished. -The popular religion is sullen and exasperated. It takes the form of -sacrifices of frenzied cruelty and lust. Children are passed through -the fire to Moloch, and the Temple is defiled by the orgies of those -who abuse their bodies to propitiate a foreign and a brutal god.[10] - -But the most certain consequence of a religion whose nerves are on -edge is persecution, and this raged all the earlier years of Manasseh. -The adherents of the purer faith were slaughtered, and Jerusalem -drenched[11] with innocent blood. Her _own sword_, says Jeremiah, -_devoured the prophets like a destroying lion_.[12] - -It is significant that all that has come down to us from this -“killing time” is anonymous;[13] we do not meet with our next group -of public prophets till Manasseh and his like-minded son have passed -away. Yet prophecy was not wholly stifled. Voices were raised to -predict the exile and destruction of the nation. _Jehovah spake by -His servants_;[14] while others wove into the prophecies of an Amos, -a Hosea or an Isaiah some application of the old principles to the -new circumstances. It is probable, for instance, that the extremely -doubtful passage in the Book of Amos, v. 26 f., which imputes to -Israel as a whole the worship of astral deities from Assyria, is to be -assigned to the reign of Manasseh. In its present position it looks -very like an intrusion: nowhere else does Amos charge his generation -with serving foreign gods; and certainly in all the history of Israel -we could not find a more suitable period for so specific a charge -than the days when into the central sanctuary of the national worship -images were introduced of the host of heaven, and the nation was, in -consequence, threatened with exile.[15] - -In times of persecution the documents of the suffering faith have -ever been reverenced and guarded with especial zeal. It is not -improbable that the prophets, driven from public life, gave themselves -to the arrangement of the national scriptures; and some critics date -from Manasseh’s reign the weaving of the two earliest documents of -the Pentateuch into one continuous book of history.[16] The Book of -Deuteronomy forms a problem by itself. The legislation which composes -the bulk of it[17] appears to have been found among the Temple archives -at the end of our period, and presented to Josiah as an old and -forgotten work.[18] There is no reason to charge with fraud those who -made the presentation by affirming that they really invented the book. -They were priests of Jerusalem, but the book is written by members of -the prophetic party, and ostensibly in the interests of the priests -of the country. It betrays no tremor of the awful persecutions of -Manasseh’s reign; it does not hint at the distinction, then for the -first time apparent, between a false and a true Israel. But it does -draw another distinction, familiar to the eighth century, between the -true and the false prophets. The political and spiritual premisses of -the doctrine of the book were all present by the end of the reign of -Hezekiah, and it is extremely improbable that his reforms, which were -in the main those of Deuteronomy, were not accompanied by some code, or -by some appeal to the fountain of all law in Israel. - -But whether the Book of Deuteronomy now existed or not, there were -those in the nation who through all the dark days between Hezekiah and -Josiah laid up its truth in their hearts and were ready to assist the -latter monarch in his public enforcement of it. - -While these things happened within Judah, very great events were taking -place beyond her borders. Asarhaddon of Assyria (681—668) was a monarch -of long purposes and thorough plans. Before he invaded Egypt, he spent -a year (675) in subduing the restless tribes of Northern Arabia, and -another (674) in conquering the peninsula of Sinai, an ancient appanage -of Egypt. Tyre upon her island baffled his assaults, but the rest of -Palestine remained subject to him. He received his reward in carrying -the Assyrian arms farther into Egypt than any of his predecessors, -and about 670 took Memphis from the Ethiopian Pharaoh Taharka. Then -he died. Assurbanipal, who succeeded, lost Egypt for a few years, but -about 665, with the help of his tributaries in Palestine, he overthrew -Taharka, took Thebes, and established along the Nile a series of vassal -states. He quelled a revolt there in 663 and overthrew Memphis for a -second time. The fall of the Egyptian capital resounds through the -rest of the century; we shall hear its echoes in Nahum. Tyre fell at -last with Arvad in 662. But the Assyrian empire had grown too vast for -human hands to grasp, and in 652 a general revolt took place in Egypt, -Arabia, Palestine, Elam, Babylon and Asia Minor. In 649 Assurbanipal -reduced Elam and Babylon; and by two further campaigns (647 and 645) -Hauran, Edom, Ammon, Moab, Nabatea and all the northern Arabs. On his -return from these he crossed Western Palestine to the sea and punished -Usu and Akko. It is very remarkable that, while Assurbanipal, who thus -fought the neighbours of Judah, makes no mention of her, nor numbers -Manasseh among the rebels whom he chastised, the Book of Chronicles -should contain the statement that _Jehovah sent upon Manasseh the -captains of the host of the king of Assyria, who bound him with fetters -and carried him to Babylon_.[19] What grounds the Chronicler had for -such a statement are quite unknown to us. He introduces Manasseh’s -captivity as the consequence of idolatry, and asserts that on his -restoration Manasseh abolished in Judah all worship save that of -Jehovah, but if this happened (and the Book of Kings has no trace -of it) it was without result. Amon, son of Manasseh, continued to -sacrifice to all the images which his father had introduced. - - - 2. THE EARLY YEARS OF JOSIAH (639—625): - JEREMIAH AND ZEPHANIAH. - -Amon had not reigned for two years when _his servants conspired against -him, and he was slain in his own house_.[20] But the _people of the -land_ rose against the court, slew the conspirators, and secured the -throne for Amon’s son, Josiah, a child of eight. It is difficult to -know what we ought to understand by these movements. Amon, who was -slain, was an idolater; the popular party, who slew his slayers, -put his son on the throne, and that son, unlike both his father and -grandfather, bore a name compounded with the name of Jehovah. Was Amon -then slain for personal reasons? Did the people, in their rising, have -a zeal for Jehovah? Was the crisis purely political, but usurped by -some school or party of Jehovah who had been gathering strength through -the later years of Manasseh, and waiting for some such unsettlement of -affairs as now occurred? The meagre records of the Bible give us no -help, and for suggestions towards an answer we must turn to the wider -politics of the time. - -Assurbanipal’s campaigns of 647 and 645 were the last appearances of -Assyria in Palestine. He had not attempted to reconquer Egypt,[21] -and her king, Psamtik I., began to push his arms northward. Progress -must have been slow, for the siege of Ashdod, which Psamtik probably -began after 645, is said to have occupied him twenty-nine years. -Still, he must have made his influence to be felt in Palestine, and -in all probability there was once more, as in the days of Isaiah, an -Egyptian party in Jerusalem. As the power of Assyria receded over the -northern horizon, the fascination of her idolatries, which Manasseh had -established in Judah, must have waned. The priests of Jehovah’s house, -jostled by their pagan rivals, would be inclined to make common cause -with the prophets under a persecution which both had suffered. With the -loosening of the Assyrian yoke the national spirit would revive, and -it is easy to imagine prophets, priests and people working together in -the movement which placed the child Josiah on the throne. At his tender -age, he must have been wholly in the care of the women of the royal -house; and among these the influence of the prophets may have found -adherents more readily than among the counsellors of an adult prince. -Not only did the new monarch carry the name of Jehovah in his own; -this was the case also with his mother’s father.[22] In the revolt, -therefore, which raised this unconscious child to the throne and in -the circumstances which moulded his character, we may infer that there -already existed the germs of the great work of reform which his manhood -achieved. - -For some time little change would be possible, but from the first facts -were working for great issues. The Book of Kings, which places the -destruction of the idols after the discovery of the law-book in the -eighteenth year of Josiah’s reign, records a previous cleansing and -restoration of the house of Jehovah.[23] This points to the growing -ascendency of the prophetic party during the first fifteen years of -Josiah’s reign. Of the first ten years we know nothing, except that the -prestige of Assyria was waning; but this fact, along with the preaching -of the prophets, who had neither a native tyrant nor the exigencies of -a foreign alliance to silence them, must have weaned the people from -the worship of the Assyrian idols. Unless these had been discredited, -the repair of Jehovah’s house could hardly have been attempted; and -that this progressed means that part of Josiah’s destruction of the -heathen images took place before the discovery of the Book of the Law, -which happened in consequence of the cleansing of the Temple. - -But just as under the good Hezekiah the social condition of the people, -and especially the behaviour of the upper classes, continued to be bad, -so it was again in the early years of Josiah. There was a _remnant of -Baal_[24] in the land. The shrines of _the host of heaven_ might have -been swept from the Temple, but they were still worshipped from the -housetops.[25] Men swore by the Queen of Heaven, and by Moloch, the -King. Some turned back from Jehovah; some, grown up in idolatry, had -not yet sought Him. Idolatry may have been disestablished from the -national sanctuary: its practices still lingered (how intelligibly to -us!) in social and commercial life. Foreign fashions were affected -by the court and nobility; trade, as always, was combined with the -acknowledgment of foreign gods.[26] Moreover, the rich were fraudulent -and cruel. The ministers of justice, and the great in the land, ravened -among the poor. Jerusalem was full of oppression. These were the same -disorders as Amos and Hosea exposed in Northern Israel, and as Micah -exposed in Jerusalem. But one new trait of evil was added. In the -eighth century, with all their ignorance of Jehovah’s true character, -men had yet believed in Him, gloried in His energy, and expected Him -to act—were it only in accordance with their low ideals. They had been -alive and bubbling with religion. But now they _had thickened on their -lees_. They had grown sceptical, dull, indifferent; they said in their -hearts, _Jehovah will not do good, neither will He do evil_! - -Now, just as in the eighth century there had risen, contemporaneous -with Israel’s social corruption, a cloud in the north, black and -pregnant with destruction, so was it once more. But the cloud was -not Assyria. From the hidden world beyond her, from the regions over -Caucasus, vast, nameless hordes of men arose, and, sweeping past her -unchecked, poured upon Palestine. This was the great Scythian invasion -recorded by Herodotus.[27] We have almost no other report than his -few paragraphs, but we can realise the event from our knowledge of -the Mongol and Tartar invasions which in later centuries pursued -the same path southwards. Living in the saddle, and (it would seem) -with no infantry nor chariots to delay them, these Centaurs swept on -with a speed of invasion hitherto unknown. In 630 they had crossed -the Caucasus, by 626 they were on the borders of Egypt. Psamtik I. -succeeded in purchasing their retreat,[28] and they swept back again -as swiftly as they came. They must have followed the old Assyrian -war-paths of the eighth century, and, without foot-soldiers, had -probably kept even more closely to the plains. In Palestine their -way would lie, like Assyria’s, across Hauran, through the plain of -Esdraelon, and down the Philistine coast, and in fact it is only on -this line that there exists any possible trace of them.[29] But they -shook the whole of Palestine into consternation. Though Judah among her -hills escaped them, as she escaped the earlier campaigns of Assyria, -they showed her the penal resources of her offended God. Once again the -dark, sacred North was seen to be full of the possibilities of doom. - -Behold, therefore, exactly the two conditions, ethical and political, -which, as we saw, called forth the sudden prophets of the eighth -century, and made them so sure of their message of judgment: on the -one side Judah, her sins calling aloud for punishment; on the other -side the forces of punishment swiftly drawing on. It was precisely at -this juncture that prophecy again arose, and as Amos, Hosea, Micah and -Isaiah appeared in the end of the eighth century, Zephaniah, Habakkuk, -Nahum and Jeremiah appeared in the end of the seventh. The coincidence -is exact, and a remarkable confirmation of the truth which we deduced -from the experience of Amos, that the assurance of the prophet in -Israel arose from the coincidence of his conscience with his political -observation. The justice of Jehovah demands His people’s chastisement, -but see—the forces of chastisement are already upon the horizon. -Zephaniah uses the same phrase as Amos: _the Day of Jehovah_, he says, -_is drawing near_. - -We are now in touch with Zephaniah, the first of our prophets, but, -before listening to him, it will be well to complete our survey of -those remaining years of the century in which he and his immediate -successors laboured. - - - 3. THE REST OF THE CENTURY (625—586): THE - FALL OF NINIVEH; NAHUM AND HABAKKUK. - -Although the Scythians had vanished from the horizon of Palestine and -the Assyrians came over it no more, the fateful North still lowered -dark and turbulent. Yet the keen eyes of the watchmen in Palestine -perceived that, for a time at least, the storm must break where it had -gathered. It is upon Niniveh, not upon Jerusalem, that the prophetic -passion of Nahum and Habakkuk is concentrated; the new day of the Lord -is filled with the fate, not of Israel, but of Assyria. - -For nearly two centuries Niniveh had been the capital and cynosure of -Western Asia; for more than one she had set the fashions, the art, and -even, to some extent, the religion of all the Semitic nations. Of late -years, too, she had drawn to herself the world’s trade. Great roads -from Egypt, from Persia and from the Ægean converged upon her, till -like Imperial Rome she was filled with a vast motley of peoples, and -men went forth from her to the ends of the earth. Under Assurbanipal -travel and research had increased, and the city acquired renown as -the centre of the world’s wisdom. Thus her size and glory, with all -her details of rampart and tower, street, palace and temple, grew -everywhere familiar. But the peoples gazed at her as those who had -been bled to build her. The most remote of them had seen face to face -on their own fields, trampling, stripping, burning, the warriors who -manned her walls. She had dashed their little ones against the rocks. -Their kings had been dragged from them and hung in cages about her -gates. Their gods had lined the temples of her gods. Year by year they -sent her their heavy tribute, and the bearers came back with fresh -tales of her rapacious insolence. So she stood, bitterly clear to -all men, in her glory and her cruelty! Their hate haunted her every -pinnacle; and at last, when about 625 the news came that her frontier -fortresses had fallen and the great city herself was being besieged, -we can understand how her victims gloated on each possible stage of -her fall, and saw her yield to one after another of the cruelties of -battle, siege and storm, which for two hundred years she had inflicted -on themselves. To such a vision the prophet Nahum gives voice, not on -behalf of Israel alone, but of all the nations whom Niniveh had crushed. - -It was obvious that the vengeance which Western Asia thus hailed upon -Assyria must come from one or other of two groups of peoples, standing -respectively to the north and to the south of her. - -To the north, or north-east, between Mesopotamia and the Caspian, there -were gathered a congeries of restless tribes known to the Assyrians as -the Madai or Matai, the Medes. They are mentioned first by Shalmaneser -II. in 840, and few of his successors do not record campaigns against -them. The earliest notice of them in the Old Testament is in connection -with the captives of Samaria, some of whom in 720 were settled among -them.[30] These Medes were probably of Turanian stock, but by the end -of the eighth century, if we are to judge from the names of some of -their chiefs,[31] their most easterly tribes had already fallen under -Aryan influence, spreading westward from Persia.[32] So led, they -became united and formidable to Assyria. Herodotus relates that their -King Phraortes, or Fravartis, actually attempted the siege of Niniveh, -probably on the death of Assurbanipal in 625, but was slain.[33] -His son Kyaxares, Kastarit or Uvakshathra, was forced by a Scythian -invasion of his own country to withdraw his troops from Assyria; but -having either bought off or assimilated the Scythian invaders, he -returned in 608, with forces sufficient to overthrow the northern -Assyrian fortresses and to invest Niniveh herself. - -The other and southern group of peoples which threatened Assyria were -Semitic. At their head were the Kasdim or Chaldeans.[34] This name -appears for the first time in the Assyrian annals a little earlier -than that of the Medes,[35] and from the middle of the ninth century -onwards the people designated by it frequently engage the Assyrian -arms. They were, to begin with, a few half-savage tribes to the -south of Babylon, in the neighbourhood of the Persian Gulf; but they -proved their vigour by the repeated lordship of all Babylonia and by -inveterate rebellion against the monarchs of Niniveh. Before the end of -the seventh century we find their names used by the prophets for the -Babylonians as a whole. Assurbanipal, who was a patron of Babylonian -culture, kept the country quiet during the last years of his reign, but -his son Asshur-itil-ilani, upon his accession in 625, had to grant the -viceroyalty to Nabopolassar the Chaldean with a considerable degree -of independence. Asshur-itil-ilani was succeeded in a few years[36] -by Sinsuriskin, the Sarakos of the Greeks, who preserved at least a -nominal sovereignty over Babylon,[37] but Nabopolassar must already -have cherished ambitions of succeeding the Assyrian in the empire of -the world. He enjoyed sufficient freedom to organise his forces to that -end. - -These were the two powers which from north and south watched with -impatience the decay of Assyria. That they made no attempt upon her -between 625 and 608 was probably due to several causes: their jealousy -of each other, the Medes’ trouble with the Scythians, Nabopolassar’s -genius for waiting till his forces were ready, and above all the still -considerable vigour of the Assyrian himself. The Lion, though old,[38] -was not broken. His power may have relaxed in the distant provinces of -his empire, though, if Budde be right about the date of Habakkuk,[39] -the peoples of Syria still groaned under the thought of it; but his -own land—his _lair_, as the prophets call it—was still terrible. It -is true that, as Nahum perceives, the capital was no longer native -and patriotic as it had been; the trade fostered by Assurbanipal had -filled Niniveh with a vast and mercenary population, ready to break -and disperse at the first breach in her walls. Yet Assyria proper was -covered with fortresses, and the tradition had long fastened upon the -peoples that Niniveh was impregnable. Hence the tension of those years. -The peoples of Western Asia looked eagerly for their revenge; but the -two powers which alone could accomplish this stood waiting—afraid of -each other perhaps, but more afraid of the object of their common -ambition. - -It is said that Kyaxares and Nabopolassar at last came to an -agreement;[40] but more probably the crisis was hastened by the -appearance of another claimant for the coveted spoil. In 608 Pharaoh -Necho _went up against the king of Assyria towards the river -Euphrates_.[41] This Egyptian advance may have forced the hand of -Kyaxares, who appears to have begun his investment of Niniveh a little -after Necho defeated Josiah at Megiddo.[42] The siege is said to -have lasted two years. Whether this included the delays necessary -for the reduction of fortresses upon the great roads of approach to -the Assyrian capital we do not know; but Niniveh’s own position, -fortifications and resources may well account for the whole of the -time. Colonel Billerbeck, a military expert, has suggested[43] that -the Medes found it possible to invest the city only upon the northern -and eastern sides. Down the west flows the Tigris, and across this the -besieged may have been able to bring in supplies and reinforcements -from the fertile country beyond. Herodotus affirms that the Medes -effected the capture of Niniveh by themselves,[44] and for this some -recent evidence has been found,[45] so that another tradition that -the Chaldeans were also actively engaged,[46] which has nothing to -support it, may be regarded as false. Nabopolassar may still have been -in name an Assyrian viceroy; yet, as Colonel Billerbeck points out, he -had it in his power to make Kyaxares’ victory possible by holding the -southern roads to Niniveh, detaching other viceroys of her provinces -and so shutting her up to her own resources. But among other reasons -which kept him away from the siege may have been the necessity of -guarding against Egyptian designs on the moribund empire. Pharaoh -Necho, as we know, was making for the Euphrates as early as 608. Now if -Nabopolassar and Kyaxares had arranged to divide Assyria between them, -then it is likely that they agreed also to share the work of making -their inheritance sure, so that while Kyaxares overthrew Niniveh, -Nabopolassar, or rather his son Nebuchadrezzar,[47] waited for and -overthrew Pharaoh by Carchemish on the Euphrates. Consequently Assyria -was divided between the Medes and the Chaldeans; the latter as her -heirs in the south took over her title to Syria and Palestine. - -The two prophets with whom we have to deal at this time are almost -entirely engrossed with the fall of Assyria. Nahum exults in the -destruction of Niniveh; Habakkuk sees in the Chaldeans nothing but the -avengers of the peoples whom Assyria[48] had oppressed. For both these -events are the close of an epoch: neither prophet looks beyond this. -Nahum (not on behalf of Israel alone) gives expression to the epoch’s -long thirst for vengeance on the tyrant; Habakkuk (if Budde’s reading -of him be right[49]) states the problems with which its victorious -cruelties had filled the pious mind—states the problem and beholds the -solution in the Chaldeans. And, surely, the vengeance was so just and -so ample, the solution so drastic and for the time complete, that we -can well understand how two prophets should exhaust their office in -describing such things, and feel no motive to look either deep into -the moral condition of Israel, or far out into the future which God -was preparing for His people. It might, of course, be said that the -prophets’ silence on the latter subjects was due to their positions -immediately after the great Reform of 621, when the nation, having -been roused to an honest striving after righteousness, did not require -prophetic rebuke, and when the success of so godly a prince as Josiah -left no spiritual ambitions unsatisfied. But this (even if the dates -of the two prophets were certain) is hardly probable; and the other -explanation is sufficient. Who can doubt this who has realised the long -epoch which then reached a crisis, or has been thrilled by the crash of -the crisis itself? The fall of Niniveh was deafening enough to drown -for the moment, as it does in Nahum, even a Hebrew’s clamant conscience -of his country’s sin. The problems, which the long success of Assyrian -cruelty had started, were old and formidable enough to demand statement -and answer before either the hopes or the responsibilities of the -future could find voice. The past also requires its prophets. Feeling -has to be satisfied, and experience balanced, before the heart is -willing to turn the leaf and read the page of the future. - -Yet, through all this time of Assyria’s decline, Israel had her own -sins, fears and convictions of judgment to come. The disappearance of -the Scythians did not leave Zephaniah’s predictions of doom without -means of fulfilment; nor did the great Reform of 621 remove the -necessity of that doom. In the deepest hearts the assurance that Israel -must be punished was by these things only confirmed. The prophetess -Huldah, the first to speak in the name of the Lord after the Book of -the Law was discovered, emphasised not the reforms which it enjoined -but the judgments which it predicted. Josiah’s righteousness could at -most ensure for himself a peaceful death: his people were incorrigible -and doomed.[50] The reforms indeed proceeded, there was public and -widespread penitence, idolatry was abolished. But those were only -shallow pedants who put their trust in the possession of a revealed -Law and purged Temple,[51] and who boasted that therefore Israel -was secure. Jeremiah repeated the gloomy forecasts of Zephaniah and -Huldah, and even before the wickedness of Jehoiakim’s reign proved the -obduracy of Israel’s heart, he affirmed _the imminence of the evil out -of the north and the great destruction_.[52] Of our three prophets in -this period Zephaniah, though the earliest, had therefore the last word. -While Nahum and Habakkuk were almost wholly absorbed with the epoch -that is closing, he had a vision of the future. Is this why his book -has been ranged among our Twelve after those of his slightly later -contemporaries? - -The precise course of events in Israel was this—and we must follow -them, for among them we have to seek exact dates for Nahum and -Habakkuk. In 621 the Book of the Law was discovered, and Josiah applied -himself with thoroughness to the reforms which he had already begun. -For thirteen years he seems to have had peace to carry them through. -The heathen altars were thrown down, with all the high places in Judah -and even some in Samaria. Images were abolished. The heathen priests -were exterminated, with the wizards and soothsayers. The Levites, -except the sons of Zadok, who alone were allowed to minister in the -Temple, henceforth the only place of sacrifice, were debarred from -priestly duties. A great passover was celebrated.[53] The king did -justice and was the friend of the poor;[54] it went well with him -and the people.[55] He extended his influence into Samaria; it is -probable that he ventured to carry out the injunctions of Deuteronomy -with regard to the neighbouring heathen.[56] Literature flourished: -though critics have not combined upon the works to be assigned to this -reign, they agree that a great many were produced in it. Wealth must -have accumulated: certainly the nation entered the troubles of the -next reign with an arrogant confidence that argues under Josiah the -rapid growth of prosperity in every direction. Then of a sudden came -the fatal year of 608. Pharaoh Necho appeared in Palestine[57] with -an army destined for the Euphrates, and Josiah went up to meet him at -Megiddo. His tactics are plain—it is the first strait on the land-road -from Egypt to the Euphrates—but his motives are obscure. Assyria can -hardly have been strong enough at this time to fling him as her vassal -across the path of her ancient foe. He must have gone of himself. “His -dream was probably to bring back the scattered remains of the northern -kingdom to a pure worship, and to unite the whole people of Israel -under the sceptre of the house of David; and he was not inclined to -allow Egypt to cross his aspirations, and rob him of the inheritance -which was falling to him from the dead hand of Assyria.”[58] - -Josiah fell, and with him not only the liberty of his people, but the -chief support of their faith. That the righteous king was cut down in -the midst of his days and in defence of the Holy Land—what could this -mean? Was it, then, vain to serve the Lord? Could He not defend His -own? With some the disaster was a cause of sore complaint, and with -others, perhaps, of open desertion from Jehovah. - -But the extraordinary thing is, how little effect Josiah’s death seems -to have had upon the people’s self-confidence at large, or upon their -adherence to Jehovah. They immediately placed Josiah’s second son on -the throne; but Necho, having got him by some means to his camp at -Riblah between the Lebanons, sent him in fetters to Egypt, where he -died, and established in his place Eliakim, his elder brother. On his -accession Eliakim changed his name to Jehoiakim, a proof that Jehovah -was still regarded as the sufficient patron of Israel; and the same -blind belief that, for the sake of His Temple and of His Law, Jehovah -would keep His people in security, continued to persevere in spite -of Megiddo. It was a most immoral ease, and filled with injustice. -Necho subjected the land to a fine. This was not heavy, but Jehoiakim, -instead of paying it out of the royal treasures, exacted it from _the -people of the land_,[59] and then employed the peace which it purchased -in erecting a costly palace for himself by the forced labour of his -subjects.[60] He was covetous, unjust and violently cruel. Like prince -like people: social oppression prevailed, and there was a recrudescence -of the idolatries of Manasseh’s time,[61] especially (it may be -inferred) after Necho’s defeat at Carchemish in 605. That all this -should exist along with a fanatic trust in Jehovah need not surprise us -who remember the very similar state of the public mind in North Israel -under Amos and Hosea. Jeremiah attacked it as they had done. Though -Assyria was fallen, and Egypt was promising protection, Jeremiah -predicted destruction from the north on Egypt and Israel alike. When -at last the Egyptian defeat at Carchemish stirred some vague fears -in the people’s hearts, Jeremiah’s conviction broke out into clear -flame. For three-and-twenty years he had brought God’s word in vain to -his countrymen. Now God Himself would act: Nebuchadrezzar was but His -servant to lead Israel into captivity.[62] - -The same year, 605 or 604, Jeremiah wrote all these things in a -volume;[63] and a few months later, at a national fast, occasioned -perhaps by the fear of the Chaldeans, Baruch, his secretary, read them -in the house of the Lord, in the ears of all the people. The king was -informed, the roll was brought to him, and as it was read, with his -own hands he cut it up and burned it, three or four columns at a time. -Jeremiah answered by calling down on Jehoiakim an ignominious death, -and repeated the doom already uttered on the land. Another prophet, -Urijah, had recently been executed for the same truth; but Jeremiah and -Baruch escaped into hiding. - -This was probably in 603, and for a little time Jehoiakim and the -populace were restored to their false security by the delay of the -Chaldeans to come south. Nebuchadrezzar was occupied in Babylon, -securing his succession to his father. At last, either in 602 or more -probably in 600, he marched into Syria, and Jehoiakim _became his -servant for three years_.[64] In such a condition the Jewish state -might have survived for at least another generation,[65] but in 599 or -597 Jehoiakim, with the madness of the doomed, held back his tribute. -The revolt was probably instigated by Egypt, which, however, did not -dare to support it. As in Isaiah’s time against Assyria, so now against -Babylon, Egypt was a blusterer _who blustered and sat still_. She still -_helped in vain and to no purpose_.[66] Nor could Judah count on the -help of the other states of Palestine. They had joined Hezekiah against -Sennacherib, but remembering perhaps how Manasseh had failed to help -them against Assurbanipal, and that Josiah had carried things with a -high hand towards them,[67] they obeyed Nebuchadrezzar’s command and -raided Judah till he himself should have time to arrive.[68] Amid these -raids the senseless Jehoiakim seems to have perished,[69] for when -Nebuchadrezzar appeared before Jerusalem in 597, his son Jehoiachin, -a youth of eighteen, had succeeded to the throne. The innocent reaped -the harvest sown by the guilty. In the attempt (it would appear) -to save his people from destruction,[70] Jehoiachin capitulated. -But Nebuchadrezzar was not content with the person of the king: he -deported to Babylon the court, a large number of influential persons, -_the mighty men of the land_ or what must have been nearly all the -fighting men, with the necessary military artificers and swordsmiths. -Priests also went, Ezekiel among them, and probably representatives -of other classes not mentioned by the annalist. All these were the -flower of the nation. Over what was left Nebuchadrezzar placed a son -of Josiah on the throne who took the name of Zedekiah. Again with -a little common-sense, the state might have survived; but it was a -short respite. The new court began intrigues with Egypt, and Zedekiah, -with the Ammonites and Tyre, ventured a revolt in 589. Jeremiah and -Ezekiel knew it was in vain. Nebuchadrezzar marched on Jerusalem, -and though for a time he had to raise the siege in order to defeat a -force sent by Pharaoh Hophra, the Chaldean armies closed in again upon -the doomed city. Her defence was stubborn; but famine and pestilence -sapped it, and numbers fell away to the enemy. About the eighteenth -month, the besiegers took the northern suburb and stormed the middle -gate. Zedekiah and the army broke their lines only to be captured at -Jericho. In a few weeks more the city was taken and given over to fire. -Zedekiah was blinded, and with a large number of his people carried to -Babylon. It was the end, for although a small community of Jews was -left at Mizpeh under a Jewish viceroy and with Jeremiah to guide them, -they were soon broken up and fled to Egypt. Judah had perished. Her -savage neighbours, who had gathered with glee to the day of Jerusalem’s -calamity, assisted the Chaldeans in capturing the fugitives, and -Edomites came up from the south on the desolate land. - - * * * * * - -It has been necessary to follow so far the course of events, because -of our prophets Zephaniah is placed in each of the three sections -of Josiah’s reign, and by some even in Jehoiakim’s; Nahum has been -assigned to different points between the eve of the first and the -eve of the second siege of Niniveh; and Habakkuk has been placed -by different critics in almost every year from 621 to the reign of -Jehoiachin; while Obadiah, whom we shall find reasons for dating during -the Exile, describes the behaviour of Edom at the final siege of -Jerusalem. The next of the Twelve, Haggai, may have been born before -the Exile, but did not prophesy till 520. Zechariah appeared the same -year, Malachi not for half a century after. These three are prophets -of the Persian period. With the approach of the Greeks Joel appears, -then comes the prophecy which we find in the end of Zechariah’s book, -and last of all the Book of Jonah. To all these post-exilic prophets we -shall provide later on the necessary historical introductions. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[2] See Vol. I., p. viii. - -[3] Expositor’s Bible, _Isaiah xl.—lxvi._, Chap. II. - -[4] It is uncertain whether Hezekiah was an Assyrian vassal during -these years, as his successor Manasseh is recorded to have been in 676. - -[5] 2 Kings xviii. 4. - -[6] The exact date is quite uncertain; 695 is suggested on the -chronological table prefixed to this volume, but it may have been 690 -or 685. - -[7] Cf. McCurdy, _History, Prophecy and the Monuments_, § 799. - -[8] Stade (_Gesch. des Volkes Israel_, I., pp. 627 f.) denies to -Manasseh the reconstruction of the high places, the Baal altars and -the Asheras, for he does not believe that Hezekiah had succeeded in -destroying these. He takes 2 Kings xxi. 3, which describes these -reconstructions, as a late interpolation rendered necessary to -reconcile the tradition that Hezekiah’s reforms had been quite in the -spirit of Deuteronomy, with the fact that there were still high places -in the land when Josiah began his reforms. Further, Stade takes the -rest of 2 Kings xxi. 2_b_-7 as also an interpolation, but unlike verse -3 an accurate account of Manasseh’s idolatrous institutions, because -it is corroborated by the account of Josiah’s reforms, 2 Kings xxiii. -Stade also discusses this passage in _Z.A.T.W._, 1886, pp. 186 ff. - -[9] See Vol. I., p. 41. In addition to the reasons of the change given -above, we must remember that we are now treating, not of Northern -Israel, but of the more stern and sullen Judæans. - -[10] 2 Kings xxi., xxiii. - -[11] _Filled from mouth to mouth_ (2 Kings xxi. 16). - -[12] Jer. ii. 30. - -[13] We have already seen that there is no reason for that theory of so -many critics which assigns to this period Micah. See Vol. I., p. 370. - -[14] 2 Kings xxi. 10 ff. - -[15] Whether the parenthetical apostrophes to Jehovah as Maker of -the heavens, their hosts and all the powers of nature (Amos iv. 13, -v. 8, 9, ix. 5, 6), are also to be attributed to Manasseh’s reign is -more doubtful. Yet the following facts are to be observed: that these -passages are also (though to a less degree than v. 26 f.) parenthetic; -that their language seems of a later cast than that of the time of Amos -(see Vol. I., pp. 204, 205: though here evidence is adduced to show -that the late features are probably post-exilic); and that Jehovah -is expressly named as the _Maker_ of certain of the stars. Similarly -when Mohammed seeks to condemn the worship of the heavenly bodies, he -insists that God is their Maker. Koran, Sur. 41, 37: “To the signs of -His Omnipotence belong night and day, sun and moon; but do not pray to -sun or moon, for God hath created them.” Sur. 53, 50: “Because He is -the Lord of Sirius.” On the other side see Driver’s _Joel and Amos_ -(Cambridge Bible for Schools Series), 1897, pp. 118 f., 189. - -How deeply Manasseh had planted in Israel the worship of the heavenly -host may be seen from the survival of the latter through all the -reforms of Josiah and the destruction of Jerusalem (Jer. vii. 18, -viii., xliv.; Ezek. viii. Cf. Stade, _Gesch. des V. Israel_, I., pp. -629 ff.). - -[16] The Jehovist and Elohist into the closely mortised JE. Stade -indeed assigns to the period of Manasseh Israel’s first acquaintance -with the Babylonian cosmogonies and myths which led to that -reconstruction of them in the spirit of her own religion which we find -in the Jehovistic portions of the beginning of Genesis (_Gesch. des V. -Isr._, I., pp. 630 ff.). But it may well be doubted (1) whether the -reign of Manasseh affords time for this assimilation, and (2) whether -it was likely that Assyrian and Babylonian theology could make so deep -and lasting impression upon the purer faith of Israel at a time when -the latter stood in such sharp hostility to all foreign influences and -was so bitterly persecuted by the parties in Israel who had succumbed -to these influences. - -[17] Chaps. v.—xxvi., xxviii. - -[18] 621 B.C. - -[19] 2 Chron. xxxiii. 11 ff. - -[20] 2 Kings xxi. 23. - -[21] But in his conquests of Hauran, Northern Arabia and the eastern -neighbours of Judah, he had evidently sought to imitate the policy of -Asarhaddon in 675 f., and secure firm ground in Palestine and Arabia -for a subsequent attack upon Egypt. That this never came shows more -than anything else could Assyria’s consciousness of growing weakness. - -[22] The name of Josiah’s (יֹאשִׁיָּהוּ) mother was Jedidah (יְדִידָה), -daughter of Adaiah (עֲדָיָה) of Boṣḳath in the Shephelah of Judah. - -[23] 2 Kings xxii., xxiii. - -[24] Zeph. i. 4: the LXX. reads _names of Baal_. See below, p. 40, n. 87. - -[25] _Ibid._, 5. - -[26] _Ibid._, 8-12. - -[27] I. 102 ff. - -[28] Herod., I. 105. - -[29] The new name of Bethshan in the mouth of Esdraelon, viz. -Scythopolis, is said to be derived from them (but see _Hist. Geog. of -the Holy Land_, pp. 363 f.); they conquered Askalon (Herod., I. 105). - -[30] 2 Kings xvii. 6: _and in the cities_ (LXX. _mountains_) _of the -Medes_. The Heb. is מָדָי, Madai. - -[31] Mentioned by Sargon. - -[32] Sayce, _Empires of the East_, 239: cf. McCurdy, § 823 f. - -[33] Herod., I. 103. - -[34] Heb. Kasdim, כַּשְׂדִים; LXX. Χαλδαῖοι; Assyr. Kaldâa, Kaldu. The -Hebrew form with _s_ is regarded by many authorities as the original, -from the Assyrian root _kashadu_, to conquer, and the Assyrian form -with _l_ to have arisen by the common change of _sh_ through _r_ into -_l_. The form with _s_ does not occur, however, in Assyrian, which also -possesses the root _kaladu_, with the same meaning as _kashadu_. See -Mr. Pinches’ articles on Chaldea and the Chaldeans in the new edition -of Vol. I. of Smith’s _Bible Dictionary_. - -[35] About 880 B.C. in the annals of Assurnatsirpal. See Chronological -Table to Vol. I. - -[36] No inscriptions of Asshur-itil-ilani have been found later than -the first two years of his reign. - -[37] Billerbeck-Jeremias, “Der Untergang Niniveh’s,” in Delitzsch and -Haupt’s _Beiträge zur Assyriologie_, III., p. 113. - -[38] Nahum ii. - -[39] See below, p. 120. - -[40] Abydenus (apud Euseb., _Chron._, I. 9) reports a marriage between -Nebuchadrezzar, Nabopolassar’s son, and the daughter of the Median king. - -[41] 2 Kings xxiii. 29. The history is here very obscure. Necho, met -at Megiddo by Josiah, and having slain him, appears to have spent a -year or two in subjugating, and arranging for the government of, Syria -(_ibid._, verses 33-35), and only reached the Euphrates in 605, when -Nebuchadrezzar defeated him. - -[42] The reverse view is taken by Wellhausen, who says (_Israel u. Jüd. -Gesch._, pp. 97 f.): “Der Pharaoh scheint ausgezogen zu sein um sich -seinen Teil an der Erbschaft Ninives vorwegzunehmen, während die Meder -und Chaldäer die Stadt belagerten.” - -[43] See above, p. 20, n. 37. - -[44] I. 106. - -[45] A stele of Nabonidus discovered at Hilleh and now in the museum -at Constantinople relates that in his third year, 553, the king -restored at Harran the temple of Sin, the moon-god, which the Medes had -destroyed fifty-four years before, _i.e._ 607. Whether the Medes did -this before, during or after the siege of Niniveh is uncertain, but the -approximate date of the siege, 608—606, is thus marvellously confirmed. -The stele affirms that the Medes alone took Niniveh, but that they -were called in by Marduk, the Babylonian god, to assist Nabopolassar -and avenge the deportation of his image by Sennacherib to Niniveh. -Messerschmidt (_Mittheilungen der Vorderasiatischen Gesellschaft_, I. -1896) argues that the Medes were summoned by the Babylonians while the -latter were being sore pressed by the Assyrians. Winckler had already -(_Untersuch._, pp. 124 ff., 1889) urged that the Babylonians would -refrain from taking an active part in the overthrow of Niniveh, in fear -of incurring the guilt of sacrilege. Neither Messerschmidt’s paper, -nor Scheil’s (who describes the stele in the _Recueil des Travaux_, -XVIII. 1896), being accessible to me, I have written this note on the -information supplied by Rev. C. H. W. Johns, of Cambridge, in the -_Expository Times_, 1896, and by Prof. A. B. Davidson in App. I. to -_Nah., Hab. and Zeph._ - -[46] Berosus and Abydenus in Eusebius. - -[47] This spelling (Jer. xlix. 28) is nearer the original than the -alternative Hebrew Nebuchad_n_ezzar. But the LXX. Ναβουχοδονόσορ, and -the Ναβουκοδρόσορος of Abydenus and Megasthenes and Ναβοκοδρόσορος of -Strabo, have preserved the more correct vocalisation; for the original -is Nabu-kudurri-uṣur = Nebo, defend the crown! - -[48] But see below, pp. 123 f. - -[49] Below, pp. 121 ff. - -[50] 2 Kings xxii. 11-20. The genuineness of this passage is proved (as -against Stade, _Gesch. des Volkes Israel_, I.) by the promise which -it gives to Josiah of a peaceful death. Had it been written after -the battle of Megiddo, in which Josiah was slain, it could not have -contained such a promise. - -[51] Jer. vii. 4, viii. 8. - -[52] vi. 1. - -[53] All these reforms in 2 Kings xxiii. - -[54] Jer. xxii. 15 f. - -[55] _Ibid._, ver. 16. - -[56] We have no record of this, but a prince who so rashly flung -himself in the way of Egypt would not hesitate to claim authority over -Moab and Ammon. - -[57] 2 Kings xxiii. 24. The question whether Necho came by land from -Egypt or brought his troops in his fleet to Acre is hardly answered by -the fact that Josiah went to Megiddo to meet him. But Megiddo on the -whole tells more for the land than the sea. It is not on the path from -Acre to the Euphrates; it is the key of the land-road from Egypt to the -Euphrates. Josiah could have no hope of stopping Pharaoh on the broad -levels of Philistia; but at Megiddo there was a narrow pass, and the -only chance of arresting so large an army as it moved in detachments. -Josiah’s tactics were therefore analogous to those of Saul, who also -left his own territory and marched north to Esdraelon, to meet his -foe—and death. - -[58] A. B. Davidson, _The Exile and the Restoration_, p. 8 (Bible Class -Primers, ed. by Salmond; Edin., T. & T. Clark, 1897). - -[59] 2 Kings xxiii. 33-35. - -[60] Jer. xxii. 13-15. - -[61] Jer. xi. - -[62] xxv. 1 ff. - -[63] xxxvi. - -[64] 2 Kings xxiv. 1. In the chronological table appended to Kautzsch’s -_Bibel_ this verse and Jehoiakim’s submission are assigned to 602. But -this allows too little time for Nebuchadrezzar to confirm his throne -in Babylon and march to Palestine, and it is not corroborated by the -record in the Book of Jeremiah of events in Judah in 604—602. - -[65] Nebuchadrezzar did not die till 562. - -[66] See _Isaiah i.—xxxix._ (Expositor’s Bible), pp. 223 f. - -[67] See above, p. 26, n. 56. - -[68] 2 Kings xxiv. 2. - -[69] Jer. xxxvii. 30, but see 2 Kings xxiv. 6. - -[70] So Josephus puts it (X. _Antiq._, vii. 1). Jehoiachin was -unusually bewailed (Lam. iv. 20; Ezek. xvii. 22 ff.). He survived -in captivity till the death of Nebuchadrezzar, whose successor -Evil-Merodach in 561 took him from prison and gave him a place in his -palace (2 Kings xxv. 27 ff.). - - - - - _ZEPHANIAH_ - - - - - _Dies Iræ, Dies Illa!_—ZEPH. i. 15. - - -“His book is the first tinging of prophecy with apocalypse: that is the -moment which it supplies in the history of Israel’s religion.” - - - - - CHAPTER II - - _THE BOOK OF ZEPHANIAH_ - - -The Book of Zephaniah is one of the most difficult in the prophetic -canon. The title is very generally accepted; the period from which -chap. i. dates is recognised by practically all critics to be the reign -of Josiah, or at least the last third of the seventh century. But after -that doubts start, and we find present nearly every other problem of -introduction. - -To begin with, the text is very damaged. In some passages we may be -quite sure that we have not the true text;[71] in others we cannot be -sure that we have it,[72] and there are several glosses.[73] The bulk -of the second chapter was written in the Qinah, or elegiac measure, but -as it now stands the rhythm is very much broken. It is difficult to -say whether this is due to the dilapidation of the original text or to -wilful insertion of glosses and other later passages. The Greek version -of Zephaniah possesses the same general features as that of other -difficult prophets. Occasionally it enables us to correct the text; -but by the time it was made the text must already have contained the -same corruptions which we encounter, and the translators were ignorant -besides of the meaning of some phrases which to us are plain.[74] - -The difficulties of textual criticism as well as of translation are -aggravated by the large number of words, grammatical forms and phrases -which either happen very seldom in the Old Testament,[75] or nowhere -else in it at all.[76] Of the rare words and phrases, a very few (as -will be seen from the appended notes) are found in earlier writings. -Indeed all that are found are from the authentic prophecies of Isaiah, -with whose style and doctrine Zephaniah’s own exhibit most affinity. -All the other rarities of vocabulary and grammar are shared only by -_later_ writers; and as a whole the language of Zephaniah exhibits -symptoms which separate it by many years from the language of the -prophets of the eighth century, and range it with that of Jeremiah, -Ezekiel, the Second Isaiah and still later literature. It may be useful -to the student to collect in a note the most striking of these symptoms -of the comparative lateness of Zephaniah’s dialect.[77] - -We now come to the question of date, and we take, to begin with, the -First Chapter. It was said above that critics agree as to the general -period—between 639, when Josiah began to reign, and 600. But this -period was divided into three very different sections, and each of -these has received considerable support from modern criticism. The -great majority of critics place the chapter in the early years of -Josiah, before the enforcement of Deuteronomy and the great Reform in -621.[78] Others have argued for the later years of Josiah, 621—608, on -the ground that the chapter implies that the great Reform has already -taken place, and otherwise shows knowledge of Deuteronomy;[79] while -some prefer the days of reaction under Jehoiakim, 608 ff.,[80] and -assume that the phrase in the title, _in the days of Josiah_, is a late -and erroneous inference from i. 4. - -The evidence for the argument consists of the title and the condition -of Judah reflected in the body of the chapter. The latter is a definite -piece of oratory. Under the alarm of an immediate and general war, -Zephaniah proclaims a vast destruction upon the earth. Judah must fall -beneath it: the worshippers of Baal, of the host of heaven and of -Milcom, the apostates from Jehovah, the princes and house of the king, -the imitators of foreign fashions, and the forceful and fraudulent, -shall be cut off in a great slaughter. Those who have grown sceptical -and indifferent to Jehovah shall be unsettled by invasion and war. This -shall be the Day of Jehovah, near and immediate, a day of battle and -disaster on the whole land. - -The conditions reflected are thus twofold—the idolatrous and sceptical -state of the people, and an impending invasion. But these suit, -more or less exactly, each of the three sections of our period. For -Jeremiah distinctly states that he had to attack idolatry in Judah for -twenty-three years, 627 to 604;[81] he inveighs against the falseness -and impurity of the people alike before the great Reform, and after it -while Josiah was still alive, and still more fiercely under Jehoiakim. -And, while before 621 the great Scythian invasion was sweeping upon -Palestine from the north, after 621, and especially after 604, the -Babylonians from the same quarter were visibly threatening the land. -But when looked at more closely, the chapter shows several features -which suit the second section of our period less than they do the -other two. The worship of the host of heaven, probably introduced -under Manasseh, was put down by Josiah in 621; it revived under -Jehoiakim,[82] but during the latter years of Josiah it cannot possibly -have been so public as Zephaniah describes.[83] - -Other reasons which have been given for those years are -inconclusive[84]—the chapter, for instance, makes no indubitable -reference to Deuteronomy or the Covenant of 621—and on the whole we -may leave the end of Josiah’s reign out of account. Turning to the -third section, Jehoiakim’s reign, we find one feature of the prophecy -which suits it admirably. The temper described in ver. 12—_men who are -settled on their lees, who say in their heart, Jehovah doeth neither -good nor evil_—is the kind of temper likely to have been produced -among the less earnest adherents of Jehovah by the failure of the -great Reform in 621 to effect either the purity or the prosperity of -the nation. But this is more than counterbalanced by the significant -exception of the king from the condemnation which ver. 8 passes on -the _princes and the sons of the king_. Such an exception could not -have been made when Jehoiakim was on the throne; it points almost -conclusively to the reign of the good Josiah. And with this agrees the -title of the chapter—_in the days of Josiah_.[85] We are, therefore, -driven back to the years of Josiah before 621. In these we find no -discrepancy either with the chapter itself, or with its title. The -southward march of the Scythians,[86] between 630 and 625, accounts for -Zephaniah’s alarm of a general war, including the invasion of Judah; -the idolatrous practices which he describes may well have been those -surviving from the days of Manasseh,[87] and not yet reached by the -drastic measures of 621; the temper of scepticism and hopelessness -condemned by ver. 12 was possible among those adherents of Jehovah who -had hoped greater things from the overthrow of Amon than the slow and -small reforms of the first fifteen years of Josiah’s reign. Nor is a -date before 621 made at all difficult by the genealogy of Zephaniah -in the title. If, as is probable,[88] the Hezekiah given as his -great-great-grandfather be Hezekiah the king, and if he died about 695, -and Manasseh, his successor, who was then twelve, was his eldest son, -then by 630 Zephaniah cannot have been much more than twenty years of -age, and not more than twenty-five by the time the Scythian invasion -had passed away.[89] It is therefore by no means impossible to suppose -that he prophesied before 625; and besides, the data of the genealogy -in the title are too precarious to make them valid, as against an -inference from the contents of the chapter itself. - -The date, therefore, of the first chapter of Zephaniah may be given as -about 625 B.C., and probably rather before than after that year, as the -tide of Scythian invasion has apparently not yet ebbed. - -The other two chapters have within recent years been almost wholly -denied to Zephaniah. Kuenen doubted chap. iii. 9-20. Stade makes all -chap. iii. post-exilic, and suspects ii. 1-3, 11. A very thorough -examination of them has led Schwally[90] to assign to exilic or -post-exilic times the whole of the little sections comprising them, -with the possible exception of chap. iii. 1-7, which “may be” -Zephaniah’s. His essay has been subjected to a searching and generally -hostile criticism by a number of leading scholars;[91] and he has -admitted the inconclusiveness of some of his reasons.[92] - -Chap. ii. 1-4 is assigned by Schwally to a date later than Zephaniah’s, -principally because of the term _meekness_ (ver. 3), which is a -favourite one with post-exilic writers. He has been sufficiently -answered;[93] and the close connection of vv. 1-3 with chap. i. has -been clearly proved.[94] Chap. ii. 4-15 is the passage in elegiac -measure but broken, an argument for the theory that insertions have -been made in it. The subject is a series of foreign nations—Philistia -(5-7), Moab and Ammon (8-10), Egypt (11) and Assyria (13-15). The -passage has given rise to many doubts; every one must admit the -difficulty of coming to a conclusion as to its authenticity. On the -one hand, the destruction just predicted is so universal that, as -Professor Davidson says, we should expect Zephaniah to mention other -nations than Judah.[95] The concluding oracle on Niniveh must have -been published before 608, and even Schwally admits that it may be -Zephaniah’s own. But if this be so, then we may infer that the first -of the oracles on Philistia is also Zephaniah’s, for both it and the -oracle on Assyria are in the elegiac measure, a fact which makes it -probable that the whole passage, however broken and intruded upon, was -originally a unity. Nor is there anything in the oracle on Philistia -incompatible with Zephaniah’s date. Philistia lay on the path of the -Scythian invasion; the phrase in ver. 7, _shall turn their captivity_, -is not necessarily exilic. As Cornill, too, points out, the expression -in ver. 13, _He will stretch out His hand to the north_, implies that -the prophecy has already looked in other directions. There remains the -passage between the oracles on Philistia and Assyria. This is not in -the elegiac measure. Its subject is Moab and Ammon, who were not on the -line of the Scythian invasion, and Wellhausen further objects to it, -because the attitude to Israel of the two peoples whom it describes -is that which is attributed to them only just before the Exile and -surprises us in Josiah’s reign. Dr. Davidson meets this objection by -pointing out that, just as in Deuteronomy, so here, Moab and Ammon are -denounced, while Edom, which in Deuteronomy is spoken of with kindness, -is here not denounced at all. A stronger objection to the passage is -that ver. 11 predicts the conversion of the nations, while ver. 12 -makes them the prey of Jehovah’s sword, and in this ver. 12 follows -on naturally to ver. 7. On this ground as well as on the absence of -the elegiac measure the oracle on Moab and Ammon is strongly to be -suspected. - -On the whole, then, the most probable conclusion is that chap. ii. -4-15 was originally an authentic oracle of Zephaniah’s in the elegiac -metre, uttered at the same date as chap. i.—ii. 3, the period of the -Scythian invasion, though from a different standpoint; and that it has -suffered considerable dilapidation (witness especially vv. 6 and 14), -and probably one great intrusion, vv. 8-10. - -There remains the Third Chapter. The authenticity has been denied by -Schwally, who transfers the whole till after the Exile. But the chapter -is not a unity.[96] - -In the first place, it falls into two sections, vv. 1-13 and 14-20. -There is no reason to take away the bulk of the first section from -Zephaniah. As Schwally admits, the argument here is parallel to that -of chap. i.—ii. 3. It could hardly have been applied to Jerusalem -during or after the Exile, but suits her conditions before her fall. -Schwally’s linguistic objections to a pre-exilic date have been -answered by Budde.[97] He holds ver. 6 to be out of place and puts -it after ver. 8, and this may be. But as it stands it appeals to the -impenitent Jews of ver. 5 with the picture of the judgment God has -already completed upon the nations, and contrasts with ver. 7, in which -God says that He trusts Israel will repent. Vv. 9 and 10 are, we shall -see, obviously an intrusion, as Budde maintains and Davidson admits to -be possible.[98] - -We reach more certainty when we come to the second section of the -chapter, vv. 14-20. Since Kuenen it has been recognised by the majority -of critics that we have here a prophecy from the end of the Exile or -after the Return. The temper has changed. Instead of the austere and -sombre outlook of chap. i.—ii. 3 and chap. iii. 1-13, in which the -sinful Israel is to be saved indeed, but only as by fire, we have a -triumphant prophecy of her recovery from all affliction (nothing is -said of her sin) and of her glory among the nations of the world. To -put it otherwise, while the genuine prophecies of Zephaniah almost -grudgingly allow a door of escape to a few righteous and humble -Israelites from a judgment which is to fall alike on Israel and the -Gentiles, chap. iii. 14-20 predicts Israel’s deliverance from her -Gentile oppressors, her return from captivity and the establishment -of her renown over the earth. The language, too, has many resemblances -to that of Second Isaiah.[99] Obviously therefore we have here, added -to the severe prophecies of Zephaniah, such a more hopeful, peaceful -epilogue as we saw was added, during the Exile or immediately after it, -to the despairing prophecies of Amos. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[71] i. 3_b_, 5_b_; ii. 2, 5, 6, 7, 8 last word, 14_b_; iii. 18, 19_a_, -20. - -[72] i. 14_b_; ii. 1, 3; iii. 1, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 15, 17. - -[73] i. 3_b_, 5_b_; ii. 2, 6; iii. 5 (?). - -[74] For details see translation below. - -[75] i. 3, מַכְשֵׁלוֹת, only in Isa. iii. 6; 15, משואה, only in Job -xxx. 3, xxxviii. 27—cf. Psalms lxxiii. 18, lxxiv. 3; ii. 8, גדפים, Isa. -xliii. 28—cf. li. 7; 9, חרול, Prov. xxiv. 31, Job xxx. 7; 15, עליזה, -Isa. xxii. 2, xxiii. 7, xxxii. 13—cf. xiii. 3, xxiv. 8; iii. 1, נגאלה, -see next note but one; 3, זאבי ערב, Hab. i. 8; 11, עליזי גאותך, Isa. -xiii. 3; 18, נוגי, Lam. i. 4, נוגות. - -[76] i. 11, המכתש as the name of a part of Jerusalem, otherwise only -Jer. xv. 19; נטילי כסף; 12, קפא in pt. Qal, and otherwise only Exod. -xv. 8, Zech. xiv. 6, Job x. 10; 14, מַהֵר (adj.), but the pointing -may be wrong—cf. Maher-shalal-hash-baz, Isa. viii. 1, 3; צרח in Qal, -elsewhere only once in Hi. Isa. xlii. 13; 17, לחום in sense of flesh, -cf. Job xx. 23; 18, נבהלה if a noun (?); ii. 1, קשש in Qal and Hithpo, -elsewhere only in Polel; 9, מכרה ,ממשק; 11, רזה, to make lean, -otherwise only in Isa. xvii. 4, to be lean; 14, ארזה (?); iii. 1, -מראה, pt. of יונה ;מרה, pt. Qal, in Jer. xlvi. 16, l. 16, it may -be a noun; 4, אנשי בגדות; 6, נצדו; 9, שכם אחד; 10, עתרי -בת־פוצי (?); 15, פנה in sense to _turn away_; 18, ממך היו (?). - -[77] i. 8, etc., פקד על, followed by person, but not by thing—cf. Jer. -ix. 24, xxiii. 34, etc., Job xxxvi. 23, 2 Chron. xxxvi. 23, Ezek. i. -2; 13, משׁסה, only in Hab. ii. 7, Isa. xlii., Jer. xxx. 16, 2 Kings -xxi. 14; 17, הֵצֵר, Hi. of צרר, only in 1 Kings viii. 37, and Deut., -2 Chron., Jer., Neh.; ii. 3, ענוה; 8, גדופים, Isa. xliii. 28, li. 7 -(fem. pl.); 9, חרול, Prov. xxiv. 31, Job xxx. 7; iii. 1, נגאלה, Ni, pt. -= impure, Isa. lix. 3, Lam. iv. 14; יונה, a pt. in Jer. xlvi. 16, l. -16; 3, זאבי ערב, Hab. i. 8—cf. Jer. v. 6, זאב ערבות; 9, ברור, Isa. -xlix. 2, ברר, Ezek. xx. 38, 1 Chron. vii. 40, ix. 22, xvi. 41, Neh. v. -18, Job xxxiii. 3, Eccles. iii. 18, ix. 1; 11, עליזי גאוה, Isa. xiii. -3; 18, נוּגֵי, Lam. i. 4 has נוּגות. - -[78] So Hitzig, Ewald, Pusey, Kuenen, Robertson Smith (_Encyc. Brit._), -Driver, Wellhausen, Kirkpatrick, Budde, von Orelli, Cornill, Schwally, -Davidson. - -[79] So Delitzsch, Kleinert, and Schulz (_Commentar über den Proph. -Zeph._, 1892, p. 7, quoted by König). - -[80] So König. - -[81] Jer. xxv. - -[82] Jer. vii. 18. - -[83] i. 3. - -[84] Kleinert in his Commentary in Lange’s _Bibelwerk_, and Delitzsch -in his article in Herzog’s _Real-Encyclopädie_², both offer a number -of inconclusive arguments. These are drawn from the position of -Zephaniah after Habakkuk, but, as we have seen, the order of the Twelve -is not always chronological; from the supposition that Zephaniah i. -7, _Silence before the Lord Jehovah_, quotes Habakkuk ii. 20, _Keep -silence before Him, all the earth_, but the phrase common to both is -too general to be decisive, and if borrowed by one or other may just as -well have been Zephaniah’s originally as Habakkuk’s; from the phrase -_remnant of Baal_ (i. 4), as if this were appropriate only after the -Reform of 621, but it was quite as appropriate after the beginnings -of reform six years earlier; from the condemnation of _the sons of -the king_ (i. 8), whom Delitzsch takes as Josiah’s sons, who before -the great Reform were too young to be condemned, while later their -characters did develop badly and judgment fell upon all of them, but -_sons of the king_, even if that be the correct reading (LXX. _house of -the king_), does not necessarily mean the reigning monarch’s children; -and from the assertion that Deuteronomy is quoted in the first chapter -of Zephaniah, and “so quoted as to show that the prophet needs only to -put the people in mind of it as something supposed to be known,” but -the verses cited in support of this (viz. 13, 15, 17: cf. Deut. xxviii. -30 and 29) are too general in their character to prove the assertion. -See translation below. - -[85] König has to deny the authenticity of this in order to make his -case for the reign of Jehoiakim. But nearly all critics take the phrase -as genuine. - -[86] See above, p. 15. For inconclusive reasons Schwally, _Z.A.T.W._, -1890, pp. 215—217, prefers the Egyptians under Psamtik. See in answer -Davidson, p. 98. - -[87] Not much stress can be laid upon the phrase _I will cut off the -remnant of Baal_, ver. 4, for, if the reading be correct, it may only -mean the destruction of Baal-worship, and not the uprooting of what has -been left over. - -[88] See below, p. 47, n. 105. - -[89] If 695 be the date of the accession of Manasseh, being then -twelve, Amariah, Zephaniah’s great-grandfather, cannot have been more -than ten, that is, born in 705. His son Gedaliah was probably not -born before 689, his son Kushi probably not before 672, and his son -Zephaniah probably not before 650. - -[90] _Z.A.T.W._, 1890, Heft 1. - -[91] Bacher, _Z.A.T.W._, 1891, 186; Cornill, _Einleitung_, 1891; Budde, -_Theol. Stud. u. Krit._, 1893, 393 ff.; Davidson, _Nah., Hab. and -Zeph._, 100 ff. - -[92] _Z.A.T.W._, 1891, Heft 2. - -[93] By especially Bacher, Cornill and Budde as above. - -[94] See Budde and Davidson. - -[95] The ideal of chap. i.—ii. 3, of the final security of a poor -and lowly remnant of Israel, “necessarily implies that they shall no -longer be threatened by hostility from without, and this condition -is satisfied by the prophet’s view of the impending judgment on the -ancient enemies of his nation,” _i.e._ those mentioned in ii. 4-15 -(Robertson Smith, _Encyc. Brit._, art. “Zephaniah”). - -[96] See, however, Davidson for some linguistic reasons for taking the -two sections as one. Robertson Smith, also in 1888 (_Encyc. Brit._, -art. “Zephaniah”), assumed (though not without pointing out the -possibility of the addition of other pieces to the genuine prophecies -of Zephaniah) that “a single leading motive runs through the whole” -book, and “the first two chapters would be incomplete without the -third, which moreover is certainly pre-exilic (vv. 1-4) and presents -specific points of contact with what precedes, as well as a general -agreement in style and idea.” - -[97] Schwally (234) thinks that the epithet צדיק (ver. 5) was first -applied to Jehovah by the Second Isaiah (xlv. 21, lxiv. 2, xlii. 21), -and became frequent from his time on. In disproof Budde (3398) quotes -Exod. ix. 27, Jer. xii. 1, Lam. i. 18. Schwally also points to נצדו as -borrowed from Aramaic. - -[98] Budde, p. 395; Davidson, 103. Schwally (230 ff.) seeks to prove -the unity of 9 and 10 with the context, but he has apparently mistaken -the meaning of ver. 8 (231). That surely does not mean that the nations -are gathered in order to punish the godlessness of the Jews, but that -they may themselves be punished. - -[99] See Davidson, 103. - - - - - CHAPTER III - - _THE PROPHET AND THE REFORMERS_ - - ZEPHANIAH i.—ii. 3 - - -Towards the year 625, when King Josiah had passed out of his -minority,[100] and was making his first efforts at religious reform, -prophecy, long slumbering, awoke again in Israel. - -Like the king himself, its first heralds were men in their early -youth. In 627 Jeremiah calls himself but a boy, and Zephaniah can -hardly have been out of his teens.[101] For the sudden outbreak of -these young lives there must have been a large reservoir of patience -and hope gathered in the generation behind them. So Scripture itself -testifies. To Jeremiah it was said: _Before I formed thee in the belly -I knew thee, and before thou camest forth out of the womb I consecrated -thee._[102] In an age when names were bestowed only because of their -significance,[103] both prophets bore that of Jehovah in their own. So -did Jeremiah’s father, who was of the priests of Anathoth. Zephaniah’s -“forbears” are given for four generations, and with one exception -they also are called after Jehovah: _The Word of Jehovah which came -to Ṣephanyah, son of Kushi, son of Gedhalyah, son of Amaryah, son of -Hizḳiyah, in the days of Joshiyahu,[104] Amon’s son, king of Judah._ -Zephaniah’s great-great-grandfather Hezekiah was in all probability the -king.[105] His father’s name Kushi, or _Ethiop_, is curious. If we are -right, that Zephaniah was a young man towards 625, then Kushi must have -been born towards 663, about the time of the conflicts between Assyria -and Egypt, and it is possible that, as Manasseh and the predominant -party in Judah so closely hung upon and imitated Assyria, the adherents -of Jehovah put their hope in Egypt, whereof, it may be, this name -Kushi is a token.[106] The name Zephaniah itself, meaning _Jehovah -hath hidden_, suggests the prophet’s birth in the “killing-time” of -Manasseh. There was at least one other contemporary of the same name—a -priest executed by Nebuchadrezzar.[107] - -Of the adherents of Jehovah, then, and probably of royal descent, -Zephaniah lived in Jerusalem. We descry him against her, almost -as clearly as we descry Isaiah. In the glare and smoke of the -conflagration which his vision sweeps across the world, only her -features stand out definite and particular: the flat roofs with men -and women bowing in the twilight to the host of heaven, the crowds of -priests, the nobles and their foreign fashions; the _Fishgate_, the New -or _Second_ Town, where the rich lived, the _Heights_ to which building -had at last spread, and between them the hollow _Mortar_, with its -markets, Phœnician merchants and money-dealers. In the first few verses -of Zephaniah we see almost as much of Jerusalem as in the whole book -either of Isaiah or Jeremiah. - -For so young a man the vision of Zephaniah may seem strangely dark -and final. Yet not otherwise was Isaiah’s inaugural vision, and as a -rule it is the young and not the old whose indignation is ardent and -unsparing. Zephaniah carries this temper to the extreme. There is no -great hope in his book, hardly any tenderness and never a glimpse of -beauty. A townsman, Zephaniah has no eye for nature; not only is no -fair prospect described by him, he has not even a single metaphor -drawn from nature’s loveliness or peace. He is pitilessly true to his -great keynotes: _I will sweep, sweep from the face of the ground; He -will burn_, burn up everything. No hotter book lies in all the Old -Testament. Neither dew nor grass nor tree nor any blossom lives in it, -but it is everywhere fire, smoke and darkness, drifting chaff, ruins, -nettles, saltpits, and owls and ravens looking from the windows of -desolate palaces. Nor does Zephaniah foretell the restoration of nature -in the end of the days. There is no prospect of a redeemed and fruitful -land, but only of a group of battered and hardly saved characters: a -few meek and righteous are hidden from the fire and creep forth when it -is over. Israel is left _a poor and humble folk_. No prophet is more -true to the doctrine of the remnant, or more resolutely refuses to -modify it. Perhaps he died young. - -The full truth, however, is that Zephaniah, though he found his -material in the events of his own day, tears himself loose from -history altogether. To the earlier prophets the Day of the Lord, the -crisis of the world, is a definite point in history: full of terrible, -divine events, yet “natural” ones—battle, siege, famine, massacre and -captivity. After it history is still to flow on, common days come back -and Israel pursue their way as a nation. But to Zephaniah the Day of -the Lord begins to assume what we call the “supernatural.” The grim -colours are still woven of war and siege, but mixed with vague and -solemn terrors from another sphere, by which history appears to be -swallowed up, and it is only with an effort that the prophet thinks of -a rally of Israel beyond. In short, with Zephaniah the Day of the Lord -tends to become the Last Day. His book is the first tinging of prophecy -with apocalypse: that is the moment which it supplies in the history of -Israel’s religion. And, therefore, it was with a true instinct that the -great Christian singer of the Last Day took from Zephaniah his keynote. -The “Dies Iræ, Dies Illa” of Thomas of Celano is but the Vulgate -translation of Zephaniah’s _A day of wrath is that day_.[108] - -Nevertheless, though the first of apocalyptic writers, Zephaniah does -not allow himself the license of apocalypse. As he refuses to imagine -great glory for the righteous, so he does not dwell on the terrors -of the wicked. He is sober and restrained, a matter-of-fact man, yet -with power of imagination, who, amidst the vague horrors he summons, -delights in giving a sharp realistic impression. The Day of the Lord, -he says, what is it? _A strong man—there!—crying bitterly._[109] - -It is to the fierce ardour, and to the elemental interests of the -book, that we owe the absence of two features of prophecy which are -so constant in the prophets of the eighth century. Firstly, Zephaniah -betrays no interest in the practical reforms which (if we are right -about the date) the young king, his contemporary, had already -started.[110] There was a party of reform, the party had a programme, -the programme was drawn from the main principles of prophecy and was -designed to put these into practice. And Zephaniah was a prophet—and -ignored them. This forms the dramatic interest of his book. Here was a -man of the same faith which kings, priests and statesmen were striving -to realise in public life, in the assured hope—as is plain from the -temper of Deuteronomy—that the nation as a whole would be reformed -and become a very great nation, righteous and victorious. All this -he ignored, and gave his own vision of the future: Israel is a brand -plucked from the burning; a very few meek and righteous are saved from -the conflagration of a whole world. Why? Because for Zephaniah the -elements were loose, and when the elements were loose what was the -use of talking about reforms? The Scythians were sweeping down upon -Palestine, with enough of God’s wrath in them to destroy a people still -so full of idolatry as Israel was; and if not the Scythians, then some -other power in that dark, rumbling North which had ever been so full -of doom. Let Josiah try to reform Israel, but it was neither Josiah’s -nor Israel’s day that was falling. It was the Day of the Lord, and when -He came it was neither to reform nor to build up Israel, but to make -visitation and to punish in His wrath for the unbelief and wickedness -of which the nation was still full. - -An analogy to this dramatic opposition between prophet and reformer may -be found in our own century. At its crisis, in 1848, there were many -righteous men rich in hope and energy. The political institutions of -Europe were being rebuilt. In our own land there were great measures -for the relief of labouring children and women, the organisation of -labour and the just distribution of wealth. But Carlyle that year held -apart from them all, and, though a personal friend of many of the -reformers, counted their work hopeless: society was too corrupt, the -rudest forces were loose, “Niagara” was near. Carlyle was proved wrong -and the reformers right, but in the analogous situation of Israel the -reformers were wrong and the prophet right. Josiah’s hope and daring -were overthrown at Megiddo, and, though the Scythians passed away, -Zephaniah’s conviction of the sin and doom of Israel was fulfilled, not -forty years later, in the fall of Jerusalem and the great Exile. - -Again, to the same elemental interests, as we may call them, is due the -absence from Zephaniah’s pages of all the social and individual studies -which form the charm of other prophets. With one exception, there is -no analysis of character, no portrait, no satire. But the exception is -worth dwelling upon: it describes the temper equally abhorred by both -prophet and reformer—that of the indifferent and stagnant man. Here we -have a subtle and memorable picture of character, which is not without -its warnings for our own time. - -Zephaniah heard God say: _And it shall be at that time that I will -search out Jerusalem with lights, and I will make visitation upon the -men who are become stagnant upon their lees, who say in their hearts, -Jehovah doeth no good and doeth no evil._[111] The metaphor is clear. -New wine was left upon its lees only long enough to fix its colour -and body.[112] If not then drawn off it grew thick and syrupy—sweeter -indeed than the strained wine, and to the taste of some more pleasant, -but feeble and ready to decay. “To settle upon one’s lees” became a -proverb for sloth, indifference and the muddy mind. _Moab hath been at -ease from his youth and hath settled upon his lees, and hath not been -emptied from vessel to vessel; therefore his taste stands in him and -his scent is not changed._[113] The characters stigmatised by Zephaniah -are also obvious. They were a precipitate from the ferment of fifteen -years back. Through the cruel days of Manasseh and Amon hope had been -stirred and strained, emptied from vessel to vessel, and so had sprung -sparkling and keen into the new days of Josiah. But no miracle came, -only ten years of waiting for the king’s majority and five more of -small, tentative reforms. Nothing divine happened. There were but -the ambiguous successes of a small party who had secured the king -for their principles. The court was still full of foreign fashions, -and idolatry was rank upon the housetops. Of course disappointment -ensued—disappointment and listlessness. The new security of life became -a temptation; persecution ceased, and religious men lived again at -ease. So numbers of eager and sparkling souls, who had been in the -front of the movement, fell away into a selfish and idle obscurity. The -prophet hears God say, _I must search Jerusalem with lights_ in order -to find them. They had “fallen from the van and the freemen”; they had -“sunk to the rear and the slaves,” where they wallowed in the excuse -that _Jehovah_ Himself _would do nothing—neither good_, therefore it -is useless to attempt reform like Josiah and his party, _nor evil_, -therefore Zephaniah’s prophecy of destruction is also vain. Exactly -the same temper was encountered by Mazzini in the second stage of -his career. Many of those, who with him had eagerly dreamt of a free -Italy, fell away when the first revolt failed—fell away not merely into -weariness and fear, but, as he emphasises, into the very two tempers -which are described by Zephaniah, scepticism and self-indulgence. - -All this starts questions for ourselves. Here is evidently the same -public temper, which at all periods provokes alike the despair of the -reformer and the indignation of the prophet: the criminal apathy of the -well-to-do classes sunk in ease and religious indifference. We have -to-day the same mass of obscure, nameless persons, who oppose their -almost unconquerable inertia to every movement of reform, and are the -drag upon all vital and progressive religion. The great causes of God -and Humanity are not defeated by the hot assaults of the Devil, but -by the slow, crushing, glacier-like mass of thousands and thousands -of indifferent nobodies. God’s causes are never destroyed by being -blown up, but by being sat upon. It is not the violent and anarchical -whom we have to fear in the war for human progress, but the slow, -the staid, the respectable. And the danger of these does not lie in -their stupidity. Notwithstanding all their religious profession, it -lies in their real scepticism. Respectability may be the precipitate -of unbelief. Nay, it is that, however religious its mask, wherever -it is mere comfort, decorousness and conventionality; where, though -it would abhor articulately confessing that God does nothing, it -virtually means so—_says_ so (as Zephaniah puts it) _in its heart_, by -refusing to share manifest opportunities of serving Him, and covers -its sloth and its fear by sneering that God is not with the great -crusades for freedom and purity to which it is summoned. In these ways, -Respectability is the precipitate which unbelief naturally forms in -the selfish ease and stillness of so much of our middle-class life. -And that is what makes mere respectability so dangerous. Like the -unshaken, unstrained wine to which the prophet compares its obscure -and muddy comfort, it tends to decay. To some extent our respectable -classes are just the dregs and lees of our national life; like all -dregs, they are subject to corruption. A great sermon could be -preached on the putrescence of respectability—how the ignoble comfort -of our respectable classes and their indifference to holy causes -lead to sensuality, and poison the very institutions of the Home and -the Family, on which they pride themselves. A large amount of the -licentiousness of the present day is not that of outlaw and disordered -lives, but is bred from the settled ease and indifference of many of -our middle-class families. - -It is perhaps the chief part of the sin of the obscure units, which -form these great masses of indifference, that they think they escape -notice and cover their individual responsibility. At all times many -have sought obscurity, not because they are humble, but because they -are slothful, cowardly or indifferent. Obviously it is this temper -which is met by the words, _I will search out Jerusalem with lights_. -None of us shall escape because we have said, “I will go with the -crowd,” or “I am a common man and have no right to thrust myself -forward.” We shall be followed and judged, each of us for his and her -personal attitude to the great movements of our time. These things are -not too high for us: they are _our_ duty; and we cannot escape our duty -by slinking into the shadow. - -For all this wickedness and indifference Zephaniah sees prepared the -Day of the Lord—near, hastening and very terrible. It sweeps at first -in vague desolation and ruin of all things, but then takes the outlines -of a solemn slaughter-feast for which Jehovah has consecrated the -guests, the dim unnamed armies from the north. Judah shall be invaded, -and they that are at ease, who say _Jehovah does nothing_, shall be -unsettled and routed. One vivid trait comes in like a screech upon the -hearts of a people unaccustomed for years to war. _Hark, Jehovah’s -Day!_ cries the prophet. _A strong man—there!—crying bitterly._ From -this flash upon the concrete, he returns to a great vague terror, -in which earthly armies merge in heavenly; battle, siege, storm and -darkness are mingled, and destruction is spread abroad upon the whole -earth. The first shades of Apocalypse are upon us. - -We may now take the full text of this strong and significant prophecy. -We have already given the title. Textual emendations and other points -are explained in footnotes. - - * * * * * - -_I will sweep, sweep away everything from the face of the ground—oracle -of Jehovah—sweep man and beast, sweep the fowl of the heaven and the -fish of the sea, and I will bring to ruin[114] the wicked and cut off -the men of wickedness from the ground—oracle of Jehovah. And I will -stretch forth My hand upon Judah, and upon all the inhabitants of -Jerusalem; and I will cut off from this place the remnant[115] of the -Baal,[116] the names[117] of the priestlings with the priests, and -them who upon the housetops bow themselves to the host of heaven, and -them who...[118] swear by their Melech,[119] and them who have turned -from following Jehovah, and who do not seek Jehovah nor have inquired -of Him._ - -_Silence for the Lord Jehovah! For near is Jehovah’s Day. Jehovah has -prepared a[120] slaughter, He has consecrated His guests._ - -_And it shall be in Jehovah’s day of slaughter that I will make -visitation upon the princes and the house[121] of the king, and upon -all who array themselves in foreign raiment; and I will make visitation -upon all who leap over the threshold[122] on that day, who fill their -lord’s house full of violence and fraud._ - -_And on that day—oracle of Jehovah—there shall be a noise of crying -from the Fishgate, and wailing from the Mishneh,[123] and great havoc -on the Heights. Howl,_ _O dwellers in the Mortar,[124] for undone are -all the merchant folk,[125] cut off are all the money-dealers.[126]_ - -_And in that time it shall be, that I will search Jerusalem with -lanterns, and make visitation upon the men who are become stagnant -upon their lees, who in their hearts say, Jehovah doeth no good and -doeth no evil.[127] Their substance shall be for spoil, and their -houses for wasting...._[128] - -_Near is the great Day of Jehovah, near and very speedy.[129] Hark, the -Day of Jehovah! A strong man—there!—crying bitterly!_ - -_A day of wrath is that Day![130] Day of siege and blockade, day of -stress and distress,[131] day of darkness and murk, day of cloud and -heavy mist, day of the war-horn and battle-roar, up against the fenced -cities and against the highest turrets! And I will beleaguer men, and -they shall walk like the blind, for they have sinned against Jehovah; -and poured out shall their blood be like dust, and the flesh of them -like dung. Even their silver, even their gold shall not avail to save -them in the day of Jehovah’s wrath,[132] and in the fire of His zeal -shall all the earth be devoured, for destruction, yea,[133] sudden -collapse shall He make of all the inhabitants of the earth._ - -Upon this vision of absolute doom there follows[134] a qualification -for the few meek and righteous. They may be hidden on the day of the -Lord’s anger; but even for them escape is only a possibility. Note the -absence of all mention of the Divine mercy as the cause of deliverance. -Zephaniah has no gospel of that kind. The conditions of escape are -sternly ethical—meekness, the doing of justice and righteousness. So -austere is our prophet. - -...,[135] _O people unabashed![136] before that ye become as the -drifting chaff, before the anger of Jehovah come upon you,[137] before -there come upon you the day of Jehovah’s wrath;[138] seek Jehovah, all -ye meek of the land who do His ordinance,[139] seek righteousness, seek -meekness, peradventure ye may hide yourselves in the day of Jehovah’s -wrath._ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[100] Josiah, born _c._ 648, succeeded _c._ 639, was about eighteen in -630, and then appears to have begun his reforms. - -[101] See above, pp. 40 f., n. 85. - -[102] Jer. i. 5. - -[103] See G. B. Gray, _Hebrew Proper Names_. - -[104] Josiah. - -[105] It is not usual in the O.T. to carry a man’s genealogy beyond his -grandfather, except for some special purpose, or in order to include -some ancestor of note. Also the name Hezekiah is very rare apart from -the king. The number of names compounded with Jah or Jehovah is another -proof that the line is a royal one. The omission of the phrase _king -of Judah_ after Hezekiah’s name proves nothing; it may have been of -purpose because the phrase has to occur immediately again. - -[106] It was not till 652 that a league was made between the Palestine -princes and Psamtik I. against Assyria. This certainly would have been -the most natural year for a child to be named Kushi. But that would set -the birth of Zephaniah as late as 632, and his prophecy towards the end -of Josiah’s reign, which we have seen to be improbable on other grounds. - -[107] Jer. xxi. 1, xxix. 25, 29, xxxvii. 3, lii. 24 ff.; 2 Kings xxv. -18. The analogous Phœnician name צפנבעל, Saphan-ba’al = “Baal protects -or hides,” is found in No. 207 of the Phœnician inscriptions in the -_Corpus Inscr. Semiticarum_. - -[108] Chap. i. 15. With the above paragraph cf. Robertson Smith, -_Encyc. Brit._, art. “Zephaniah.” - -[109] Chap. i. 14_b_. - -[110] In fact this forms one difficulty about the conclusion which we -have reached as to the date. We saw that one reason against putting -the Book of Zephaniah after the great Reforms of 621 was that it -betrayed no sign of their effects. But it might justly be answered -that, if Zephaniah prophesied before 621, his book ought to betray some -sign of the approach of reform. Still the explanation given above is -satisfactory. - -[111] Chap. i. 12. - -[112] So _wine upon the lees_ is a generous wine according to -Isa. xxv. 6. - -[113] Jer. xlviii. 11. - -[114] The text reads _the ruins_ (מַכְשֵׁלוֹת, unless we prefer with -Wellhausen מִכְשֹׁלים, _the stumbling-blocks_, i.e. _idols_) _with the -wicked, and I will cut off man_ (LXX. _the lawless_) _from off the face -of the ground._ Some think the clause partly too redundant, partly too -specific, to be original. But suppose we read וְהִכְשַׁלְתִּי (cf. Mal. ii. 8, -Lam. i. 14 and _passim_: this is more probable than Schwally’s כִּשַׁלְתִּי, -_op. cit._, p. 169), and for אדם the reading which probably the LXX. -had before them, אדם רשע (Job xx. 29, xxvii. 13, Prov. xi. 7: cf. אדם -בליעל Prov. vi. 12) or אדם עַוָּל (cf. iii. 5), we get the rendering -adopted in the translation above. Some think the whole passage an -intrusion, yet it is surely probable that the earnest moral spirit of -Zephaniah would aim at the wicked from the very outset of his prophecy. - -[115] LXX. _names_, held by some to be the original reading (Schwally, -etc.). In that case the phrase might have some allusion to the -well-known promise in Deut., _the place where I shall set My name_. -This is more natural than a reference to Hosea ii. 19, which is quoted -by some. - -[116] Some Greek codd. take Baal as fem., others as plur.. - -[117] So LXX. - -[118] Heb. reads _and them who bow themselves, who swear, by Jehovah_. -So LXX. B with _and_ before _who swear_. But LXX. A omits _and_. LXX. Q -omits _them who bow themselves_. Wellhausen keeps the clause with the -exception of _who swear_, and so reads (to the end of verse) _them who -bow themselves to Jehovah and swear by Milcom_. - -[119] Or Molech = king. LXX. _by their king_. Other Greek versions: -Moloch and Melchom. Vulg. Melchom. - -[120] LXX. _His._ - -[121] So LXX. Heb. _sons_. - -[122] Is this some superstitious rite of the idol-worshippers as -described in the case of Dagon, 1 Sam. v. 5? Or is it a phrase for -breaking into a house, and so parallel to the second clause of the -verse? Most interpreters prefer the latter. The idolatrous rites have -been left behind. Schwally suggests the original order may have been: -_princes and sons of the king, who fill their lord’s house full of -violence and deceit; and I will visit upon every one that leapeth over -the threshold on that day, and upon all that wear foreign raiment_. - -[123] The _Second_ or New Town: cf. 2 Kings xxii. 14, 2 Chron. xxxiv. -22, which state that the prophetess Huldah lived there. Cf. Neh. iii. -9, 12, xi. 9. - -[124] The hollow probably between the western and eastern hills, or the -upper part of the Tyropœan (Orelli). - -[125] Heb. _people of Canaan_. - -[126] נטיל, found only here, from נטל, to lift up, and in Isa. xl. -15 to weigh. Still it may have a wider meaning, _all they that carry -money_ (Davidson). - -[127] See above, p. 52. - -[128] The Hebrew text and versions here add: _And they shall build -houses and not inhabit_ (Greek _in them_), _and plant vineyards and not -drink the wine thereof._ But the phrase is a common one (Deut. xxviii. -30; Amos v. 11: cf. Micah vi. 15), and while likely to have been -inserted by a later hand, is here superfluous, and mars the firmness -and edge of Zephaniah’s threat. - -[129] For מהר Wellhausen reads ממהר, pt. Pi; but מהר may be a verbal -adj.; compare the phrase מהר שלל, Isa. viii. 1. - -[130] Dies Iræ, Dies Illa! - -[131] Heb. sho’ah u-mesho’ah. Lit. ruin (or devastation) and -destruction. - -[132] Some take this first clause of ver. 18 as a gloss. See Schwally -_in loco_. - -[133] Read אף for אך. So LXX., Syr., Wellhausen, Schwally. - -[134] In vv. 1-3 of chap. ii., wrongly separated from chap. i.: see -Davidson. - -[135] Heb. הִתְקוֹשְׁשׁוּ וָקשּׁוּ. A.V. _Gather yourselves together, yea, -gather together_ (קוֹשֵׁשׁ is _to gather straw or sticks_—cf. Arab. -_ḳash_, to sweep up—and Nithp. of the Aram. is to assemble). Orelli: -_Crowd and crouch down_. Ewald compares Aram. _ḳash_, late Heb. קְשַׁשׁ, -_to grow old_, which he believes originally meant _to be -withered, grey_. Budde suggests בשו התבששו, but, as Davidson remarks, -it is not easy to see how this, if once extant, was altered to the -present reading. - -[136] נִכְסָף is usually thought to have as its root meaning _to be -pale_ or _colourless_, _i.e._ either white or black (_Journal of -Phil._, 14, 125), whence כֶּסֶף, _silver_ or _the pale metal_: hence in -the Qal to long for, Job xiv. 15, Ps. xvii. 12; so Ni, Gen. xxxi. 30, -Ps. lxxxiv. 3; and here _to be ashamed_. But the derivation of the name -for silver is quite imaginary, and the colour of shame is red rather -than white: cf. the mod. Arab. saying, “They are a people that cannot -blush; they have no blood in their faces,” _i.e._ shameless. Indeed -Schwally says (_in loco_), “Die Bedeutung fahl, blass ist -unerweislich.” Hence (in spite of the meanings of the Aram. כסף both to -lose colour and to be ashamed) a derivation for the Hebrew is more -probably to be found in the root _kasaf_, to cut off. The Arab. کﺴف, -which in the classic tongue means to cut a thread or eclipse the sun, -is in colloquial Arabic to give a rebuff, refuse a favour, disappoint, -shame. In the forms _inkasaf_ and _itkasaf_ it means to receive a -rebuff, be disappointed, then shy or timid, and _kasûf_ means shame, -shyness (as well as eclipse of the sun). See Spiro’s _Arabic-English -Vocabulary_. In Ps. lxxxiv. נכסף is evidently used of unsatisfied -longing (but see Cheyne), which is also the proper meaning of the -parallel כלה (cf. other passages where כלה is used of still unfulfilled -or rebuffed hopes: Job xix. 27, Ps. lxix. 4, cxix. 81, cxliii. 7). So -in Ps. xvii. 4 כסף is used of a lion who is longing for, _i.e._ still -disappointed in, his prey, and so in Job xiv. 15. - -[137] LXX. πρὸ γένεσθαι ὑμᾶς ὡς ἄνθος (here in error reading נץ for מץ) -παραπορευόμενον, πρὸ τοῦ ἐπελθεῖν ἐφ’ ὑμᾶς ὀργὴν κυρίου (last clause -omitted by א^{c.b}). According to this the Hebrew text, which is -obviously disarranged, may be restored to בְּטֶרֶם לאֹ־תִהיוּ כַמֹּץ עֹבֵר בְּטֶרֶם -לאֹ־יָבֹא עֲלֵיכֶם חֲרוֹן יהו. - -[138] This clause Wellhausen deletes. Cf. Hexaplar Syriac translation. - -[139] LXX. take this also as imperative, _do judgment_, and so -co-ordinate to the other clauses. - - - - - CHAPTER IV - - _NINIVE DELENDA_ - - ZEPHANIAH ii. 4-15 - - -There now come a series of oracles on foreign nations, connected with -the previous prophecy by the conjunction _for_, and detailing the -worldwide judgment which it had proclaimed. But though dated from the -same period as that prophecy, _circa_ 626, these oracles are best -treated by themselves.[140] - -These oracles originally formed one passage in the well-known Qinah -or elegiac measure; but this has suffered sadly both by dilapidation -and rebuilding. How mangled the text is may be seen especially from -vv. 6 and 14, where the Greek gives us some help in restoring it. The -verses (8-11) upon Moab and Ammon cannot be reduced to the metre which -both precedes and follows them. Probably, therefore, they are a later -addition: nor did Moab and Ammon lie upon the way of the Scythians, who -are presumably the invaders pictured by the prophet.[141] - -The poem begins with Philistia and the sea-coast, the very path of the -Scythian raid.[142] Evidently the latter is imminent, the Philistine -cities are shortly to be taken and the whole land reduced to grass. -Across the emptied strip the long hope of Israel springs sea-ward; -but—mark!—not yet with a vision of the isles beyond. The prophet is -satisfied with reaching the edge of the Promised Land: _by the sea -shall they feed_[143] their flocks. - - _For Gaza forsaken shall be, - Ashḳ’lôn a desert. - Ashdod—by noon shall they rout her, - And Eḳron be torn up!_[144] - - _Ah! woe, dwellers of the sea-shore, - Folk of Kerēthim. - The word of Jehovah against thee, Kĕna‘an,[145] - Land of the Philistines!_ - - _And I destroy thee to the last inhabitant,[146] - And Kereth shall become shepherds’ cots,[147] - And folds for flocks. - And the coast[148] for the remnant of Judah’s house; - By the sea[149] shall they feed. - In Ashḳelon’s houses at even shall they couch; - . . . . . .[150] - For Jehovah their God shall visit them, - And turn their captivity.[151]_ - -There comes now an oracle upon Moab and Ammon (vv. 8-11). As already -said, it is not in the elegiac measure which precedes and follows it, -while other features cast a doubt upon its authenticity. Like other -oracles on the same peoples, this denounces the loud-mouthed arrogance -of the sons of Moab and Ammon. - -_I have heard[152] the reviling of Moab and the insults of the sons -of Ammon, who have reviled My people and vaunted themselves upon -their[153] border. Wherefore as I live, saith Jehovah of Hosts, God of -Israel, Moab shall become as Sodom, and Ammon’s sons as Gomorrah—the -possession[154] of nettles, and saltpits,[155] and a desolation for -ever; the remnant of My people shall spoil them, and the rest of My -nation possess them. This to them for their arrogance, because they -reviled, and vaunted themselves against, the people of[156] Jehovah of -Hosts. Jehovah showeth Himself terrible[157] against them, for He hath -made lean[158] all gods of earth, that all the coasts of the nations -may worship Him, every man from his own place.[159]_ - - * * * * * - -The next oracle is a very short one (ver. 12) upon Egypt, which after -its long subjection to Ethiopic dynasties is called, not Miṣraim, but -Kush, or Ethiopia. The verse follows on naturally to ver. 7, but is not -reducible to the elegiac measure. - -_Also ye, O Kushites, are the slain of My sword.[160]_ - -The elegiac measure is now renewed[161] in an oracle against Assyria, -the climax and front of heathendom (vv. 13-15). It must have been -written before 608: there is no reason to doubt that it is Zephaniah’s. - - _And may He stretch out His hand against the North, - And destroy Asshur; - And may He turn Niniveh to desolation, - Dry as the desert. - And herds shall couch in her midst. - Every beast of....[162] - Yea, pelican and bittern[163] shall roost on the capitals; - The owl shall hoot in the window, - The raven on the doorstep._ - - . . . . .[164] - - _Such is the City, the Jubilant, - She that sitteth at ease, - She that saith in her heart, I am - And there is none else! - How hath she become desolation! - A lair of beasts. - Every one passing by her hisses, - Shakes his hand._ - -The essence of these oracles is their clear confidence in the -fall of Niniveh. From 652, when Egypt revolted from Assyria, and, -Assurbanipal notwithstanding, began to push northward, men must -have felt, throughout all Western Asia, that the great empire upon -the Tigris was beginning to totter. This feeling was strengthened -by the Scythian invasion, and after 625 it became a moral certainty -that Niniveh would fall[165]—which happened in 607—6. These are the -feelings, 625 to 608, which Zephaniah’s oracles reflect. We can hardly -over-estimate what they meant. Not a man was then alive who had ever -known anything else than the greatness and the glory of Assyria. It was -two hundred and thirty years since Israel first felt the weight of her -arms.[166] It was more than a hundred since her hosts had swept through -Palestine,[167] and for at least fifty her supremacy had been accepted -by Judah. Now the colossus began to totter. As she had menaced, so she -was menaced. The ruins with which for nigh three centuries she had -strewn Western Asia—to these were to be reduced her own impregnable and -ancient glory. It was the close of an epoch. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[140] See above, pp. 41 ff. - -[141] Some, however, think the prophet is speaking in prospect of the -Chaldean invasion of a few years later. This is not so likely, because -he pictures the overthrow of Niniveh as subsequent to the invasion -of Philistia, while the Chaldeans accomplished the latter only after -Niniveh had fallen. - -[142] According to Herodotus. - -[143] Ver. 7, LXX. - -[144] The measure, as said above, is elegiac: alternate lines long -with a rising, and short with a falling, cadence. There is a play -upon the names, at least on the first and last—“Gazzah” or “‘Azzah -‘Azubah”—which in English we might reproduce by the use of Spenser’s -word for “dreary”: _For Gaza ghastful shall be._ “‘Eḳron te’aḳer.” -LXX. Ἀκκαρων ἐκριζωθήσεταὶ (B), ἐκριφήσεται (A). In the second line -we have a slighter assonance, ‘Ashkĕlōn lishĕmamah. In the third the -verb is יְגָרְשׁוּהָ; Bacher (_Z.A.T.W._, 1891, 185 ff.) points out -that גֵּרַשׁ is not used of cities, but of their populations or of -individual men, and suggests (from Abulwalid) יירשוה, _shall possess -her_, as “a plausible emendation.” Schwally (_ibid._, 260) prefers to -alter to יְשָׁרְשׁוּהָ, with the remark that this is not only a good -parallel to תעקר, but suits the LXX. ἐκριφήσεται.—On the expression _by -noon_ see Davidson, _N. H. and Z._, Appendix, Note 2, where he quotes a -parallel expression, in the Senjerli inscription, of Asarhaddon: that -he took Memphis by midday or in half a day (Schrader). This suits the -use of the phrase in Jer. xv. 8, where it is parallel to _suddenly_. - -[145] Canaan omitted by Wellhausen, who reads עליך for עליכם. But as -the metre requires a larger number of syllables in the first line -of each couplet than in the second, Kĕna’an should probably remain. -The difficulty is the use of Canaan as synonymous with _Land of the -Philistines_. Nowhere else in the Old Testament is it expressly applied -to the coast south of Carmel, though it is so used in the Egyptian -inscriptions, and even in the Old Testament in a sense which covers -this as well as other lowlying parts of Palestine. - -[146] An odd long line, either the remains of two, or perhaps we should -take the two previous lines as one, omitting Canaan. - -[147] So LXX.: Hebrew text _and the sea-coast shall become dwellings, -cots_ (כְּרֹת) _of shepherds_. But the pointing and meaning of כרת are -both conjectural, and the _sea-coast_ has probably fallen by mistake -into this verse from the next. On Kereth and Kerethim as names for -Philistia and the Philistines see _Hist. Geog._, p. 171. - -[148] LXX. adds _of the sea_. So Wellhausen, but unnecessarily and -improbably for phonetic reasons, as sea has to be read in the next line. - -[149] So Wellhausen, reading for עַל־הַיָּם עֲליהֶם. - -[150] Some words must have fallen out, for _first_ a short line is -required here by the metre, and _second_ the LXX. have some additional -words, which, however, give us no help to what the lost line was: ἀπὸ -προσώπου υἱῶν Ἰούδα. - -[151] As stated above, there is no conclusive reason against the -pre-exilic date of this expression. - -[152] Cf. Isa. xvi. 6. - -[153] LXX. _My._ - -[154] Doubtful word, not occurring elsewhere. - -[155] Heb. singular. - -[156] LXX. omits _the people of_. - -[157] LXX. _maketh Himself manifest_, נראה for נורא. - -[158] ἅπαξ λεγόμενον. The passive of the verb means _to grow lean_ -(Isa. xvii. 4). - -[159] מקום has probably here the sense which it has in a few other -passages of the Old Testament, and in Arabic, of _sacred place_. - -Many will share Schwally’s doubts (p. 192) about the authenticity of -ver. 11; nor, as Wellhausen points out, does its prediction of the -conversion of the heathen agree with ver. 12, which devotes them to -destruction. Ver. 12 follows naturally on to ver. 7. - -[160] Wellhausen reads _His sword_, to agree with the next verse. -Perhaps חרבי is an abbreviation for חרב יהוה. - -[161] See Budde, _Z.A.T.W._, 1882, 25. - -[162] Heb. reads _a nation_, and Wellhausen translates _ein buntes -Gemisch von Volk_. LXX. _beasts of the earth_. - -[163] קאת, a water-bird according to Deut. xiv. 17, Lev. xi. 18, mostly -taken as _pelican_; so R.V. A.V. _cormorant_. קִפֹּד has usually been -taken from קפד, to draw together, therefore _hedgehog_ or _porcupine_. -But the other animals mentioned here are birds, and it is birds -which would naturally roost on capitals. Therefore _bittern_ is the -better rendering (Hitzig, Cheyne). The name is onomatopœic. Cf. Eng. -butter-dump. LXX. translates _chameleons and hedgehogs_. - -[164] Heb.: _a voice shall sing in the window, desolation on the -threshold, for He shall uncover the cedar-work_. LXX. καὶ θηρία φωνήσει -ἐν τοῖς διορύγμασιν αὐτῆς, κόρακες ἐν τοῖς πυλῶσιν αὐτῆς, διότι κέδρος -τὸ ἀνάστημα αὐτῆς: Wild beasts shall sound in her excavations, ravens -in her porches, because (the) cedar is her height. For קול, _voice_, -Wellhausen reads כוס, _owl_, and with the LXX. ערב, _raven_, for חרב, -_desolation_. The last two words are left untranslated above. אַרְזָה -occurs only here and is usually taken to mean cedar-work; but it -might be pointed _her_ cedar. ערה, _he_, or _one, has stripped the -cedar-work_. - -[165] See above, pp. 17, 18. - -[166] At the battle of Karkar, 854. - -[167] Under Tiglath-Pileser in 734. - - - - - CHAPTER V - - _SO AS BY FIRE_ - - Zephaniah iii. - - -The third chapter of the Book of Zephaniah consists[168] of two -sections, of which only the first, vv. 1-13, is a genuine work of the -prophet; while the second, vv. 14-20, is a later epilogue such as we -found added to the genuine prophecies of Amos. It is written in the -large hope and brilliant temper of the Second Isaiah, saying no word of -Judah’s sin or judgment, but predicting her triumphant deliverance out -of all her afflictions. - -In a second address to his City (vv. 1-13) Zephaniah strikes the same -notes as he did in his first. He spares the king, but denounces the -ruling and teaching classes. Jerusalem’s princes are lions, her judges -wolves, her prophets braggarts, her priests pervert the law, her wicked -have no shame. He repeats the proclamation of a universal doom. But -the time is perhaps later. Judah has disregarded the many threats. She -will not accept the Lord’s discipline; and while in chap. i.—ii. 3 -Zephaniah had said that the meek and righteous might escape the doom, -he now emphatically affirms that all proud and impenitent men shall be -removed from Jerusalem, and a humble people be left to her, righteous -and secure. There is the same moral earnestness as before, the same -absence of all other elements of prophecy than the ethical. Before we -ask the reason and emphasise the beauty of this austere gospel, let us -see the exact words of the address. There are the usual marks of poetic -diction in it—elliptic phrases, the frequent absence of the definite -article, archaic forms and an order of the syntax different from that -which obtains in prose. But the measure is difficult to determine, and -must be printed as prose. The echo of the elegiac rhythm in the opening -is more apparent than real: it is not sustained beyond the first verse. -Verses 9 and 10 are relegated to a footnote, as very probably an -intrusion, and disturbance of the argument. - -_Woe, rebel and unclean, city of oppression![169] She listens to no -voice, she accepts no discipline, in Jehovah she trusts not, nor has -drawn near to her God._ - - _Her princes in her midst are roaring lions; her judges evening -wolves,[170] they ...[171] not till morning; her prophets are braggarts -and traitors; her priests have profaned what is holy and done violence -to the Law.[172] Jehovah is righteous in the midst of her, He does no -wrong. Morning by morning He brings His judgment to light: He does not -let Himself fail[173]—but the wicked man knows no shame. I have cut -off nations, their turrets are ruined; I have laid waste their broad -streets, till no one passes upon them; destroyed are their cities, -without a man, without a dweller.[174] I said, Surely she will fear -Me, she will accept punishment,[175] and all that I have visited upon -her[176] shall never vanish from her eyes.[177] But only the more -zealously have they corrupted all their doings.[178]_ - -_Wherefore wait ye for Me—oracle of Jehovah—_wait_ for the day of My -rising to testify, for ’tis My fixed purpose[179] to sweep nations -together, to collect kingdoms, to pour upon them ...[180] all the heat -of My wrath—yea, with the fire of My jealousy shall the whole earth -be consumed.[181]_ - -_In that day thou shalt not be ashamed[182] of all thy deeds, by which -thou hast rebelled against Me: for then will I turn out of the midst of -thee all who exult with that arrogance of thine,[183] and thou wilt not -again vaunt thyself upon the Mount of My Holiness. But I will leave in -thy midst a people humble and poor, and they shall trust in the name of -Jehovah. The Remnant of Israel shall do no evil, and shall not speak -falsehood, and no fraud shall be found in their mouth, but they shall -pasture and they shall couch, with none to make them afraid._ - -Such is the simple and austere gospel of Zephaniah. It is not to be -overlooked amid the lavish and gorgeous promises which other prophets -have poured around it, and by ourselves, too, it is needed in our often -unscrupulous enjoyment of the riches of grace that are in Christ Jesus. -A thorough purgation, the removal of the wicked, the sparing of the -honest and the meek; insistence only upon the rudiments of morality and -religion; faith in its simplest form of trust in a righteous God, and -character in its basal elements of meekness and truth,—these and these -alone survive the judgment. Why does Zephaniah never talk of the Love -of God, of the Divine Patience, of the Grace that has spared and will -spare wicked hearts if only it can touch them to penitence? Why has he -no call to repent, no appeal to the wicked to turn from the evil of -their ways? We have already seen part of the answer. Zephaniah stands -too near to judgment and the last things. Character is fixed, the time -for pleading is past; there remains only the separation of bad men -from good. It is the same standpoint (at least ethically) as that of -Christ’s visions of the Judgment. Perhaps also an austere gospel was -required by the fashionable temper of the day. The generation was loud -and arrogant; it gilded the future to excess, and knew no shame.[184] -The true prophet was forced to reticence; he must make his age feel the -desperate earnestness of life, and that salvation is by fire. For the -gorgeous future of its unsanctified hopes he must give it this severe, -almost mean, picture of a poor and humble folk, hardly saved but at -last at peace. - -The permanent value of such a message is proved by the thirst which -we feel even to-day for the clear, cold water of its simple promises. -Where a glaring optimism prevails, and the future is preached with a -loud assurance, where many find their only religious enthusiasm in the -resurrection of mediæval ritual or the singing of stirring and gorgeous -hymns of second-hand imagery, how needful to be recalled to the -earnestness and severity of life, to the simplicity of the conditions -of salvation, and to their ethical, not emotional, character! Where -sensationalism has so invaded religion, how good to hear the sober -insistence upon God’s daily commonplaces—_morning by morning He -bringeth forth His judgment to light_—and to know that the acceptance -of discipline is what prevails with Him. Where national reform is -vaunted and the progress of education, how well to go back to a prophet -who ignored all the great reforms of his day that he might impress -his people with the indispensableness of humility and faith. Where -Churches have such large ambitions for themselves, how necessary to -hear that the future is destined for _a poor folk_, the meek and the -honest. Where men boast that their religion—Bible, Creed or Church—has -undertaken to save them, _vaunting themselves on the Mount of My -Holiness_, how needful to hear salvation placed upon character and a -very simple trust in God. - -But, on the other hand, is any one in despair at the darkness and -cruelty of this life, let him hear how Zephaniah proclaims that, though -all else be fraud, _the Lord is righteous in the midst_ of us, _He doth -not let Himself fail_, that the resigned heart and the humble, the just -and the pure heart, is imperishable, and in the end there is at least -peace. - - - EPILOGUE. - - VERSES 14-20. - -Zephaniah’s prophecy was fulfilled. The Day of the Lord came, and -the people met their judgment. The Remnant survived—_a folk poor and -humble_. To them, in the new estate and temper of their life, came a -new song from God—perhaps it was nearly a hundred years after Zephaniah -had spoken—and they added it to his prophecies. It came in with -wonderful fitness, for it was the song of the redeemed, whom he had -foreseen, and it tuned his book, severe and simple, to the full harmony -of prophecy, so that his book might take a place in the great choir of -Israel—the diapason of that full salvation which no one man, but only -the experience of centuries, could achieve. - -_Sing out, O daughter of Zion! shout aloud, O Israel! Rejoice and be -jubilant with all thy[185] heart, daughter of Jerusalem! Jehovah hath -set aside thy judgments,[186] He hath turned thy foes. King of Israel, -Jehovah is in thy midst; thou shalt not see[187] evil any more._ - -_In that day it shall be said to Jerusalem, Fear not. O Zion, let not -thy hands droop! Jehovah, thy God, in the midst of thee is mighty;[188] -He will save, He will rejoice over thee with joy, He will make new[189] -His love, He will exult over thee with singing._ - -_The scattered of thy congregation[190] have I gathered—thine[191] are -they, ...[192] reproach upon her. Behold, I am about to do all for thy -sake at that time,[193] and I will rescue the lame and the outcast will -I bring in,[194] and I will make them for renown and fame whose shame -is in the whole earth.[195] In that time I will bring you in,[196] -even in the time that I gather you.[197] For I will set you for fame -and renown among all the peoples of the earth, when I turn again your -captivity before your eyes, saith Jehovah.[198]_ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[168] See above, pp. 43-45. - -[169] Heb. _the city the oppressor_. The two participles in the first -clause are not predicates to the noun and adjective of the second -(Schwally), but vocatives, though without the article, after הוֹי. - -[170] LXX. _wolves of Arabia_. - -[171] The verb left untranslated, גרמו, is quite uncertain in meaning. -גרם is a root common to the Semitic languages and seems to mean -originally _to cut off_, while the noun גרם is _a bone_. In Num. xxiv. -8 the Piel of the verb used with another word for bone means _to gnaw_, -_munch_. (The only other passage where it is used, Ezek. xxiii. 34, is -corrupt.) So some take it here: _they do not gnaw bones till morning_, -_i.e._ devour all at once; but this is awkward, and Schwally (198) -has proposed to omit the negative, _they do gnaw bones till morning_, -yet in that case surely the impf. and not the perf. tense would have -been used. The LXX. render _they do not leave over_, and it has been -attempted, though inconclusively, to derive this meaning from that of -_cutting off_, i.e. _laying aside_ (the Arabic Form II. means, however, -_to leave behind_). Another line of meaning perhaps promises more. In -Aram. the verb means _to be the cause of anything, to bring about_, -and perhaps contains the idea of _deciding_ (Levy _sub voce_ compares -κρίνω, _cerno_); in Arab. it means, among other things, _to commit -a crime, be guilty_, but in mod. Arabic _to fine_. Now it is to be -noticed that here the expression is used of _judges_, and it may be -there is an intentional play upon the double possibility of meaning in -the root. - -[172] Ezek. xxii. 26: _Her priests have done violence to My Law and -have profaned My holy things; they have put no difference between the -holy and profane, between the clean and the unclean._ Cf. Jer. ii. 8. - -[173] Schwally by altering the accents: _morning by morning He giveth -forth His judgment: no day does He fail_. - -[174] On this ver. 6 see above, p. 44. It is doubtful. - -[175] Or _discipline_. - -[176] Wellhausen: _that which I have commanded her_. Cf. Job xxxvi. 23; -2 Chron. xxxvi. 23; Ezra i. 2. - -[177] So LXX., reading מֵעֵינֶיהָ for the Heb. מְעוֹנָהּ, _her -dwelling_. - -[178] A frequent phrase of Jeremiah’s. - -[179] משפטי, decree, ordinance, decision. - -[180] Heb. _My anger._ LXX. omits. - -[181] That is to say, the prophet returns to that general judgment -of the whole earth, with which in his first discourse he had already -threatened Judah. He threatens her with it again in this eighth verse, -because, as he has said in the preceding ones, all other warnings have -failed. The eighth verse therefore follows naturally upon the seventh, -just as naturally as in Amos iv. ver. 12, introduced by the same לֵָכן -as here, follows its predecessors. The next two verses of the text, -however, describe an opposite result: instead of the destruction of the -heathen, they picture their conversion, and it is only in the eleventh -verse that we return to the main subject of the passage, Judah herself, -who is represented (in harmony with the close of Zephaniah’s first -discourse) as reduced to a righteous and pious remnant. Vv. 9 and 10 -are therefore obviously a later insertion, and we pass to the eleventh -verse. Vv. 9 and 10: _For then_ (this has no meaning after ver. 8) -_will I give to the peoples a pure lip_ (elliptic phrase: _turn to the -peoples a pure lip_—i.e. _turn their_ evil lip into _a pure lip_: pure -= _picked out_, _select_, _excellent_, cf. Isa. xlix. 2), _that they -may all of them call upon the name of the Lord, that they may serve -Him with one consent_ (Heb. _shoulder_, LXX. _yoke_). _From beyond -the rivers of Ethiopia_—there follows a very obscure phrase, עֲתָרַי -בַּת־פּוּצַי, _suppliants (?) of the daughter of My dispersed_, but -Ewald _of the daughter of Phut—they shall bring Mine offering_. - -[182] Wellhausen _despair_. - -[183] Heb. _the jubilant ones of thine arrogance_. - -[184] See vv. 4, 5, 11. - -[185] Heb. _the_. - -[186] מִשְׁפָּטַיִךְ. But Wellhausen reads מְשׁוֹפְטַיִךְ, thine -adversaries: cf. Job ix. 15. - -[187] Reading תִּרְאִי (with LXX., Wellhausen and Schwally) for -תִּירָאִי of the Hebrew text, _fear_. - -[188] Lit. _hero_, _mighty man_. - -[189] Heb. _will be silent in_, יַחֲרִישׁ, but not in harmony with the -next clause. LXX. and Syr. render _will make new_, which translates -יַחֲדִישׁ, a form that does not elsewhere occur, though that is no -objection to finding it in Zephaniah, or יְחַדֵּשׁ. Hitzig: _He makes -new things in His love_. Buhl: _He renews His love_. Schwally suggests -יחדה, _He rejoices in His love_. - -[190] LXX. _In the days of thy festival_, which it takes with the -previous verse. The Heb. construction is ungrammatical, though not -unprecedented—the construct state before a preposition. Besides נוגי is -obscure in meaning. It is a Ni. pt. for נוגה from יגה, _to be sad_: cf. -the Pi. in Lam. iii. 33. But the Hiphil הוגה in 2 Sam. xx. 13, followed -(as here) by מן, means _to thrust away from_, and that is probably the -sense here. - -[191] LXX. _thine oppressed_ in acc. governed by the preceding verb, -which in LXX. begins the verse. - -[192] The Heb., מַשְׂאֵת, _burden of_, is unintelligible. Wellhausen -proposes מִשְׂאֵת עֲלֵיהֶ. - -[193] This rendering is only a venture in the almost impossible task of -restoring the text of the clause. As it stands the Heb. runs, _Behold, -I am about to do_, or _deal, with thine oppressors_ (which Hitzig and -Ewald accept). Schwally points מְעַנַּיִךְ (active) as a passive, מְעֻנַּיִךְ, -_thine oppressed_. LXX. has ἰδοὺ ἐγὼ ποιῶ ἐν σοὶ ἕνεκεν -σοῦ, _i.e._ it read אִתֵּךְ לְמַעֲנֵךְ. Following its suggestion we -might read אֶת־כֹּל לְמַעֲנֵךְ, and so get the above translation. - -[194] Micah iv. 6. - -[195] This rendering (Ewald’s) is doubtful. The verse concludes with -_in the whole earth their shame_. But בָּשְׁתָּם may be a gloss. LXX. -take it as a verb with the next verse. - -[196] LXX. _do good to you_; perhaps אטיב for אביא. - -[197] So Heb. literally, but the construction is very awkward. Perhaps -we should read _in that time I will gather you_. - -[198] _Before your eyes_, _i.e._ in your lifetime. It is doubtful -whether ver. 20 is original to the passage. For it is simply a -variation on ver. 19, and it has more than one impossible reading: see -previous note, and for שבותיכם read שבותכם. - - - - - _NAHUM_ - - - - - _Woe to the City of Blood, - All of her guile, robbery-full, ceaseless rapine!_ - - _Hark the whip, - And the rumbling of wheels! - Horses at the gallop, - And the rattling dance of the chariot! - Cavalry at the charge, - Flash of sabres, and lightning of lances!_ - - - - - CHAPTER VI - - _THE BOOK OF NAHUM_ - - -The Book of Nahum consists of a double title and three odes. The title -runs _Oracle of Niniveh: Book of the Vision of Nahum the Elḳôshite_. -The three odes, eager and passionate pieces, are all of them apparently -vibrant to the impending fall of Assyria. The first, chap. i. with the -possible inclusion of chap. ii. 2,[199] is general and theological, -affirming God’s power of vengeance and the certainty of the overthrow -of His enemies. The second, chap. ii. with the omission of ver. 2,[200] -and the third, chap, iii., can hardly be disjoined; they both present a -vivid picture of the siege, the storm and the spoiling of Niniveh. - -The introductory questions, which title and contents start, are in the -main three: 1. The position of Elḳôsh, to which the title assigns the -prophet; 2. The authenticity of chap. i.; 3. The date of chaps, ii., -iii.: to which siege of Niniveh do they refer? - - -1. THE POSITION OF ELḲÔSH. - -The title calls Nahum the Elḳôshite—that is, native or citizen of -Elḳôsh.[201] Three positions have been claimed for this place, which is -not mentioned elsewhere in the Bible. - -The first we take is the modern Al-Ḳûsh, a town still flourishing -about twenty-four miles to the north of the site of Niniveh,[202] -with “no fragments of antiquity” about it, but possessing a “simple -plaster box,” which Jews, Christians and Mohammedans alike reverence as -the tomb of Nahum.[203] There is no evidence that Al-Ḳûsh, a name of -Arabic form, is older than the Arab period, while the tradition which -locates the tomb there is not found before the sixteenth century of -our era, but on the contrary Nahum’s grave was pointed out to Benjamin -of Tudela in 1165 at ‘Ain Japhata, on the south of Babylon.[204] The -tradition that the prophet lived and died at Al-Ḳûsh is therefore due -to the similarity of the name to that of Nahum’s Elḳôsh, as well as -to the fact that Niniveh was the subject of his prophesying.[205] In -his book there is no trace of proof for the assertion that Nahum was a -descendant of the ten tribes exiled in 721 to the region to the north -of Al-Ḳûsh. He prophesies for Judah alone. Nor does he show any more -knowledge of Niniveh than her ancient fame must have scattered to the -limits of the world.[206] We might as well argue from chap. iii. 8-10 -that Nahum had visited Thebes of Egypt. - -The second tradition of the position of Elḳôsh is older. In his -commentary on Nahum Jerome says that in his day it still existed, -a petty village of Galilee, under the name of Helkesei,[207] or -Elkese, and apparently with an established reputation as the -town of Nahum.[208] But the book itself bears no symptom of its -author’s connection with Galilee, and although it was quite possible -for a prophet of that period to have lived there, it is not very -probable.[209] - -A third tradition places Elḳôsh in the south of Judah. A Syriac version -of the accounts of the prophets, which are ascribed to Epiphanius,[210] -describes Nahum as “of Elḳôsh beyond Bêt Gabrê, of the tribe of -Simeon”;[211] and it may be noted that Cyril of Alexandria says[212] -that Elkese was a village in the country of the Jews. This tradition -is superior to the first in that there is no apparent motive for its -fabrication, and to the second in so far as Judah was at the time -of Nahum a much more probable home for a prophet than Galilee; nor -does the book give any references except such as might be made by a -Judæan.[213] No modern place-name, however, can be suggested with any -certainty as the echo of Elḳôsh. Umm Lâḳis, which has been proved not -to be Lachish, contains the same radicals, and some six and a quarter -miles east from Beit-Jibrin at the upper end of the Wady es Sur there -is an ancient well with the name Bir el Ḳûs.[214] - - - 2. THE AUTHENTICITY OF CHAP. I. - -Till recently no one doubted that the three chapters formed a unity. -“Nahum’s prophecy,” said Kuenen in 1889, “is a whole.” In 1891[215] -Cornill affirmed that no questions of authenticity arose in regard -to the book; and in 1892 Wellhausen saw in chap. i. an introduction -leading “in no awkward way to the proper subject of the prophecy.” - -Meantime, however, Bickell,[216] discovering what he thought to be -the remains of an alphabetic Psalm in chap. i. 1-7, attempted to -reconstruct throughout chap. i.—ii. 3 twenty-two verses, each beginning -with a successive letter of the alphabet. And, following this, Gunkel -in 1893 produced a more full and plausible reconstruction of the same -scheme.[217] By radical emendations of the text, by excision of what he -believes to be glosses and by altering the order of many of the verses, -Gunkel seeks to produce twenty-three distichs, twenty of which begin -with the successive letters of the alphabet, two are wanting, while in -the first three letters of the twenty-third, [שׁבי], he finds very -probable the name of the author, Shobai or Shobi.[218] He takes this -ode, therefore, to be an eschatological Psalm of the later Judaism, -which from its theological bearing has been thought suitable as an -introduction to Nahum’s genuine prophecies. - -The text of chap. i.—ii. 4 has been badly mauled and is clamant for -reconstruction of some kind. As it lies, there are traces of an -alphabetical arrangement as far as the beginning of ver. 9,[219] -and so far Gunkel’s changes are comparatively simple. Many of his -emendations are in themselves and apart from the alphabetic scheme -desirable. They get rid of difficulties and improve the poetry of the -passage.[220] His reconstruction is always clever and as a whole forms -a wonderfully spirited poem. But to have produced good or poetical -Hebrew is not conclusive proof of having recovered the original, and -there are obvious objections to the process. Several of the proposed -changes are unnatural in themselves and unsupported by anything -except the exigencies of the scheme; for example, 2_b_ and 3_a_ are -dismissed as a gloss only because, if they be retained, the _Aleph_ -verse is two bars too long. The gloss, Gunkel thinks, was introduced -to mitigate the absoluteness of the declaration that Jehovah is a God -of wrath and vengeance; but this is not obvious and would hardly have -been alleged apart from the needs of the alphabetic scheme. In order -to find a _Daleth_, it is quite arbitrary to say that the first אמלל -in 4_b_ is redundant in face of the second, and that a word beginning -with _Daleth_ originally filled its place, but was removed because -it was a rare or difficult word! The re-arrangement of 7 and 8_a_ is -very clever, and reads as if it were right; but the next effort, to -get a verse beginning with _Lamed_, is of the kind by which anything -might be proved. These, however, are nothing to the difficulties which -vv. 9-14 and chap. ii. 1, 3, present to an alphabetic scheme, or to -the means which Gunkel takes to surmount them. He has to re-arrange -the order of the verses,[221] and of the words within the verses. The -distichs beginning with _Nun_ and _Ḳoph_ are wanting, or at least -undecipherable. To provide one with initial _Resh_ the interjection -has to be removed from the opening of chap. ii. 1, and the verse made -to begin with רגלי and to run thus: _the feet of him that bringeth -good news on the mountains; behold him that publisheth peace_. Other -unlikely changes will be noticed when we come to the translation. Here -we may ask the question: if the passage was originally alphabetic, that -is, furnished with so fixed and easily recognised a frame, why has it -so fallen to pieces? And again, if it has so fallen to pieces, is it -possible that it can be restored? The many arbitrarinesses of Gunkel’s -able essay would seem to imply that it is not. Dr. Davidson says: “Even -if it should be assumed that an alphabetical poem lurks under chap. i., -the attempt to restore it, just as in Psalm x., can never be more than -an academic exercise.” - -Little is to be learned from the language. Wellhausen, who makes no -objection to the genuineness of the passage, thinks that about ver. 7 -we begin to catch the familiar dialect of the Psalms. Gunkel finds -a want of originality in the language, with many touches that betray -connection not only with the Psalms but with late eschatological -literature. But when we take one by one the clauses of chap, i., -we discover very few parallels with the Psalms, which are not at -the same time parallels with Jeremiah’s or some earlier writings. -That the prophecy is vague, and with much of the air of the later -eschatology about it, is no reason for removing it from an age in -which we have already seen prophecy beginning to show the same -apocalyptic temper.[222] Gunkel denies any reference in ver. 9_b_ to -the approaching fall of Niniveh, although that is seen by Kuenen, -Wellhausen, König and others, and he omits ver. 11_a_, in which most -read an allusion to Sennacherib. - -Therefore, while it is possible that a later poem has been prefixed to -the genuine prophecies of Nahum, and the first chapter supplies many -provocations to belief in such a theory, this has not been proved, -and the able essays of proof have much against them. The question is -open.[223] - - - 3. THE DATE OF CHAPS. II. AND III. - -We turn now to the date of the Book apart from this prologue. It was -written after a great overthrow of the Egyptian Thebes[224] and when -the overthrow of Niniveh was imminent. Now Thebes had been devastated -by Assurbanipal about 664 (we know of no later overthrow), and Niniveh -fell finally about 607. Nahum flourished, then, somewhere between 664 -and 607.[225] Some critics, feeling in his description of the fall of -Thebes the force of a recent impression, have placed his prophesying -immediately after that, or about 660.[226] But this is too far away -from the fall of Niniveh. In 660 the power of Assyria was unthreatened. -Nor is 652, the year of the revolt of Babylon, Egypt and the princes -of Palestine, a more likely date.[227] For although in that year -Assyrian supremacy ebbed from Egypt never to return, Assurbanipal -quickly reduced Elam, Babylon and all Syria. Nahum, on the other hand, -represents the very centre of the empire as threatened. The land of -Assyria is apparently already invaded (iii. 13, etc.). Niniveh, if -not invested, must immediately be so, and that by forces too great -for resistance. Her mixed populace already show signs of breaking up. -Within, as without, her doom is sealed. All this implies not only the -advance of an enormous force upon Niniveh, but the reduction of her -people to the last stage of hopelessness. Now, as we have seen,[228] -Assyria proper was thrice overrun. The Scythians poured across her -about 626, but there is no proof that they threatened Niniveh.[229] -A little after Assurbanipal’s death in 625, the Medes under King -Phraortes invaded Assyria, but Phraortes was slain and his son Kyaxares -called away by an invasion of his own country. Herodotus says that -this was after he had defeated the Assyrians in a battle and had begun -the siege of Niniveh,[230] but before he had succeeded in reducing -the city. After a time he subdued or assimilated the Medes, and then -investing Niniveh once more, about 607, in two years he took and -destroyed her. - -To which of these two sieges by Kyaxares are we to assign the Book -of Nahum? Hitzig, Kuenen, Cornill and others incline to the first on -the ground that Nahum speaks of the yoke of Assyria as still heavy on -Judah, though about to be lifted. They argue that by 608, when King -Josiah had already felt himself free enough to extend his reforms -into Northern Israel, and dared to dispute Necho’s passage across -Esdraelon, the Jews must have been conscious that they had nothing -more to fear from Assyria, and Nahum could hardly have written as he -does in i. 13, _I will break his yoke from off thee and burst thy -bonds in sunder_.[231] But this is not conclusive, for _first_, as we -have seen, it is not certain that i. 13 is from Nahum himself, and -_second_, if it be from himself, he might as well have written it about -608 as about 625, for he speaks not from the feelings of any single -year, but with the impression upon him of the whole epoch of Assyrian -servitude then drawing to a close. The eve of the later siege as a -date for the book is, as Davidson remarks,[232] “well within the verge -of possibility,” and some critics prefer it because in their opinion -Nahum’s descriptions thereby acquire greater reality and naturalness. -But this is not convincing, for if Kyaxares actually began the siege -of Niniveh about 625, Nahum’s sense of the imminence of her fall is -perfectly natural. Wellhausen indeed denies that earlier siege. “Apart -from Herodotus,” he says, “it would never have occurred to anybody to -doubt that Nahum’s prophecy coincided with the fall of Niniveh.”[233] -This is true, for it is to Herodotus alone that we owe the tradition of -the earlier siege. But what if we believe Herodotus? In that case, it -is impossible to come to a decision as between the two sieges. With our -present scanty knowledge of both, the prophecy of Nahum suits either -equally well.[234] - -Fortunately it is not necessary to come to a decision. Nahum, we -cannot too often insist, expresses the feelings neither of this nor -of that decade in the reign of Josiah, but the whole volume of hope, -wrath and just passion of vengeance which had been gathering for more -than a century and which at last broke into exultation when it became -certain that Niniveh was falling. That suits the eve of either siege by -Kyaxares. Till we learn a little more about the first siege and how far -it proceeded towards a successful result, perhaps we ought to prefer -the second. And of course those who feel that Nahum writes not in the -future but the present tense of the details of Niniveh’s overthrow, -must prefer the second. - - * * * * * - -That the form as well as the spirit of the Book of Nahum is poetical is -proved by the familiar marks of poetic measure—the unusual syntax, the -frequent absence of the article and particles, the presence of elliptic -forms and archaic and sonorous ones. In the two chapters on the siege -of Niniveh the lines are short and quick, in harmony with the dashing -action they echo. - -As we have seen, the text of chap. i. is very uncertain. The subject -of the other two chapters involves the use of a number of technical -and some foreign terms, of the meaning of most of which we are -ignorant.[235] There are apparently some glosses; here and there the -text is obviously disordered. We get the usual help, and find the usual -faults, in the Septuagint; they will be noticed in the course of the -translation. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[199] In the English version, but in the Hebrew chap. ii. vv. 1 and -3; for the Hebrew text divides chap. i. from chap. ii. differently -from the English, which follows the Greek. The Hebrew begins chap. ii. -with what in the English and Greek is the fifteenth verse of chap. i.: -_Behold, upon the mountains_, etc. - -[200] In the English text, but in the Hebrew with the omission of vv. 1 -and 3: see previous note. - -[201] Other meanings have been suggested, but are impossible. - -[202] So it lies on Billerbeck’s map in Delitzsch and Haupt’s _Beiträge -zur Assyr._, III. Smith’s _Bible Dictionary_ puts it at only 2 m. N. of -Mosul. - -[203] Layard, _Niniveh and its Remains_, I. 233, 3rd ed., 1849. - -[204] Bohn’s _Early Travels in Palestine_, p. 102. - -[205] Just as they show Jonah’s tomb at Niniveh itself. - -[206] See above, p. 18. - -[207] Just as in Micah’s case Jerome calls his birthplace Moresheth -by the adjective Morasthi, so with equal carelessness he calls Elḳosh -by the adjective with the article Ha-elḳoshi, the Elḳoshite. Jerome’s -words are: “Quum Elcese usque hodie in Galilea viculus sit, parvus -quidem et vix ruinis veterum ædificiorum indicans vestigia, sed tamen -notus Judæis et mihi quoque a circumducente monstratus” (in _Prol. ad -Prophetiam Nachumi_). In the _Onomasticon_ Jerome gives the name as -Elcese, Eusebius as Ἐλκεσέ, but without defining the position. - -[208] This Elkese has been identified, though not conclusively, with -the modern El Kauze near Ramieh, some seven miles W. of Tibnin. - -[209] Cf. Kuenen, § 75, n. 5; Davidson, p. 12 (2). - -Capernaum, which the Textus Receptus gives as Καπερναούμ, but most -authorities as Καφαρναούμ and the Peshitto as Kaphar Nahum, obviously -means Village of Nahum, and both Hitzig and Knobel looked for Elḳôsh in -it. See _Hist. Geog._, p. 456. - -Against the Galilean origin of Nahum it is usual to appeal to John vii. -52: _Search and see that out of Galilee ariseth no prophet_; but this -is not decisive, for Jonah came out of Galilee. - -[210] Though perhaps falsely. - -[211] This occurs in the Syriac translation of the Old Testament by -Paul of Tella, 617 A.D., in which the notices of Epiphanius (Bishop -of Constantia in Cyprus A.D. 367) or Pseudepiphanius are attached to -their respective prophets. It was first communicated to the _Z.D.P.V._, -I. 122 ff., by Dr. Nestle: cf. _Hist. Geog._, p. 231, n. 1. The -previously known readings of the passage were either geographically -impossible, as “He came from Elkesei beyond Jordan, towards Begabar of -the tribe of Simeon” (so in Paris edition, 1622, of the works of St. -Epiphanius, Vol. II., p. 147: cf. Migne, _Patr. Gr._, XLIII. 409); or -based on a misreading of the title of the book: “Nahum son of Elkesaios -was of Jesbe of the tribe of Simeon”; or indefinable: “Nahum was of -Elkesem beyond Betabarem of the tribe of Simeon”; these last two from -recensions of Epiphanius published in 1855 by Tischendorf (quoted -by Davidson, p. 13). In the Στιχηρὸν τῶν ΙΒ´ Προφητῶν καὶ Ἰσαιοῦ, -attributed to Hesychius, Presbyter of Jerusalem, who died 428 of 433 -(Migne, _Patrologia Gr._, XCIII. 1357), it is said that Nahum was ἀπὸ -Ἑλκεσεὶν (Helcesin) πέραν τοῦ τηνβαρεὶν ἐκ φυλῆς Συμεών; to which has -been added a note from Theophylact, Ἑλκασαΐ πέραν τοῦ Ἰορδάνου εἰς -Βιγαβρὶ. - -[212] Ad Nahum i. I (Migne, _Patr. Gr._, LXXI. 780): Κώμη δὲ αὕτη -πάντως ποῦ τῆς Ἰουδαίων χώρας. - -[213] The selection Bashan, Carmel and Lebanon (i. 4), does not prove -northern authorship. - -[214] אֶלְקוֹשׁ may be (1) a theophoric name = Ḳosh is God; and -Ḳosh might then be the Edomite deity קוֹס whose name is spelt with -a Shin on the Assyrian monuments (Baethgen, _Beiträge z. Semit. -Religionsgeschichte_, p. 11; Schrader, _K.A.T._², pp. 150, 613), and -who is probably the same as the Arab deity Ḳais (Baethgen, _id._, p. -108); and this would suit a position in the south of Judah, in which -region we find the majority of place-names compounded with אל. Or else -(2) the א is prosthetic, as in the place-names אכזיב on the Phœnician -coast, אכשׁף in Southern Canaan, אשדוד, etc. In this case we might -find its equivalent in the form לְקוֹש (cf. כזיב אכזיב); but no such -form is now extant or recorded at any previous period. The form Lâḳis -would not suit. On Bir el Ḳûs see Robinson, _B.R._, III., p. 14, and -Guérin, _Judée_, III., p. 341. Bir el Ḳûs means Well of the Bow, or, -according to Guérin, of the Arch, from ruins that stand by it. The -position, _east_ of Beit-Jibrin, is unsuitable; for the early Christian -texts quoted in the previous note fix it _beyond_, presumably south or -south-west of Beit-Jibrin, and in the tribe of Simeon. The error “tribe -of Simeon” does not matter, for the same fathers place Bethzecharias, -the alleged birthplace of Habakkuk, there. - -[215] _Einleitung_, 1st ed. - -[216] Who seems to have owed the hint to a quotation by Delitzsch on -Psalm ix. from G. Frohnmeyer to the effect that there were traces of -“alphabetic” verses in chap, i., at least in vv. 3-7. See Bickell’s -_Beiträge zur Semit. Metrik_, Separatabdruck, Wien, 1894. - -[217] _Z.A.T.W._, 1893, pp. 223 ff. - -[218] Cf. Ezra ii. 42; Neh. vii. 45; 2 Sam. xvii. 27. - -[219] Ver. 1 is title; 2 begins with א; then ב is found in בסופה, 3_b_; -ג in גוער, ver. 4; ד is wanting—Bickell proposes to substitute a -New-Hebrew word דצק, Gunkel דאב, for אמלל, ver. 4_b_; ה in הרים, -5_a_; ו in ותשא, 5_b_; ז by removing לפני of ver. 6_a_ to the end -of the clause (and reading it there לפניו), and so leaving זעמו as the -first word; ח in חמתו in 6_b_; ט in טוב, 7_a_; י by eliding ו -from וידע, 7_b_; כ in כלה, 8; ל is wanting, though Gunkel -seeks to supply it by taking 9_c_, beginning לא, with 9_b_, -before 9_a_; מ begins 9_a_. - -[220] See below in the translation. - -[221] As thus: 9_a_, 11_b_, 12 (but unintelligible), 10, 13, 14, ii. 1, -3. - -[222] See above on Zephaniah, pp. 49 ff. - -[223] Cornill, in the 2nd ed. of his _Einleitung_, has accepted -Gunkel’s and Bickell’s main contentions. - -[224] iii. 8-10. - -[225] The description of the fall of No-Amon precludes the older -view almost universally held before the discovery of Assurbanipal’s -destruction of Thebes, viz. that Nahum prophesied in the days of -Hezekiah or in the earlier years of Manasseh (Lightfoot, Pusey, -Nägelsbach, etc.). - -[226] So Schrader, Volck in Herz. _Real. Enc._, and others. - -[227] It is favoured by Winckler, _A.T. Untersuch._, pp. 127 f. - -[228] Above, pp. 15 f.; 19, 22 ff. - -[229] This in answer to Jeremias in Delitzsch’s and Haupt’s _Beiträge -zur Assyriologie_, III. 96. - -[230] I. 103. - -[231] Hitzig’s other reason, that the besiegers of Niniveh are -described by Nahum in ii. 3 ff. as single, which was true of the siege -in 625 _c._, but not of that of 607—6, when the Chaldeans joined the -Medes, is disposed of by the proof on p. 22 above, that even in 607—6 -the Medes carried on the siege alone. - -[232] Page 17. - -[233] In commenting on chap. i. 9; p. 156 of _Kleine Propheten_. - -[234] The phrase which is so often appealed to by both sides, i. 9, -_Jehovah maketh a complete end, not twice shall trouble arise_, is -really inconclusive. Hitzig maintains that if Nahum had written this -after the first and before the second siege of Niniveh he would have -had to say, “not thrice _shall trouble arise_.” This is not conclusive: -the prophet is looking only at the future and thinking of it—_not -twice_ again _shall trouble arise_; and if there were really two sieges -of Niniveh, would the words _not twice_ have been suffered to remain, -if they had been a confident prediction _before_ the first siege? -Besides, the meaning of the phrase is not certain; it may be only a -general statement corresponding to what seems a general statement in -the first clause of the verse. Kuenen and others refer the _trouble_ -not to that which is about to afflict Assyria, but to the long slavery -and slaughter which Judah has suffered at Assyria’s hands. Davidson -leaves it ambiguous. - -[235] Technical military terms: ii. 2, מצורה; 4, פלדת (?); 4, הרעלו; -6, הסכך; iii. 3, מעלה (?). Probably foreign terms: ii. 8, הצב; -iii. 17, מנזריך. Certainly foreign: iii. 17, טפסריך. - - - - - CHAPTER VII - - _THE VENGEANCE OF THE LORD_ - - NAHUM i - - -The prophet Nahum, as we have seen,[236] arose probably in Judah, if -not about the same time as Zephaniah and Jeremiah, then a few years -later. Whether he prophesied before or after the great Reform of 621 we -have no means of deciding. His book does not reflect the inner history, -character or merits of his generation. His sole interest is the fate -of Niniveh. Zephaniah had also doomed the Assyrian capital, yet he -was much more concerned with Israel’s unworthiness of the opportunity -presented to them. The yoke of Asshur, he saw, was to be broken, but -the same cloud which was bursting from the north upon Niniveh must -overwhelm the incorrigible people of Jehovah. For this Nahum has no -thought. His heart, for all its bigness, holds room only for the bitter -memories, the baffled hopes, the unappeased hatreds of a hundred -years. And that is why we need not be anxious to fix his date upon one -or other of the shifting phases of Israel’s history during that last -quarter of the seventh century. For he represents no single movement of -his fickle people’s progress, but the passion of the whole epoch then -drawing to a close. Nahum’s book is one great At Last! - -And, therefore, while Nahum is a worse prophet than Zephaniah, with -less conscience and less insight, he is a greater poet, pouring forth -the exultation of a people long enslaved, who see their tyrant ready -for destruction. His language is strong and brilliant; his rhythm -rumbles and rolls, leaps and flashes, like the horsemen and chariots -he describes. It is a great pity the text is so corrupt. If the -original lay before us, and that full knowledge of the times which the -excavation of ancient Assyria may still yield to us, we might judge -Nahum to be an even greater poet than we do. - -We have seen that there are some reasons for doubting whether he wrote -the first chapter of the book,[237] but no one questions its fitness as -an introduction to the exultation over Niniveh’s fall in chapters ii. -and iii. The chapter is theological, affirming those general principles -of Divine Providence, by which the overthrow of the tyrant is certain -and God’s own people are assured of deliverance. Let us place ourselves -among the people, who for so long a time had been thwarted, crushed and -demoralised by the most brutal empire which was ever suffered to roll -its force across the world, and we shall sympathise with the author, -who for the moment will feel nothing about his God, save that He is a -God of vengeance. Like the grief of a bereaved man, the vengeance of an -enslaved people has hours sacred to itself. And this people had such a -God! Jehovah must punish the tyrant, else were He untrue. He had been -patient, and patient, as a verse seems to hint,[238] just because He -was omnipotent, but in the end He must rise to judgment. He was God of -heaven and earth, and it is the old physical proofs of His power, so -often appealed to by the peoples of the East, for they feel them as we -cannot, which this hymn calls up as Jehovah sweeps to the overthrow of -the oppressor. _Before such power of wrath who may stand? What think ye -of Jehovah?_ The God who works with such ruthless, absolute force in -nature will not relax in the fate He is preparing for Niniveh. _He is -one who maketh utter destruction_, not needing to raise up His forces -a second time, and as stubble before fire so His foes go down before -Him. No half-measures are His, Whose are the storm, the drought and the -earthquake. - -Such is the sheer religion of the Proem to the Book of Nahum—thoroughly -Oriental in its sense of God’s method and resources of destruction; -very Jewish, and very natural to that age of Jewish history, in the -bursting of its long pent hopes of revenge. We of the West might -express these hopes differently. We should not attribute so much -personal passion to the Avenger. With our keener sense of law, we -should emphasise the slowness of the process, and select for its -illustration the forces of decay rather than those of sudden ruin. But -we must remember the crashing times in which the Jews lived. The world -was breaking up. The elements were loose, and all that God’s own people -could hope for was the bursting of their yoke, with a little shelter in -the day of trouble. The elements were loose, but amidst the blind crash -the little people knew that Jehovah knew them. - - _A God jealous and avenging is Jehovah; - Jehovah is avenger and lord of wrath; - Vengeful is Jehovah towards His enemies, - And implacable He to His foes._ - - _Jehovah is long-suffering and great in might,[239] - Yet He will not absolve. - Jehovah! His way is in storm and in hurricane, - And clouds are the dust of His feet.[240] - He curbeth the sea, and drieth it up; - All the streams hath He parched. - Withered[241] be Bashan and Carmel; - The bloom of Lebānon is withered. - Mountains have quaked before Him, - And the hills have rolled down. - Earth heaved at His presence, - The world and all its inhabitants. - Before His rage who may stand, - Or who abide in the glow of His anger? - His wrath pours forth like fire, - And rocks are rent before Him._ - - _Good is Jehovah to them that wait upon Him in the day of trouble,[242] - And He knoweth them that trust Him. - With an overwhelming flood He makes an end of His rebels, - And His foes He comes down on[243] with darkness._ - - _What think ye of Jehovah? - He is one that makes utter destruction; - Not twice need trouble arise. - For though they be like plaited thorns, - And sodden as ...,[244] - They shall be consumed like dry stubble._ - - _Came there not[245] out of thee one to plan evil against Jehovah, - A counsellor of mischief?[246]_ - -_Thus saith Jehovah, ... many waters,[247] yet shall they be cut off -and pass away, and I will so humble thee that I need humble thee[248] -no more;[249] and Jehovah hath ordered concerning thee, that no more of -thy seed be sown: from the house of thy God, I will cut off graven and -molten image. I will make thy sepulchre_ ...[250] - -Disentangled from the above verses are three which plainly refer not -to Assyria but to Judah. How they came to be woven among the others we -cannot tell. Some of them appear applicable to the days of Josiah after -the great Reform. - - _And now will I break his yoke from upon thee, - And burst thy bonds asunder. - Lo, upon the mountains the feet of Him that bringeth good tidings, - That publisheth peace! - Keep thy feasts, O Judah, - Fulfil thy vows: - For no more shall the wicked attempt to pass through thee; - Cut off is the whole of him.[251] - For Jehovah hath turned the pride of Jacob, - Like to the pride of Isrāel:[252] - For the plunderers plundered them, - And destroyed their vine branches._ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[236] Above, pp. 78 ff., 85 ff. - -[237] See above, pp. 81 ff. - -[238] Ver. 3, if the reading be correct. - -[239] Gunkel amends to _in mercy_ to make the parallel exact. But see -above, p. 82. - -[240] Gunkel’s emendation is quite unnecessary here. - -[241] See above, p. 83. - -[242] So LXX. Heb. = _for a stronghold in the day of trouble_. - -[243] _Thrusts into_, Wellhausen, reading ינדף or ידף for ירדף. LXX. -_darkness shall pursue_. - -[244] Heb. and R.V. _drenched as with their drink_. LXX. _like a -tangled yew_. The text is corrupt. - -[245] The superfluous word מלא at the end of ver. 10 Wellhausen reads -as הלא at the beginning of ver. 11. - -[246] Usually taken as Sennacherib. - -[247] The Hebrew is given by the R.V. _though they be in full strength -and likewise many_. LXX. _Thus saith Jehovah ruling over many waters_, -reading משל מים רבים and omitting the first וכן. Similarly Syr. -_Thus saith Jehovah of the heads of many waters_, על משלי מים רבים. -Wellhausen, substituting מים for the first וכן, translates, _Let the -great waters be ever so full, they will yet all_ ...? (misprint here) -_and vanish_. For עבר read עברו with LXX., borrowing ו from next word. - -[248] Lit. _and I will afflict thee, I will not afflict thee again_. -This rendering implies that Niniveh is the object. The A.V., _though I -have afflicted thee I will afflict thee no more_, refers to Israel. - -[249] Omit ver. 13 and run 14 on to 12. For the curious alternation -now occurs: Assyria in one verse, Judah in the other. Assyria: i. 12, -14, ii. 2 (Heb.; Eng. ii. 1), 4 ff. Judah: i. 13, ii. 1 (Heb.; Eng. i. -15), 3 (Heb.; Eng. 2). Remove these latter, as Wellhausen does, and the -verses on Assyria remain a connected and orderly whole. So in the text -above. - -[250] Syr. _make it thy sepulchre_. The Hebrew left untranslated above -might be rendered _for thou art vile_. Bickell amends into _dunghills_. -Lightfoot, _Chron. Temp. et Ord. Text V.T._ in Collected Works, I. 109, -takes this as a prediction of Sennacherib’s murder in the temple, an -interpretation which demands a date for Nahum under either Hezekiah or -Manasseh. So Pusey also, p. 357. - -[251] LXX. _destruction_ כָּלָה, for כֻּלה. - -[252] Davidson: _restoreth the excellency of Jacob, as the excellency -of Israel_, but when was the latter restored? - - - - - CHAPTER VIII - - _THE SIEGE AND FALL OF NINIVEH_ - - NAHUM ii., iii - - -The scene now changes from the presence and awful arsenal of the -Almighty to the historical consummation of His vengeance. Nahum -foresees the siege of Niniveh. Probably the Medes have already overrun -Assyria.[253] The _Old Lion_ has withdrawn to his inner den, and is -making his last stand. The suburbs are full of the enemy, and the great -walls which made the inner city one vast fortress are invested. Nahum -describes the details of the assault. Let us try, before we follow him -through them, to form some picture of Assyria and her capital at this -time.[254] - -As we have seen,[255] the Assyrian Empire began about 625 to shrink -to the limits of Assyria proper, or Upper Mesopotamia, within the -Euphrates on the south-west, the mountain-range of Kurdistan on the -north-east, the river Chabor on the north-west and the Lesser Zab -on the south-east.[256] This is a territory of nearly a hundred and -fifty miles from north to south, and rather more than two hundred and -fifty from east to west. To the south of it the Viceroy of Babylon, -Nabopolassar, held practically independent sway over Lower Mesopotamia, -if he did not command as well a large part of the Upper Euphrates -Valley. On the north the Medes were urgent, holding at least the -farther ends of the passes through the Kurdish mountains, if they had -not already penetrated these to their southern issues. - -The kernel of the Assyrian territory was the triangle, two of whose -sides are represented by the Tigris and the Greater Zab, the third -by the foot of the Kurdistan mountains. It is a fertile plain, with -some low hills. To-day the level parts of it are covered by a large -number of villages and well-cultivated fields. The more frequent -mounds of ruin attest in ancient times a still greater population. -At the period of which we are treating, the plains must have been -covered by an almost continuous series of towns. At either end lay a -group of fortresses. The southern was the ancient capital of Assyria, -Kalchu, now Nimrud, about six miles to the north of the confluence of -the Greater Zab and the Tigris. The northern, close by the present -town of Khorsabad, was the great fortress and palace of Sargon, -Dur-Sargina:[257] it covered the roads upon Niniveh from the north, -and standing upon the upper reaches of the Choser protected Niniveh’s -water supply. But besides these there were scattered upon all the main -roads and round the frontiers of the territory a number of other forts, -towers and posts, the ruins of many of which are still considerable, -but others have perished without leaving any visible traces. The roads -thus protected drew in upon Niniveh from all directions. The chief -of those, along which the Medes and their allies would advance from -the east and north, crossed the Greater Zab, or came down through -the Kurdistan mountains upon the citadel of Sargon. Two of them were -distant enough from the latter to relieve the invaders from the -necessity of taking it, and Kalchu lay far to the south of all of them. -The brunt of the first defence of the land would therefore fall upon -the smaller fortresses. - -Niniveh itself lay upon the Tigris between Kalchu and Sargon’s city, -just where the Tigris is met by the Choser. Low hills descend from -the north upon the very site of the fortress, and then curve east and -south, bow-shaped, to draw west again upon the Tigris at the south end -of the city. To the east of the latter they leave a level plain, some -two and a half miles by one and a half. These hills appear to have -been covered by several forts. The city itself was four-sided, lying -lengthwise to the Tigris and cut across its breadth by the Choser. The -circumference was about seven and a half miles, enclosing the largest -fortified space in Western Asia, and capable of holding a population of -three hundred thousand. The western wall, rather over two and a half -miles long, touched the Tigris at either end, but between there lay a -broad, bow-shaped stretch of land, probably in ancient times, as now, -free of buildings. The north-western wall ran up from the Tigris for -a mile and a quarter to the low ridge which entered the city at its -northern corner. From this the eastern wall, with a curve upon it, ran -down in face of the eastern plain for a little more than three miles, -and was joined to the western by the short southern wall of not quite -half a mile. The ruins of the western wall stand from ten to twenty, -those of the others from twenty-five to sixty, feet above the natural -surface, with here and there the still higher remains of towers. There -were several gates, of which the chief were one in the northern and two -in the eastern wall. Round all the walls except the western ran moats -about a hundred and fifty feet broad—not close up to the foot of the -walls, but at a distance of some sixty feet. Water was supplied by the -Choser to all the moats south of it; those to the north were fed from -a canal which entered the city near its northern corner. At these and -other points one can still trace the remains of huge dams, batardeaux -and sluices; and the moats might be emptied by opening at either end -of the western wall other dams, which kept back the waters from the -bed of the Tigris. Beyond its moat, the eastern wall was protected -north of the Choser by a large outwork covering its gate, and south of -the Choser by another outwork, in shape the segment of a circle, and -consisting of a double line of fortification more than five hundred -yards long, of which the inner wall was almost as high as the great -wall itself, but the outer considerably lower. Again, in front of this -and in face of the eastern plain was a third line of fortification, -consisting of a low inner wall and a colossal outer wall still rising -to a height of fifty feet, with a moat one hundred and fifty feet -broad between them. On the south this third line was closed by a large -fortress. - -Upon the trebly fortified city the Medes drew in from east and north, -far away from Kalchu and able to avoid even Dur-Sargina. The other -fortresses on the frontier and the approaches fell into their hands, -says Nahum, like _ripe fruit_.[258] He cries to Niniveh to prepare -for the siege.[259] Military authorities[260] suppose that the Medes -directed their main attack upon the northern corner of the city. -Here they would be upon a level with its highest point, and would -command the waterworks by which most of the moats were fed. Their -flank, too, would be protected by the ravines of the Choser. Nahum -describes fighting in the suburbs before the assault of the walls, and -it was just here, according to some authorities,[261] that the famous -suburbs of Niniveh lay, out upon the canal and the road to Khorsabad. -All the open fighting which Nahum foresees would take place in these -_outplaces_ and _broad streets_[262]—the mustering of the _red_ -ranks,[263] the _prancing horses_[264] and _rattling chariots_[265] and -_cavalry at the charge_.[266] Beaten there the Assyrians would retire -to the great walls, and the waterworks would fall into the hands of -the besiegers. They would not immediately destroy these, but in order -to bring their engines and battering-rams against the walls they would -have to lay strong dams across the moats; the eastern moat has actually -been found filled with rubbish in face of a great breach at the north -end of its wall. This breach may have been effected not only by the -rams but by directing upon the wall the waters of the canal; or farther -south the Choser itself, in its spring floods, may have been confined -by the besiegers and swept in upon the sluices which regulate its -passage through the eastern wall into the city. To this means tradition -has assigned the capture of Niniveh,[267] and Nahum perhaps foresees -the possibility of it: _the gates of the rivers are opened, the palace -is dissolved_.[268] - -Now of all this probable progress of the siege Nahum, of course, does -not give us a narrative, for he is writing upon the eve of it, and -probably, as we have seen, in Judah, with only such knowledge of the -position and strength of Niniveh as her fame had scattered across the -world. The military details, the muster, the fighting in the open, the -investment, the assault, he did not need to go to Assyria or to wait -for the fall of Niniveh to describe as he has done. Assyria herself -(and herein lies much of the pathos of the poem) had made all Western -Asia familiar with their horrors for the last two centuries. As we -learn from the prophets and now still more from herself, Assyria was -the great Besieger of Men. It is siege, siege, siege, which Amos, Hosea -and Isaiah tell their people they shall feel: _siege and blockade, -and that right round the land!_ It is siege, irresistible and full of -cruelty, which Assyria records as her own glory. Miles of sculpture -are covered with masses of troops marching upon some Syrian or Median -fortress. Scaling ladders and enormous engines are pushed forward to -the walls under cover of a shower of arrows. There are assaults and -breaches, panic-stricken and suppliant defenders. Streets and places -are strewn with corpses, men are impaled, women led away weeping, -children dashed against the stones. The Jews had seen, had felt these -horrors for a hundred years, and it is out of their experience of them -that Nahum weaves his exultant predictions. The Besieger of the world -is at last besieged; every cruelty he has inflicted upon men is now -to be turned upon himself. Again and again does Nahum return to the -vivid details,—he hears the very whips crack beneath the walls, and the -rattle of the leaping chariots; the end is slaughter, dispersion and a -dead waste.[269] - -Two other points remain to be emphasised. - -There is a striking absence from both chapters of any reference -to Israel.[270] Jehovah of Hosts is mentioned twice in the same -formula,[271] but otherwise the author does not obtrude his -nationality. It is not in Judah’s name he exults, but in that of -all the peoples of Western Asia. Niniveh has sold _peoples_ by her -harlotries and _races_ by her witchcraft; it is _peoples_ that shall -gaze upon her nakedness and _kingdoms_ upon her shame. Nahum gives -voice to no national passions, but to the outraged conscience of -mankind. We see here another proof, not only of the large, human heart -of prophecy, but of that which in the introduction to these Twelve -Prophets we ventured to assign as one of its causes. By crushing all -peoples to a common level of despair, by the universal pity which her -cruelties excited, Assyria contributed to the development in Israel of -the idea of a common humanity.[272] - -The other thing to be noticed is Nahum’s feeling of the incoherence and -mercenariness of the vast population of Niniveh. Niniveh’s command of -the world had turned her into a great trading power. Under Assurbanipal -the lines of ancient commerce had been diverted so as to pass through -her. The immediate result was an enormous increase of population, such -as the world had never before seen within the limits of one city. But -this had come out of all races and was held together only by the greed -of gain. What had once been a firm and vigorous nation of warriors, -irresistible in their united impact upon the world, was now a loose -aggregate of many peoples, without patriotism, discipline or sense of -honour. Nahum likens it to a reservoir of waters,[273] which as soon as -it is breached must scatter, and leave the city bare. The Second Isaiah -said the same of Babylon, to which the bulk of Niniveh’s mercenary -populace must have fled:— - - _Thus are they grown to thee, they who did weary thee, - Traders of thine from thy youth up; - Each as he could escape have they fled; - None is thy helper._[274] - -The prophets saw the truth about both cities. Their vastness and their -splendour were artificial. Neither of them, and Niniveh still less -than Babylon, was a natural centre for the world’s commerce. When -their political power fell, the great lines of trade, which had been -twisted to their feet, drew back to more natural courses, and Niniveh -in especial became deserted. This is the explanation of the absolute -collapse of that mighty city. Nahum’s foresight, and the very metaphor -in which he expressed it, were thoroughly sound. The population -vanished like water. The site bears little trace of any disturbance -since the ruin by the Medes, except such as has been inflicted -by the weather and the wandering tribes around. Mosul, Niniveh’s -representative to-day, is not built upon it, and is but a provincial -town. The district was never meant for anything else. - -The swift decay of these ancient empires from the climax of their -commercial glory is often employed as a warning to ourselves. But -the parallel, as the previous paragraphs suggest, is very far from -exact. If we can lay aside for the moment the greatest difference of -all, in religion and morals, there remain others almost of cardinal -importance. Assyria and Babylonia were not filled, like Great Britain, -with reproductive races, able to colonise distant lands, and carry -everywhere the spirit which had made them strong at home. Still -more, they did not continue at home to be homogeneous. Their native -forces were exhausted by long and unceasing wars. Their populations, -especially in their capitals, were very largely alien and distraught, -with nothing to hold them together save their commercial interests. -They were bound to break up at the first disaster. It is true that -we are not without some risks of their peril. No patriot among us -can observe without misgiving the large and growing proportion of -foreigners in that department of our life from which the strength of -our defence is largely drawn—our merchant navy. But such a fact is -very far from bringing our empire and its chief cities into the fatal -condition of Niniveh and Babylon. Our capitals, our commerce, our life -as a whole are still British to the core. If we only be true to our -ideals of righteousness and religion, if our patriotism continue moral -and sincere, we shall have the power to absorb the foreign elements -that throng to us in commerce, and stamp them with our own spirit. - -We are now ready to follow Nahum’s two great poems delivered on the -eve of the Fall of Niniveh. Probably, as we have said, the first of -them has lost its original opening. It wants some notice at the outset -of the object to which it is addressed: this is indicated only by -the second personal pronoun. Other needful comments will be given in -footnotes. - - - 1. - - _The Hammer[275] is come up to thy face! - Hold the rampart![276]Keep watch on the way! - Brace the loins![277] Pull thyself firmly together![278] - The shields[279] of his heroes are red, - The warriors are in scarlet;[280] - Like[281] fire are the ...[282]of the chariots in the day - of his muster, - And the horsemen[283] are prancing. - Through the markets rage chariots, - They tear across the squares;[284] - The look of them is like torches, - Like lightnings they dart to and fro.[285] - He musters his nobles....[286] - They rush to the wall and the mantlet[287] is fixed! - The river-gates[288] burst open, the palace dissolves.[289] - And Huṣṣab[290] is stripped, is brought forth, - With her maids sobbing like doves, - Beating their breasts. - And Niniveh! she was like a reservoir of waters, - Her waters ...[291] - And now they flee. “Stand, stand!” but there is - none to rally. - Plunder silver, plunder gold! - Infinite treasures, mass of all precious things! - Void and devoid and desolate[292] is she. - Melting hearts and shaking knees, - And anguish in all loins, - And nothing but faces full of black fear._[293] - - _Where is the Lion’s den, - And the young lions’ feeding ground[294]? - Whither the Lion retreated,[295] - The whelps of the Lion, with none to affray: - The Lion, who tore enough for his whelps, - And strangled for his lionesses. - And he filled his pits with prey, - And his dens with rapine._ - - _Lo, I am at thee (oracle of Jehovah of Hosts): - I will put up thy ...[296] in flames, - The sword shall devour thy young lions; - I will cut off from the earth thy rapine, - And the noise of thine envoys shall no more be heard._ - - - 2. - - _Woe to the City of Blood, - All of her guile, robbery-full, ceaseless rapine!_ - - _Hark the whip, - And the rumbling of the wheel, - And horses galloping, - And the rattling dance of the chariot![297] - Cavalry at the charge,[298] and flash of sabres, - And lightning of lances, - Mass of slain and weight of corpses, - Endless dead bodies— - They stumble on their dead! - —For the manifold harlotries of the Harlot, - The well-favoured, mistress of charms, - She who sold nations with her harlotries - And races by her witchcrafts!_ - - _Lo, I am at thee (oracle of Jehovah of Hosts): - I will uncover thy skirts to thy face;[299] - Give nations to look on thy nakedness, - And kingdoms upon thy shame; - Will have thee pelted with filth, and disgrace thee, - And set thee for a gazingstock; - So that every one seeing thee shall shrink from thee and say, - “Shattered is Niniveh—who will pity her? - Whence shall I seek for comforters to thee?”_ - - _Shalt thou be better than No-Amon,[300] - Which sat upon the Nile streams[301]—waters were round her— - Whose rampart was the sea,[302] and waters her wall?[303] - Kush was her strength and Miṣraim without end; - Phut and the Lybians were there to assist her.[304] - Even she was for exile, she went to captivity: - Even her children were dashed on every street corner; - For her nobles they cast lots, - And all her great men were fastened with fetters._ - - _Thou too shalt stagger,[305] shalt grow faint; - Thou too shalt seek help from[306] the foe! - All thy fortresses are fig-trees with figs early-ripe: - Be they shaken they fall on the mouth of the eater. - Lo, thy folk are but women in thy midst:[307] - To thy foes the gates of thy land fly open; - Fire has devoured thy bars._ - - _Draw thee water for siege, strengthen thy forts! - Get thee down to the mud, and tramp in the clay! - Grip fast the brick-mould! - There fire consumes thee, the sword cuts thee off.[308] - Make thyself many as a locust swarm, - Many as grasshoppers, - Multiply thy traders more than heaven’s stars, - —The locusts break off[309] and fly away. - Thy ...[310] are as locusts and thy ... as grasshoppers, - That hive in the hedges in the cold of the day:[311] - The sun is risen, they are fled, - And one knows not the place where they be._ - - _Asleep are thy shepherds, O king of Assyria, - Thy nobles do slumber;[312] - Thy people are strewn on the mountains, - Without any to gather. - There is no healing of thy wreck, - Fatal thy wound! - All who hear the bruit of thee shall clap the hand at thee, - For upon whom hath not thy cruelty passed without ceasing?_ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[253] See above, pp. 22 ff. - -[254] The authorities are very full. First there is M. Botta’s huge -work _Monument de Ninive_, Paris, 5 vols., 1845. Then must be mentioned -the work of which we availed ourselves in describing Babylon in _Isaiah -xl.—lxvi._, Expositor’s Bible, pp. 52 ff.: “Memoirs by Commander -James Felix Jones, I.N.,” in _Selections from the Records of the -Bombay Government_, No. XLIII., New Series, 1857. It is good to find -that the careful and able observations of Commander Jones, too much -neglected in his own country, have had justice done them by the German -Colonel Billerbeck in the work about to be cited. Then there is the -invaluable _Niniveh and its Remains_, by Layard. There are also the -works of Rawlinson and George Smith. And recently Colonel Billerbeck, -founding on these and other works, has published an admirable monograph -(lavishly illustrated by maps and pictures), not only upon the military -state of Assyria proper and of Niniveh at this period, but upon the -whole subject of Assyrian fortification and art of besieging, as well -as upon the course of the Median invasions. It forms the larger part of -an article to which Dr. Alfred Jeremias contributes an introduction, -and reconstruction with notes of chaps. ii. and iii. of the Book of -Nahum: “Der Untergang Niniveh’s und die Weissagungschrift des Nahum von -Elḳosh,” in Vol. III. of _Beiträge zur Assyriologie und Semitischen -Sprachwissenschaft_, edited by Friedrich Delitzsch and Paul Haupt, with -the support of Johns Hopkins University at Baltimore, U.S.A.: Leipzig, -1895. - -[255] Pages 20 f. - -[256] Colonel Billerbeck (p. 115) thinks that the south-east frontier -at this time lay more to the north, near the Greater Zab. - -[257] First excavated by M. Botta, 1842-1845. See also George Smith, -_Assyr. Disc._, pp. 98 f. - -[258] iii. 12. - -[259] iii. 14. - -[260] See Jones and Billerbeck. - -[261] Delitzsch places the עיר רחבות of Gen. x. 11, the “ribit Nina” of -the inscriptions, on the north-east of Niniveh. - -[262] ii. 4 Eng., 5 Heb. - -[263] ii. 3 Eng., 4 Heb. - -[264] _Ibid._ LXX. - -[265] iii. 2. - -[266] iii. 3. - -[267] It is the waters of the Tigris that the tradition avers to have -broken the wall; but the Tigris itself runs in a bed too low for this: -it can only have been the Choser. See both Jones and Billerbeck. - -[268] ii. 6. - -[269] If the above conception of chaps. ii. and iii. be correct, then -there is no need for such a re-arrangement of these verses as has been -proposed by Jeremias and Billerbeck. In order to produce a continuous -narrative of the progress of the siege, they bring forward iii. 12-15 -(describing the fall of the fortresses and gates of the land and the -call to the defence of the city), and place it immediately after ii. -2, 4 (the description of the invader) and ii. 5-11 (the appearance of -chariots in the suburbs of the city, the opening of the floodgates, -the flight and the spoiling of the city). But if they believe that the -original gave an orderly account of the progress of the siege, why do -they not bring forward also iii. 2 f., which describe the arrival of -the foe under the city walls? The truth appears to be as stated above. -We have really two poems against Niniveh, chap. ii. and chap. iii. -They do not give an orderly description of the siege, but exult over -Niniveh’s imminent downfall, with gleams scattered here and there of -how this is to happen. Of these “impressions” of the coming siege there -are three, and in the order in which we now have them they occur very -naturally: ii. 5 ff., iii. 2 f., and iii. 12 ff. - -[270] ii. 2 goes with the previous chapter. See above, pp. 94 f. - -[271] ii. 13, iii. 5. - -[272] See above, Vol. I., Chap. IV., especially pp. 54 ff. - -[273] ii. 8. - -[274] _Isaiah xl.—lxvi._ (Expositor’s Bible), pp. 197 ff. - -[275] Read מַפֵּץ with Wellhausen (cf. Siegfried-Stade’s _Wörterbuch_, -sub פּוּץ) for מֵפִיץ, _Breaker in pieces_. In Jer. li. 20 Babylon is -also called by Jehovah His מַפֵּץ, _Hammer_ or _Maul_. - -[276] _Keep watch_, Wellhausen. - -[277] This may be a military call to attention, the converse of “Stand -at ease!” - -[278] Heb. literally: _brace up thy power exceedingly_. - -[279] Heb. singular. - -[280] Rev. ix. 17. Purple or red was the favourite colour of the Medes. -The Assyrians also loved red. - -[281] Read כאשׁ for באשׁ. - -[282] פלדות, the word omitted, is doubtful; it does not occur -elsewhere. LXX. ἡνίαι; Vulg. _habenæ_. Some have thought that it means -_scythes_—cf. the Arabic _falad_, “to cut”—but the earliest notice of -chariots armed with scythes is at the battle of Cunaxa, and in Jewish -literature they do not appear before 2 Macc. xiii. 2. Cf. Jeremias, -_op. cit._, p. 97, where Billerbeck suggests that the words of Nahum -are applicable to the covered siege-engines, pictured on the Assyrian -monuments, from which the besiegers flung torches on the walls: cf. -_ibid._, p. 167, n. ***. But from the parallelism of the verse it is -more probable that ordinary chariots are meant. The leading chariots -were covered with plates of metal (Billerbeck, p. 167). - -[283] So LXX., reading פרשים for ברשים of Heb. text, that means -_fir-trees_. If the latter be correct, then we should need to suppose -with Billerbeck that either the long lances of the Aryan Medes were -meant, or the great, heavy spears which were thrust against the walls -by engines. We are not, however, among these yet; it appears to be the -cavalry and chariots in the open that are here described. - -[284] Or _broad places_ or _suburbs_. See above, pp. 100 f. - -[285] See above, p. 106, end of n. 282. - -[286] Heb. _They stumble in their goings._ Davidson holds this is -more probably of the defenders. Wellhausen takes the verse as of the -besiegers. See next note. - -[287] הסֹּכֵךְ. Partic. of the verb _to cover_, hence covering thing: -whether _mantlet_ (on the side of the besiegers) or _bulwark_ (on -the side of the besieged: cf. מָסָךְ, Isa. xxii. 8) is uncertain. -Billerbeck says, if it be an article of defence, we can read ver. 5 -as illustrating the vanity of the hurried defence, when the elements -themselves break in vv. 6 and 7 (p. 101: cf. p. 176, n. *). - -[288] _Sluices_ (Jeremias) or _bridge-gates_ (Wellhausen)? - -[289] Or _breaks into motion_, i.e. _flight_. - -[290] הֻצּב, if a Hebrew word, might be Hophal of נצב and has been -taken to mean _it is determined, she_ (Niniveh) _is taken captive_. -Volck (in Herzog), Kleinert, Orelli: _it is settled_. LXX. ὑπόστασις = -מצב. Vulg. _miles_ (as if some form of צבא?). Hitzig points it הַצָּב, -_the lizard_, Wellhausen _the toad_. But this noun is masculine (Lev. -xi. 29) and the verbs feminine. Davidson suggests the other הַצָּב, -fem., the _litter_ or _palanquin_ (Isa. lxvi. 20): “in lieu of anything -better one might be tempted to think that the litter might mean the -woman or lady, just as in Arab. ḍḥa’inah means a woman’s litter and -then a woman.” One is also tempted to think of הַצְּבי, _the beauty_. -The Targ. has מלכתא, _the queen_. From as early as at least 1527 -(_Latina Interpretatio_ Xantis Pagnini Lucensis revised and edited -for the Plantin Bible, 1615) the word has been taken by a series of -scholars as a proper name, Huṣṣab. So Ewald and others. It may be an -Assyrian word, like some others in Nahum. Perhaps, again, the text is -corrupt. - -Mr. Paul Ruben (_Academy_, March 7th, 1896) has proposed instead of -העלתה, _is brought forth_, to read העתלה, and to translate it by -analogy of the Assyrian “etellu,” fem. “etellitu” = great or exalted, -_The Lady_. The line would then run _Huṣṣab, the lady, is stripped_. -(With העתלה Cheyne, _Academy_, June 21st, 1896, compares עתליה, which, -he suggests, is “Yahwe is great” or “is lord.”) - -[291] Heb. מֵימֵי הִיא for מימי אשר היא, _from days she was_. A.V. _is -of old_. R.V. _hath been of old_, and Marg. _from the days that she -hath been_. LXX. _her waters_, מֵימֶיהָ. On waters fleeing, cf. Ps. -civ. 7. - -[292] Buḳah, umebuḳah, umebullāḳah. Ewald: _desert and desolation and -devastation_. The adj. are feminine. - -[293] Literally: _and the faces of all them gather lividness_. - -[294] For מרעה Wellhausen reads מערה, _cave_ or _hold_. - -[295] LXX., reading לבוא for לביא. - -[296] Heb. _her chariots_. LXX. and Syr. suggest _thy mass_ or -_multitude_, רבכה. Davidson suggests _thy lair_, רבצכה. - -[297] Literally _and the chariot dancing_, but the word, merakedah, has -a rattle in it. - -[298] Doubtful, מַעֲלֶה. LXX. ἀναβαίνοντος. - -[299] Jeremias (104) shows how the Assyrians did this to female -captives. - -[300] Jer. xlvi. 25: _I will punish Amon at No_. Ezek. xxx. 14-16: -_... judgments in No.... I will cut off No-Amon_ (Heb. and A.V. -_multitude of No_, reading המון; so also LXX. τὸ πλῆθος for אמון) -_... and No shall be broken up_. It is Thebes, the Egyptian name of -which was Nu-Amen. The god Amen had his temple there: Herod. I. 182, -II. 42. Nahum refers to Assurbanipal’s account of the fall of Thebes. -See above, p. 11. - -[301] היארים. Pl. of the word for Nile. - -[302] Arabs still call the Nile the sea. - -[303] So LXX., reading מַיִם for Heb. מִיָּם. - -[304] So LXX.; Heb. _thee_. - -[305] Heb. _be drunken_. - -[306] I.e. _against_, _because of_. - -[307] Jer. l. 37, li. 30. - -[308] Heb. and LXX. add _devour thee like the locust_, probably a gloss. - -[309] Cf. Jer. ix. 33. Some take it of the locusts stripping the skin -which confines their wings: Davidson. - -[310] מנזריך. A.V. _thy crowned ones_; but perhaps like its -neighbour an Assyrian word, meaning we know not what. Wellhausen reads -ממזרך, LXX. ὁ συμμικτός σοῦ (applied in Deut. xxiii. 3 and Zech. ix. 6 -to the offspring of a mixed marriage between an Israelite and a -Gentile), deine Mischlinge: a term of contempt for the floating foreign -or semi-foreign population which filled Niniveh and was ready to fly at -sight of danger. Similarly Wellhausen takes the second term, טפסר. -This, which occurs also in Jer. li. 27, appears to be some kind of -official. In Assyrian _dupsar_ is scribe, which may, like Heb. שׁטר, -have been applied to any high official. See Schrader, _K.A.T._, Eng. -Tr., I. 141, II. 118. See also Fried. Delitzsch, _Wo lag Parad._, p. -142. The name and office were ancient. Such Babylonian officials are -mentioned in the Tell el Amarna letters as present at the Egyptian -court. - -[311] Heb. _day of cold_. - -[312] ישכנו, _dwell_, is the Heb. reading. But LXX. ישנו, -ἐκοίμισεν. Sleep must be taken in the sense of death: cf. Jer. li. 39, -57; Isa. xiv. 18. - - - - - _HABAKKUK_ - - - - - _Upon my watch-tower will I stand, - And take up my post on the rampart. - I will watch to see what He will say to me, - And what answer I get back to my plea._ - - * * * * * - - _The righteous shall live by his faithfulness._ - - - “The beginning of speculation in Israel.” - - - - - CHAPTER IX - - _THE BOOK OF HABAKKUK_ - - -As it has reached us, the Book of Habakkuk, under the title _The Oracle -which Habakkuk the prophet received by vision_, consists of three -chapters, which fall into three sections. _First:_ chap. i. 2—ii. 4 -(or 8), a piece in dramatic form; the prophet lifts his voice to God -against the wrong and violence of which his whole horizon is full, and -God sends him answer. _Second:_ chap. ii. 5 (or 9)-20, a taunt-song -in a series of Woes upon the wrong-doer. _Third:_ chap. iii., part -psalm, part prayer, descriptive of a Theophany and expressive of -Israel’s faith in their God. Of these three sections no one doubts the -authenticity of the _first_; opinion is divided about the _second_; -about the _third_ there is a growing agreement that it is not a genuine -work of Habakkuk, but a poem from a period after the Exile. - - -1. CHAP. I. 2—II. 4 (OR 8). - -Yet it is the first piece which raises the most difficult questions. -All[313] admit that it is to be dated somewhere along the line of -Jeremiah’s long career, _c._ 627—586. There is no doubt about the -general trend of the argument: it is a plaint to God on the sufferings -of the righteous under tyranny, with God’s answer. But the order and -connection of the paragraphs of the argument are not clear. There is -also difference of opinion as to who the tyrant is—native, Assyrian or -Chaldee; and this leads to a difference, of course, about the date, -which ranges from the early years of Josiah to the end of Jehoiakim’s -reign, or from about 630 to 597. - -As the verses lie, their argument is this. In chap. i. 2-4 Habakkuk -asks the Lord how long the wicked are to oppress the righteous, to -the paralysing of the Torah, or Revelation of His Law, and the making -futile of judgment. For answer the Lord tells him, vv. 5-11, to look -round among the heathen: He is about to raise up the Chaldees to do His -work, a people swift, self-reliant, irresistible. Upon which Habakkuk -resumes his question, vv. 12-17, how long will God suffer a tyrant -who sweeps up the peoples into his net like fish? Is he to go on with -this for ever? In ii. 1 Habakkuk prepares for an answer, which comes -in ii. 2, 3, 4: let the prophet wait for the vision though it tarries; -the proud oppressor cannot last, but the righteous shall live by his -constancy, or faithfulness. - -The difficulties are these. Who are the wicked oppressors in chap. i. -2-4? Are they Jews, or some heathen nation? And what is the connection -between vv. 1-4 and vv. 5-11? Are the Chaldees, who are described in -the latter, raised up to punish the tyrant complained against in the -former? To these questions three different sets of answers have been -given. - -_First:_ the great majority of critics take the wrong complained -of in vv. 2-4 to be wrong done by unjust and cruel Jews to their -countrymen, that is, civic disorder and violence, and believe that -in vv. 5-11 Jehovah is represented as raising up the Chaldees to -punish the sin of Judah—a message which is pretty much the same as -Jeremiah’s. But Habakkuk goes further: the Chaldees themselves with -their cruelties aggravate his problem, how God can suffer wrong, and -he appeals again to God, vv. 12-17. Are the Chaldees to be allowed to -devastate for ever? The answer is given, as above, in chap. ii. 1-4. -Such is practically the view of Pusey, Delitzsch, Kleinert, Kuenen, -Sinker,[314] Driver, Orelli, Kirkpatrick, Wildeboer and Davidson, a -formidable league, and Davidson says “this is the most natural sense of -the verses and of the words used in them.” But these scholars differ -as to the date. Pusey, Delitzsch and Volck take the whole passage from -i. 5 as prediction, and date it from before the rise of the Chaldee -power in 625, attributing the internal wrongs of Judah described in -vv. 2-4 to Manasseh’s reign or the early years of Josiah.[315] But -the rest, on the grounds that the prophet shows some experience of -the Chaldean methods of warfare, and that the account of the internal -disorder in Judah does not suit Josiah’s reign, bring the passage down -to the reign of Jehoiakim, 608—598, or of Jehoiachin, 597. Kleinert and -Von Orelli date it before the battle of Carchemish, 506, in which the -Chaldean Nebuchadrezzar wrested from Egypt the Empire of the Western -Asia, on the ground that after that Habakkuk could not have called -a Chaldean invasion of Judah incredible (i. 5). But Kuenen, Driver, -Kirkpatrick, Wildeboer and Davidson date it after Carchemish. To Driver -it must be immediately after, and before Judah became alarmed at the -consequences to herself. To Davidson the description of the Chaldeans -“is scarcely conceivable before the battle,” “hardly one would think -before the deportation of the people under Jehoiachin.”[316] This also -is Kuenen’s view, who thinks that Judah must have suffered at least the -first Chaldean raids, and he explains the use of an undoubted future in -chap. i. 5, _Lo, I am about to raise up the Chaldeans_, as due to the -prophet’s predilection for a dramatic style. “He sets himself in the -past, and represents the already experienced chastisement [of Judah] -as having been then announced by Jehovah. His contemporaries could not -have mistaken his meaning.” - -_Second:_ others, however, deny that chap. i. 2-4 refers to the -internal disorder of Judah, except as the effect of foreign tyranny. -The _righteous_ mentioned there are Israel as a whole, _the wicked_ -their heathen oppressors. So Hitzig, Ewald, König and practically -Smend. Ewald is so clear that Habakkuk ascribes no sin to Judah, that -he says we might be led by this to assign the prophecy to the reign of -the righteous Josiah; but he prefers, because of the vivid sense which -the prophet betrays of actual experience of the Chaldees, to date the -passage from the reign of Jehoiakim, and to explain Habakkuk’s silence -about his people’s sinfulness as due to his overwhelming impression of -Chaldean cruelty. König[317] takes vv. 2-4 as a general complaint of -the violence that fills the prophet’s day, and vv. 5-11 as a detailed -description of the Chaldeans, the instruments of this violence. -Vv. 5-11, therefore, give not the judgment upon the wrongs described in -vv. 2-4, but the explanation of them. Lebanon is already wasted by the -Chaldeans (ii. 17); therefore the whole prophecy must be assigned to -the days of Jehoiakim. Giesebrecht[318] and Wellhausen adhere to the -view that no sins of Judah are mentioned, but that the _righteous_ and -_wicked_ of chap. i. 4 are the same as in ver. 13, viz. Israel and a -heathen tyrant. But this leads them to dispute that the present order -of the paragraphs of the prophecy is the right one. In chap. i. 5 the -Chaldeans are represented as about to be raised up for the first time, -although their violence has already been described in vv. 1-4, and in -vv. 12-17 these are already in full career. Moreover ver. 12 follows on -naturally to ver. 4. Accordingly these critics would remove the section -vv. 5-11. Giesebrecht prefixes it to ver. 1, and dates the whole -passage from the Exile. Wellhausen calls 5-11 an older passage than the -rest of the prophecy, and removes it altogether as not Habakkuk’s. To -the latter he assigns what remains, i. 1-4, 12-17, ii. 1-5, and dates -it from the reign of Jehoiakim.[319] - -_Third:_ from each of these groups of critics Budde of Strasburg -borrows something, but so as to construct an arrangement of the verses, -and to reach a date, for the whole, from which both differ.[320] With -Hitzig, Ewald, König, Smend, Giesebrecht and Wellhausen he agrees that -the violence complained of in i. 2-4 is that inflicted by a heathen -oppressor, _the wicked_, on the Jewish nation, the _righteous_. But -with Kuenen and others he holds that the Chaldeans are raised up, -according to i. 5-11, to punish the violence complained of in i. 2-4 -and again in i. 12-17. In these verses it is the ravages of another -heathen power than the Chaldeans which Budde descries. The Chaldeans -are still to come, and cannot be the same as the devastator whose long -continued tyranny is described in i. 12-17. They are rather the power -which is to punish him. He can only be the Assyrian. But if that be so, -the proper place for the passage, i. 5-11, which describes the rise of -the Chaldeans must be after the description of the Assyrian ravages in -i. 12-17, and in the body of God’s answer to the prophet which we find -in ii. 2 ff. Budde, therefore, places i. 5-11 after ii. 2-4. But if the -Chaldeans are still to come, and Budde thinks that they are described -vaguely and with a good deal of imagination, the prophecy thus arranged -must fall somewhere between 625, when Nabopolassar the Chaldean made -himself independent of Assyria and King of Babylon, and 607, when -Assyria fell. That the prophet calls Judah _righteous_ is proof that he -wrote after the great Reform of 621; hence, too, his reference to Torah -and Mishpat (i. 4), and his complaint of the obstacles which Assyrian -supremacy presented to their free course. As the Assyrian yoke appears -not to have been felt anywhere in Judah by 608, Budde would fix the -exact date of Habakkuk’s prophecy about 615. To these conclusions of -Budde Cornill, who in 1891 had very confidently assigned the prophecy -of Habakkuk to the reign of Jehoiakim, gave his adherence in 1896.[321] - -Budde’s very able and ingenious argument has been subjected to a -searching criticism by Professor Davidson, who emphasises first the -difficulty of accounting for the transposition of chap. i. 5-11 from -what Budde alleges to have been its original place after ii. 4 to -its present position in chap. i.[322] He points out that if chap. i. -2-4 and 12-17 and ii. 5 ff. refer to the Assyrian, it is strange the -latter is not once mentioned. Again, by 615 we may infer (though we -know little of Assyrian history at this time) that the Assyrian’s hold -on Judah was already too relaxed for the prophet to impute to him -power to hinder the Law, especially as Josiah had begun to carry his -reforms into the northern kingdom; and the knowledge of the Chaldeans -displayed in i. 5-11 is too fresh and detailed[323] to suit so early a -date: it was possible only after the battle of Carchemish. And again, -it is improbable that we have two different nations, as Budde thinks, -described by the very similar phrases in i. 11, _his own power becomes -his god_, and in i. 16, _he sacrifices to his net_. Again, chap. i. -5-11 would not read quite naturally after chap. ii. 4. And in the woes -pronounced on the oppressor it is not one nation, the Chaldeans, which -are to spoil him, but all the remnant of the peoples (ii. 7, 8). - -These objections are not inconsiderable. But are they conclusive? And -if not, is any of the other theories of the prophecy less beset with -difficulties? - -The objections are scarcely conclusive. We have no proof that the power -of Assyria was altogether removed from Judah by 615; on the contrary, -even in 608 Assyria was still the power with which Egypt went forth -to contend for the empire of the world. Seven years earlier her hand -may well have been strong upon Palestine. Again, by 615 the Chaldeans, -a people famous in Western Asia for a long time, had been ten years -independent: men in Palestine may have been familiar with their methods -of warfare; at least it is impossible to say they were not.[324] There -is more weight in the objection drawn from the absence of the name of -Assyria from all of the passages which Budde alleges describe it; nor -do we get over all difficulties of text by inserting i. 5-11 between -ii. 4 and 5. Besides, how does Budde explain i. 12_b_ on the theory -that it means Assyria? Is the clause not premature at that point? Does -he propose to elide it, like Wellhausen? And in any case an erroneous -transposition of the original is impossible to prove and difficult to -account for.[325] - -But have not the other theories of the Book of Habakkuk equally great -difficulties? Surely, we cannot say that the _righteous_ and the -_wicked_ in i. 4 mean something different from what they do in i. 13? -But if this is impossible the construction of the book supported -by the great majority of critics[326] falls to the ground. Professor -Davidson justly says that it has “something artificial in it” and “puts -a strain on the natural sense.”[327] How can the Chaldeans be described -in i. 5 as _just about to be raised up_, and in 14-17 as already for -a long time the devastators of earth? Ewald’s, Hitzig’s and König’s -views[328] are equally beset by these difficulties; König’s exposition -also “strains the natural sense.” Everything, in fact, points to i. 5-11 -being out of its proper place; it is no wonder that Giesebrecht, -Wellhausen and Budde independently arrived at this conclusion.[329] -Whether Budde be right in inserting i. 5-11 after ii. 4, there can be -little doubt of the correctness of his views that i. 12-17 describe a -heathen oppressor who is not the Chaldeans. Budde says this oppressor -is Assyria. Can he be any one else? From 608 to 605 Judah was sorely -beset by Egypt, who had overrun all Syria up to the Euphrates. The -Egyptians killed Josiah, deposed his successor, and put their own -vassal under a very heavy tribute; _gold and silver were exacted of the -people of the land_: the picture of distress in i. 1-4 might easily -be that of Judah in these three terrible years. And if we assigned -the prophecy to them, we should certainly give it a date at which the -knowledge of the Chaldeans expressed in i. 5-11 was more probable than -at Budde’s date of 615. But then does the description in chap, i. 14-17 -suit Egypt so well as it does Assyria? We can hardly affirm this, until -we know more of what Egypt did in those days, but it is very probable. - -Therefore, the theory supported by the majority of critics being -unnatural, we are, with our present meagre knowledge of the time, flung -back upon Budde’s interpretation that the prophet in i. 2—ii. 4 appeals -from oppression by a heathen power, which is not the Chaldean, but upon -which the Chaldean shall bring the just vengeance of God. The tyrant is -either Assyria up to about 615 or Egypt from 608 to 605, and there is -not a little to be said for the latter date. - -In arriving at so uncertain a conclusion about i.—ii. 4, we have but -these consolations, that no other is possible in our present knowledge, -and that the uncertainty will not hamper us much in our appreciation of -Habakkuk’s spiritual attitude and poetic gifts.[330] - - - 2. CHAP. II. 5-20. - -The dramatic piece i. 2—ii. 4 is succeeded by a series of fine -taunt-songs, starting after an introduction from 6_b_, then 9, 11, 15 -and (18) 19, and each opening with _Woe!_ Their subject is, if we take -Budde’s interpretation of the dramatic piece, the Assyrian and not the -Chaldean[331] tyrant. The text, as we shall see when we come to it, -is corrupt. Some words are manifestly wrong, and the rhythm must have -suffered beyond restoration. In all probability these fine lyric Woes, -or at least as many of them as are authentic—for there is doubt about -one or two—were of equal length. Whether they all originally had the -refrain now attached to two is more doubtful. - -Hitzig suspected the authenticity of some parts of this series of -songs. Stade[332] and Kuenen have gone further and denied the -genuineness of vv. 9-20. But this is with little reason. As Budde says, -a series of Woes was to be expected here by a prophet who follows so -much the example of Isaiah.[333] In spite of Kuenen’s objection, vv. -9-11 would not be strange of the Chaldean, but they suit the Assyrian -better. Vv. 12-14 are doubtful: 12 recalls Micah iii. 10; 13 is a -repetition of Jer. li. 58; 14 is a variant of Isa. xi. 9. Very likely -Jer. li. 58, a late passage, is borrowed from this passage; yet the -addition used here, _Are not these things[334] from the Lord of Hosts?_ -looks as if it noted a citation. Vv. 15-17 are very suitable to the -Assyrian; there is no reason to take them from Habakkuk.[335] The final -song, vv. 18 and 19, has its Woe at the beginning of its second verse, -and closely resembles the language of later prophets.[336] Moreover the -refrain forms a suitable close at the end of ver. 17. Ver. 20 is a -quotation from Zephaniah,[337] perhaps another sign of the composite -character of the end of this chapter. Some take it to have been -inserted as an introduction to the theophany in chap. iii. - -Smend has drawn up a defence[338] of the whole passage, ii. 9-20, which -he deems not only to stand in a natural relation to vv. 4-8, but to be -indispensable to them. That the passage quotes from other prophets, he -holds to be no proof against its authenticity. If we break off with -ver. 8, he thinks that we must impute to Habakkuk the opinion that the -wrongs of the world are chiefly avenged by human means—a conclusion -which is not to be expected after chap. i.—ii. 1 ff. - - - 3. CHAP. III. - -The third chapter, an Ode or Rhapsody, is ascribed to Habakkuk by -its title. This, however, does not prove its authenticity: the title -is too like those assigned to the Psalms in the period of the Second -Temple.[339] On the contrary, the title itself, the occurrence of the -musical sign Selah in the contents, and the colophon suggest for the -chapter a liturgical origin after the Exile.[340] That this is more -probable than the alternative opinion, that, being a genuine work of -Habakkuk, the chapter was afterwards arranged as a Psalm for public -worship, is confirmed by the fact that no other work of the prophets -has been treated in the same way. Nor do the contents support the -authorship by Habakkuk. They reflect no definite historical situation -like the preceding chapters. The style and temper are different. While -in them the prophet speaks for himself, here it is the nation or -congregation of Israel that addresses God. The language is not, as some -have maintained, late;[341] but the designation of the people as _Thine -anointed_, a term which before the Exile was applied to the king, -undoubtedly points to a post-exilic date. The figures, the theophany -itself, are not necessarily archaic, but are more probably moulded on -archaic models. There are many affinities with Psalms of a late date. - -At the same time a number of critics[342] maintain the genuineness of -the chapter, and they have some grounds for this. Habakkuk was, as we -can see from chaps. i. and ii., a real poet. There was no need why -a man of his temper should be bound down to reflecting only his own -day. If so practical a prophet as Hosea, and one who has so closely -identified himself with his times, was wont to escape from them to a -retrospect of the dealings of God with Israel from of old, why should -not the same be natural for a prophet who was much less practical and -more literary and artistic? There are also many phrases in the Psalm -which may be interpreted as reflecting the same situation as chaps. i., -ii. All this, however, only proves possibility. - -The Psalm has been adapted in Psalm lxxvii. 17-20. - - - FURTHER NOTE ON CHAP. I.—II. 4. - - Since this chapter was in print Nowack’s _Die Kleinen Propheten_ - in the “Handkommentar z. A. T.” has been published. He recognises - emphatically that the disputed passage about the Chaldeans, chap. - i. 5-11, is out of place where it lies (this against Kuenen and the - other authorities cited above, p. 117), and admits that it follows on, - with a natural connection, to chap. ii. 4, to which Budde proposes to - attach it. Nevertheless, for other reasons, which he does not state, - he regards Budde’s proposal as untenable; and reckons the disputed - passage to be by another hand than Habakkuk’s, and intruded into - the latter’s argument. Habakkuk’s argument he assigns to after 605; - perhaps 590. The tyrant complained against would therefore be the - Chaldean.—Driver in the 6th ed. of his _Introduction_ (1897) deems - Budde’s argument “too ingenious,” and holds by the older and most - numerously supported argument (above, pp. 116 ff.).—On a review of - the case in the light of these two discussions, the present writer - holds to his opinion that Budde’s rearrangement, which he has adopted, - offers the fewest difficulties. - -FOOTNOTES: - -[313] Except one or two critics who place it in Manasseh’s reign. See -below. - -[314] See next note. - -[315] So Pusey. Delitzsch in his commentary on Habakkuk, 1843, -preferred Josiah’s reign, but in his _O. T. Hist. of Redemption_, 1881, -p. 226, Manasseh’s. Volck (in Herzog, _Real Encyc._,² art. “Habakkuk,” -1879), assuming that Habakkuk is quoted both by Zephaniah (see above, -p. 39, n.) and Jeremiah, places him before these. Sinker (_The Psalm -of Habakkuk_: see below, p. 127, n. 2) deems “the prophecy, taken as a -whole,” to bring “before us the threat of the Chaldean invasion, the -horrors that follow in its train,” etc., with a vision of the day “when -the Chaldean host itself, its work done, falls beneath a mightier foe.” -He fixes the date either in the concluding years of Manasseh’s reign, -or the opening years of that of Josiah (Preface, 1-4). - -[316] Pages 53, 49. Kirkpatrick (Smith’s _Dict. of the Bible_,² art. -“Habakkuk,” 1893) puts it not later than the sixth year of Jehoiakim. - -[317] _Einl. in das A. T._ - -[318] _Beiträge zur Jesaiakritik_, 1890, pp. 197 f. - -[319] See Further Note on p. 128. - -[320] _Studien u. Kritiken_ for 1893. - -[321] Cf. the opening of § 30 in the first edition of his _Einleitung_ -with that of § 34 in the third and fourth editions. - -[322] Budde’s explanation of this is, that to the later editors of the -book, long after the Babylonian destruction of Jews, it was incredible -that the Chaldean should be represented as the deliverer of Israel, and -so the account of him was placed where, while his call to punish Israel -for her sins was not emphasised, he should be pictured as destined to -doom; and so the prophecy originally referring to the Assyrian was read -of him. “This is possible,” says Davidson, “if it be true criticism is -not without its romance.” - -[323] This in opposition to Budde’s statement that the description of -the Chaldeans in i. 5-11 “ist eine phantastische Schilderung” (p. 387). - -[324] It is, however, a serious question whether it would be possible -in 615 to describe the Chaldeans as _a nation that traversed the -breadth of the earth to occupy dwelling-places that were not his own_ -(i. 6). This suits better after the battle of Carchemish. - -[325] See above, p. 121, n. 322. - -[326] See above, pp. 114 ff. - -[327] Pages 49 and 50. - -[328] See above, pp. 118 f. - -[329] Wellhausen in 1873 (see p. 661); Giesebrecht in 1890; Budde in -1892, before he had seen the opinions of either of the others (see -_Stud. und Krit._, 1893, p. 386, n. 2). - -[330] Cornill quotes a rearrangement of chaps, i., ii., by Rothstein, -who takes i. 2-4, 12 _a_, 13, ii. 1-3, 4, 5 _a_, i. 6-10, 14, 15 _a_, -ii. 6 _b_, 7, 9, 10 _a_ _b_ β, 11, 15, 16, 19, 18, as an oracle against -Jehoiakim and the godless in Israel about 605, which during the Exile -was worked up into the present oracle against Babylon. Cornill esteems -it “too complicated.” Budde (_Expositor_, 1895, pp. 372 ff.) and Nowack -hold it untenable. - -[331] As of course was universally supposed according to either of the -other two interpretations given above. - -[332] _Z.A.T.W._, 1884, p. 154. - -[333] Cf. Isa. v. 8 ff. (x. 1-4), etc. - -[334] So LXX. - -[335] Cf. Davidson, p. 56, and Budde, p. 391, who allows 9-11 and 15-17. - -[336] _E.g._ Isa. xl. 18 ff., xliv. 9 ff., xlvi. 5 ff., etc. On this -ground it is condemned by Stade, Kuenen and Budde. Davidson finds this -not a serious difficulty, for, he points out, Habakkuk anticipates -several later lines of thought. - -[337] See above, p. 39, n. - -[338] _A. T. Religionsgeschichte_, p. 229, n. 2. - -[339] Cf. the ascription by the LXX. of Psalms cxlvi.-cl. to the -prophets Haggai and Zechariah. - -[340] Cf. Kuenen, who conceives it to have been taken from a -post-exilic collection of Psalms. See also Cheyne, _The Origin of the -Psalter_: “exilic or more probably post-exilic” (p. 125). “The most -natural position for it is in the Persian period. It was doubtless -appended to Habakkuk, for the same reason for which Isa. lxiii. 7—lxiv. -was attached to the great prophecy of Restoration, viz. that the -earlier national troubles seemed to the Jewish Church to be typical -of its own sore troubles after the Return.... The lovely closing -verses of Hab. iii. are also in a tone congenial to the later religion” -(p. 156). Much less certain is the assertion that the language is -imitative and artificial (_ibid._); while the statement that in ver. -3—cf. with Deut. xxxiii. 2—we have an instance of the effort to avoid -the personal name of the Deity (p. 287) is disproved by the use of the -latter in ver. 2 and other verses. - -[341] ישע את, ver. 13, cannot be taken as a proof of lateness; -read probably הושיע את. - -[342] Pusey, Ewald, König, Sinker (_The Psalm of Habakkuk_, Cambridge, -1890), Kirkpatrick (Smith’s _Bible Dict._, art. “Habakkuk”), Von Orelli. - - - - - CHAPTER X - - _THE PROPHET AS SCEPTIC_ - - HABAKKUK i.—ii. 4 - - -Of the prophet Habakkuk we know nothing that is personal save his -name—to our ears his somewhat odd name. It is the intensive form of a -root which means to caress or embrace. More probably it was given to -him as a child, than afterwards assumed as a symbol of his clinging to -God.[343] - -Tradition says that Habakkuk was a priest, the son of Joshua, of the -tribe of Levi, but this is only an inference from the late liturgical -notes to the Psalm which has been appended to his prophecy.[344] All -that we know for certain is that he was a contemporary of Jeremiah, -with a sensitiveness under wrong and impulses to question God which -remind us of Jeremiah; but with a literary power which is quite his -own. We may emphasise the latter, even though we recognise upon his -writing the influence of Isaiah’s. - -Habakkuk’s originality, however, is deeper than style. He is the -earliest who is known to us of a new school of religion in Israel. He -is called _prophet_, but at first he does not adopt the attitude which -is characteristic of the prophets. His face is set in an opposite -direction to theirs. They address the nation Israel, on behalf of God: -he rather speaks to God on behalf of Israel. Their task was Israel’s -sin, the proclamation of God’s doom and the offer of His grace to their -penitence. Habakkuk’s task is God Himself, the effort to find out -what He means by permitting tyranny and wrong. They attack the sins, -he is the first to state the problems, of life. To him the prophetic -revelation, the Torah, is complete: it has been codified in Deuteronomy -and enforced by Josiah. Habakkuk’s business is not to add to it but -to ask why it does not work. Why does God suffer wrong to triumph, -so that the Torah is paralysed, and Mishpat, the prophetic _justice_ -or _judgment_, comes to nought? The prophets travailed for Israel’s -character—to get the people to love justice till justice prevailed -among them: Habakkuk feels justice cannot prevail in Israel, because of -the great disorder which God permits to fill the world. It is true that -he arrives at a prophetic attitude, and before the end authoritatively -declares God’s will; but he begins by searching for the latter, with -an appreciation of the great obscurity cast over it by the facts of -life. He complains to God, asks questions and expostulates. This is -the beginning of speculation in Israel. It does not go far: it is -satisfied with stating questions _to_ God; it does not, directly at -least, state questions _against_ Him. But Habakkuk at least feels that -revelation is baffled by experience, that the facts of life bewilder a -man who believes in the God whom the prophets have declared to Israel. -As in Zephaniah prophecy begins to exhibit traces of apocalypse, so in -Habakkuk we find it developing the first impulses of speculation. - -We have seen that the course of events which troubles Habakkuk -and renders the Torah ineffectual is somewhat obscure. On one -interpretation of these two chapters, that which takes the present -order of their verses as the original, Habakkuk asks why God is silent -in face of the injustice which fills the whole horizon (chap. i. 1-4), -is told to look round among the heathen and see how God is raising up -the Chaldeans (i. 5-11), presumably to punish this injustice (if it be -Israel’s own) or to overthrow it (if vv. 1-4 mean that it is inflicted -on Israel by a foreign power). But the Chaldeans only aggravate the -prophet’s problem; they themselves are a wicked and oppressive people: -how can God suffer them? (i. 12-17). Then come the prophet’s waiting -for an answer (ii. 1) and the answer itself (ii. 2 ff.). Another -interpretation takes the passage about the Chaldeans (i. 5-11) to be -out of place where it now lies, removes it to after chap. ii. 4 as a -part of God’s answer to the prophet’s problem, and leaves the remainder -of chap. i. as the description of the Assyrian oppression of Israel, -baffling the Torah and perplexing the prophet’s faith in a Holy and -Just God.[345] Of these two views the former is, we have seen, somewhat -artificial, and though the latter is by no means proved, the arguments -for it are sufficient to justify us in re-arranging the verses chap. -i.—ii. 4 in accordance with its proposals. - - _The Oracle which Habakkuk the Prophet - Received by Vision._[346] - - _How long, O Jehovah, have I called and Thou hearest not? - I cry to Thee, Wrong! and Thou sendest no help. - Why make me look upon sorrow, - And fill mine eyes with trouble? - Violence and wrong are before me, - Strife comes and quarrel arises.[347] - So the Law is benumbed, and judgment never gets forth:[348] - For the wicked beleaguers the righteous, - So judgment comes forth perverted._[349] - - * * * * * - - _Art not Thou of old, Jehovah, my God, my Holy One?...[350] - Purer of eyes than to behold evil, - And that canst not gaze upon trouble! - Why gazest Thou upon traitors,[351] - Art dumb when the wicked swallows him that is - more righteous than he?[352] - Thou hast let men be made[353] like fish of the sea, - Like worms that have no ruler![354] - He lifts the whole of it with his angle; - Draws it in with his net, sweeps it in his drag-net: - So rejoices and exults. - So he sacrifices to his net, and offers incense to his drag-net; - For by them is his portion fat, and his food rich. - Shall he for ever draw his sword,[355] - And ceaselessly, ruthlessly massacre nations?[356]_ - - _Upon my watch-tower I will stand, - And take my post on the rampart.[357] - I will watch to see what He will say to me, - And what answer I[358] get back to my plea._ - - _And Jehovah answered me and said: - Write the vision, and make it plain upon tablets, - That he may run who reads it. - For[359] the vision is for a time yet to be fixed, - Yet it hurries[360] to the end, and shall not fail: - Though it linger, wait thou for it; - Coming it shall come, and shall not be behind.[361] - Lo! swollen,[362] not level is his[363] soul within him; - But the righteous shall live by his faithfulness.[364]_ - - * * * * * - - _Look[365] round among the heathen, and look well, - Shudder and be shocked;[366] - For I am[367] about to do a work in your days, - Ye shall not believe it when told. - For, lo, I am about to raise up the Kasdim,[368] - A people the most bitter and the most hasty, - That traverse the breadths of the earth, - To possess dwelling-places not their own. - Awful and terrible are they; - From themselves[369] start their purpose and rising. - Fleeter than leopards their steeds, - Swifter than night-wolves. - Their horsemen leap[370] from afar; - They swoop like the eagle a-haste to devour. - All for wrong do they[371] come; - The set of their faces is forward,[372] - And they sweep up captives like sand. - They—at kings do they scoff, - And princes are sport to them. - They—they laugh at each fortress, - Heap dust up and take it! - Then the wind shifts,[373] and they pass! - But doomed are those whose own strength is their god![374]_ - -The difficulty of deciding between the various arrangements of the -two chapters of Habakkuk does not, fortunately, prevent us from -appreciating his argument. What he feels throughout (this is obvious, -however you arrange his verses) is the tyranny of a great heathen -power,[375] be it Assyrian, Egyptian or Chaldean. The prophet’s horizon -is filled with wrong:[376] Israel thrown into disorder, revelation -paralysed, justice perverted.[377] But, like Nahum, Habakkuk feels not -for Israel alone. The Tyrant has outraged humanity.[378] He _sweeps -peoples into his net_, and as soon as he empties this, he fills it -again _ceaselessly_, as if there were no just God above. He exults in -his vast cruelty, and has success so unbroken that he worships the very -means of it. In itself such impiety is gross enough, but to a heart -that believes in God it is a problem of exquisite pain. Habakkuk’s is -the burden of the finest faith. He illustrates the great commonplace of -religious doubt, that problems arise and become rigorous in proportion -to the purity and tenderness of a man’s conception of God. It is -not the coarsest but the finest temperaments which are exposed to -scepticism. Every advance in assurance of God or in appreciation of His -character develops new perplexities in face of the facts of experience, -and faith becomes her own most cruel troubler. Habakkuk’s questions -are not due to any cooling of the religious temper in Israel, but are -begotten of the very heat and ardour of prophecy in its encounter with -experience. His tremulousness, for instance, is impossible without the -high knowledge of God’s purity and faithfulness, which older prophets -had achieved in Israel:— - - _Art not Thou of old, O LORD, my God, my Holy One, - Purer of eyes than to behold evil, - And incapable of looking upon wrong?_ - -His despair is that which comes only from eager and persevering habits -of prayer:— - - _How long, O LORD, have I called and Thou hearest not! - I cry to Thee of wrong and Thou givest no help!_ - -His questions, too, are bold with that sense of God’s absolute power, -which flashed so bright in Israel as to blind men’s eyes to all -secondary and intermediate causes. _Thou_, he says,— - - _Thou hast made men like fishes of the sea, - Like worms that have no ruler_, - -boldly charging the Almighty, in almost the temper of Job himself, -with being the cause of the cruelty inflicted by the unchecked tyrant -upon the nations; _for shall evil happen, and Jehovah not have done -it_?[379] Thus all through we perceive that Habakkuk’s trouble springs -from the central founts of prophecy. This scepticism—if we may venture -to give the name to the first motions in Israel’s mind of that temper -which undoubtedly became scepticism—this scepticism was the inevitable -heritage of prophecy: the stress and pain to which prophecy was forced -by its own strong convictions in face of the facts of experience. -Habakkuk, _the prophet_, as he is called, stood in the direct line of -his order, but just because of that he was the father also of Israel’s -religious doubt. - -But a discontent springing from sources so pure was surely the -preparation of its own healing. In a verse of exquisite beauty the -prophet describes the temper in which he trusted for an answer to all -his doubts:— - - _On my watch-tower will I stand, - And take up my post on the rampart; - I will watch to see what He says to me, - And what answer I get back to my plea._ - -This verse is not to be passed over, as if its metaphors were merely -of literary effect. They express rather the moral temper in which -the prophet carries his doubt, or, to use New Testament language, -_the good conscience, which some having put away, concerning faith -have made shipwreck_. Nor is this temper patience only and a certain -elevation of mind, nor only a fixed attention and sincere willingness -to be answered. Through the chosen words there breathes a noble -sense of responsibility. The prophet feels he has a post to hold, a -rampart to guard. He knows the heritage of truth, won by the great -minds of the past; and in a world seething with disorder, he will -take his stand upon that and see what more his God will send him. At -the very least, he will not indolently drift, but feel that he has a -standpoint, however narrow, and bravely hold it. Such has ever been the -attitude of the greatest sceptics—not only, let us repeat, earnestness -and sincerity, but the recognition of duty towards the truth: the -conviction that even the most tossed and troubled minds have somewhere -a ποῦ στῶ appointed of God, and upon it interests human and divine to -defend. Without such a conscience, scepticism, however intellectually -gifted, will avail nothing. Men who drift never discover, never grasp -aught. They are only dazzled by shifting gleams of the truth, only -fretted and broken by experience. - -Taking then his stand within the patient temper, but especially -upon the conscience of his great order, the prophet waits for his -answer and the healing of his trouble. The answer comes to him in the -promise of _a Vision_, which, though it seem to linger, will not be -later than the time fixed by God. _A Vision_ is something realised, -experienced—something that will be as actual and present to the -waiting prophet as the cruelty which now fills his sight. Obviously -some series of historical events is meant, by which, in the course of -time, the unjust oppressor of the nations shall be overthrown and the -righteous vindicated. Upon the re-arrangement of the text proposed by -Budde,[380] this series of events is the rise of the Chaldeans, and it -is an argument in favour of his proposal that the promise of _a Vision_ -requires some such historical picture to follow it as we find in the -description of the Chaldeans—chap. i. 5-11. This, too, is explicitly -introduced by terms of vision: _See among the nations and look -round.... Yea, behold I am about to raise up the Kasdim._ But before -this Vision is given,[381] and for the uncertain interval of waiting -ere the facts come to pass, the Lord enforces upon His watching servant -the great moral principle that arrogance and tyranny cannot, from the -nature of them, last, and that if the righteous be only patient he will -survive them:— - - _Lo, swollen, not level, is his soul within him; - But the righteous shall live by his faithfulness._ - -We have already seen[382] that the text of the first line of this -couplet is uncertain. Yet the meaning is obvious, partly in the words -themselves, and partly by their implied contrast with the second -line. The soul of the wicked is a radically morbid thing: _inflated_, -_swollen_ (unless we should read _perverted_, which more plainly means -the same thing[383]), not _level_, not natural and normal. In the -nature of things it cannot endure. _But the righteous shall live by -his faithfulness._ This word, wrongly translated _faith_ by the Greek -and other versions, is concentrated by Paul in his repeated quotation -from the Greek[384] upon that single act of faith by which the sinner -secures forgiveness and justification. With Habakkuk it is a wider -term. _’Emunah_,[385] from a verb meaning originally to be firm, is -used in the Old Testament in the physical sense of steadfastness. -So it is applied to the arms of Moses held up by Aaron and Hur over -the battle with Amalek: _they were steadiness till the going down of -the sun_.[386] It is also used of the faithful discharge of public -office,[387] and of fidelity as between man and wife.[388] It is also -faithful testimony,[389] equity in judgment,[390] truth in speech,[391] -and sincerity or honest dealing.[392] Of course it has faith in God -as its secret—the verb from which it is derived is the regular Hebrew -term to believe—but it is rather the temper which faith produces of -endurance, steadfastness, integrity. Let the righteous, however baffled -his faith be by experience, hold on in loyalty to God and duty, and he -shall live. Though St. Paul, as we have said, used the Greek rendering -of _faith_ for the enforcement of trust in God’s mercy through -Jesus Christ as the secret of forgiveness and life, it is rather to -Habakkuk’s wider intention of patience and fidelity that the author -of the Epistle to the Hebrews returns in his fuller quotation of the -verse: _For yet a little while and He that shall come will come and -will not tarry; now the just shall live by faith, but if he draw back -My soul shall have no pleasure in him._[393] - -Such then is the tenor of the passage. In face of experience that -baffles faith, the duty of Israel is patience in loyalty to God. -In this the nascent scepticism of Israel received its first great -commandment, and this it never forsook. Intellectual questions arose, -of which Habakkuk’s were but the faintest foreboding—questions -concerning not only the mission and destiny of the nation, but the -very foundation of justice and the character of God Himself. Yet -did no sceptic, however bold and however provoked, forsake his -_faithfulness_. Even Job, when most audaciously arraigning the God of -his experience, turned from Him to God as in his heart of hearts he -believed He must be, experience notwithstanding. Even the Preacher, -amid the aimless flux and drift which he finds in the universe, holds -to the conclusion of the whole matter in a command, which better -than any other defines the contents of the _faithfulness_ enforced -by Habakkuk: _Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the -whole of man._ It has been the same with the great mass of the race. -Repeatedly disappointed of their hopes, and crushed for ages beneath -an intolerable tyranny, have they not exhibited the same heroic temper -with which their first great questioner was endowed? Endurance—this -above all others has been the quality of Israel: _though He slay me, -yet will I trust Him_. And, therefore, as Paul’s adaptation, _The just -shall live by faith_, has become the motto of evangelical Christianity, -so we may say that Habakkuk’s original of it has been the motto and the -fame of Judaism: _The righteous shall live by his faithfulness._ - -FOOTNOTES: - -[343] חֲבַקּוּק (the Greek Ἁμβακουμ, LXX. version of the title of this -book, and again the inscription to _Bel and the Dragon_, suggests the -pointing חַבַּקוּק; Epiph., _De Vitis Proph._—see next note—spells it -Ἁββακουμ), from חבק, _to embrace_. Jerome: “He is called ‘embrace’ -either because of his love to the Lord, or because he wrestles with -God.” Luther: “Habakkuk means one who comforts and holds up his people -as one embraces a weeping person.” - -[344] See above, pp. 126 ff. The title to the Greek version of _Bel -and the Dragon_ bears that the latter was taken from the prophecy of -Hambakoum, son of Jesus, of the tribe of Levi. Further details are -offered in the _De Vitis Prophetarum_ of (Pseud-) Epiphanius, _Epiph. -Opera_, ed. Paris, 1622, Vol. II., p. 147, according to which Habakkuk -belonged to Βεθζοχηρ, which is probably Βεθζαχαριας of 1 Macc. vi. 32, -the modern Beit-Zakaryeh, a little to the north of Hebron, and placed -by this notice, as Nahum’s Elkosh is placed, in the tribe of Simeon. -His grave was shown in the neighbouring Keilah. The notice further -alleges that when Nebuchadrezzar came up to Jerusalem Habakkuk fled to -Ostracine, where he travelled in the country of the Ishmaelites; but he -returned after the fall of Jerusalem, and died in 538, two years before -the return of the exiles. _Bel and the Dragon_ tells an extraordinary -story of his miraculous carriage of food to Daniel in the lions’ den -soon after Cyrus had taken Babylon. - -[345] See above, pp. 119 ff. - -[346] Heb. _saw_. - -[347] Text uncertain. Perhaps we should read, _Why make me look upon -sorrow and trouble? why fill mine eyes with violence and wrong? Strife -is come before me, and quarrel arises_. - -[348] _Never gets away_, to use a colloquial expression. - -[349] Here vv. 5-11 come in the original. - -[350] Ver. 12_b_: _We shall not die_ (many Jewish authorities read -_Thou shalt not die_). _O Jehovah, for judgment hast Thou set him, and, -O my Rock, for punishment hast Thou appointed him._ - -[351] Wellhausen: _on the robbery of robbers_. - -[352] LXX. _devoureth the righteous_. - -[353] Literally _Thou hast made men_. - -[354] Wellhausen: cf. Jer. xviii. 1, xix. 1. - -[355] So Giesebrecht (see above, p. 119, n. 318), reading העולם יריק -חרבו for העל־כן יריק חרמו, _shall he therefore empty his net?_ - -[356] Wellhausen, reading יהרג for להרג: _should he therefore be -emptying his net continually, and slaughtering the nations without -pity?_ - -[357] מצור. But Wellhausen takes it as from נצר and = _ward_ or -_watch-tower_. So Nowack. - -[358] So Heb. and LXX.; but Syr. _he_: so Wellhausen, _what answer He -returns to my plea_. - -[359] Bredenkamp (_Stud. u. Krit._, 1889, pp. 161 ff.) suggests that -the writing on the tablets begins here and goes on to ver. 5_a_. Budde -(_Z.A.T.W._, 1889, pp. 155 f.) takes the כי which opens it as simply -equivalent to the Greek ὅτι, introducing, like our marks of quotation, -the writing itself. - -[360] וְיָפֵחַ: cf. Psalm xxvii. 12. Bredenkamp emends to וְיִפְרַח. - -[361] _Not be late_, or past its fixed time. - -[362] So literally the Heb. עֻפְּלָה, i.e. _arrogant_, _false_: cf. -the colloquial expression _swollen-head_ = conceit, as opposed to -level-headed. Bredenkamp, _Stud. u. Krit._, 1889, 121, reads הַנֶעֱלָף -for הִנֵּה עֻפְּלָה. Wellhausen suggests הִנֵּה הֶעַוָל, _Lo, the -sinner_, in contrast to צדיק of next clause. Nowack prefers this. - -[363] LXX. wrongly _my_. - -[364] LXX. πίδτις, _faith_, and so in N. T. - -[365] Chap. i. 5-11. - -[366] So to bring out the assonance, reading הִתְמַהְמְהוּ וּתִמָהוּ. - -[367] So LXX. - -[368] Or Chaldeans; on the name and people see above, p. 19. - -[369] Heb. singular. - -[370] Omit ופרשיו (evidently a dittography) and the lame יבאו which -is omitted by LXX. and was probably inserted to afford a verb for the -second פרשיו. - -[371] Heb. sing., and so in all the clauses here except the next. - -[372] A problematical rendering. מגמה is found only here, and probably -means _direction_. Hitzig translates _desire_, _effort_, _striving_. -קדימה, _towards the front_ or _forward_; but elsewhere it means only -_eastward_: קדים, _the east wind_. Cf. Judg. v. 21, נחל קדומים נחל -קישון, _a river of spates or rushes is the river Kishon_ (_Hist. -Geog._, p. 395). Perhaps we should change פניהים to a singular suffix, -as in the clauses before and after, and this would leave מ to form with -קדימה a participle from הקדים (cf. Amos ix. 10). - -[373] Or _their spirit changes_, or _they change like the wind_ -(Wellhausen suggests כרוח). Grätz reads כֺּחַ and יַחֲלִיף, _he renews -his strength_. - -[374] Von Orelli. For אשׁם Wellhausen proposes וְיָשִׂם, _and sets_. - -[375] _The wicked_ of chap. i. 4 must, as we have seen, be the same as -_the wicked_ of chap. i. 13—a heathen oppressor of _the righteous_, -_i.e._ the people of God. - -[376] i. 3. - -[377] i. 4. - -[378] i. 13-17. - -[379] Amos iii. 6. See Vol. I., p. 90. - -[380] See above, pp. 119 ff. - -[381] Its proper place in Budde’s re-arrangement is after chap. ii. 4. - -[382] Above, p. 134, n. 362. - -[383] עֻקְּלָה instead of עֻפְּלָה. - -[384] Rom. i. 17; Gal. iii. 11. - -[385] אֱמוּנָה. - -[386] Exod. xvii. 12. - -[387] 2 Chron. xix. 9. - -[388] Hosea ii. 22 (Heb.). - -[389] Prov. xiv. 5. - -[390] Isa. xi. 5. - -[391] Prov. xii. 17: cf. Jer. ix. 2. - -[392] Prov. xii. 22, xxviii. 30. - -[393] Heb. x. 37, 38. - - - - - CHAPTER XI - - _TYRANNY IS SUICIDE_ - - HABAKKUK ii. 5-20 - - -In the style of his master Isaiah, Habakkuk follows up his _Vision_ -with a series of lyrics on the same subject: chap. ii. 5-20. They are -taunt-songs, the most of them beginning with _Woe unto_, addressed to -the heathen oppressor. Perhaps they were all at first of equal length, -and it has been suggested that the striking refrain in which two of -them close— - - _For men’s blood, and earth’s waste, - Cities and their inhabitants_— - -was once attached to each of the others as well. But the text has been -too much altered, besides suffering several interpolations,[394] to -permit of its restoration, and we can only reproduce these taunts as -they now run in the Hebrew text. There are several quotations (not -necessarily an argument against Habakkuk’s authorship); but, as a -whole, the expression is original, and there are some lines of especial -force and freshness. Verses 5-6_a_ are properly an introduction, the -first Woe commencing with 6_b_. - -The belief which inspires these songs is very simple. Tyranny is -intolerable. In the nature of things it cannot endure, but works -out its own penalties. By oppressing so many nations, the tyrant is -preparing the instruments of his own destruction. As he treats them, -so in time shall they treat him. He is like a debtor who increases the -number of his creditors. Some day they shall rise up and exact from him -the last penny. So that in cutting off others he is _but forfeiting his -own life_. The very violence done to nature, the deforesting of Lebanon -for instance, and the vast hunting of wild beasts, shall recoil on -him. This line of thought is exceedingly interesting. We have already -seen in prophecy, and especially in Isaiah, the beginnings of Hebrew -Wisdom—the attempt to uncover the moral processes of life and express -a philosophy of history. But hardly anywhere have we found so complete -an absence of all reference to the direct interference of God Himself -in the punishment of the tyrant; for _the cup of Jehovah’s right -hand_ in ver. 16 is simply the survival of an ancient metaphor. These -_proverbs_ or _taunt-songs_, in conformity with the proverbs of the -later Wisdom, dwell only upon the inherent tendency to decay of all -injustice. Tyranny, they assert, and history ever since has affirmed -their truthfulness—tyranny is suicide. - -The last of the taunt-songs, which treats of the different subject of -idolatry, is probably, as we have seen, not from Habakkuk’s hand, but -of a later date.[395] - - - INTRODUCTION TO THE TAUNT-SONGS (ii. 5-6_a_). - - _For ...[396] treacherous, - An arrogant fellow, and is not ...[397] - Who opens his desire wide as Sheol; - He is like death, unsatisfied; - And hath swept to himself all the nations, - And gathered to him all peoples. - Shall not these, all of them, take up a proverb upon him, - And a taunt-song against him? and say:—_ - - - FIRST TAUNT-SONG (ii. 6_b_-8). - - _Woe unto him who multiplies what is not his own, - —How long?— - And loads him with debts![398] - Shall not thy creditors[399] rise up, - And thy troublers awake, - And thou be for spoil[400] to them? - Because thou hast spoiled many nations, - All the rest of the peoples shall spoil thee. - For men’s blood, and earth’s waste, - Cities and all their inhabitants._[401] - - - SECOND TAUNT-SONG (ii. 9-11). - - _Woe unto him that gains evil gain for his house,[402] - To set high his nest, to save him from the grasp of calamity! - Thou hast planned shame for thy house; - Thou hast cut off[403] many people, - While forfeiting thine own life.[404] - For the stone shall cry out from the wall, - And the lath[405] from the timber answer it._ - - - THIRD TAUNT-SONG (ii. 12-14). - - _Woe unto him that builds a city in blood,[406] - And stablishes a town in iniquity![407] - Lo, is it not from Jehovah of hosts, - That the nations shall toil for smoke,[408] - And the peoples wear themselves out for nought? - But earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the - glory of Jehovah,[409] - Like the waters that cover the sea._ - - - FOURTH TAUNT-SONG (ii. 15-17). - - _Woe unto him that gives his neighbour to drink, - From the cup of his wrath[410] till he be drunken, - That he may gloat on his[411] nakedness! - Thou art sated with shame—not with glory; - Drink also thou, and stagger.[412] - Comes round to thee the cup of Jehovah’s right hand, - And foul shame[413] on thy glory. - For the violence to Lebānon shall cover thee, - The destruction of the beasts shall affray thee.[414] - For men’s blood, and earth’s waste, - Cities and all their inhabitants.[415]_ - - - FIFTH TAUNT-SONG (ii. 18-20). - - _What boots an image, when its artist has graven it, - A cast-image and lie-oracle, that its moulder has trusted upon it, - Making dumb idols? - Woe to him that saith to a block, Awake! - To a dumb stone, Arise! - Can it teach? - Lo, it ...[416] with gold and silver; - There is no breath at all in the heart of it. - But Jehovah is in His Holy Temple: - Silence before Him, all the earth!_ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[394] See above, pp. 125 f. - -[395] See above, pp. 125 f. Nowack (1897) agrees that Cornill’s and -others’ conclusion that vv. 9-20 are not Habakkuk’s is too sweeping. He -takes the first, second and fourth of the taunt-songs as authentic, but -assigns the third (vv. 12-14) and the fifth (18-20) to another hand. He -deems the refrain, 8_b_ and 17_b_, to be a gloss, and puts 19 before -18. Driver, _Introd._, 6th ed., holds to the authenticity of all the -verses. - -[396] The text reads, _For also wine is treacherous_, under which -we might be tempted to suspect some such original as, _As wine is -treacherous, so_ (next line) _the proud fellow_, etc. (or, as Davidson -suggests, _Like wine is the treacherous dealer_), were it not that the -word _wine_ appears neither in the Greek nor in the Syrian version. -Wellhausen suggests that היין, _wine_, is a corruption of הוי, with -which the verse, like vv. 6_b_, 9, 12, 15, 19, may have originally -begun, but according to 6_a_ the taunt-songs, opening with הוי, start -first in 6_b_. Bredenkamp proposes וְאֶפֶס כְּאַיִן. - -[397] The text is ינוה, a verb not elsewhere found in the Old -Testament, and conjectured by our translators to mean _keepeth -at home_, because the noun allied to it means _homestead_ or -_resting-place_. The Syriac gives _is not satisfied_, and Wellhausen -proposes to read ירוה with that sense. See Davidson’s note on the verse. - -[398] A.V. _thick clay_, which is reached by breaking up the word -עבטיט, _pledge_ or _debt_, into עב, _thick cloud_, and טיט, _clay_. - -[399] Literally _thy biters_, נשכיך, but נשך, _biting_, is _interest_ -or _usury_, and the Hiphil of נשך is _to exact interest_. - -[400] LXX. sing., Heb. pl. - -[401] These words occur again in ver. 17. Wellhausen thinks they suit -neither here nor there. But they suit all the taunt-songs, and some -suppose that they formed the refrain to each of these. - -[402] Dynasty or people? - -[403] So LXX.; Heb. _cutting off_. - -[404] The grammatical construction is obscure, if the text be correct. -There is no mistaking the meaning. - -[405]Heb. כפיס, not elsewhere found in the O.T., is in Rabbinic Hebrew -both _cross-beam_ and _lath_. - -[406] Micah iii. 10. - -[407] Jer. xxii. 13. - -[408] Literally _fire_. - -[409] Jer. li. 58: which original? - -[410] After Wellhausen’s suggestion to read מסף חמתו instead of the -text מספח חמתך, _adding_, or _mixing_, _thy wrath_. - -[411] So LXX. Q.; Heb. _their_. - -[412] Read הרעל (cf. Nahum ii. 4; Zech. xii. 2). The text is הערל, -not found elsewhere, which has been conjectured to mean _uncover the -foreskin_. And there is some ground for this, as parallel to _his -nakedness_ in the previous clause. Wellhausen also removes the first -clause to the end of the verse: _Drink also thou and reel; there comes -to thee the cup in Jehovah’s right hand, and thou wilt glut thyself -with shame instead of honour._ - -[413] So R.V. for קיקלון, which A.V. has taken as two words—קי for -which cf. Jer. xxv. 27, where however the text is probably corrupt, and -קלון. With this confusion cf. above, ver. 6, עבטיט. - -[414] Read with LXX. יחתך for יחיתן of the text. - -[415] See above, ver. 8. - -[416] תָּפוּשׂ? - - - - - CHAPTER XII - - “_IN THE MIDST OF THE YEARS_” - - HABAKKUK iii. - - -We have seen the impossibility of deciding the age of the ode which is -attributed to Habakkuk in the third chapter of his book.[417] But this -is only one of the many problems raised by that brilliant poem. Much of -its text is corrupt, and the meaning of many single words is uncertain. -As in most Hebrew poems of description, the tenses of the verbs puzzle -us; we cannot always determine whether the poet is singing of that -which is past or present or future, and this difficulty is increased -by his subject, a revelation of God in nature for the deliverance -of Israel. Is this the deliverance from Egypt, with the terrible -tempests which accompanied it? Or have the features of the Exodus been -borrowed to describe some other deliverance, or to sum up the constant -manifestation of Jehovah for His people’s help? - -The introduction, in ver. 2, is clear. The singer has heard what is -to be heard of Jehovah, and His great deeds in the past. He prays for -a revival of these _in the midst of the years_. The times are full -of trouble and turmoil. Would that God, in the present confusion of -baffled hopes and broken issues, made Himself manifest by power and -brilliance, as of old! _In turmoil remember mercy!_ To render _turmoil_ -by _wrath_, as if it were God’s anger against which the singer’s heart -appealed, is not true to the original word itself,[418] affords no -parallel to _the midst of the years_, and misses the situation. Israel -cries from a state of life in which the obscure years are huddled -together and full of turmoil. We need not wish to fix the date more -precisely than the writer himself does, but may leave it with him _in -the midst of the years_. - -There follows the description of the Great Theophany, of which, in his -own poor times, the singer has heard. It is probable that he has in -his memory the events of the Exodus and Sinai. On this point his few -geographical allusions agree with his descriptions of nature. He draws -all the latter from the desert, or Arabian, side of Israel’s history. -He introduces none of the sea-monsters, or imputations of arrogance -and rebellion to the sea itself, which the influence of Babylonian -mythology so thickly scattered through the later sea-poetry of the -Hebrews. The Theophany takes place in a violent tempest of thunder -and rain, the only process of nature upon which the desert poets of -Arabia dwell with any detail. In harmony with this, God appears from -the southern desert, from Teman and Paran, as in the theophanies in -Deuteronomy xxxiii. and in the Song of Deborah;[419] a few lines recall -the Song of the Exodus,[420] and there are many resemblances to the -phraseology of the Sixty-Eighth Psalm. The poet sees under trouble -the tents of Kushan and of Midian, tribes of Sinai. And though the -Theophany is with floods of rain and lightning, and foaming of great -waters, it is not with hills, rivers or sea that God is angry, but with -the _nations_, the oppressors of His poor people, and in order that He -may deliver the latter. All this, taken with the fact that no mention -is made of Egypt, proves that, while the singer draws chiefly upon -the marvellous events of the Exodus and Sinai for his description, he -celebrates not them alone but all the ancient triumphs of God over the -heathen oppressors of Israel. Compare the obscure line—these be _His -goings of old_. - -The report of it all fills the poet with trembling (ver. 16 returns -upon ver. 26), and although his language is too obscure to permit us to -follow with certainty the course of his feeling, he appears to await in -confidence the issue of Israel’s present troubles. His argument seems -to be, that such a God may be trusted still, in face of approaching -invasion (ver. 16). The next verse, however, does not express the -experience of trouble from human foes; but figuring the extreme -affliction of drought, barrenness and poverty, the poet speaking in the -name of Israel declares that, in spite of them, he will still rejoice -in the God of their salvation (ver. 17). So sudden is this change from -human foes to natural plagues, that some scholars have here felt a -passage to another poem describing a different situation. But the last -lines with their confidence in the _God of salvation_, a term always -used of deliverance from enemies, and the boast, borrowed from the -Eighteenth Psalm, _He maketh my feet like to hinds’ feet, and gives me -to march on my heights_, reflect the same circumstances as the bulk of -the Psalm, and offer no grounds to doubt the unity of the whole.[421] - - - PSALM[422] OF HABAKKUK THE PROPHET. - - _LORD, I have heard the report of Thee; - I stand in awe![423] - LORD, revive Thy work in the midst of the years, - In the midst of the years make Thee known;[424] - In turmoil[425] remember mercy!_ - - _God comes from Teman,[426] - The Holy from Mount Paran.[427] - He covers the heavens with His glory, - And filled with His praise is the earth. - The flash is like lightning; - He has rays from each hand of Him, - Therein[428] is the ambush of His might._ - - _Pestilence travels before Him, - The plague-fire breaks forth at His feet. - He stands and earth shakes,[429] - He looks and drives nations asunder; - And the ancient mountains are cloven, - The hills everlasting sink down._ - These be _His ways from of old_.[430] - - _Under trouble I see the tents of Kûshān,[431] - The curtains of Midian’s land are quivering. - Is it with hills[432] Jehovah is wroth? - Is Thine anger with rivers? - Or against the sea is Thy wrath, - That Thou ridest it with horses, - Thy chariots of victory? - Thy bow is stripped bare;[433] - Thou gluttest (?) Thy shafts.[434] - Into rivers Thou cleavest the earth;[435] - Mountains see Thee and writhe; - The rainstorm sweeps on:[436] - The Deep utters his voice, - He lifts up his roar upon high.[437] - Sun and moon stand still in their dwelling, - At the flash of Thy shafts as they speed, - At the sheen of the lightning, Thy lance. - In wrath Thou stridest the earth, - In anger Thou threshest the nations! - Thou art forth to the help of Thy people, - To save Thine anointed.[438] - Thou hast shattered the head from the house of the wicked, - Laying bare from ...[439] to the neck. - Thou hast pierced with Thy spears the head of his princes.[440] - They stormed forth to crush me; - Their triumph was as to devour the poor in secret.[441] - Thou hast marched on the sea with Thy horses; - Foamed[442] the great waters._ - - _I have heard, and my heart[443] shakes; - At the sound my lips tremble,[444] - Rottenness enters my bones,[445] - My steps shake under me.[446] - I will ...[447] for the day of trouble - That pours in on the people.[448]_ - - _Though the fig-tree do not blossom,[449] - And no fruit be on the vines, - Fail the produce of the olive, - And the fields yield no meat, - Cut off[450] be the flock from the fold, - And no cattle in the stalls, - Yet in the LORD will I exult, - I will rejoice in the God of my salvation. - Jehovah, the Lord, is my might; - He hath made my feet like the hinds’, - And on my heights He gives me to march._ - -This Psalm, whose musical signs prove it to have been employed in the -liturgy of the Jewish Temple, has also largely entered into the use -of the Christian Church. The vivid style, the sweep of vision, the -exultation in the extreme of adversity with which it closes, have -made it a frequent theme of preachers and of poets. St. Augustine’s -exposition of the Septuagint version spiritualises almost every clause -into a description of the first and second advents of Christ.[451] -Calvin’s more sober and accurate learning interpreted it of God’s -guidance of Israel from the time of the Egyptian plagues to the days -of Joshua and Gideon, and made it enforce the lesson that He who so -wonderfully delivered His people in their youth will not forsake them -in the midway of their career.[452] The closing verses have been torn -from the rest to form the essence of a large number of hymns in many -languages. - -For ourselves it is perhaps most useful to fasten upon the poet’s -description of his own position in the midst of the years, and like -him to take heart, amid our very similar circumstances, from the -glorious story of God’s ancient revelation, in the faith that He is -still the same in might and in purpose of grace to His people. We, too, -live among the nameless years. We feel them about us, undistinguished -by the manifest workings of God, slow and petty, or, at the most, -full of inarticulate turmoil. At this very moment we suffer from the -frustration of a great cause, on which believing men had set their -hearts as God’s cause; Christendom has received from the infidel no -greater reverse since the days of the Crusades. Or, lifting our eyes -to a larger horizon, we are tempted to see about us a wide, flat waste -of years. It is nearly nineteen centuries since the great revelation -of God in Christ, the redemption of mankind, and all the wonders of -the Early Church. We are far, far away from that, and unstirred by the -expectation of any crisis in the near future. We stand _in the midst -of the years_, equally distant from beginning and from end. It is the -situation which Jesus Himself likened to the long double watch in the -middle of the night—_if he come in the second watch or in the third -watch_—against whose dulness He warned His disciples. How much need is -there at such a time to recall, like this poet, what God has done—how -often He has shaken the world and overturned the nations, for the sake -of His people and the Divine causes they represent. _His ways are -everlasting._ As He then worked, so He will work now for the same ends -of redemption. Our prayer for _a revival of His work_ will be answered -before it is spoken. - -It is probable that much of our sense of the staleness of the years -comes from their prosperity. The dull feeling that time is mere routine -is fastened upon our hearts by nothing more firmly than by the constant -round of fruitful seasons—that fortification of comfort, that -regularity of material supplies, which modern life assures to so many. -Adversity would brace us to a new expectation of the near and strong -action of our God. This is perhaps the meaning of the sudden mention of -natural plagues in the seventeenth verse of our Psalm. Not in spite of -the extremes of misfortune, but just because of them, should we exult -in _the God of our salvation_; and realise that it is by discipline He -makes His Church to feel that she is not marching over the dreary -levels of nameless years, but _on our high places He makes us to -march_. - -“Grant, Almighty God, as the dulness and hardness of our flesh is so -great that it is needful for us to be in various ways afflicted—oh -grant that we patiently bear Thy chastisement, and under a deep -feeling of sorrow flee to Thy mercy displayed to us in Christ, so that -we depend not on the earthly blessings of this perishable life, but -relying on Thy word go forward in the course of our calling, until at -length we be gathered to that blessed rest which is laid up for us in -heaven, through Christ our Lord. Amen.”[453] - -FOOTNOTES: - -[417] Above, pp. 126 ff. - -[418] רגז nowhere in the Old Testament means _wrath_, but either -roar and noise of thunder (Job xxxvii. 2) and of horsehoofs (xxxix. -24), or the raging of the wicked (iii. 17) or the commotion of fear -(iii. 26; Isa. xiv. 3). - -[419] - - _Jehovah from Sinai hath come, - And risen from Se‘ir upon them; - He shone from Mount Paran, - And broke from Meribah of Ḳadesh: - From the South fire ... to them._ - -Deut. xxxiii. 2, slightly altered after the LXX. _South_: some form -of ימין must be read to bring the line into parallel with the others; -תימן, Teman, is from the same root. - - _Jehovah, in Thy going forth from Se’ir, - In Thy marching from Edom’s field, - Earth shook, yea, heaven dropped, - Yea, the clouds dropped water. - Mountains flowed down before Jehovah, - Yon Sinai at the face of the God of Israel._ - - Judges v. 4, 5. - - -[420] Exod. xv. - -[421] In this case ver. 17 would be the only one that offered any -reason for suspicion that it was an intrusion. - -[422] תפלה, lit. Prayer, but used for Psalm: cf. Psalm cii. 1. - -[423] Sinker takes with this the first two words of next line: _I have -trembled, O LORD, at Thy work_. - -[424] תודע, Imp. Niph., after LXX. γνωσθήσῃ. The Hebrew has תּוֹדִיעַ, -Hi., _make known_. The LXX. had a text of these verses which -reduplicated them, and it has translated them very badly. - -[425] רֹגֶז, _turmoil_, _noise_, as in Job: a meaning that offers a -better parallel to _in the midst of the years_ than _wrath_, which -the word also means. Davidson, however, thinks it more natural to -understand the _wrath_ manifest at the coming of Jehovah to judgment. -So Sinker. - -[426] Vulg. _ab Austro_, _from the South_. - -[427] LXX. adds κατασκίον δασέος, which seems the translation of a -clause, perhaps a gloss, containing the name of Mount Se‘ir, as in the -parallel descriptions of a theophany, Deut. xxiii. 2, Judg. v. 4. See -Sinker, p. 45. - -[428] Wellhausen, reading שׂם for שׁם, translates _He made them_, etc. - -[429] So LXX. Heb. _and measures the earth_. - -[430] This is the only way of rendering the verse so as not to make it -seem superfluous: so rendered it sums up and clenches the theophany -from ver. 3 onwards; and a new strophe now begins. There is therefore -no need to omit the verse, as Wellhausen does. - -[431] LXX. Ἀίθιοπες; but these are Kush, and the parallelism requires -a tribe in Arabia. Calvin rejects the meaning _Ethiopian_ on the same -ground, but takes the reference as to King Kushan in Judg. iii. 8, 10, -on account of the parallelism with Midian. The Midianite wife whom -Moses married is called the Kushite (Num. xii. 1). Hommel (_Anc. Hebrew -Tradition as illustrated by the Monuments_, p. 315 and n. 1) appears to -take Zerah the Kushite of 2 Chron. xiv. 9 ff. as a prince of Kush in -Central Arabia. But the narrative which makes him deliver his invasion -of Judah at Mareshah surely confirms the usual opinion that he and his -host were Ethiopians coming up from Egypt. - -[432] For הבנהרים, _is it with streams_, read הבהרים, _is it with -hills_: because hills have already been mentioned, and rivers occur in -the next clause, and are separated by the same disjunctive particle, -אִם, which separates _the sea_ in the third clause from them. The -whole phrase might be rendered, _Is it with hills_ Thou art _angry, O -Jehovah_? - -[433] Questionable: the verb תֵּעוֹר, Ni. of a supposed עוּר, does -not elsewhere occur, and is only conjectured from the noun עֶרְוָה, -_nakedness_, and עֶרְיָה, _stripping_. LXX. has ἐντείνων ἐνέτεινας, -and Wellhausen reads, after 2 Sam. xxiii. 18, עוֹרֵר תְּעוֹרֵר, _Thou -bringest into action Thy bow_. - -[434] שְׁבֻעוֹת מַטּוֹת אֹמֶר, literally _sworn are staves_ or _rods of -speech_. A.V.: according _to the oaths of the tribes_, even Thy _word_. -LXX. (omitting שְׁבֻעוֹת and adding יהוה) ἐπὶ σκῆπτρα, λέγει κύριος. -These words “form a riddle which all the ingenuity of scholars has not -been able to solve. Delitzsch calculates that a hundred translations -of them have been offered” (Davidson). In parallel to previous -clause about a _bow_, we ought to expect מטות, _staves_, though it -is not elsewhere used for _shafts_ or _arrows_. שׁבעות may have been -שַׂבֵּעְתָּ, _Thou satest_. The Cod. Barb. reads: ἐχόρτασας βολίδας τῆς -φαρέτρης αὐτοῦ, _Thou hast satiated the shafts of his quiver_. Sinker: -_sworn are the punishments of the solemn decree_, and relevantly -compares Isa. xi. 4, _the rod of His mouth_; xxx. 32, _rod of doom_. -Ewald: _sevenfold shafts of war_. But cf. Psalm cxviii. 12. - -[435] Uncertain, but a more natural result of cleaving than _the rivers -Thou cleavest into dry land_ (Davidson and Wellhausen). - -[436] But Ewald takes this as of the Red Sea floods sweeping on the -Egyptians. - -[437] רום ידיהו נשא = _he lifts up his hands on high_. But the LXX. -read מריהו, φαντασίας αὐτῆς, and took נשא with the next verse. The -reading מריהו (for מראיהו) is indeed nonsense, but suggests an -emendation to מרזחו, _his shout or wail_: cf. Amos vi. 7, Jer. xvi. 5. - -[438] Reading for הושיע ישע, required by the acc. following. _Thine -anointed_, lit. _Thy Messiah_, according to Isa. xl. ff. the whole -people. - -[439] Heb. יסוד, _foundation_. LXX. _bonds_. Some suggest laying bare -from the foundation to the neck, but this is mixed unless _neck_ -happened to be a technical name for a part of a building: cf. Isa. -viii. 8, xxx. 28. - -[440] Heb. _his spears_ or _staves_; _his own_ (Von Orelli). LXX. -ἐν ἐκστάσει: see Sinker, pp. 56 ff. _Princes_: פְרָזָו only here. -Hitzig: _his brave ones_. Ewald, Wellhausen, Davidson: _his princes_. -Delitzsch: _his hosts_. LXX. κεφαλὰς δυναστῶν. - -[441] So Heb. literally. A very difficult line. On LXX. see Sinker, pp. -60 f. - -[442] For חֹמֶר, _heap_ (so A.V.), read some part of חמר, _to foam_. -LXX. ταράσσοντας: cf. Psalm xlvi. 4. - -[443] So LXX. א (some codd.), softening the original _belly_. - -[444] Or _my lips quiver aloud_—לקול, _vocally_ (Von Orelli). - -[445] By the Hebrew the bones were felt, as a modern man feels his -nerves: Psalms xxxii., li.; Job. - -[446] For אשר, for which LXX. gives ἡ ἔξις μου, read אשרי, _my steps_; -and for ארגז, LXX. ἑταράχθη, ירגזו. - -[447] אָנוּחַ. LXX. ἀναπαύσομαι, _I will rest_. A.V.: _that I might -rest in the day of trouble_. Others: _I will wait for_. Wellhausen -suggests אִנָּחֵם (Isa. l. 24), _I will take comfort_. Sinker takes -אשר as the simple relative: _I who will wait patiently for the day of -doom_. Von Orelli takes it as the conjunction _because_. - -[448] יְגֻדֶנּוּ, _it invades_, _brings up troops on them_, only in -Gen. xlix. 19 and here. Wellhausen: _which invades us_. Sinker: _for -the coming up against the people of him who shall assail it_. - -[449] תפרח; but LXX. תפרה, οὐ καρποφορήσει, _bear no fruit_. - -[450] For גזר Wellhausen reads נִגזר. LXX. ἐξελιπεν. - -[451] _De Civitate Dei_, XVIII. 32. - -[452] So he paraphrases _in the midst of the years_. - -[453] From the prayer with which Calvin concludes his exposition of -Habakkuk. - - - - - _OBADIAH_ - - - - -_And Saviours shall come up on Mount Zion to judge Mount Esau, and the -kingdom shall be Jehovah’s._ - - - - - CHAPTER XIII - - _THE BOOK OF OBADIAH_ - - -The Book of Obadiah is the smallest among the prophets, and the -smallest in all the Old Testament. Yet there is none which better -illustrates many of the main problems of Old Testament criticism. It -raises, indeed, no doctrinal issue nor any question of historical -accuracy. All that it claims to be is _The Vision of Obadiah_;[454] and -this vague name, with no date or dwelling-place to challenge comparison -with the contents of the book, introduces us without prejudice to -the criticism of the latter. Nor is the book involved in the central -controversy of Old Testament scholarship, the date of the Law. It has -no reference to the Law. Nor is it made use of in the New Testament. -The more freely, therefore, may we study the literary and historical -questions started by the twenty-one verses which compose the book. -Their brief course is broken by differences of style, and by sudden -changes of outlook from the past to the future. Some of them present -a close parallel to another passage of prophecy, a feature which when -present offers a difficult problem to the critic. Hardly any of the -historical allusions are free from ambiguity, for although the book -refers throughout to a single nation—and so vividly that even if Edom -were not named we might still discern the character and crimes of that -bitter brother of Israel—yet the conflict of Israel and Edom was so -prolonged and so monotonous in its cruelties, that there are few of -its many centuries to which some scholar has not felt himself able to -assign, in part or whole, Obadiah’s indignant oration. The little book -has been tossed out of one century into another by successive critics, -till there exists in their estimates of its date a difference of nearly -six hundred years.[455] Such a fact seems, at first sight, to convict -criticism either of arbitrariness or helplessness;[456] yet a little -consideration of details is enough to lead us to an appreciation of the -reasonable methods of Old Testament criticism, and of its indubitable -progress towards certainty, in spite of our ignorance of large -stretches of the history of Israel. To the student of the Old Testament -nothing could be more profitable than to master the historical and -literary questions raised by the Book of Obadiah, before following them -out among the more complicated problems which are started by other -prophetical books in their relation to the Law of Israel, or to their -own titles, or to claims made for them in the New Testament. - - * * * * * - -The Book of Obadiah contains a number of verbal parallels to another -prophecy against Edom which appears in Jeremiah xlix. 7-22. Most -critics have regarded this prophecy of Jeremiah as genuine, and have -assigned it to the year 604 B.C. The question is whether Obadiah or -Jeremiah is the earlier. Hitzig and Vatke[457] answered in favour of -Jeremiah; and as the Book of Obadiah also contains a description of -Edom’s conduct in the day of Jerusalem’s overthrow by Nebuchadrezzar, -in 586, they brought the whole book down to post-exilic times. -Very forcible arguments, however, have been offered for Obadiah’s -priority.[458] Upon this priority, as well as on the facts that Joel, -whom they take to be early, quotes from Obadiah, and that Obadiah’s -book occurs among the first six—presumably the pre-exilic members—of -the Twelve, a number of scholars have assigned all of it to an early -period in Israel’s history. Some fix upon the reign of Jehoshaphat, -when Judah was invaded by Edom and his allies Moab and Ammon, but saved -from disaster through Moab and Ammon turning upon the Edomites and -slaughtering them.[459] To this they refer the phrase in Obadiah 9, -_the men of thy covenant have betrayed thee_. Others place the whole -book in the reign of Joram of Judah (849—842 B.C.), when, according to -the Chronicles,[460] Judah was invaded and Jerusalem partly sacked by -Philistines and Arabs.[461] But in the story of this invasion, there -is no mention of Edomites, and the argument which is drawn from Joel’s -quotation of Obadiah fails if Joel, as we shall see, be of late date. -With greater prudence Pusey declines to fix a period. - -The supporters of a pre-exilic origin for the _whole_ Book of Obadiah -have to explain vv. 11-14, which appear to reflect Edom’s conduct at -the sack of Jerusalem by Nebuchadrezzar in 586, and they do so in two -ways. Pusey takes the verses as predictive of Nebuchadrezzar’s siege. -Orelli and others believe that they suit better the conquest and -plunder of the city in the time of Jehoram. But, as Calvin has said, -“they seem to be mistaken who think that Obadiah lived before the time -of Isaiah.” - -The question, however, very early arose, whether it was possible to -take Obadiah as a unity. Vv. 1-9 are more vigorous and firm than vv. -10-21. In vv. 1-9 Edom is destroyed by nations who are its allies; in -vv. 10-21 it is still to fall along with other Gentiles in the general -judgment of the Lord.[462] Vv. 10-21 admittedly describe the conduct -of the Edomites at the overthrow of Jerusalem in 586; but vv. 1-9 -probably reflect earlier events; and it is significant that in them -alone occur the parallels to Jeremiah’s prophecy against Edom in 604. -On some of these grounds Ewald regarded the little book as consisting -of two pieces, both of which refer to Edom, but the first of which was -written before Jeremiah, and the second is post-exilic. As Jeremiah’s -prophecy has some features more original than Obadiah’s,[463] he traced -both prophecies to an original oracle against Edom, of which Obadiah on -the whole renders an exact version. He fixed the date of this oracle in -the earlier days of Isaiah, when Rezin of Syria enabled Edom to assert -again its independence of Judah, and Edom won back Elath, which Uzziah -had taken.[464] Driver, Wildeboer and Cornill[465] adopt this theory, -with the exception of the period to which Ewald refers the original -oracle. According to them, the Book of Obadiah consists of two pieces, -vv. 1-9 pre-exilic, and vv. 10-21 post-exilic and descriptive in 11-14 -of Nebuchadrezzar’s sack of Jerusalem. - -This latter point need not be contested.[466] But is it clear that -1-9 are so different from 10-21 that they must be assigned to another -period? Are they necessarily pre-exilic? Wellhausen thinks not, and has -constructed still another theory of the origin of the book, which, like -Vatke’s, brings it all down to the period after the Exile. - -There is no mention in the book either of Assyria or of Babylonia.[467] -The allies who have betrayed Edom (ver. 7) are therefore probably -those Arabian tribes who surrounded it and were its frequent -confederates.[468] They are described as _sending_ Edom _to the border_ -(_ib._). Wellhausen thinks that this can only refer to the great -northward movement of Arabs which began to press upon the fertile -lands to the south-east of Israel during the time of the Captivity. -Ezekiel[469] prophesies that Ammon and Moab will disappear before -the Arabs, and we know that by the year 312 the latter were firmly -settled in the territories of Edom.[470] Shortly before this the -Hagarenes appear in Chronicles, and Se’ir is called by the Arabic name -Gebal,[471] while as early as the fifth century “Malachi”[472] records -the desolation of Edom’s territory by the _jackals of the wilderness_, -and the expulsion of the Edomites, who will not return. The Edomites -were pushed up into the Negeb of Israel, and occupied the territory -round, and to the south of, Hebron till their conquest by John Hyrcanus -about 130; even after that it was called Idumæa.[473] Wellhausen would -assign Obadiah 1-7 to the same stage of this movement as is reflected -in “Malachi” i. 1-5; and, apart from certain parentheses, would -therefore take the whole of Obadiah as a unity from the end of the -fifth century before Christ. In that case Giesebrecht argues that the -parallel prophecy, Jeremiah xlix. 7-22, must be reckoned as one of the -passages of the Book of Jeremiah in which post-exilic additions have -been inserted.[474] - -Our criticism of this theory may start from the seventh verse of -Obadiah: _To the border they have sent thee, all the men of thy -covenant have betrayed thee, they have overpowered thee, the men of -thy peace._ On our present knowledge of the history of Edom it is -impossible to assign the first of these clauses to any period before -the Exile. No doubt in earlier days Edom was more than once subjected -to Arab _razzias_. But up to the Jewish Exile the Edomites were still -in possession of their own land. So the Deuteronomist[475] implies, -and so Ezekiel[476] and perhaps the author of Lamentations.[477] -Wellhausen’s claim, therefore, that the seventh verse of Obadiah refers -to the expulsion of Edomites by Arabs in the sixth or fifth century -B.C. may be granted.[478] But does this mean that verses 1-6 belong, -as he maintains, to the same period? A negative answer seems required -by the following facts. To begin with, the seventh verse is not found -in the parallel prophecy in Jeremiah. There is no reason why it should -not have been used there, if that prophecy had been compiled at a -time when the expulsion of the Edomites was already an accomplished -fact. But both by this omission and by all its other features, that -prophecy suits the time of Jeremiah, and we may leave it, therefore, -where it was left till the appearance of Wellhausen’s theory—namely, -with Jeremiah himself.[479] Moreover Jeremiah xlix. 9 seems to have -been adapted in Obadiah 5 in order to suit verse 6. But again, Obadiah -1-6, which contains so many parallels to Jeremiah’s prophecy, also -seems to imply that the Edomites are still in possession of their -land. _The nations_ (we may understand by this the Arab tribes) are -risen against Edom, and Edom is already despicable in face of them -(vv. 1, 2); but he has not yet fallen, any more than, to the writer of -Isaiah xlv.—xlvii., who uses analogous language, Babylon is already -fallen. Edom is weak and cannot resist the Arab _razzias_. But he -still makes his eyrie on high and says: _Who will bring me down?_ To -which challenge Jehovah replies, not ‘I have brought thee down,’ but -_I will bring thee down_. The post-exilic portion of Obadiah, then, I -take to begin with verse 7; and the author of this prophecy has begun -by incorporating in vv. 1-6 a pre-exilic prophecy against Edom, which -had been already, and with more freedom, used by Jeremiah. Verses -8-9 form a difficulty. They return to the future tense, as if the -Edomites were still to be cut off from Mount Esau. But verse 10, as -Wellhausen points out, follows on naturally to verse 7, and, with its -successors, clearly points to a period subsequent to Nebuchadrezzar’s -overthrow of Jerusalem. The change from the past tense in vv. 10-11 -to the imperatives of 12-14 need cause, in spite of what Pusey says, -no difficulty, but may be accounted for by the excited feelings of -the prophet. The suggestion has been made, and it is plausible, that -Obadiah speaks as an eye-witness of that awful time. Certainly there -is nothing in the rest of the prophecy (vv. 15-21) to lead us to bring -it further down than the years following the destruction of Jerusalem. -Everything points to the Jews being still in exile. The verbs which -describe the inviolateness of Jerusalem (17), and the reinstatement of -Israel in their heritage (17, 19), and their conquest of Edom (18), are -all in the future. The prophet himself appears to write in exile (20). -The captivity of Jerusalem is in Sepharad (_ib._) and the _saviours_ -have to _come up_ to Mount Zion; that is to say, they are still beyond -the Holy Land (21).[480] - -The one difficulty in assigning this date to the prophecy is that -nothing is said in the Hebrew of ver. 19 about the re-occupation of -the hill-country of Judæa itself, but here the Greek may help us.[481] -Certainly every other feature suits the early days of the Exile. - -The result of our inquiry is that the Book of Obadiah was written at -that time by a prophet in exile, who was filled by the same hatred of -Edom as filled another exile, who in Babylon wrote Psalm cxxxvii.; and -that, like so many of the exilic writers, he started from an earlier -prophecy against Edom, already used by Jeremiah.[482] [Nowack (_Comm._, -1897) takes vv. 1-14 (with additions in vv. 1, 5, 6, 8f. and 12) to -be from a date not long after the Fall of Jerusalem, alluded to in -vv. 11-14; and vv. 15-21 to belong to a later period, which it is -impossible to fix exactly.] - -There is nothing in the language of the book to disturb this -conclusion. The Hebrew of Obadiah is pure; unlike its neighbour, the -Book of Jonah, it contains neither Aramaisms nor other symptoms of -decadence. The text is very sound. The Septuagint Version enables us to -correct vv. 7 and 17, offers the true division between vv. 9 and 10, -but makes an omission which leaves no sense in ver. 17.[483] It will be -best to give all the twenty-one verses together before commenting on -their spirit. - - - THE VISION OF OBADIAH. - -_Thus hath the Lord Jehovah spoken concerning Edom._[484] - -“_A report have we heard from Jehovah, and a messenger has been sent -through the nations, ‘Up and let us rise against her to battle.’ Lo, -I have made thee small among the nations, thou art very despised! The -arrogance of thy heart hath misled thee, dweller in clefts of the -Rock[485]; the height is his dwelling, that saith in his heart ‘Who -shall bring me down to earth!’ Though thou build high as the eagle, -though between the stars thou set thy nest, thence will I bring thee -down—oracle of Jehovah. If thieves had come into thee by night (how -art thou humbled!),[486] would they not steal _just_ what they wanted? -If vine-croppers had come into thee, would they not leave_ some -_gleanings? (How searched out is Esau, how rifled his treasures!)_” -But now _to_ thy very _border have they sent thee, all the men of thy -covenant[487] have betrayed thee, the men of thy peace have overpowered -thee[488]; they kept setting traps for thee—there is no understanding -in him! “[489]Shall it not be in that day—oracle of Jehovah—that I -will cause the wise men to perish from Edom, and understanding from -Mount Esau? And thy heroes, O Teman, shall be dismayed, till[490] -every man be cut off from Mount Esau.” For the slaughter,[491] for the -outraging of thy brother Jacob, shame doth cover thee, and thou art -cut off for ever. In the day of thy standing aloof,[492] in the day -when strangers took captive his substance, and aliens came into his -gates,[493] and they cast lots on Jerusalem, even thou wert as one of -them!_ Ah, _gloat not[494] upon the day of thy brother,[495] the day -of his misfortune[496]; exult not over the sons of Judah in the day -of their destruction, and make not thy mouth large[497] in the day of -distress. Come not up into the gate of My people in the day of their -disaster. Gloat not thou, yea thou, upon his ills, in the day of his -disaster, nor put forth thy hand to his substance in the day of his -disaster, nor stand at the parting[498]_ of the ways (?) _to cut off -his fugitives; nor arrest his escaped ones in the day of distress_. - -_For near is the day of Jehovah, upon all the nation as thou hast done, -so shall it be done to thee: thy deed shall come back on thine own -head.[499]_ - -_For as ye[500] have drunk on my holy mount, all the nations shall -drink continuously, drink and reel, and be as though they had not -been.[501] But on Mount Zion shall be refuge, and it shall be -inviolate, and the house of Jacob shall inherit those who have -disinherited them.[502] For the house of Jacob shall be fire, and the -house of Joseph a flame, but the house of Esau shall become stubble, -and they shall kindle upon them and devour them, and there shall not -one escape of the house of Esau—for Jehovah hath spoken._ - -_And the Negeb shall possess Mount Esau, and the Shephelah the -Philistines,[503] and the Mountain[504] shall possess Ephraim and the -field of Samaria,[505] and Benjamin shall possess Gilead. And the -exiles of this host[506] of the children of Israel shall possess(?) the -land[507] of the Canaanites unto Sarephath, and the exiles of Jerusalem -who are in Sepharad[508] shall inherit the cities of the Negeb. And -saviours shall come up on Mount Zion to judge Mount Esau, and the -kingdom shall be Jehovah’s._ - -FOOTNOTES: - -[454] עֹבַדְיָה, ‘Obadyah, the later form of עֹבַדְיָהוּ, ‘Obadyahu (a name -occurring thrice before the Exile: Ahab’s steward who hid the prophets -of the Lord, 1 Kings xviii. 3-7, 16; of a man in David’s house, 1 -Chron. xxvii. 19; a Levite in Josiah’s reign, 2 Chron. xxxiv. 12), is -the name of several of the Jews who returned from exile: Ezra viii. 9, -the son of Jehi’el (in 1 Esdras viii. Ἀβαδιας); Neh. x. 6, a priest, -probably the same as the Obadiah in xii. 25, a porter, and the עַבְדָּא, -the singer, in xi. 17, who is called עֹבַדְיָה in 1 Chron. ix. 16. Another -‘Obadyah is given in the eleventh generation from Saul, 1 Chron. viii. -38, ix. 44; another in the royal line in the time of the Exile, iii. -21; a man of Issachar, vii. 3; a Gadite under David, xii. 9; a _prince_ -under Jehoshaphat sent _to teach in the cities of Judah_, 2 Chron. -xvii. 7. With the Massoretic points עֹבַדְיָה means worshipper of Jehovah: -cf. Obed-Edom, and so in the Greek form, Ὀβδειου, of Cod. B. But other -Codd., A, θ and א, give Ἀβδιου or Ἀβδειου, and this, with the -alternative Hebrew form אַבְדָּא of Neh. xi. 17, suggests rather עֶבֶד יָה, -_servant of Jehovah_. The name as given in the title is probably -intended to be that of an historical individual, as in the titles of -all the other books; but which, or if any, of the above mentioned it is -impossible to say. Note, however, that it is the later post-exilic form -of the name that is used, in spite of the book occurring among the -pre-exilic prophets. Some, less probably, take the name Obadyah to be -symbolic of the prophetic character of the writer. - -[455] 889 B.C. Hofmann, Keil, etc.; and soon after 312, Hitzig. - -[456] Cf. the extraordinary tirade of Pusey in his Introd. to Obadiah. - -[457] The first in his Commentary on _Die Zwölf Kleine Propheten_; the -other in his _Einleitung_. - -[458] Caspari (_Der Proph. Ob. ausgelegt_ 1842), Ewald, Graf, Pusey, -Driver, Giesebrecht, Wildeboer and König. Cf. Jer. xlix. 9 with Ob. 5; -Jer. xlix. 14 ff. with Ob. 1-4. The opening of Ob. 1 ff. is held to -be more in its place than where it occurs in the middle of Jeremiah’s -passage. The language of Obadiah is “terser and more forcible. Jeremiah -seems to expand Obadiah, and parts of Jeremiah which have no parallel -in Obadiah are like Obadiah’s own style” (Driver). This strong argument -is enforced in detail by Pusey: “Out of the sixteen verses of which -the prophecy of Jeremiah against Edom consists, four are identical -with those of Obadiah; a fifth embodies a verse of Obadiah’s; of the -eleven which remain ten have some turns of expression or idioms, more -or fewer, which occur in Jeremiah, either in these prophecies against -foreign nations, or in his prophecies generally. Now it would be wholly -improbable that a prophet, selecting verses out of the prophecy of -Jeremiah, should have selected precisely those which contain none of -Jeremiah’s characteristic expressions; whereas it perfectly fits in -with the supposition that Jeremiah interwove verses of Obadiah with his -own prophecy, that in verses so interwoven there is not one expression -which occurs elsewhere in Jeremiah.” Similarly Nowack, _Comm._, 1897. - -[459] 2 Chron. xx. - -[460] 2 Chron. xxi. 14-17. - -[461] So Delitzsch, Keil, Volck in Herzog’s _Real. Ency._ II., Orelli -and Kirkpatrick. Delitzsch indeed suggests that the prophet may have -been _Obadiah the prince_ appointed by Jehoshaphat _to teach in the -cities of Judah_. See above, p. 163, n. 454. - -[462] Driver, _Introd._ - -[463] Jer. xlix. 9 and 16 appear to be more original than Ob. 3 and 2b. -Notice the presence in Jer. xlix. 16 of תפלצתך which Obadiah omits. - -[464] 2 Kings xiv. 22; xvi. 6, Revised Version margin. - -[465] _Einl._³ pp. 185 f.: “In any case Obadiah 1-9 are older than the -fourth year of Jehoiakim.” - -[466] “That the verses Obadiah 10 ff. refer to this event [the sack of -Jerusalem] will always remain the most natural supposition, for the -description which they give so completely suits that time that it is -not possible to take any other explanation into consideration.” - -[467] Edom paid tribute to Sennacherib in 701, and to Asarhaddon -(681—669). According to 2 Kings xxiv. 2 Nebuchadrezzar sent Ammonites, -Moabites and Edomites [for ארם read אדם] against Jehoiakim, who had -broken his oath to Babylonia. - -[468] For Edom’s alliances with Arab tribes cf. Gen. xxv. 13 with -xxxvi. 3, 12, etc. - -[469] Ezek. xxv. 4, 5, 10. - -[470] Diod. Sic. XIX. 94. A little earlier they are described as in -possession of Iturea, on the south-east slopes of Anti-Lebanon (Arrian -II. 20, 4). - -[471] Psalm lxxxiii. 8. - -[472] i. 1-5. - -[473] _E.g._ in the New Testament: Mark iii. 8. - -[474] So too Nowack, 1897. - -[475] Deut. ii. 5, 8, 12. - -[476] Ezek. xxxv., esp. 2 and 15. - -[477] iv. 21: yet _Uz_ fails in LXX., and some take ארץ to refer to the -Holy Land itself. Buhl, _Gesch. der Edomiter_, 73. - -[478] It can hardly be supposed that Edom’s treacherous allies were -Assyrians or Babylonians, for even if the phrase “men of thy covenant” -could be applied to those to whom Edom was tributary, the Assyrian or -Babylonian method of dealing with conquered peoples is described by -saying that they took them off into captivity, not that they _sent them -to the border_. - -[479] So even Cornill, _Einl._³ - -[480] This in answer to Wellhausen on the verse. - -[481] See below, p. 175, n. 6. - -[482] Calvin, while refusing in his introduction to Obadiah to fix a -date (except in so far as he thinks it impossible for the book to be -earlier than Isaiah), implies throughout his commentary on the book -that it was addressed to Edom while the Jews were in exile. See his -remarks on vv. 18-20. - -[483] There is a mistranslation in ver. 18: שׂריד is rendered by -πυρόφορος. - -[484] This is no doubt from the later writer, who before he gives the -new word of Jehovah with regard to Edom, quotes the earlier prophecy, -marked above by quotation marks. In no other way can we explain the -immediate following of the words “Thus hath the Lord spoken” with “_We_ -have heard a report,” etc. - -[485] ‘Sela,’ the name of the Edomite capital, Petra. - -[486] The parenthesis is not in Jer. xlix. 9; Nowack omits it. _If -spoilers_ occurs in Heb. before _by night_: delete. - -[487] Antithetic to _thieves_ and _spoilers by night_, as the sending -of the people to their border is antithetic to the thieves taking only -what they wanted. - -[488] לחמך, _thy bread_, which here follows, is not found in the LXX., -and is probably an error due to a mechanical repetition of the letters -of the previous word. - -[489] Again perhaps a quotation from an earlier prophecy: Nowack counts -it from another hand. Mark the sudden change to the future. - -[490] Heb. _so that_. - -[491] With LXX. transfer this expression from the end of the ninth to -the beginning of the tenth verse. - -[492] “When thou didst stand on the opposite side.”—Calvin. - -[493] Plural; LXX. and Qeri. - -[494] Sudden change to imperative. The English versions render, _Thou -shouldest not have looked on_, etc. - -[495] Cf. Ps. cxxxvii. 7, _the day of Jerusalem_. - -[496] The day of his strangeness = _aliena fortuna_. - -[497] With laughter. Wellhausen and Nowack suspect ver. 13 as an -intrusion. - -[498] פֶּרֶק does not elsewhere occur. It means cleaving, and the LXX. -render it by διεκβολή, _i.e._ pass between mountains. The Arabic forms -from the same root suggest the sense of a band of men standing apart -from the main body on the watch for stragglers (cf. נגד, in ver. 11). -Calvin, “the going forth”; Grätz פרץ, _breach_, but see Nowack. - -[499] Wellhausen proposes to put the last two clauses immediately after -ver. 14. - -[500] The prophet seems here to turn to address his own countrymen: the -drinking will therefore take the meaning of suffering God’s chastising -wrath. Others, like Calvin, take it in the opposite sense, and apply it -to Edom: “as ye have exulted,” etc. - -[501] _Reel_—for לעוּ we ought (with Wellhausen) probably to read -נעוּ: cf. Lam. iv. 2. Some codd. of LXX. omit _all the nations ... -continuously, drink and reel_. But א^{Ca} A and Q have _all the -nations shall drink wine_. - -[502] So LXX. Heb. _their heritages_. - -[503] That is the reverse of the conditions after the Jews went into -exile, for then the Edomites came up on the Negeb and the Philistines -on the Shephelah. - -[504] _I.e._ of Judah, the rest of the country outside the Negeb and -Shephelah. The reading is after the LXX. - -[505] Whereas the pagan inhabitants of these places came upon the -hill-country of Judæa during the Exile. - -[506] An unusual form of the word. Ewald would read _coast_. The verse -is obscure. - -[507] So LXX. - -[508] The Jews themselves thought this to be Spain: so Onkelos, who -translates ספרד by אַסְפַּמְיָא = Hispania. Hence the origin of the -name Sephardim Jews. The supposition that it is Sparta need hardly -be noticed. Our decision must lie between two other regions—the one -in Asia Minor, the other in S.W. Media. _First_, in the ancient -Persian inscriptions there thrice occurs (great Behistun inscription, -I. 15; inscription of Darius, II. 12, 13; and inscription of Darius -from Naḳsh-i-Rustam) Çparda. It is connected with Janua or Ionia and -Katapatuka or Cappadocia (Schrader, _Cun. Inscr. and O. T._, Germ. ed., -p. 446; Eng., Vol. II., p. 145); and Sayce shows that, called Shaparda -on a late cuneiform inscription of 275 B.C., it must have lain in -Bithynia or Galatia (_Higher Criticism and Monuments_, p. 483). Darius -made it a satrapy. It is clear, as Cheyne says (_Founders of O. T. -Criticism_, p. 312), that those who on other grounds are convinced of -the post-exilic origin of this part of Obadiah, of its origin in the -Persian period, will identify Sepharad with this Çparda, which both he -and Sayce do. But to those of us who hold that this part of Obadiah -is from the time of the Babylonian exile, as we have sought to prove -above on pp. 171 f., then Sepharad cannot be Çparda, for Nebuchadrezzar -did not subdue Asia Minor and cannot have transported Jews there. Are -we then forced to give up our theory of the date of Obadiah 10-21 in -the Babylonian exile? By no means. For, _second_, the inscriptions of -Sargon, king of Assyria (721—705 B.C.), mention a Shaparda, in S.W. -Media towards Babylonia, a name phonetically correspondent to ספרד -(Schrader, _l.c._), and the identification of the two is regarded as -“exceedingly probable” by Fried. Delitzsch (_Wo lag das Paradies?_ p. -249). But even if this should be shown to be impossible, and if the -identification Sepharad = Çparda be proved, that would not oblige us to -alter our opinion as to the date of the whole of Obadiah 10-21, for it -is possible that later additions, including Sepharad, have been made to -the passage. - - - - - CHAPTER XIV - - _EDOM AND ISRAEL_ - - OBADIAH 1-21 - - -If the Book of Obadiah presents us with some of the most difficult -questions of criticism, it raises besides one of the hardest ethical -problems in all the vexed history of Israel. - -Israel’s fate has been to work out their calling in the world through -antipathies rather than by sympathies, but of all the antipathies which -the nation experienced none was more bitter and more constant than that -towards Edom. The rest of Israel’s enemies rose and fell like waves: -Canaanites were succeeded by Philistines, Philistines by Syrians, -Syrians by Greeks. Tyrant relinquished his grasp of God’s people to -tyrant: Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian; the Seleucids, the -Ptolemies. But Edom was always there, _and fretted his anger for -ever_.[509] From that far back day when their ancestors wrestled in the -womb of Rebekah to the very eve of the Christian era, when a Jewish -king[510] dragged the Idumeans beneath the yoke of the Law, the two -peoples scorned, hated and scourged each other, with a relentlessness -that finds no analogy, between kindred and neighbour nations, anywhere -else in history. About 1030 David, about 130 the Hasmoneans, were -equally at war with Edom; and few are the prophets between those -distant dates who do not cry for vengeance against him or exult in his -overthrow. The Book of Obadiah is singular in this, that it contains -nothing else than such feelings and such cries. It brings no spiritual -message. It speaks no word of sin, or of righteousness, or of mercy, -but only doom upon Edom in bitter resentment at his cruelties, and in -exultation that, as he has helped to disinherit Israel, Israel shall -disinherit him. Such a book among the prophets surprises us. It seems -but a dark surge staining the stream of revelation, as if to exhibit -through what a muddy channel these sacred waters have been poured upon -the world. Is the book only an outbreak of Israel’s selfish patriotism? -This is the question we have to discuss in the present chapter. - -Reasons for the hostility of Edom and Israel are not far to seek. The -two nations were neighbours with bitter memories and rival interests. -Each of them was possessed by a strong sense of distinction from -the rest of mankind, which goes far to justify the story of their -common descent. But while in Israel this pride was chiefly due to the -consciousness of a peculiar destiny not yet realised—a pride painful -and hungry—in Edom it took the complacent form of satisfaction in a -territory of remarkable isolation and self-sufficiency, in large -stores of wealth, and in a reputation for worldly wisdom—a fulness that -recked little of the future, and felt no need of the Divine. - -The purple mountains, into which the wild sons of Esau clambered, -run out from Syria upon the desert, some hundred miles by twenty of -porphyry and red sandstone. They are said to be the finest rock scenery -in the world. “Salvator Rosa never conceived so savage and so suitable -a haunt for banditti.”[511] From Mount Hor, which is their summit, you -look down upon a maze of mountains, cliffs, chasms, rocky shelves and -strips of valley. On the east the range is but the crested edge of -a high, cold plateau, covered for the most part by stones, but with -stretches of corn land and scattered woods. The western walls, on the -contrary, spring steep and bare, black and red, from the yellow of the -desert ‘Arabah. The interior is reached by defiles, so narrow that two -horsemen may scarcely ride abreast, and the sun is shut out by the -overhanging rocks. Eagles, hawks and other mountain birds fly screaming -round the traveller. Little else than wild-fowls’ nests are the -villages; human eyries perched on high shelves or hidden away in caves -at the ends of the deep gorges. There is abundance of water. The gorges -are filled with tamarisks, oleanders and wild figs. Besides the wheat -lands on the eastern plateau, the wider defiles hold fertile fields -and terraces for the vine. Mount Esau is, therefore, no mere citadel -with supplies for a limited siege, but a well-stocked, well-watered -country, full of food and lusty men, yet lifted so high, and locked -so fast by precipice and slippery mountain, that it calls for little -trouble of defence. _Dweller in the clefts of the rock, the height is -his habitation, that saith in his heart: Who shall bring me down to -earth?_[512] - -On this rich fortress-land the Edomites enjoyed a civilisation far -above that of the tribes who swarmed upon the surrounding deserts; -and at the same time they were cut off from the lands of those Syrian -nations who were their equals in culture and descent. When Edom looked -out of himself, he looked _down_ and _across_—down upon the Arabs, whom -his position enabled him to rule with a loose, rough hand, and across -at his brothers in Palestine, forced by their more open territories -to make alliances with and against each other, from all of which he -could afford to hold himself free. That alone was bound to exasperate -them. In Edom himself it appears to have bred a want of sympathy, a -habit of keeping to himself and ignoring the claims both of pity and of -kinship—with which he is charged by all the prophets. _He corrupted his -natural feelings, and watched his passion for ever.[513] Thou stoodest -aloof!_[514] - -This self-sufficiency was aggravated by the position of the country -among several of the main routes of ancient trade. The masters of Mount -Se’ir held the harbours of ‘Akaba, into which the gold ships came from -Ophir. They intercepted the Arabian caravans and cut the roads to Gaza -and Damascus. Petra, in the very heart of Edom, was in later times -the capital of the Nabatean kingdom, whose commerce rivalled that of -Phœnicia, scattering its inscriptions from Teyma in Central Arabia up -to the very gates of Rome.[515] The earlier Edomites were also traders, -middlemen between Arabia and the Phœnicians; and they filled their -caverns with the wealth both of East and West.[516] There can be little -doubt that it was this which first drew the envious hand of Israel upon -a land so cut off from their own and so difficult of invasion. Hear the -exultation of the ancient prophet whose words Obadiah has borrowed: -_How searched out is Esau, and his hidden treasures rifled!_[517] But -the same is clear from the history. Solomon, Jehoshaphat, Amaziah, -Uzziah and other Jewish invaders of Edom were all ambitious to command -the Eastern trade through Elath and Ezion-geber. For this it was -necessary to subdue Edom; and the frequent reduction of the country -to a vassal state, with the revolts in which it broke free, were -accompanied by terrible cruelties upon both sides.[518] Every century -increased the tale of bitter memories between the brothers, and added -the horrors of a war of revenge to those of a war for gold. - -The deepest springs of their hate, however, bubbled in their blood. In -genius, temper and ambition, the two peoples were of opposite extremes. -It is very singular that we never hear in the Old Testament of the -Edomite gods. Israel fell under the fascination of every neighbouring -idolatry, but does not even mention that Edom had a religion. Such a -silence cannot be accidental, and the inference which it suggests is -confirmed by the picture drawn of Esau himself. Esau is a _profane -person_[519]; with no conscience of a birthright, no faith in the -future, no capacity for visions; dead to the unseen, and clamouring -only for the satisfaction of his appetites. The same was probably the -character of his descendants; who had, of course, their own gods, like -every other people in that Semitic world,[520] but were essentially -irreligious, living for food, spoil and vengeance, with no national -conscience or ideals—a kind of people who deserved even more than the -Philistines to have their name descend to our times as a symbol of -hardness and obscurantism. It is no contradiction to all this that the -one intellectual quality imputed to the Edomites should be that of -shrewdness and a wisdom which was obviously worldly. _The wise men of -Edom, the cleverness of Mount Esau_[521] were notorious. It is the race -which has given to history only the Herods—clever, scheming, ruthless -statesmen, as able as they were false and bitter, as shrewd in policy -as they were destitute of ideals. _That fox_, cried Christ, and crying -stamped the race. - -But of such a national character Israel was in all points, save that -of cunning, essentially the reverse. Who had such a passion for the -ideal? Who such a hunger for the future, such hopes or such visions? -Never more than in the day of their prostration, when Jerusalem and the -sanctuary fell in ruins, did they feel and hate the hardness of the -brother, who _stood aloof_ and _made large his mouth_.[522] - -It is, therefore, no mere passion for revenge, which inspires these -few, hot verses of Obadiah. No doubt, bitter memories rankle in his -heart. He eagerly repeats[523] the voices of a day when Israel matched -Edom in cruelty and was cruel for the sake of gold, when Judah’s kings -coveted Esau’s treasures and were foiled. No doubt there is exultation -in the news he hears, that these treasures have been rifled by others; -that all the cleverness of this proud people has not availed against -its treacherous allies; and that it has been sent packing to its -borders.[524] But beneath such savage tempers, there beats the heart -which has fought and suffered for the highest things, and now in its -martyrdom sees them baffled and mocked by a people without vision and -without feeling. Justice, mercy and truth; the education of humanity in -the law of God, the establishment of His will upon earth—these things, -it is true, are not mentioned in the Book of Obadiah, but it is for the -sake of some dim instinct of them that its wrath is poured upon foes -whose treachery and malice seek to make them impossible by destroying -the one people on earth who then believed and lived for them. Consider -the situation. It was the darkest hour of Israel’s history. City and -Temple had fallen, the people had been carried away. Up over the empty -land the waves of mocking heathen had flowed, there was none to beat -them back. A Jew who had lived through these things, who had seen[525] -the day of Jerusalem’s fall and passed from her ruins under the mocking -of her foes, dared to cry back into the large mouths they made: Our day -is not spent; we shall return with the things we live for; the land -shall yet be ours, and the kingdom our God’s. - -Brave, hot heart! It shall be as thou sayest; it shall be for a brief -season. But in exile thy people and thou have first to learn many more -things about the heathen than you can now feel. Mix with them on that -far-off coast, from which thou criest. Learn what the world is, and -that more beautiful and more possible than the narrow rule which thou -hast promised to Israel over her neighbours shall be that worldwide -service of man, of which, in fifty years, all the best of thy people -shall be dreaming. - -The Book of Obadiah at the beginning of the Exile, and the great -prophecy of the Servant at the end of it—how true was his word who -said: _He that goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed, shall -doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him._ - - * * * * * - -The subsequent history of Israel and Edom may be quickly traced. When -the Jews returned from exile they found the Edomites in possession of -all the Negeb, and of the Mountain of Judah far north of Hebron. The -old warfare was resumed, and not till 130 B.C. (as has been already -said) did a Jewish king bring the old enemies of his people beneath -the Law of Jehovah. The Jewish scribes transferred the name of Edom -to Rome, as if it were the perpetual symbol of that hostility of the -heathen world, against which Israel had to work out her calling as -the peculiar people of God. Yet Israel had not done with the Edomites -themselves. Never did she encounter foes more dangerous to her higher -interests than in her Idumean dynasty of the Herods; while the savage -relentlessness of certain Edomites in the last struggles against Rome -proved that the fire which had scorched her borders for a thousand -years, now burned a still more fatal flame within her. More than -anything else, this Edomite fanaticism provoked the splendid suicide of -Israel, which beginning in Galilee was consummated upon the rocks of -Masada, half-way between Jerusalem and Mount Esau. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[509] Amos i. 11. See Vol. I., p. 129. - -[510] John Hyrcanus, about 130 B.C. - -[511] Irby and Mangles’ _Travels_: cf. Burckhardt’s _Travels in Syria_, -and Doughty, _Arabia Deserta_, I. - -[512] Obadiah 3. - -[513] Amos i.: cf. Ezek. xxxv. 5. - -[514] Obadiah 10. - -[515] _C. I. S._, II. i. 183 ff. - -[516] Obadiah 6. - -[517] Verse 6. - -[518] See the details in Vol. I., pp. 129 f. - -[519] Heb. xii. 16. - -[520] We even know the names of some of these deities from the -theophorous names of Edomites: _e.g._ Baal-chanan (Gen. xxxvi. 38), -Hadad (_ib._ 35; 1 Kings xi. 14 ff.); Malikram, Ḳausmalaka, Ḳausgabri -(on Assyrian inscriptions: Schrader, _K.A.T._² 150, 613); Κοσαδαρος, -Κοσβανος, Κοσγηρος, Κοσνατανος (_Rev. archéol._ 1870, I. pp. 109 ff., -170 ff.), Κοστοβαρος (Jos., XV. _Ant._ vii. 9). See Baethgen, _Beiträge -zur Semit. Rel. Gesch._, pp. 10 ff. - -[521] Obadiah 8: cf. Jer. xlix. 7. - -[522] Obadiah 11, 12: cf. Ezek. xxxv. 12 f. - -[523] 1-5 or 6. See above, pp. 167, 171 f. - -[524] Verse 7. - -[525] See above, p. 171. - - - - - _INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPHETS OF THE PERSIAN PERIOD_ - - (539—331 B.C.) - - - - -“The exiles returned from Babylon to found not a kingdom but a church.” - - KIRKPATRICK. - -“Israel is no longer a kingdom, but a colony” (p. 189). - - - - - CHAPTER XV - - _ISRAEL UNDER THE PERSIANS_ (539—331 B.C.) - - -The next group of the Twelve Prophets—Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi and -perhaps Joel—fall within the period of the Persian Empire. The Persian -Empire was founded on the conquest of Babylon by Cyrus in 539 B.C., -and it fell in the defeat of Darius III. by Alexander the Great at the -battle of Gaugamela, or Arbela, in 331. The period is thus one of a -little more than two centuries. - -During all this time Israel were the subjects of the Persian monarchs, -and bound to them and their civilisation by the closest of ties. They -owed them their liberty and revival as a separate community upon its -own land. The Jewish State—if we may give that title to what is perhaps -more truly described as a Congregation or Commune—was part of an empire -which stretched from the Ægean to the Indus, and the provinces of -which were held in close intercourse by the first system of roads and -posts that ever brought different races together. Jews were scattered -almost everywhere across this empire. A vast number still remained in -Babylon, and there were many at Susa and Ecbatana, two of the royal -capitals. Most of these were subject to the full influence of Aryan -manners and religion; some were even members of the Persian Court and -had access to the Royal Presence. In the Delta of Egypt there were -Jewish settlements, and Jews were found also throughout Syria and -along the coasts, at least, of Asia Minor. Here they touched another -civilisation, destined to impress them in the future even more deeply -than the Persian. It is the period of the struggle between Asia -and Europe, between Persia and Greece: the period of Marathon and -Thermopylæ, of Salamis and Platæa, of Xenophon and the Ten Thousand. -Greek fleets occupied Cyprus and visited the Delta. Greek armies—in the -pay of Persia—trod for the first time the soil of Syria.[526] - -In such a world, dominated for the first time by the Aryan, Jews -returned from exile, rebuilt their Temple and resumed its ritual, -revived Prophecy and codified the Law: in short, restored and organised -Israel as the people of God, and developed their religion to those -ultimate forms in which it has accomplished its supreme service to the -world. - -In this period Prophecy does not maintain that lofty position which -it has hitherto held in the life of Israel, and the reasons for its -decline are obvious. To begin with, the national life, from which it -springs, is of a far poorer quality. Israel is no longer a kingdom, -but a colony. The state is not independent: there is virtually no -state. The community is poor and feeble, cut off from all the habit -and prestige of their past, and beginning the rudiments of life -again in hard struggle with nature and hostile tribes. To this level -Prophecy has to descend, and occupy itself with these rudiments. -We miss the civic atmosphere, the great spaces of public life, the -large ethical issues. Instead we have tearful questions, raised by -a grudging soil and bad seasons, with all the petty selfishness of -hunger-bitten peasants. The religious duties of the colony are mainly -ecclesiastical: the building of a temple, the arrangement of ritual, -and the ceremonial discipline of the people in separation from their -heathen neighbours. We miss, too, the clear outlook of the earlier -prophets upon the history of the world, and their calm, rational grasp -of its forces. The world is still seen, and even to further distances -than before. The people abate no whit of their ideal to be the teachers -of mankind. But it is all through another medium. The lurid air of -Apocalypse envelops the future, and in their weakness to grapple either -politically or philosophically with the problems which history offers, -the prophets resort to the expectation of physical catastrophes and -of the intervention of supernatural armies. Such an atmosphere is not -the native air of Prophecy, and Prophecy yields its supreme office -in Israel to other forms of religious development. On one side the -ecclesiastic comes to the front—the legalist, the organiser of ritual, -the priest; on another, the teacher, the moralist, the thinker and the -speculator. At the same time personal religion is perhaps more deeply -cultivated than at any other stage of the people’s history. A large -number of lyrical pieces bear proof to the existence of a very genuine -and beautiful piety throughout the period. - - - * * * * * - -Unfortunately the Jewish records for this time are both fragmentary -and confused; they touch the general history of the world only at -intervals, and give rise to a number of difficult questions, some -of which are insoluble. The clearest and only consecutive line of -data through the period is the list of the Persian monarchs. The -Persian Empire, 539—331, was sustained through eleven reigns and two -usurpations, of which the following is a chronological table:— - - Cyrus (Kurush) the Great 539—529 - Cambyses (Kambujiya) 529—522 - Pseudo-Smerdis, or Baradis 522 - Darius (Darayahush) I., Hystaspis 521—485 - Xerxes (Kshayarsha) I. 485—464 - Artaxerxes (Artakshathra) I., Longimanus 464—424 - Xerxes II. 424—423 - Sogdianus 423 - Darius II., Nothus 423—404 - Artaxerxes II., Mnemon 404—358 - Artaxerxes III., Ochus 358—338 - Arses 338—335 - Darius III., Codomanus 335—331 - -Of these royal names, Cyrus, Darius, Xerxes (Ahasuerus) and Artaxerxes -are given among the Biblical data; but the fact that there are three -Darius’, two Xerxes’ and three Artaxerxes’ makes possible more than -one set of identifications, and has suggested different chronological -schemes of Jewish history during this period. The simplest and most -generally accepted identification of the Darius, Xerxes (Ahasuerus) -and Artaxerxes of the Biblical history,[527] is that they were the -first Persian monarchs of these names; and after needful rearrangement -of the somewhat confused order of events in the narrative of the Book -of Ezra, it was held as settled that, while the exiles returned under -Cyrus about 537, Haggai and Zechariah prophesied and the Temple was -built under Darius I. between the second and the sixth year of his -reign, or from 520 to 516; that attempts were made to build the walls -of Jerusalem under Xerxes I. (485—464), but especially under Artaxerxes -I. (464—424), under whom first Ezra in 458 and then Nehemiah in 445 -arrived at Jerusalem, promulgated the Law and reorganised Israel. - -But this has by no means satisfied all modern critics. Some in the -interests of the authenticity and correct order of the Book of Ezra, -and some for other reasons, argue that the Darius under whom the Temple -was built was Darius II., or Nothus, 423—404, and thus bring down -the building of the Temple and the prophets Haggai and Zechariah a -whole century later than the accepted theory;[528] and that therefore -the Artaxerxes, under whom Ezra and Nehemiah laboured, was not the -first Artaxerxes, or Longimanus (464—424), but the second, or Mnemon -(404—358).[529] This arrangement of the history finds some support -in the data, and especially in the _order_ of the data, furnished by -the Book of Ezra, which describes the building of the Temple under -Darius _after_ its record of events under Xerxes I. (Ahasuerus) and -Artaxerxes I.[530] But, as we shall see in the next chapter, the -Compiler of the Book of Ezra has seen fit, for some reason, to violate -the chronological order of the data at his disposal, and nothing -reliable can be built upon his arrangement. Unravel his somewhat -confused history, take the contemporary data supplied in Haggai and -Zechariah, add to them the historical probabilities of the time, and -you will find, as the three Dutch scholars Kuenen, Van Hoonacker and -Kosters have done,[531] that the rebuilding of the Temple cannot -possibly be dated so late as the reign of the second Darius (423—404), -but must be left, according to the usual acceptation, under Darius I. -(521—485). Haggai, for instance, plainly implies that among those who -saw the Temple rising were men who had seen its predecessor destroyed -in 586,[532] and Zechariah declares that God’s wrath on Jerusalem has -just lasted seventy years.[533] Nor (however much his confusion may -give grounds to the contrary) can the Compiler of the Book of Ezra -have meant any other reign for the building of the Temple than that -of Darius I. He mentions that nothing was done to the Temple _all the -days of Cyrus and up to the reign of Darius_:[534] by this he cannot -intend to pass over the first Darius and leap on three more reigns, or -a century, to Darius II. He mentions Zerubbabel and Jeshua both as at -the head of the exiles who returned under Cyrus, and as presiding at -the building of the Temple under Darius.[535] If alive in 536, they may -well have been alive in 521, but cannot have survived till 423.[536] -These data are fully supported by the historical probabilities. It is -inconceivable that the Jews should have delayed the building of the -Temple for more than a century from the time of Cyrus. That the Temple -was built by Zerubbabel and Jeshua in the beginning of the reign of -Darius I. may be considered as one of the unquestionable data of our -period. - -But if this be so, then there falls away a great part of the argument -for placing the building of the walls of Jerusalem and the labours of -Ezra and Nehemiah under Artaxerxes II. (404—358) instead of Artaxerxes -I. It is true that some who accept the building of the Temple under -Darius I. nevertheless put Ezra and Nehemiah under Artaxerxes II. -The weakness of their case, however, has been clearly exposed by -Kuenen,[537] who proves that Nehemiah’s mission to Jerusalem must have -fallen in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes I., or 445.[538] “On this -fact there can be no further difference of opinion.”[539] - -These two dates then are fixed: the beginning of the Temple in 520 by -Zerubbabel and Jeshua, and the arrival of Nehemiah at Jerusalem in -445. Other points are more difficult to establish, and in particular -there rests a great obscurity on the date of the two visits of Ezra to -Jerusalem. According to the Book of Ezra,[540] he went there first in -the seventh year of Artaxerxes I., or 458 B.C., thirteen years before -the arrival of Nehemiah. He found many Jews married to heathen wives, -laid it to heart, and called a general assembly of the people to drive -the latter out of the community. Then we hear no more of him: neither -in the negotiations with Artaxerxes about the building of the walls, -nor upon the arrival of Nehemiah, nor in Nehemiah’s treatment of the -mixed marriages. He is absent from everything, till suddenly he appears -again at the dedication of the walls by Nehemiah and at the reading of -the Law.[541] This “eclipse of Ezra,” as Kuenen well calls it, taken -with the mixed character of all the records left of him, has moved some -to deny to him and his reforms and his promulgation of the Law any -historical reality whatever;[542] while others, with a more sober and -rational criticism, have sought to solve the difficulties by another -arrangement of the events than that usually accepted. Van Hoonacker -makes Ezra’s _first_ appearance in Jerusalem to be at the dedication of -the walls and promulgation of the Law in 445, and refers his arrival -described in Ezra vii. and his attempts to abolish the mixed marriages -to a second visit to Jerusalem in the twentieth year, not of Artaxerxes -I., but of Artaxerxes II., or 398 B.C. Kuenen has exposed the extreme -unlikelihood, if not impossibility, of so late a date for Ezra, and -in this Kosters holds with him.[543] But Kosters agrees with Van -Hoonacker in placing Ezra’s activity subsequent to Nehemiah’s and to -the dedication of the walls. - -These questions about Ezra have little bearing on our present study -of the prophets, and it is not our duty to discuss them. But Kuenen, -in answer to Van Hoonacker, has shown very strong reasons[544] for -holding in the main to the generally accepted theory of Ezra’s arrival -in Jerusalem in 458, the seventh year of Artaxerxes I.; and though -there are great difficulties about the narrative which follows, and -especially about Ezra’s sudden disappearance from the scene till after -Nehemiah’s arrival, reasons may be found for this.[545] - -We are therefore justified in holding, in the meantime, to the -traditional arrangement of the great events in Israel in the fifth -century before Christ. We may divide the whole Persian period by the -two points we have found to be certain, the beginning of the Temple -under Darius I. in 520 and the mission of Nehemiah to Jerusalem in 445, -and by the other that we have found to be probable, Ezra’s arrival in -458. - -On these data the Persian period may be arranged under the following -four sections, among which we place those prophets who respectively -belong to them:— - -1. From the Taking of Babylon by Cyrus to the Completion of the Temple -in the sixth year of Darius I., 538—516: Haggai and Zechariah in 520 ff. - -2. From the Completion of the Temple under Darius I. to the arrival of -Ezra in the seventh year of Artaxerxes I., 516—458: sometimes called -the period of silence, but probably yielding the Book of “Malachi.” - -3. The Work of Ezra and Nehemiah under Artaxerxes I., Longimanus, -458—425. - -4. The Rest of the Period, Xerxes II. to Darius III., 425—331: the -prophet Joel and perhaps several other anonymous fragments of prophecy. - - * * * * * - -Of these four sections we must now examine the first, for it forms -the necessary introduction to our study of Haggai and Zechariah, and -above all it raises a question almost greater than any of those we -have just been discussing. The fact recorded by the Book of Ezra, and -till a few years ago accepted without doubt by tradition and modern -criticism, the first Return of Exiles from Babylon under Cyrus, has -lately been altogether denied; and the builders of the Temple in 520 -have been asserted to be, not returned exiles, but the remnant of Jews -left in Judah by Nebuchadrezzar in 586. The importance of this for our -interpretation of Haggai and Zechariah, who instigated the building of -the Temple, is obvious: we must discuss the question in detail. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[526] The chief authorities for this period are as follows:—A. Ancient: -the inscriptions of Nabonidus, last native King of Babylon, Cyrus and -Darius I.; the Hebrew writings which were composed in, or record the -history of, the period; the Greek historians Herodotus, fragments of -Ctesias in Diodorus Sic. etc., of Abydenus in Eusebius, Berosus. B. -Modern: Meyer’s and Duncker’s Histories of Antiquity; art. “Ancient -Persia” in _Encycl. Brit._, by Nöldeke and Gutschmid; Sayce, _Anc. -Empires_; the works of Kuenen, Van Hoonacker and Kosters given on p. -192; recent histories of Israel, _e.g._ Stade’s, Wellhausen’s and -Klostermann’s; P. Hay Hunter, _After the Exile, a Hundred Years of -Jewish History and Literature_, 2 Vols., Edin. 1890; W. Fairweather, -_From the Exile to the Advent_, Edin. 1895. On Ezra and Nehemiah see -especially Ryle’s _Commentary_ in the _Cambridge Bible for Schools_, -and Bertheau-Ryssel’s in _Kurzgefasstes Exegetisches Handbuch_: cf. -also Charles C. Torrey, _The Composition and Historical Value of -Ezra-Nehemiah_, in the _Beihefte zur Z.A.T.W._, II., 1896. - -[527] Ezra iv. 5-7, etc., vi. 1-14, etc. - -[528] Havet, _Revue des Deux Mondes_, XCIV. 799 ff. (art. _La Modernité -des Prophètes_); Imbert (in defence of the historical character of -the Book of Ezra), _Le Temple Reconstruit par Zorobabel_, extrait du -_Muséon_, 1888-9 (this I have not seen); Sir Henry Howorth in the -_Academy_ for 1893—see especially pp. 320 ff. - -[529] Another French writer, Bellangé, in the _Muséon_ for 1890, quoted -by Kuenen (_Ges. Abhandl._, p. 213), goes further, and places Ezra and -Nehemiah under the _third_ Artaxerxes, Ochus (358—338). - -[530] Ezra iv. 6—v. - -[531] Kuenen, _De Chronologie van het Perzische Tijdvak der Joodsche -Geschiedenis_, 1890, translated by Budde in Kuenen’s _Gesammelte -Abhandlungen_, pp. 212 ff.; Van Hoonacker, _Zorobabel et le Second -Temple_ (1892); Kosters, _Het Herstel van Israel_, in _Het Perzische -Tijdvak_, 1894, translated by Basedow, _Die Wiederherstellung Israels -im Persischen Zeitalter_, 1896. - -[532] Hag. ii. 3. - -[533] Zech. i. 12. - -[534] Ezra iv. 5. - -[535] Ezra ii. 2, iv. 1 ff., v. 2. - -[536] As Kuenen shows, p. 226, nothing can be deduced from Ezra vi. 14. - -[537] P. 227; in answer to De Saulcy, _Étude Chronologique des Livres -d’Esdras et de Néhémie_ (1868), _Sept Siècles de l’Histoire Judaïque_ -(1874). De Saulcy’s case rests on the account of Josephus (XI. _Ant._ -vii. 2-8: cf. ix. 1), the untrustworthy character of which and its -confusion of two distant eras Kuenen has no difficulty in showing. - -[538] When Nehemiah came to Jerusalem Eliyashib was high priest, and -he was grandson of Jeshua, who was high priest in 520, or seventy-five -years before; but between 520 and the twentieth year of Artaxerxes II. -lie one hundred and thirty-six years. And again, the Artaxerxes of -Ezra iv. 8-23, under whom the walls of Jerusalem were begun, was the -immediate follower of Xerxes (Ahasuerus), and therefore Artaxerxes I., -and Van Hoonacker has shown that he must be the same as the Artaxerxes -of Nehemiah. - -[539] Kosters, p. 43. - -[540] vii. 1-8. - -[541] Neh. xii. 36, viii., x. - -[542] Vernes, _Précis d’Histoire Juive depuis les Origines jusqu’à -l’Époque Persane_ (1889), pp. 579 ff. (not seen); more recently also -Charles C. Torrey of Andover, _The Composition and Historical Value of -Ezra-Nehemiah_, in the _Beihefte zur Z.A.T.W._, II., 1896. - -[543] Pages 113 ff. - -[544] Page 237. - -[545] The failure of his too hasty and impetuous attempts at so -wholesale a measure as the banishment of the heathen wives; or his -return to Babylon, having accomplished his end. See Ryle, _Ezra and -Nehemiah_, in the _Cambridge Bible for Schools_, Introd., pp. xl. f. - - - - - CHAPTER XVI - - _FROM THE RETURN FROM BABYLON TO THE BUILDING OF THE TEMPLE_ - - (536—516 B. C.) - - -Cyrus the Great took Babylon and the Babylonian Empire in 539. Upon the -eve of his conquest the Second Isaiah had hailed him as the Liberator -of the people of God and the builder of their Temple. The Return of -the Exiles and the Restoration both of Temple and City were predicted -by the Second Isaiah for the immediate future; and a Jewish historian, -the Compiler of the Books of Ezra and Nehemiah, who lived about 300 -B.C., has taken up the story of how these events came to pass from -the very first year of Cyrus onward. Before discussing the dates and -proper order of these events, it will be well to have this Chronicler’s -narrative before us. It lies in the first and following chapters of -our Book of Ezra. - -According to this, Cyrus, soon after his conquest of Babylon, gave -permission to the Jewish exiles to return to Palestine, and between -forty and fifty thousand[546] did so return, bearing the vessels of -Jehovah’s house which the Chaldeans had taken away in 586. These Cyrus -delivered _to Sheshbazzar, prince of Judah_[547] (who is further -described in an Aramaic document incorporated by the Compiler of the -Book of Ezra as “Peḥah,” or _provincial governor_,[548] and as laying -the foundation of the Temple[549]), and there is also mentioned in -command of the people a Tirshatha, probably the Persian Tarsâta,[550] -which also means _provincial governor_. Upon their arrival at -Jerusalem, the date of which will be immediately discussed, the -people are said to be under Jeshu’a ben Jōṣadak[551] and Zerubbabel -ben She’altî’el,[552] who had already been mentioned as the head of -the returning exiles,[553] and who is called by his contemporary -Haggai Peḥah, or _governor, of Judah_.[554] Are we to understand by -Sheshbazzar and Zerubbabel one and the same person? Most critics have -answered in the affirmative, believing that Sheshbazzar is but the -Babylonian or Persian name by which the Jew Zerubbabel was known at -court;[555] and this view is supported by the facts that Zerubbabel -was of the house of David and is called Peḥah by Haggai, and by the -argument that the command given by the Tirshatha to the Jews to abstain -from _eating the most holy things_[556] could only have been given -by a native Jew.[557] But others, arguing that Ezra v. 1, compared -with vv. 14 and 16, implies that Zerubbabel and Sheshbazzar were two -different persons, take the former to have been the most prominent of -the Jews themselves, but the latter an official, Persian or Babylonian, -appointed by Cyrus to carry out such business in connection with the -Return as could only be discharged by an imperial officer.[558] This -is, on the whole, the more probable theory. - -If it is right, Sheshbazzar, who superintended the Return, had -disappeared from Jerusalem by 521, when Haggai commenced to prophesy, -and had been succeeded as Peḥah, or governor, by Zerubbabel. But in -that case the Compiler has been in error in calling Sheshbazzar _a -prince of Judah_.[559] - -The next point to fix is what the Compiler considers to have been the -date of the Return. He names no year, but he recounts that the same -people, whom he has just described as receiving the command of Cyrus -to return, did immediately leave Babylon,[560] and he says that they -arrived at Jerusalem in _the seventh month_, but again without stating -a year.[561] In any case, he obviously intends to imply that the Return -followed immediately on reception of the permission to return, and -that this was given by Cyrus very soon after his occupation of Babylon -in 539—8. We may take it that the Compiler understood the year to be -that we know as 537 B.C. He adds that, on the arrival of the caravans -from Babylon, the Jews set up the altar on its old site and restored -the morning and evening sacrifices; that they kept also the Feast of -Tabernacles, and thereafter all the rest of the _feasts of Jehovah_; -and further, that they engaged masons and carpenters for building the -Temple, and Phœnicians to bring them cedar-wood from Lebanon.[562] - -Another section from the Compiler’s hand states that the returned Jews -set to work upon the Temple _in the second month of the second year_ -of their Return, presumably 536 B.C., laying the foundation-stone with -due pomp, and amid the excitement of the whole people.[563] Whereupon -certain _adversaries_, by whom the Compiler means Samaritans, demanded -a share in the building of the Temple, and when Jeshua and Zerubbabel -refused this, _the people of the land_ frustrated the building of the -Temple even until the reign of Darius, 521 ff. - -This—the second year of Darius—is the point to which contemporary -documents, the prophecies of Haggai and Zechariah, assign the -beginning of new measures to build the Temple. Of these the Compiler -of the Book of Ezra says in the meantime nothing, but after barely -mentioning the reign of Darius leaps at once[564] to further Samaritan -obstructions—though not of the building of the Temple (be it noted), -but of the building of the city walls—in the reigns of Ahasuerus, that -is Xerxes, presumably Xerxes I., the successor of Darius, 485—464, -and of his successor Artaxerxes I., 464—424;[565] the account of the -latter of which he gives not in his own language but in that of an -Aramaic document, Ezra iv. 8 ff. And this document, after recounting -how Artaxerxes empowered the Samaritans to stop the building of the -walls of Jerusalem, records[566] that the building ceased _till the -second year of the reign of Darius_, when the prophets Haggai and -Zechariah stirred up Zerubbabel and Jeshua to rebuild, not the city -walls, be it observed, but the Temple, and with the permission of -Darius this building was at last completed in his sixth year.[567] That -is to say, this Aramaic document brings us back, with _the frustrated -building of the walls_ under Xerxes I. and Artaxerxes I. (485—424), -to the same date under their predecessor Darius I., viz. 520, to -which the Compiler had brought down _the frustrated building of the -Temple_! The most reasonable explanation of this confusion, not only of -chronology, but of two distinct processes—the erection of the Temple -and the fortification of the city—is that the Compiler was misled by -his desire to give as strong an impression as possible of the Samaritan -obstructions by placing them all together. Attempts to harmonise the -order of his narrative with the ascertained sequence of the Persian -reigns have failed.[568] - -Such then is the character of the compilation known to us as the Book -of Ezra. If we add that in its present form it cannot be of earlier -date than 300 B.C., or two hundred and thirty-six years after the -Return, and that the Aramaic document which it incorporates is probably -not earlier than 430, or one hundred years after the Return, while the -List of Exiles which it gives (in chap. ii.) also contains elements -that cannot be earlier than 430, we shall not wonder that grave doubts -should have been raised concerning its trustworthiness as a narrative. - -These doubts affect, with one exception, all the great facts which -it professes to record. The exception is the building of the Temple -between the second and sixth years of Darius I., 520—516, which we -have already seen to be past doubt.[569] But all that the Book of -Ezra relates before this has been called in question, and it has been -successively alleged: (1) that there was no such attempt as the book -describes to build the Temple before 520, (2) that there was no Return -of Exiles at all under Cyrus, and that the Temple was not built by Jews -who had come from Babylon, but by Jews who had never left Judah. - -These conclusions, if justified, would have the most important bearing -upon our interpretation of Haggai and Zechariah. It is therefore -necessary to examine them with care. They were reached by critics in -the order just stated, but as the second is the more sweeping and to -some extent involves the other, we may take it first. - -1. Is the Book of Ezra, then, right or wrong in asserting that there -was a great return of Jews, headed by Zerubbabel and Jeshua, about the -year 536, and that it was they who in 520—516 rebuilt the Temple? - -The argument that in recounting these events the Book of Ezra is -unhistorical has been fully stated by Professor Kosters of Leiden.[570] -He reaches his conclusion along three lines of evidence: the Books of -Haggai and Zechariah, the sources from which he believes the Aramaic -narrative Ezra v. 1—vi. 18 to have been compiled, and the list of names -in Ezra ii. In the Books of Haggai and Zechariah, he points out that -the inhabitants of Jerusalem whom the prophets summon to build the -Temple are not called by any name which implies that they are returned -exiles; that nothing in the description of them would lead us to -suppose this; that God’s anger against Israel is represented as still -unbroken; that neither prophet speaks of a Return as past, but that -Zechariah seems to look for it as still to come.[571] The second line -of evidence is an analysis of the Aramaic document, Ezra v. 6 ff., into -two sources, neither of which implies a Return under Cyrus. But these -two lines of proof cannot avail against the List of Returned Exiles -offered us in Ezra ii. and Nehemiah vii., if the latter be genuine. -On his third line of evidence, Dr. Kosters, therefore, disputes the -genuineness of this List, and further denies that it even gives itself -out as a List of Exiles returned under Cyrus. So he arrives at the -conclusion that there was no Return from Babylon under Cyrus, nor any -before the Temple was built in 520 ff., but that the builders were -_people of the land_, Jews who had never gone into exile. - -The evidence which Dr. Kosters draws from the Book of Ezra least -concerns us. Both because of this and because it is the weakest part of -his case, we may take it first. - -Dr. Kosters analyses the bulk of the Aramaic document, Ezra v.—vi. 18, -into two constituents. His arguments for this are very precarious.[572] -The first document, which he takes to consist of chap. v. 1-5 and 10, -with perhaps vi. 6-15 (except a few phrases), relates that Thathnai, -Satrap of the West of the Euphrates, asked Darius whether he might -allow the Jews to proceed with the building of the Temple, and received -command not only to allow but to help them, on the ground that Cyrus -had already given them permission. The second, chap. v. 11-17, vi. -1-3, affirms that the building had actually begun under Cyrus, who -had sent Sheshbazzar, the Satrap, to see it carried out. Neither of -these documents says a word about any order from Cyrus to the Jews to -return; and the implication of the second, that the building had gone -on uninterruptedly from the time of Cyrus’ order to the second year -of Darius,[573] is not in harmony with the evidence of the Compiler -of the Book of Ezra, who, as we have seen,[574] states that Samaritan -obstruction stayed the building till the second year of Darius. - -But suppose we accept Kosters’ premisses and agree that these two -documents really exist within Ezra v.—vi. 18. Their evidence is not -irreconcilable. Both imply that Cyrus gave command to rebuild the -Temple: if they were originally independent that would but strengthen -the tradition of such a command, and render a little weaker Dr. -Kosters’ contention that the tradition arose merely from a desire to -find a fulfilment of the Second Isaiah’s predictions[575] that Cyrus -would be the Temple’s builder. That neither of the supposed documents -mentions the Return itself is very natural, because both are concerned -with the building of the Temple. For the Compiler of the Book of Ezra, -who on Kosters’ argument put them together, the interest of the Return -is over; he has already sufficiently dealt with it. But more—Kosters’ -second document, which ascribes the building of the Temple to Cyrus, -surely by that very statement implies a Return of Exiles during his -reign. For is it at all probable that Cyrus would have committed the -rebuilding of the Temple to a Persian magnate like Sheshbazzar, without -sending with him a large number of those Babylonian Jews who must have -instigated the king to give his order for rebuilding? We may conclude -then that Ezra v.—vi. 18, whatever be its value and its date, contains -no evidence, positive or negative, against a Return of the Jews under -Cyrus, but, on the contrary, takes this for granted. - -We turn now to Dr. Kosters’ treatment of the so-called List of the -Returned Exiles. He holds this List to have been, not only borrowed for -its place in Ezra ii. from Nehemiah vii.,[576] but even interpolated in -the latter. His reasons for this latter conclusion are very improbable, -as will be seen from the appended note, and really weaken his otherwise -strong case.[577] As to the contents of the List, there are, it is -true, many elements which date from Nehemiah’s own time and even later. -But these are not sufficient to prove that the List was not originally -a List of Exiles returned under Cyrus. The verses in which this is -asserted—Ezra ii. 1, 2; Nehemiah vii. 6, 7—plainly intimate that those -Jews who came up out of the Exile were the same who built the Temple -under Darius. Dr. Kosters endeavours to destroy the force of this -statement (if true so destructive of his theory) by pointing to the -number of the leaders which the List assigns to the returning exiles. -In fixing this number as twelve, the author, Kosters maintains, -intended to make the leaders representative of the twelve tribes and -the body of returned exiles as equivalent to All-Israel. But, he -argues, neither Haggai nor Zechariah considers the builders of the -Temple to be equivalent to All-Israel, nor was this conception realised -in Judah till after the arrival of Ezra with his bands. The force of -this argument is greatly weakened by remembering how natural it would -have been for men, who felt the Return under Cyrus, however small, to -be the fulfilment of the Second Isaiah’s glorious predictions of a -restoration of All-Israel, to appoint twelve leaders, and so make them -representative of the nation as a whole. Kosters’ argument against the -naturalness of such an appointment in 537, and therefore against the -truth of the statement of the List about it, falls to the ground. - -But in the Books of Haggai and Zechariah Dr. Kosters finds much more -formidable witnesses for his thesis that there was no Return of exiles -from Babylon before the building of the Temple under Darius. These -books nowhere speak of a Return under Cyrus, nor do they call the -community who built the Temple by the names of Gôlah or B’ne ha-Gôlah, -_Captivity_ or _Sons of the Captivity_, which are given after the -Return of Ezra’s bands; but they simply name them _this people_[578] or -_remnant of the people_,[579] _people of the land_,[580] _Judah_ or -_House of Judah_,[581] names perfectly suitable to Jews who had never -left the neighbourhood of Jerusalem. Even if we except from this list -the phrase _the remnant of the people_, as intended by Haggai and -Zechariah in the numerical sense of _the rest_ or _all the -others_,[582] we have still to deal with the other titles, with the -absence from them of any symptom descriptive of return from exile, and -with the whole silence of our two prophets concerning such a return. -These are very striking phenomena, and they undoubtedly afford -considerable evidence for Dr. Kosters’ thesis.[583] But it cannot -escape notice that the evidence they afford is mainly negative, and -this raises two questions: (1) Can the phenomena in Haggai and -Zechariah be accounted for? and (2) whether accounted for or not, can -they be held to prevail against the mass of positive evidence in favour -of a Return under Cyrus? - -An explanation of the absence of all allusion in Haggai and Zechariah -to the Return is certainly possible. - -No one can fail to be struck with the spirituality of the teaching of -Haggai and Zechariah. Their one ambition is to put courage from God -into the poor hearts before them, that these out of their own resources -may rebuild their Temple. As Zechariah puts it, _Not by might, nor by -power, but by My Spirit, saith Jehovah of Hosts_.[584] It is obvious -why men of this temper should refrain from appealing to the Return, or -to the royal power of Persia by which it had been achieved. We can -understand why, while the annals employed in the Book of Ezra record -the appeal of the political leaders of the Jews to Darius upon the -strength of the edict of Cyrus, the prophets, in their effort to -encourage the people to make the most of what they themselves were and -to enforce the omnipotence of God’s Spirit apart from all human aids, -should be silent about the latter. We must also remember that Haggai -and Zechariah were addressing a people to whom (whatever view we take -of the transactions under Cyrus) the favour of Cyrus had been one vast -disillusion in the light of the predictions of Second Isaiah.[585] The -Persian magnate Sheshbazzar himself, invested with full power, had been -unable to build the Temple for them, and had apparently disappeared -from Judah, leaving his powers as Peḥah, or governor, to Zerubbabel. -Was it not, then, as suitable to these circumstances, as it was -essential to the prophets’ own religious temper, that Haggai and -Zechariah should refrain from alluding to any of the political -advantages, to which their countrymen had hitherto trusted in -vain?[586] - -Another fact should be marked. If Haggai is silent about any return -from exile in the past, he is equally silent about any in the future. -If for him no return had yet taken place, would he not have been likely -to predict it as certain to happen?[587] At least his silence on the -subject proves how absolutely he confined his thoughts to the -circumstances before him, and to the needs of his people at the moment -he addressed them. Kosters, indeed, alleges that Zechariah describes -the Return from Exile as still future—viz. in the lyric piece appended -to his Third Vision.[588] But, as we shall see when we come to it, this -lyric piece is most probably an intrusion among the Visions, and is not -to be assigned to Zechariah himself. Even, however, if it were from the -same date and author as the Visions, it would not prove that no return -from Babylon had taken place, but only that numbers of Jews still -remained in Babylon. - -But we may now take a further step. If there were these natural reasons -for the silence of Haggai and Zechariah about a return of exiles under -Cyrus, can that silence be allowed to prevail against the mass of -testimony which we have that such a return took place? It is true that, -while the Books of Haggai and Zechariah are contemporary with the -period in question, some of the evidence for the Return, Ezra i. and -iii.—iv. 7, is at least two centuries later, and upon the date of the -rest, the List in Ezra ii. and the Aramaic document in Ezra iv. 8 ff., -we have no certain information. But that the List is from a date very -soon after Cyrus is allowed by a large number of the most advanced -critics,[589] and even if we ignore it, we still have the Aramaic -document, which agrees with Haggai and Zechariah in assigning the real, -effectual beginning of the Temple-building to the second year of Darius -and to the leadership of Zerubbabel and Jeshua at the instigation of -the two prophets. May we not trust the same document in its relation of -the main facts concerning Cyrus? Again, in his memoirs Ezra[590] speaks -of the transgressions of the Gôlah or B’ne ha-Gôlah in effecting -marriages with the mixed people of the land, in a way which shows that -he means by the name, not the Jews who had just come up with himself -from Babylon, but the older community whom he found in Judah, and who -had had time, as his own bands had not, to scatter over the land and -enter into social relations with the heathen. - -But, as Kuenen points out,[591] we have yet further evidence for the -probability of a Return under Cyrus, in the explicit predictions of the -Second Isaiah that Cyrus would be the builder of Jerusalem and the -Temple. “If they express the expectation, nourished by the prophet and -his contemporaries, then it is clear from their preservation for future -generations that Cyrus did not disappoint the hope of the exiles, from -whose midst this voice pealed forth to him.” And this leads to other -considerations. Whether was it more probable for the poverty-stricken -_people of the land_, the dregs which Nebuchadrezzar had left behind, -or for the body and flower of Israel in Babylon, to rebuild the Temple? -Surely for the latter.[592] Among them had risen, as Cyrus drew near to -Babylon, the hopes and the motives, nay, the glorious assurance of the -Return and the Rebuilding; and with them was all the material for the -latter. Is it credible that they took no advantage of their opportunity -under Cyrus? Is it credible that they waited nearly a century before -seeking to return to Jerusalem, and that the building of the Temple was -left to people who were half-heathen, and, in the eyes of the exiles, -despicable and unholy? This would be credible only upon one condition, -that Cyrus and his immediate successors disappointed the predictions of -the Second Isaiah and refused to allow the exiles to leave Babylon. But -the little we know of these Persian monarchs points all the other way: -nothing is more probable, for nothing is more in harmony with Persian -policy, than that Cyrus should permit the captives of the Babylon which -he conquered to return to their own lands.[593] - -Moreover, we have another, and to the mind of the present writer an -almost conclusive argument, that the Jews addressed by Haggai and -Zechariah were Jews returned from Babylon. Neither prophet ever charges -his people with idolatry; neither prophet so much as mentions idols. -This is natural if the congregation addressed was composed of such -pious and ardent adherents of Jehovah, as His word had brought back -to Judah, when His servant Cyrus opened the way. But had Haggai and -Zechariah been addressing _the people of the land_, who had never left -the land, they could not have helped speaking of idolatry. - -Such considerations may very justly be used against an argument which -seeks to prove that the narratives of a Return under Cyrus were due to -the pious invention of a Jewish writer who wished to record that the -predictions of the Second Isaiah were fulfilled by Cyrus, their -designated trustee.[594] They certainly possess a far higher degree of -probability than that argument does. - -Finally there is this consideration. If there was no return from -Babylon under Cyrus, and the Temple, as Dr. Kosters alleges, was built -by the poor people of the land, is it likely that the latter should -have been regarded with such contempt as they were by the exiles who -returned under Ezra and Nehemiah? Theirs would then have been the glory -of reconstituting Israel, and their position very different from what -we find it. - -On all these grounds, therefore, we must hold that the attempt to -discredit the tradition of an important return of exiles under Cyrus -has not been successful; that such a return remains the more probable -solution of an obscure and difficult problem; and that therefore the -Jews who with Zerubbabel and Jeshua are represented in Haggai and -Zechariah as building the Temple in the second year of Darius, 520, -had come up from Babylon about 537.[595] Such a conclusion, of course, -need not commit us to the various data offered by the Chronicler in -his story of the Return, such as the Edict of Cyrus, nor to all of his -details. - -2. Many, however, who grant the correctness of the tradition that a -large number of Jewish exiles returned under Cyrus to Jerusalem, deny -the statement of the Compiler of the Book of Ezra that the returned -exiles immediately prepared to build the Temple and laid the -foundation-stone with solemn festival, but were hindered from -proceeding with the building till the second year of Darius.[596] They -maintain that this late narrative is contradicted by the contemporary -statements of Haggai and Zechariah, who, according to them, imply that -no foundation-stone was laid till 520 B.C.[597] For the interpretation -of our prophets this is not a question of cardinal importance. But for -clearness’ sake we do well to lay it open. - -We may at once concede that in Haggai and Zechariah there is nothing -which necessarily implies that the Jews had made any beginning to build -the Temple before the start recorded by Haggai in the year 520. The one -passage, Haggai ii. 18, which is cited to prove this[598] is at the -best ambiguous, and many scholars claim it as a fixture of that date -for the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month of 520.[599] At the same -time, and even granting that the latter interpretation of Haggai ii. 18 -is correct, there is nothing in either Haggai or Zechariah to make it -impossible that a foundation-stone had been laid some years before, but -abandoned in consequence of the Samaritan obstruction, as alleged in -Ezra iii. 8-11. If we keep in mind Haggai’s and Zechariah’s silence -about the Return from Babylon, and their very natural concentration -upon their own circumstances,[600] we shall not be able to reckon their -silence about previous attempts to build the Temple as a conclusive -proof that these attempts never took place. Moreover the Aramaic -document, which agrees with our two prophets in assigning the only -effective start of the work on the Temple to 520,[601] does not deem it -inconsistent with this to record that the Persian Satrap of the West of -the Euphrates[602] reported to Darius that, when he asked the Jews why -they were rebuilding the Temple, they replied not only that a decree of -Cyrus had granted them permission,[603] but that his legate Sheshbazzar -had actually laid the foundation-stone upon his arrival at Jerusalem, -and that the building had gone on without interruption from that time -to 520.[604] This last assertion, which of course was false, may have -been due either to a misunderstanding of the Jewish elders by the -reporting Satrap, or else to the Jews themselves, anxious to make their -case as strong as possible. The latter is the more probable -alternative. As even Stade admits, it was a very natural assertion for -the Jews to make, and so conceal that their effort of 520 was due to -the instigation of their own prophets. But in any case the Aramaic -document corroborates the statement of the Compiler that there was a -foundation-stone laid in the early years of Cyrus, and does not -conceive this to be inconsistent with its own narrative of a stone -being laid in 520, and an effective start at last made upon the Temple -works. So much does Stade feel the force of this, that he concedes not -only that Sheshbazzar may have started some preparation for building -the Temple, but that he may even have laid the stone with -ceremony.[605] - -And indeed, is it not in itself very probable that some early attempt -was made by the exiles returned under Cyrus to rebuild the house of -Jehovah? Cyrus had been predicted by the Second Isaiah not only as the -redeemer of God’s people, but with equal explicitness as the builder -of the Temple; and all the argument which Kuenen draws from the Second -Isaiah for the fact of the Return from Babylon[606] tells with almost -equal force for the fact of some efforts to raise the fallen sanctuary -of Israel immediately after the Return. Among the returned were many -priests, and many no doubt of the most sanguine spirits in Israel. -They came straight from the heart of Jewry, though that heart was -in Babylon; they came with the impetus and obligation of the great -Deliverance upon them; they were the representatives of a community -which we know to have been comparatively wealthy. Is it credible that -they should not have begun the Temple at the earliest possible moment? - -Nor is the story of their frustration by the Samaritans any less -natural.[607] It is true that there were not any adversaries likely to -dispute with the colonists the land in the immediate neighbourhood of -Jerusalem. The Edomites had overrun the fruitful country about Hebron, -and part of the Shephelah. The Samaritans held the rich valleys of -Ephraim, and probably the plain of Ajalon. But if any peasants -struggled with the stony plateaus of Benjamin and Northern Judah, such -must have been of the remnants of the Jewish population who were left -behind by Nebuchadrezzar, and who clung to the sacred soil from habit -or from motives of religion. Jerusalem was never a site to attract men, -either for agriculture, or, now that its shrine was desolate and its -population scattered, for the command of trade.[608] The returned -exiles must have been at first undisturbed by the envy of their -neighbours. The tale is, therefore, probable which attributes the -hostility of the latter to purely religious causes—the refusal of the -Jews to allow the half-heathen Samaritans to share in the construction -of the Temple.[609] Now the Samaritans could prevent the building. -While stones were to be had by the builders in profusion from the ruins -of the city and the great quarry to the north of it, ordinary timber -did not grow in their neighbourhood, and though the story be true that -a contract was already made with Phœnicians to bring cedar to Joppa, it -had to be carried thence for thirty-six miles. Here, then, was the -opportunity of the Samaritans. They could obstruct the carriage both of -the ordinary timber and of the cedar. To this state of affairs the -present writer found an analogy in 1891 among the Circassian colonies -settled by the Turkish Government a few years earlier in the vicinity -of Gerasa and Rabbath-Ammon. The colonists had built their houses from -the numerous ruins of these cities, but at Rabbath-Ammon they said -their great difficulty had been about timber. And we could well -understand how the Beduin, who resented the settlement of Circassians -on lands they had used for ages, and with whom the Circassians were -nearly always at variance,[610] did what they could to make the -carriage of timber impossible. Similarly with the Jews and their -Samaritan adversaries. The site might be cleared and the stone of the -Temple laid, but if the timber was stopped there was little use in -raising the walls, and the Jews, further discouraged by the failure of -their impetuous hopes of what the Return would bring them, found cause -for desisting from their efforts. Bad seasons followed, the labours for -their own sustenance exhausted their strength, and in the sordid toil -their hearts grew hard to higher interests. Cyrus died in 529, and his -legate Sheshbazzar, having done nothing but lay the stone, appears to -have left Judæa.[611] Cambyses marched more than once through -Palestine, and his army garrisoned Gaza, but he was not a monarch to -have any consideration for Jewish ambitions. Therefore—although -Samaritan opposition ceased on the stoppage of the Temple works and the -Jews procured timber enough for their private dwellings[612]—is it -wonderful that the site of the Temple should be neglected and the stone -laid by Sheshbazzar forgotten, or that the disappointed Jews should -seek to explain the disillusions of the Return, by arguing that God’s -time for the restoration of His house had not yet come? - -The death of a cruel monarch is always in the East an occasion for -the revival of shattered hopes, and the events which accompanied -the suicide of Cambyses in 522 were particularly fraught with the -possibilities of political change. Cambyses’ throne had been usurped by -one Gaumata, who pretended to be Smerdis or Barada, a son of Cyrus. In -a few months Gaumata was slain by a conspiracy of seven Persian nobles, -of whom Darius, the son of Hystaspes, both by virtue of his royal -descent and by his own great ability, was raised to the throne in 521. -The empire had been too profoundly shocked by the revolt of Gaumata to -settle at once under the new king, and Darius found himself engaged by -insurrections in all his provinces except Syria and Asia Minor.[613] -The colonists in Jerusalem, like all their Syrian neighbours, remained -loyal to the new king; so loyal that their Peḥah or Satrap was allowed -to be one of themselves—Zerubbabel, son of She’altî’el,[614] a son of -their royal house. Yet though they were quiet, the nations were rising -against each other and the world was shaken. It was just such a crisis -as had often before in Israel rewakened prophecy. Nor did it fail -now; and when prophecy was roused what duty lay more clamant for its -inspiration than the duty of building the Temple? - -We are in touch with the first of our post-exilic prophets, Haggai and -Zechariah. - -FOOTNOTES: - -[546] 42,360, _besides their servants_, is the total sum given in Ezra -ii. 64; but the detailed figures in Ezra amount only to 29,818, those -in Nehemiah to 31,089, and those in 1 Esdras to 30,143 (other MSS. -30,678). See Ryle on Ezra ii. 64. - -[547] Ezra i. 8. - -[548] Ezra v. 14. - -[549] _Ib._ 16. - -[550] Ezra ii. 63. - -[551] יֵשׁוּעַ בֶּן־יוֹצָדק: Ezra iii. 2, like Ezra i. 1-8, from the -Compiler of Ezra-Nehemiah. - -[552] זְרֻבָּבֶל בֶּן־שְׁאַלְתִּיאֵל. - -[553] Ezra ii. 2. - -[554] Hag. i. 14, ii. 2, 21, and perhaps by Nehemiah (vii. 65-70). -Nehemiah himself is styled both Peḥah (xiv. 20) and Tirshatha (viii. 9, -x. 1). - -[555] As Daniel and his three friends had also Babylonian names. - -[556] Ezra ii. 63. - -[557] Cf. Ryle, xxxi ff.; and on Ezra i. 8, ii. 63. - -[558] Stade, _Gesch. des Volkes Israel_, II. 98 ff.: cf. Kuenen, -_Gesammelte Abhandl._, 220. - -[559] Ezra i. 8. - -[560] Ezra i. compared with ii. 1. - -[561] Some think to find this in 1 Esdras v. 1-6, where it is said that -Darius, a name they take to be an error for that of Cyrus, brought up -the exiles with an escort of a thousand cavalry, starting in the first -month of the second year of the king’s reign. This passage, however, -is not beyond suspicion as a gloss (see Ryle on Ezra i. 11), and even -if genuine may be intended to describe a second contingent of exiles -despatched by Darius I. in his second year, 520. The names given -include that of Jesua, son of Josedec, and instead of Zerubbabel’s, -that of his son Joacim. - -[562] Ezra iii. 3-7. - -[563] _Ib._ 8-13. - -[564] Ezra iv. 7. - -[565] See above, p. 193. - -[566] iv. 24. - -[567] Ezra iv. 24—vi. 15. - -[568] There are in the main two classes of such attempts. (_a_) Some -have suggested that the Ahasuerus (Xerxes) and Artaxerxes mentioned in -Ezra iv. 6 and 7 ff. are not the successors of Darius I. who bore these -names, but titles of his predecessors Cambyses and the Pseudo-Smerdis -(see above, p. 190). This view has been disposed of by Kuenen, _Ges. -Abhandl._, pp. 224 ff., and by Ryle, pp. 65 ff. (_b_) The attempt to -prove that the Darius under whom the Temple was built was not Darius I. -(521—485), the predecessor of Xerxes I. and Artaxerxes I. (485—424), -but their successor once removed, Darius II., Nothus (423—404). So, in -defence of the Book of Ezra, Imbert. For his theory and the answer to -it see above, pp. 191 f. - -[569] See above, pp. 192 ff. - -[570] For his work see above, p. 192, n. 531. I regret that neither -Wellhausen’s answer to it, nor Kosters’ reply to Wellhausen, was -accessible to me in preparing this chapter. Nor did I read Mr. Torrey’s -_resume_ of Wellhausen’s answer, or Wellhausen’s notes to the second -edition of his _Isr. u. Jüd. Geschichte_, till the chapter was written. -Previous to Kosters, the Return under Cyrus had been called in question -only by the very arbitrary French scholar M. Vernes in 1889-90. - -[571] ii. 6 ff. Eng., 10 ff. Heb. - -[572] His chief grounds for this analysis are (1) that in v. 1-5 the -Jews are said to have _begun_ to build the Temple in the second year -of Darius, while in v. 16 the foundation-stone is said to have been -laid under Cyrus; (2) the frequent want of connection throughout the -passage; (3) an alleged doublet: in v. 17—vi. 1 search is said to have -been made for the edict of Cyrus _in Babylon_, while in vi. 2 the edict -is said to have been found _in Ecbatana_. But (1) and (3) are capable -of very obvious explanations, and (2) is far from conclusive.—The -remainder of the Aramaic text, iv. 8-24, Kosters seeks to prove is by -the Chronicler or Compiler himself. As Torrey (_op. cit._, p. 11) has -shown, this “is as unlikely as possible.” At the most he may have made -additions to the Aramaic document. - -[573] Ezra v. 16. - -[574] Above, pp. 201 f. - -[575] Isa. xliv. 28, xlv. 1. According to Kosters, the statement of -the Aramaic document about the rebuilding of the Temple is therefore a -pious invention of a literal fulfilment of prophecy. To this opinion -Cheyne adheres (_Introd. to the Book of Isaiah_, 1895, p. xxxviii), -and adds the further assumption that the Chronicler, being “shocked at -the ascription to Cyrus (for the Judæan builders have no credit given -them) of what must, he thought, have been at least equally due to the -zeal of the exiles,” invented his story in the earlier chapters of Ezra -as to the part the exiles themselves took in the rebuilding. It will -be noticed that these assumptions have precisely the value of such. -They are merely the imputation of motives, more or less probable to -the writers of certain statements, and may therefore be fairly met by -probabilities from the other side. But of this more later on. - -[576] This is the usual opinion of critics, who yet hold it to be -genuine—_e.g._ Ryle. - -[577] He seeks to argue that a List of Exiles returned under Cyrus -in 536 could be of no use for Nehemiah’s purpose to obtain in 445 a -census of the inhabitants of Jerusalem; but surely, if in his efforts -to make a census Nehemiah discovered the existence of such a List, it -was natural for him to give it as the basis of his inquiry, or (because -the List—see above, p. 203—contains elements from Nehemiah’s own -time) to enlarge it and bring it down to date. But Dr. Kosters thinks -also that, as Nehemiah would never have broken the connection of his -memoirs with such a List, the latter must have been inserted by the -Compiler, who at this point grew weary of the discursiveness of the -memoirs, broke from them, and then—inserted this lengthy List! This is -simply incredible—that he should seek to atone for the diffuseness of -Nehemiah’s memoirs by the intrusion of a very long catalogue which had -no relevance to the point at which he broke them off. - -[578] Hag. i. 2, 12; ii. 14. - -[579] Hag. i. 12, 14; ii. 2; Zech. viii. 6, 11, 12. - -[580] Hag. ii. 4; Zech. vii. 5. - -[581] Zech. ii. 16; viii. 13, 15. - -[582] It is used in Hag. i. 12, 14, ii. 2, only after the mention of -the leaders; see, however, Pusey’s note 9 to Hag. i. 12; while in Zech. -viii. 6, 11, 18, it might be argued that it was employed in such a way -as to cover not only Jews who had never left their land, but all Jews -as well who were left of ancient Israel. - -[583] Compare Cheyne, _Introduction to the Book of Isaiah_, 1895, xxxv. -ff., who says that in the main points Kosters’ conclusions “appear -so inevitable” that he has “constantly presupposed them” in dealing -with chaps. lvi.—lxvi. of Isaiah; and Torrey, _op. cit._, 1896, p. 53: -“Kosters has demonstrated, from the testimony of Haggai and Zechariah, -that Zerubbabel and Jeshua were not returned exiles; and furthermore, -that the prophets Haggai and Zechariah knew nothing of an important -return of exiles from Babylonia.” Cf. also Wildeboer, _Litteratur des -A. T._, pp. 291 ff. - -[584] iv. 4. - -[585] Of course it is always possible that, if there had been no great -Return from Babylon under Cyrus, the community at Jerusalem in 520 had -not heard of the prophecies of the Second Isaiah. - -[586] This argument, it is true, does not fully account for the curious -fact that Haggai and Zechariah never call the Jewish community at -Jerusalem by a name significant of their return from exile. But in -reference to this it ought to be noted that even the Aramaic document -in the Book of Ezra which records the Return under Cyrus does not call -the builders of the Temple by any name which implies that they have -come up from exile, but styles them simply _the Jews who were in Judah -and Jerusalem_ (Ezra v. 1), in contrast to the Jews who were in foreign -lands. - -[587] Indeed, why does he ignore the whole Exile itself if no return -from it has taken place? - -[588] Zech. ii. 10-17 Heb., 6-13 Eng. - -[589] _E.g._ Stade, Kuenen (_op. cit._, p. 216). So, too, Klostermann, -_Gesch. des Volkes Israel_, München, 1896. Wellhausen, in the second -edition of his _Gesch._, does not admit that the List is one of exiles -returned under Cyrus (p. 155, n.). - -[590] ix. 4; x. 6, 7. - -[591] _Op. cit._, p. 216, where he also quotes the testimony of the -Book of Daniel (ix. 25). - -[592] Since writing the above I have seen the relevant notes to -the second edition of Wellhausen’s _Gesch._, pp. 155 and 160. “The -refounding of Jerusalem and the Temple cannot have started from the -Jews left behind in Palestine.” “The remnant left in the land would -have restored the old popular cultus of the high places. Instead of -that we find even before Ezra the legitimate cultus and the hierocracy -in Jerusalem: in the Temple-service proper Ezra discovers nothing to -reform. Without the leaven of the Gôlah the Judaism of Palestine is in -its origin incomprehensible.” - -[593] The inscription of Cyrus is sometimes quoted to this effect: -cf. P. Hay Hunter, _op. cit._, I. 35. But it would seem that the -statement of Cyrus is limited to the restoration of Assyrian idols and -their worshippers to Assur and Akkad. Still, what he did in this case -furnishes a strong argument for the probability of his having done the -same in the case of the Jews. - -[594] See above, p. 206, and especially n. 575. - -[595] Even Cheyne, after accepting Kosters’ conclusions as in the main -points inevitable (_op. cit._, p. xxxv), considers (p. xxxviii) that -“the earnestness of Haggai and Zechariah (who cannot have stood alone) -implies the existence of a higher religious element at Jerusalem long -before 432 B.C. Whence came this higher element but from its natural -home among the more cultured Jews in Babylonia?” - -[596] Ezra iii. 8-13. - -[597] Schrader, “Ueber die Dauer des Tempelbaues,” in _Stud. u. Krit._, -1879, 460 ff.; Stade, _Gesch. des Volkes Israel_, II. 115 ff.; Kuenen, -_op. cit._, p. 222; Kosters, _op. cit._, Chap. I., § 1. To this -opinion others have adhered: König (_Einleit. in das A. T._), Ryssel -(_op. cit._) and Marti (2nd edition of Kayser’s _Theol. des A. T._, -p. 200). Schrader (p. 563) argues that Ezra iii. 8-13 was not founded -on a historical document, but is an imitation of Neh. vii. 73—viii.; -and Stade that the Aramaic document in Ezra which ascribes the laying -of the foundation-stone to Sheshbazzar, the legate of Cyrus, was not -earlier than 430. - -[598] Ryle, _op. cit._, p. xxx. - -[599] Stade, Wellhausen, etc. See below, Chap. XVIII. on Hag. ii. 18. - -[600] See above, pp. 210 f. - -[601] Ezra iv. 24, v. 1. - -[602] Ezra v. 6. - -[603] _Ib._ 13. - -[604] _Ib._ 16. - -[605] _Gesch._, II., p. 123. - -[606] See above, p. 213. - -[607] Ezra iv. 1-4. “That the relation of Ezra iv. 1-4 is historical -seems to be established against objections which have been taken to it -by the reference to Esarhaddon, which A. v. Gutschmid has vindicated -by an ingenious historical combination with the aid of the Assyrian -monuments (_Neue Beiträge_, p. 145).”—Robertson Smith, art. “Haggai,” -_Encyc. Brit._ - -[608] Cf. _Hist. Geog._, pp. 317 ff. - -[609] Ezra iv. - -[610] There was a sharp skirmish at Rabbath-Ammon the night we spent -there, and at least one Circassian was shot. - -[611] “Sheshbazzar presumably having taken up his task with the -usual conscientiousness of an Oriental governor, that is having done -nothing though the work was nominally in hand all along (Ezra v. -16).”—Robertson Smith, art. “Haggai,” _Encyc. Brit._ - -[612] See below, Chap. XVIII. - -[613] Herod., I. 130, III. 127. - -[614] 1 Chron. iii. 19 makes him a son of Pedaiah, brother of -She’altî’el, son of Jehoiachin, the king who was carried away by -Nebuchadrezzar in 597 and remained captive till 561, when King -Evil-Merodach set him in honour. It has been supposed that, She’altî’el -dying childless, Pedaiah by levirate marriage with his widow became -father of Zerubbabel. - - - - - _HAGGAI_ - - _Go up into the mountain, and fetch wood, and build the House._ - - - - - CHAPTER XVII - - _THE BOOK OF HAGGAI_ - - -The Book of Haggai contains thirty-eight verses, which have been -divided between two chapters.[615] The text is, for the prophets, -a comparatively sound one. The Greek version affords a number of -corrections, but has also the usual amount of misunderstandings, -and, as in the case of other prophets, a few additions to the Hebrew -text.[616] These and the variations in the other ancient versions will -be noted in the translation below.[617] - -The book consists of four sections, each recounting a message from -Jehovah to the Jews in Jerusalem in 520 B.C., _the second year of -Darius_ (Hystaspis), _by the hand of the prophet Haggai_. - -The _first_, chap. i., dated the first day of the sixth month, during -our September, reproves the Jews for building their own _cieled -houses_, while they say that _the time for building Jehovah’s house has -not yet come_; affirms that this is the reason of their poverty and of -a great drought which has afflicted them. A piece of narrative is added -recounting how Zerubbabel and Jeshua, the heads of the community, were -stirred by this word to lead the people to begin work on the Temple, on -the twenty-fourth day of the same month. - -The _second_ section, chap. ii. 1-9, contains a message, dated the -twenty-first day of the seventh month, during our October, in which the -builders are encouraged for their work. Jehovah is about to shake all -nations, these shall contribute of their wealth, and the latter glory -of the Temple be greater than the former. - -The _third_ section, chap. ii. 10-19, contains a word of Jehovah which -came to Haggai on the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, during our -December. It is in the form of a parable based on certain ceremonial -laws, according to which the touch of a holy thing does not sanctify so -much as the touch of an unholy pollutes. Thus is the people polluted, -and thus every work of their hands. Their sacrifices avail nought, and -adversity has persisted: small increase of fruits, blasting, mildew and -hail. But from this day God will bless. - -The _fourth_ section, chap. ii. 20-23, is a second word from the -Lord to Haggai on the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month. It is -for Zerubbabel, and declares that God will overthrow the thrones of -kingdoms and destroy the forces of many of the Gentiles by war. In that -day Zerubbabel, the Lord’s elect servant, shall be as a signet to the -Lord. - -The authenticity of all these four sections was doubted by no one,[618] -till ten years ago W. Böhme, besides pointing out some useless -repetitions of single words and phrases, cast suspicion on chap. i. 13, -and questioned the whole of the _fourth_ section, chap. ii. 20-23.[619] -With regard to chap. i. 13, it is indeed curious that Haggai should be -described as _the messenger of Jehovah_; while the message itself, _I -am with you_, seems superfluous here, and if the verse be omitted, ver. -14 runs on naturally to ver. 12.[620] Böhme’s reasons for disputing the -authenticity of chap. ii. 20-23 are much less sufficient. He thinks he -sees the hand of an editor in the phrase _for a second time_ in ver. -20; notes the omission of the title “prophet”[621] after Haggai’s name, -and the difference of the formula _the word came to Haggai_ from that -employed in the previous sections, _by the hand of Haggai_, and the -repetition of ver. 6_b_ in ver. 21; and otherwise concludes that the -section is an insertion from a later hand. But the formula _the word -came to Haggai_ occurs also in ii. 10:[622] the other points are -trivial, and while it was most natural for Haggai the contemporary of -Zerubbabel to entertain of the latter such hopes as the passage -expresses, it is inconceivable that a later writer, who knew how they -had not been fulfilled in Zerubbabel, should have invented them.[623] - -Recently M. Tony Andrée, _privat-docent_ in the University of Geneva, -has issued a large work on Haggai,[624] in which he has sought to prove -that the _third_ section of the book, chap. ii. (10) 11-19, is from the -hand of another writer than the rest. He admits[625] that in neither -form, nor style, nor language is there anything to prove this -distinction, and that the ideas of all the sections suit perfectly the -condition of the Jews in the time soon after the Return. But he -considers that chap. ii. (10) 11-19 interrupts the connection between -the sections upon either side of it; that the author is a legalist or -casuist, while the author of the other sections is a man whose only -ecclesiastical interest is the rebuilding of the Temple; that there are -obvious contradictions between chap. ii. (10) 11-19 and the rest of the -book; and that there is a difference of vocabulary. Let us consider -each of these reasons. - -The first, that chap. ii. (10) 11-19 interrupts the connection between -the sections on either side of it, is true only in so far as it has a -different subject from that which the latter have more or less in -common. But the second of the latter, chap. ii. 20-23, treats only of a -corollary of the first, chap. ii. 1-9, and that corollary may well have -formed the subject of a separate oracle. Besides, as we shall see, -chap. ii. 10-19 is a natural development of chap. i.[626] The -contradictions alleged by M. Andrée are two. He points out that while -chap. i. speaks only of a _drought_,[627] chap. ii. (10) 11-19 -mentions[628] as the plagues on the crops shiddāphôn and yērākôn, -generally rendered _blasting_ and _mildew_ in our English Bible, and -bārād, or _hail_; and these he reckons to be plagues due not to drought -but to excessive moisture. But shiddāphôn and yērākôn, which are always -connected in the Old Testament and are words of doubtful meaning, are -not referred to damp in any of the passages in which they occur, but, -on the contrary, appear to be the consequences of drought.[629] The -other contradiction alleged refers to the ambiguous verse ii. 18, on -which we have already seen it difficult to base any conclusion, and -which will be treated when we come to it in the course of -translation.[630] Finally, the differences in language which M. Andrée -cites are largely imaginary, and it is hard to understand how a -responsible critic has come to cite, far more to emphasise them, as he -has done. We may relegate the discussion of them to a note,[631] and -need here only remark that there is among them but one of any -significance: while the rest of the book calls the Temple _the House_ -or _the House of Jehovah_ (or _of Jehovah of Hosts_), chap. ii. (10) -11-19 styles it _palace_, or temple, of Jehovah.[632] On such a -difference between two comparatively brief passages it would be -unreasonable to decide for a distinction of authorship. - -There is, therefore, no reason to disagree with the consensus of all -other critics in the integrity of the Book of Haggai. The four sections -are either from himself or from a contemporary of his. They probably -represent,[633] not the full addresses given by him on the occasions -stated, but abstracts or summaries of these. “It is never an easy task -to persuade a whole population to make pecuniary sacrifices, or to -postpone private to public interests; and the probability is, that in -these brief remains of the prophet Haggai we have but one or two -specimens of a ceaseless diligence and persistent determination, -which upheld and animated the whole people till the work was -accomplished.”[634] At the same time it must be noticed that the style -of the book is not wholly of the bare, jejune prose which it is -sometimes described to be. The passages of Haggai’s own exhortation are -in the well-known parallel rhythm of prophetic discourse: see -especially chap. i., ver. 6. - -The only other matter of Introduction to the prophet Haggai is his -name. The precise form[635] is not elsewhere found in the Old -Testament; but one of the clans of the tribe of Gad is called -Haggi,[636] and the letters H G I occur as the consonants of a name on -a Phœnician inscription.[637] Some[638] have taken Haggai to be a -contraction of Haggiyah, the name of a Levitical family,[639] but -although the final _yod_ of some proper names stands for Jehovah, we -cannot certainly conclude that it is so in this case. Others[640] see -in Haggai a probable contraction for Hagariah,[641] as Zaccai, the -original of Zacchæus, is a contraction of Zechariah.[642] A more -general opinion[643] takes the termination as adjectival,[644] and the -root to be “hag,” _feast_ or _festival_.[645] In that case Haggai would -mean _festal_, and it has been supposed that the name would be given to -him from his birth on the day of some feast. It is impossible to decide -with certainty among these alternatives. M. Andrée,[646] who accepts -the meaning _festal_, ventures the hypothesis that, like “Malachi,” -Haggai is a symbolic title given by a later hand to the anonymous -writer of the book, because of the coincidence of his various -prophecies with solemn festivals.[647] But the name is too often and -too naturally introduced into the book to present any analogy to that -of “Malachi”; and the hypothesis may be dismissed as improbable and -unnatural. - -Nothing more is known of Haggai than his name and the facts given in -his book. But as with the other prophets whom we have treated, so with -this one, Jewish and Christian legends have been very busy. Other -functions have been ascribed to him; a sketch of his biography has been -invented. According to the Rabbis he was one of the men of the Great -Synagogue, and with Zechariah and “Malachi” transmitted to that -mythical body the tradition of the older prophets.[648] He was the -author of several ceremonial regulations, and with Zechariah and -“Malachi” introduced into the alphabet the terminal forms of the five -elongated letters.[649] The Christian Fathers narrate that he was of -the tribe of Levi,[650] that with Zechariah he prophesied in exile of -the Return,[651] and was still young when he arrived in Jerusalem,[652] -where he died and was buried. A strange legend, founded on the doubtful -verse which styles him _the messenger of Jehovah_, gave out that -Haggai, as well as for similar reasons “Malachi” and John the Baptist, -were not men, but angels in human shape.[653] With Zechariah Haggai -appears on the titles of Psalms cxxxvii., cxlv.-cxlviii. in the -Septuagint; cxi., cxlv., cxlvi. in the Vulgate; and cxxv., cxxvi. and -cxlv.-cxlviii. in the Peshitto.[654] “In the Temple at Jerusalem he was -the first who chanted the Hallelujah, ... wherefore we say: Hallelujah, -which is the hymn of Haggai and Zechariah.”[655] All these testimonies -are, of course, devoid of value. - -Finally, the modern inference from chap. ii. 3, that Haggai in his -youth had seen the former Temple, had gone into exile, and was now -returned a very old man,[656] may be probable, but is not certain. We -are quite ignorant of his age at the time the word of Jehovah came to -him. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[615] In the English Bible the division corresponds to that of the -Hebrew, which gives fifteen verses to chap. i. The LXX. takes the -fifteenth verse along with ver. 1 of chap. ii. - -[616] ii. 9, 14: see on these passages, pp. 243, n. 685, 246, n. 700. - -[617] Besides the general works on the text of the Twelve Prophets, -already cited, M. Tony Andrée has published _État Critique du Texte -d’Aggée: Quatre Tableaux Comparatifs_ (Paris, 1893), which is also -included in his general introduction and commentary on the prophet, -quoted below. - -[618] Robertson Smith (_Encyc. Brit._, art. “Haggai,” 1880) does -not even mention authenticity. “Without doubt from Haggai himself” -(Kuenen). “The Book of Haggai is without doubt to be dated, according -to its whole extant contents, from the prophet Haggai, whose work fell -in the year 520” (König). So Driver, Kirkpatrick, Cornill, etc. - -[619] _Z.A.T.W._, 1887, 215 f. - -[620] So also Wellhausen. - -[621] Which occurs only in the LXX. - -[622] See note on that verse, n. 694 - -[623] Cf. Wildeboer, _Litter. des A. T._, 294. - -[624] _Le Prophète Aggée, Introduction Critique et Commentaire._ Paris, -Fischbacher, 1893. - -[625] Page 151. - -[626] Below, p. 249. - -[627] i. 10, 11. - -[628] ii. 17. - -[629] They follow drought in Amos iv. 9; and in the other passages -where they occur—Deut. xxviii. 22; 1 Kings viii. 37; 2 Chron. vi. -28—they are mentioned in a list of possible plagues after famine, or -pestilence, or fevers, all of which, with the doubtful exception of -fevers, followed drought. - -[630] Above, p. 216; below, p. 248, n. 708. - -[631] Some of M. Andrée’s alleged differences need not be discussed at -all, _e.g._ that between מפני and לפני. But here are the others. He -asserts that while chap. i. calls _oil and wine_ “yiṣhar and tîrôsh,” -chap. ii. (10) 11-19 calls them “yayin and shemen.” But he overlooks -the fact that the former pair of names, meaning the newly pressed oil -and wine, suit their connection, in which the fruits of the earth are -being catalogued, i. 11, while the latter pair, meaning the finished -wine and oil, equally suit their connection, in which articles of food -are being catalogued, ii. 12. Equally futile is the distinction drawn -between i. 9, which speaks of bringing the crops _to the house_, or as -we should say _home_, and ii. 19, which speaks of seed being _in the -barn_. Again, what is to be said of a critic who adduces in evidence of -distinction of authorship the fact that i. 6 employs the verb labhash, -_to clothe_, while ii. 12 uses beged for _garment_, and who actually -puts in brackets the root bagad, as if it anywhere in the Old Testament -meant _to clothe_! Again, Andrée remarks that while ii. (10) 11-19 does -not employ the epithet _Jehovah of Hosts_, but only _Jehovah_, the rest -of the book frequently uses the former; but he omits to observe that -the rest of the book, besides using _Jehovah of Hosts_, often uses -the name Jehovah alone [the phrase in ii. (10) 11-19 is נאם יהוה, and -occurs twice ii. 14, 17; but the rest of the book has also נאם יהוה, -ii. 4; and besides דבר יהוה, i. 1, ii. 1, ii. 20; אמר יהוה, i. 8; and -יהוה אלהים and מפני יהוה, i. 12]. Again, Andrée observes that while the -rest of the book designates Israel always by עם and the heathen by גוי, -chap. ii. (10) 11-19, in ver. 14, uses both terms of Israel. Yet in -this latter case גוי is used only in parallel to עם, as frequently in -other parts of the Old Testament. Again, that while in the rest of the -book Haggai is called the prophet (the doubtful i. 13 may be omitted), -he is simply named in ii. (10) 11-19, means nothing, for the name here -occurs only in introducing his contribution to a conversation, in -recording which it was natural to omit titles. Similarly insignificant -is the fact that while the rest of the book mentions only _the High -Priest_, chap. ii. (10) 11-19 talks only of _the priests_: because here -again each is suitable to the connection.—Two or three of Andrée’s -alleged grounds (such as that from the names for wine and oil and that -from labhash and beged) are enough to discredit his whole case. - -[632] ii. 15, 18. - -[633] In this opinion, stated first by Eichhorn, most critics agree. - -[634] Marcus Dods, _Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi_, 1879, in Handbooks -for Bible Classes: Edin., T. & T. Clark. - -[635] חַגַּי Greek Ἀγγαῖος. - -[636] חַגִּי, Gen. xlvi. 16, Num. xxvi. 15; Greek Ἁγγει, Ἁγγεις. The -feminine חַגִּית, Haggith, was the name of one of David’s wives: 2 Sam. -iii. 4. - -[637] No. 67 of the Phœnician inscriptions in _C. I. S._ - -[638] Hiller, _Onom. Sacrum_, Tüb., 1706 (quoted by Andrée), and Pusey. - -[639] חַגִּיָּה, see 1 Chron. vi. 15; Greek Ἁγγια, Lu. Ἀναια. - -[640] Köhler, _Nachexil. Proph._, I. 2; Wellhausen in fourth edition of -Bleek’s _Einleitung_; Robertson Smith, _Encyc. Brit._, art. “Haggai.” - -[641] חגריה = _Jehovah hath girded_. - -[642] Derenbourg, _Hist. de la Palestine_, pp. 95, 150. - -[643] Jerome, Gesenius, and most moderns. - -[644] As in the names קַלַּי ,כְּלוּבַי ,בַּרְזִלַּי, etc. - -[645] The radical double _g_ of which appears in composition. - -[646] _Op. cit._, p. 8. - -[647] i. 1, the new moon; ii. 1, the seventh day of the Feast of -Tabernacles; ii. 18, the foundation of the Temple (?). - -[648] Baba-bathra, 15_a_, etc. - -[649] Megilla, 2_b_. - -[650] Hesychius: see above, p. 80, n. - -[651] Augustine, _Enarratio in Psalm cxlvii._ - -[652] Pseud-Epiphanius, _De Vitis Prophetarum_. - -[653] Jerome on Hag. i. 13. - -[654] Eusebius did not find these titles in the Hexaplar Septuagint. -See Field’s _Hexaplar_ on Psalm cxlv. 1. The titles are of course -wholly without authority. - -[655] Pseud-Epiphanius, as above. - -[656] So Ewald, Wildeboer (p. 295) and others. - - - - - CHAPTER XVIII - - _HAGGAI AND THE BUILDING OF THE TEMPLE_ - - HAGGAI i., ii. - - -We have seen that the most probable solution of the problems presented -to us by the inadequate and confused records of the time is that a -considerable number of Jewish exiles returned from Jerusalem to Babylon -about 537, upon the permission of Cyrus, and that the Satrap whom he -sent with them not only allowed them to raise the altar on its ancient -site, but himself laid for them the foundation-stone of the Temple.[657] - -We have seen, too, why this attempt led to nothing, and we have -followed the Samaritan obstructions, the failure of the Persian -patronage, the drought and bad harvests, and all the disillusion of the -fifteen years which succeeded the Return.[658] The hostility of the -Samaritans was entirely due to the refusal of the Jews to give them a -share in the construction of the Temple, and its virulence, probably -shown by preventing the Jews from procuring timber, seems to have -ceased when the Temple works were stopped. At least we find no mention -of it in our prophets; and the Jews are furnished with enough of timber -to panel and ciel their own houses.[659] But the Jews must have feared -a renewal of Samaritan attacks if they resumed work on the Temple, and -for the rest they were too sodden with adversity, and too weighted with -the care of their own sustenance, to spring at higher interests. What -immediately precedes our prophets is a miserable story of barren -seasons and little income, money leaking fast away, and every man’s -sordid heart engrossed with his own household. Little wonder that -critics have been led to deny the great Return of sixteen years back, -with its grand ambitions for the Temple and glorious future of Israel. -But the like collapse has often been experienced in history when bands -of religious men, going forth, as they thought, to freedom and the -immediate erection of a holy commonwealth, have found their unity -wrecked and their enthusiasm dissipated by a few inclement seasons on a -barren and a hostile shore. Nature and their barbarous fellow-men have -frustrated what God had promised. Themselves, accustomed from a high -stage of civilisation to plan still higher social structures, are -suddenly reduced to the primitive necessities of tillage and defence -against a savage foe. Statesmen, poets and idealists of sorts have to -hoe the ground, quarry stones and stay up of nights to watch as -sentinels. Destitute of the comforts and resources with which they have -grown up, they live in constant battle with their bare and -unsympathetic environs. It is a familiar tale in history, and we read -it with ease in the case of Israel. The Jews enjoyed this advantage, -that they came not to a strange land, but to one crowded with inspiring -memories, and they had behind them the most glorious impetus of -prophecy which ever sent a people forward to the future. Yet the very -ardours of this hurried them past a due appreciation of the -difficulties they would have to encounter, and when they found -themselves on the stony soil of Judah, which they had been idealising -for fifty years, and were further afflicted by barren seasons, their -hearts must have suffered an even more bitter disillusion than has so -frequently fallen to the lot of religious emigrants to an absolutely -new coast. - - - 1. THE CALL TO BUILD (Chap. i.). - -It was to this situation, upon an autumn day, when the colonists felt -another year of beggarly effort behind them and their wretched harvest -had been brought home, that the prophet Haggai addressed himself. -With rare sense he confined his efforts to the practical needs of -the moment. The sneers of modern writers have not been spared upon a -style that is crabbed and jejune, and they have esteemed this to be -a collapse of the prophetic spirit, in which Haggai ignored all the -achievements of prophecy and interpreted the word of God as only a call -to hew wood and lay stone upon stone. But the man felt what the moment -needed, and that is the supreme mark of the prophet. Set a prophet -there, and what else could a prophet have done? It would have been -futile to rewaken those most splendid voices of the past, which had in -part been the reason of the people’s disappointment, and equally futile -to interpret the mission of the great world powers towards God’s -people. What God’s people themselves could do for themselves—that was -what needed telling at the moment; and if Haggai told it with a meagre -and starved style, this also was in harmony with the occasion. One does -not expect it otherwise when hungry men speak to each other of their -duty. - -Nor does Haggai deserve blame that he interpreted the duty as the -material building of the Temple. This was no mere ecclesiastical -function. Without the Temple the continuity of Israel’s religion could -not be maintained. An independent state, with the full courses of civic -life, was then impossible. The ethical spirit, the regard for each -other and God, could prevail over their material interests in no other -way than by common devotion to the worship of the God of their fathers. -In urging them to build the Temple from their own unaided resources, in -abstaining from all hopes of imperial patronage, in making the business -one, not of sentiment nor of comfortable assurance derived from the -past promises of God, but of plain and hard duty—Haggai illustrated at -once the sanity and the spiritual essence of prophecy in Israel. - -Professor Robertson Smith has contrasted the central importance which -Haggai attached to the Temple with the attitude of Isaiah and Jeremiah, -to whom “the religion of Israel and the holiness of Jerusalem have -little to do with the edifice of the Temple. The city is holy because -it is the seat of Jehovah’s sovereignty on earth, exerted in His -dealings with and for the state of Judah and the kingdom of -David.”[660] At the same time it ought to be pointed out that even to -Isaiah the Temple was the dwelling-place of Jehovah, and if it had been -lying in ruins at his feet, as it was at Haggai’s, there is little -doubt he would have been as earnest as Haggai in urging its -reconstruction. Nor did the Second Isaiah, who has as lofty an idea of -the spiritual destiny of the people as any other prophet, lay less -emphasis upon the cardinal importance of the Temple to their life, and -upon the certainty of its future glory. - -_In the second year of Darius[661] the king, in the sixth month and -the first day of the month_—that is, on the feast of the new moon—_the -word of Jehovah came by[662] Haggai the prophet to Zerubbabel, son -of She’altî’el,[663] Satrap of Judah, and to Jehoshua‘, son of -Jehoṣadaḳ,[664] the high priest_—the civil and religious heads of the -community—_as follows_[665]:— - -_Thus hath Jehovah of Hosts spoken, saying: This people have said, Not -yet[666] is come the time for the building of Jehovah’s House. -Therefore Jehovah’s word is come by Haggai the prophet, saying: Is it a -time for you—you[667]—to be dwelling in houses cieled with planks,[668] -while this House is waste? And now thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: Lay to -heart how things have gone with you.[669] Ye sowed much but had little -income, ate and were not satisfied, drank and were not full, put on -clothing and there was no warmth, while he that earned wages has earned -them into a bag with holes._ - -_Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts:[670] Go up into the mountain_—the -hill-country of Judah—_and bring in timber, and build the House, that -I may take pleasure in it, and show My glory, saith Jehovah. Ye looked -for much and it has turned out little,[671] and what ye brought home I -puffed at. On account of what?—oracle of Jehovah of Hosts—on account -of My House which is waste, while ye are hurrying every man after his -own house. Therefore[672] hath heaven shut off the dew,[673] and earth -shut off her increase. And I have called drought upon the earth, both -upon the mountains,[674] and upon the corn, and upon the wine, and upon -the oil, and upon what the ground brings forth, and upon man, and upon -beast, and upon all the labour of the hands._ - -For ourselves, Haggai’s appeal to the barren seasons and poverty of the -people as proof of God’s anger with their selfishness must raise -questions. But we have already seen, not only that natural calamities -were by the ancient world interpreted as the penal instruments of the -Deity, but that all through history they have had a wonderful influence -on the spirits of men, forcing them to search their own hearts and to -believe that Providence is conducted for other ends than those of our -physical prosperity. “Have not those who have believed as Amos believed -ever been the strong spirits of our race, making the very disasters -which crushed them to the earth the tokens that God has great views -about them?”[675] Haggai, therefore, takes no sordid view of Providence -when he interprets the seasons, from which his countrymen had suffered, -as God’s anger upon their selfishness and delay in building His House. - -The straight appeal to the conscience of the Jews had an immediate -effect. Within three weeks they began work on the Temple. - -_And Zerubbabel, son of She’altî’el, and Jehoshua‘, son of Jehoṣadaḳ, -the high priest, and all the rest of the people, hearkened to the -voice of Jehovah their God, and to the words of Haggai the prophet, as -Jehovah their God had sent him; and the people feared before the face -of Jehovah. [And Haggai, the messenger of Jehovah, in Jehovah’s mission -to the people, spake, saying, I am with you—oracle of Jehovah.][676] -And Jehovah stirred the spirit of Zerubbabel, son of She’altî’el, -Satrap of Judah, and the spirit of Jehoshua‘, son of Jehoṣadaḳ, the -high priest, and the spirit of all the rest of the people; and they -went and did work in the House of Jehovah of Hosts, their God, on the -twenty-fourth day of the sixth month, in the second year of Darius the -king._[677] - -Note how the narrative emphasises that the new energy was, as it could -not but be from Haggai’s unflattering words, a purely spiritual result. -It was the _spirit_ of Zerubbabel, and the _spirit_ of Jehoshua, and -the _spirit_ of all the rest of the people, which was stirred—their -conscience and radical force of character. Not in vain had the people -suffered their great disillusion under Cyrus, if now their history was -to start again from sources so inward and so pure. - - - 2. COURAGE, ZERUBBABEL! COURAGE, JEHOSHUA AND - ALL THE PEOPLE! (Chap. ii. 1-9). - -The second occasion on which Haggai spoke to the people was another -feast the same autumn, the seventh day of the Feast of Tabernacles,[678] -the twenty-first of the seventh month. For nearly four weeks the work -on the Temple had proceeded. Some progress must have been made, for -comparisons became possible between the old Temple and the state of -this one. Probably the outline and size of the building were visible. -In any case it was enough to discourage the builders with their efforts -and the means at their disposal. Haggai’s new word is a very simple one -of encouragement. The people’s conscience had been stirred by his -first; they needed now some hope. Consequently he appeals to what he -had ignored before, the political possibilities which the present state -of the world afforded—always a source of prophetic promise. But again -he makes his former call upon their own courage and resources. The -Hebrew text contains a reference to the Exodus which would be -appropriate to a discourse delivered during the Feast of Tabernacles, -but it is not found in the Septuagint, and is so impossible to construe -that it has been justly suspected as a gloss, inserted by some later -hand, only because the passage had to do with the Feast of Tabernacles. - -_In the seventh_ month, _on the twenty-first day of the month, the word -of Jehovah came by[679] Haggai the prophet, saying_:— - -_Speak now to Zerubbabel, son of She’altî’el, Satrap of Judah, and to -Jehoshua‘, son of Jehoṣadaḳ, the high priest, and to the rest of the -people, saying: Who among you is left that saw this House in its former -glory, and how do ye see it now? Is it not as nothing in your -eyes?[680] And now courage,[681] O Zerubbabel—oracle of Jehovah—and -courage, Jehoshua‘, son of Jehoṣadaḳ, O high priest;[682] and courage, -all people of the land!—oracle of Jehovah; and get to work, for I am -with you—oracle of Jehovah of Hosts[683]—and My Spirit is standing in -your midst. Fear not! For thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: It is but a -little while, and I will shake the heavens, and the earth and the sea -and the dry land; and I will shake all nations, and the costly -things[684] of all nations shall come in, and I will fill this House -with glory, saith Jehovah of Hosts. Mine is the silver and Mine the -gold—oracle of Jehovah of Hosts. Greater shall the latter glory of this -House be than the former, saith Jehovah of Hosts, and in this place -will I give peace[685]—oracle of Jehovah of Hosts._ - -From the earliest times this passage, by the majority of the Christian -Church, has been interpreted of the coming of Christ. The Vulgate -renders ver. 7_b_, _Et veniet Desideratus cunctis gentibus_, and so a -large number of the Latin Fathers, who are followed by Luther, _Der -Trost aller Heiden_, and by our own Authorised Version, _And the Desire -of all nations shall come_. This was not contrary to Jewish tradition, -for Rabbi Akiba had defined the clause of the Messiah, and Jerome -received the interpretation from his Jewish instructors. In itself the -noun, as pointed in the Massoretic text, means _longing_ or _object of -longing_.[686] But the verb which goes with it is in the plural, and by -a change of points the noun itself may be read as a plural.[687] That -this was the original reading is made extremely probable by the fact -that it lay before the translators of the Septuagint, who render: _the -picked_, or _chosen, things of the nations_.[688] So the old Italic -version: _Et venient omnia electa gentium_.[689] Moreover this meaning -suits the context, as the other does not. The next verse mentions -silver and gold. “We may understand what he says,” writes Calvin, “of -Christ; we indeed know that Christ was the expectation of the whole -world; ... but as it immediately follows, _Mine is the silver and Mine -is the gold_, the more simple meaning is that which I first stated: -that the nations would come, bringing with them all their riches, that -they might offer themselves and all their possessions a sacrifice to -God.”[690] - - - 3. THE POWER OF THE UNCLEAN (Chap. ii. 10-19). - -Haggai’s third address to the people is based on a deliverance which he -seeks from the priests. The Book of Deuteronomy had provided that, in -all difficult cases not settled by its own code, the people shall seek -a _deliverance_ or _Torah_ from the priests, _and shall observe to do -according to the deliverance which the priests deliver to thee_.[691] -Both noun and verb, which may be thus literally translated, are also -used for the completed and canonical Law in Israel, and they signify -that in the time of the composition of the Book of Deuteronomy that Law -was still regarded as in process of growth. So it is also in the time -of Haggai: he does not consult a code of laws, nor asks the priests -what the canon says, as, for instance, our Lord does with the question, -_how readest thou_? But he begs them to give him _a_ Torah or -_deliverance_,[692] based of course upon existing custom, but not yet -committed to writing.[693] For the history of the Law in Israel this -is, therefore, a passage of great interest. - -_On the twenty-fourth of the ninth month, in the second year of Darius, -the word of Jehovah came to[694] Haggai the prophet, saying: Thus saith -Jehovah of Hosts, Ask, I pray, of the priests a deliverance,[695] -saying:—_ - -_If a man be carrying flesh that is holy in the skirt of his robe, and -with his skirt touch bread or pottage or wine or oil or any food, shall -_the latter_ become holy? And the priests gave answer and said, No! And -Haggai said, If one unclean by a corpse[696] touch any of these, shall -_the latter_ become unclean? And the priests gave answer and said, It -shall._ That is to say, holiness which passed from the source to an -object immediately in touch with the latter did not spread further; but -pollution infected not only the person who came into contact with it, -but whatever he touched.[697] “The flesh of the sacrifice hallowed -whatever it should touch, but not further;[698] but the human being who -was defiled by touching a dead body, defiled all he might touch.”[699] -_And Haggai answered and said: So is this people, and so is this nation -before Me—oracle of Jehovah—and so is all the work of their hands, and -what they offer there_—at the altar erected on its old site—_is -unclean_.[700] That is to say, while the Jews had expected their -restored ritual to make them holy to the Lord, this had not been -effective, while, on the contrary, their contact with sources of -pollution had thoroughly polluted both themselves and their labour and -their sacrifices. What these sources of pollution are is not explicitly -stated, but Haggai, from his other messages, can only mean, either the -people’s want of energy in building the Temple, or the unbuilt Temple -itself. Andrée goes so far as to compare the latter with the corpse, -whose touch, according to the priests, spreads infection through more -than one degree. In any case Haggai means to illustrate and enforce the -building of the Temple without delay; and meantime he takes one -instance of the effect he has already spoken of, _the work of their -hands_, and shows how it has been spoilt by their neglect and delay. -_And now, I pray, set your hearts backward from to-day,[701] before -stone was laid upon stone in the Temple of Jehovah: ...[702] when one -came to a heap of grain of twenty measures, and it had become ten, or -went to the winevat to draw fifty measures,[703] and it had become -twenty. I smote you with blasting and with withering,[704] and with -hail all the work of your hands, and ...[705]—oracle of Jehovah. Lay -now your hearts _on the time_ before to-day[706] (the twenty-fourth day -of the ninth month[707]), before the day of the foundation of the -Temple of Jehovah[708]—lay your hearts_ to that time! _Is there yet_ -any _seed in the barn[709]? And as yet[710] the vine, the fig-tree, the -pomegranate and the olive have not borne_ fruit. _From this day I will -bless thee._ - -This then is the substance of the whole message. On the twenty-fourth -day of the ninth month, somewhere in our December, the Jews had been -discouraged that their attempts to build the Temple, begun three months -before,[711] had not turned the tide of their misfortunes and produced -prosperity in their agriculture. Haggai tells them, there is not yet -time for the change to work. If contact with a holy thing has only a -slight effect, but contact with an unclean thing has a much greater -effect (verses 11-13), then their attempts to build the Temple must -have less good influence upon their condition than the bad influence -of all their past devotion to themselves and their secular labours. -That is why adversity still continues, but courage! from this day on -God will bless. The whole message is, therefore, opportune to the date -at which it was delivered, and comes naturally on the back of Haggai’s -previous oracles. Andrée’s reason for assigning it to another writer, -on the ground of its breaking the connection, does not exist.[712] - -These poor colonists, in their hope deferred, were learning the old -lesson, which humanity finds so hard to understand, that repentance and -new-born zeal do not immediately work a change upon our material -condition; but the natural consequences of sin often outweigh the -influence of conversion, and though devoted to God and very industrious -we may still be punished for a sinful past. Evil has an infectious -power greater than that of holiness. Its effects are more extensive and -lasting.[713] It was no bit of casuistry which Haggai sought to -illustrate by his appeal to the priests on the ceremonial law, but an -ethical truth deeply embedded in human experience. - - - 4. THE REINVESTMENT OF ISRAEL’S HOPE (Chap. ii. 20-23). - -On the same day Haggai published another oracle, in which he put the -climax to his own message by re-investing in Zerubbabel the ancient -hopes of his people. When the monarchy fell the Messianic hopes were -naturally no longer concentrated in the person of a king; and the -great evangelist of the Exile found the elect and anointed Servant of -Jehovah in the people as a whole, or in at least the pious part of -them, with functions not of political government but of moral influence -and instruction towards all the peoples of the earth. Yet in the Exile -Ezekiel still predicted an individual Messiah, a son of the house of -David; only it is significant that, in his latest prophecies delivered -after the overthrow of Jerusalem, Ezekiel calls him not _king_[714] any -more, but _prince_.[715] - -After the return of Sheshbazzar to Babylon this position was virtually -filled by Zerubbabel, a grandson of Jehoiakin, the second last king -of Judah, and appointed by the Persian king Peḥah or Satrap of Judah. -Him Haggai now formally names the elect servant of Jehovah. In that -overturning of the kingdoms of the world which Haggai had predicted two -months before, and which he now explains as their mutual destruction by -war, Jehovah of Hosts will make Zerubbabel His signet-ring, inseparable -from Himself and the symbol of His authority. - -_And the word of Jehovah came a second time to[716] Haggai on the -twenty-fourth day of the_ ninth _month, saying: Speak to Zerubbabel, -Satrap of Judah, saying: I am about to shake the heavens and the -earth,[717] and I will overturn the thrones[718] of kingdoms, and will -shatter the power of the kingdoms of the Gentiles, and will overturn -chariots[719] and their riders, and horses and their riders will -come down, every man by the sword of his brother. In that day—oracle -of Jehovah of Hosts—I will take Zerubbabel, son of She’altî’el, My -servant—oracle of Jehovah—and will make him like a signet-ring; for -thee have I chosen—oracle of Jehovah of Hosts._ - -The wars and mutual destruction of the Gentiles, of which Haggai -speaks, are doubtless those revolts of races and provinces, which -threatened to disrupt the Persian Empire upon the accession of Darius -in 521. Persians, Babylonians, Medes, Armenians, the Sacæ and others -rose together or in succession. In four years Darius quelled them all, -and reorganised his empire before the Jews finished their Temple. Like -all the Syrian governors, Zerubbabel remained his poor lieutenant and -submissive tributary. History rolled westward into Europe. Greek and -Persian began their struggle for the control of its future, and the -Jews fell into an obscurity and oblivion unbroken for centuries. The -_signet-ring of Jehovah_ was not acknowledged by the world—does not -seem even to have challenged its briefest attention. But Haggai had at -least succeeded in asserting the Messianic hope of Israel, always -baffled, never quenched, in this re-opening of her life. He had -delivered the ancient heritage of Israel to the care of the new -Judaism. - - * * * * * - -Haggai’s place in the succession of prophecy ought now to be clear -to us. The meagreness of his words and their crabbed style, his -occupation with the construction of the Temple, his unfulfilled hope in -Zerubbabel, his silence on the great inheritance of truth delivered by -his predecessors, and the absence from his prophesying of all visions -of God’s character and all emphasis upon the ethical elements of -religion—these have moved some to depress his value as a prophet almost -to the vanishing point. Nothing could be more unjust. In his opening -message Haggai evinced the first indispensable power of the prophet: to -speak to the situation of the moment, and to succeed in getting men to -take up the duty at their feet; in another message he announced a great -ethical principle; in his last he conserved the Messianic traditions -of his religion, and though not less disappointed than Isaiah in the -personality to whom he looked for their fulfilment, he succeeded in -passing on their hope undiminished to future ages. - -FOOTNOTES: - -[657] See above, pp. 210-18, and emphasise specially the facts that -the most pronounced adherents of Kosters’ theory seek to qualify his -absolute negation of a Return under Cyrus, by the admission that -some Jews did return; and that even Stade, who agrees in the main -with Schrader that no attempt was made by the Jews to begin building -the Temple till 520, admits the probability of a stone being laid by -Sheshbazzar about 536. - -[658] See above, pp. 218 ff. - -[659] Hag. i. 4. - -[660] Art. “Haggai,” _Encyc. Brit._ - -[661] Heb. Daryavesh. - -[662] Heb. _by the hand of_. - -[663] See above, pp. 199 f. and 221. - -[664] See below, pp. 258, 279, 292 ff. - -[665] Heb. _saying_. - -[666] For לאֹ עֶת־בֹּא = _not the time of coming_ read with Hitzig and -Wellhausen לאֹ עַתָּ בָא, _not now is come_; for עַתָּ cf. Ezek. xxiii. -4, Psalm lxxiv. 6. - -[667] The emphasis may be due only to the awkward grammatical -construction. - -[668] ספונים, from ספן, _to cover_ with planks of cedar, 2 Kings -vi. 9: cf. iii. 7. - -[669] Heb. _set your hearts_ (see Vol. I., pp. 258, 275, 321, 323) -_upon your ways_; but _your ways_ cannot mean here, as elsewhere, _your -conduct_, but obviously from what follows _the ways_ you have been -led, _the way_ things have gone with you—the barren seasons and little -income. - -[670] The Hebrew and Versions here insert _set your hearts upon your -ways_, obviously a mere clerical repetition from ver. 5. - -[671] For והנה למעט read with the LXX. והיה למעט or ויהי. - -[672] The עליכם here inserted in the Hebrew text is unparsable, not -found in the LXX. and probably a clerical error by dittography from the -preceding על־כן. - -[673] Heb. _heavens are shut from dew_. But perhaps the מ of מטל should -be deleted. So Wellhausen. There is no instance of an intransitive Qal -of כלא. - -[674] Query? - -[675] Vol. I., pp. 162 ff. - -[676] See above, p. 227. - -[677] The LXX. wrongly takes this last verse of chap. i. as the first -half of the first verse of chap. ii. - -[678] Lev. xxiii. 34, 36, 40-42. - -[679] _By the hand of._ - -[680] הֲלאֹ כָמֹהוּ כְאַיִן בְּעֵינֵיכֶם. Literally, _is not the like -of it as nothing in your eyes_? But that can hardly be the meaning. -It might be equivalent to _is it not, as it stands, as nothing in -your eyes?_ But the fact is that in Hebrew construction of a simple, -unemphasised comparison, the comparing particle כ stands before _both_ -objects compared: as, for instance, in the phrase (Gen. xliv. 18) -כִּי כָמוֹךָ כְּפַרְעֹה, _thou art as Pharaoh_. - -[681] Literally: _be strong_. - -[682] It is difficult to say whether _high priest_ belongs to the text -or not. - -[683] Here occurs the anacolouthic clause, introduced by an acc. -without a verb, which is not found in the LXX. and is probably a gloss -(see above, p. 241): _The promise which I made with you in your going -forth from Egypt_. - -[684] Hebrew has singular, _costly thing_ or _desirableness_, חֶמְדַּת -(fem, for neut.), but the verb _shall come_ is in the plural, and the -LXX. has τα ἐκλεκτά, _the choice things_. See below, next page. - -[685] The LXX. add a parallel clause καὶ εἰρήνην φυχῆς εἰς περιποίησιν -παντὶ τῷ κτίζοντι τοῦ ἀναστῆσαι τὸν ναὸν τοῦτον, which would read in -Hebrew וְשַׁלְוַת נֶפֶשׁ לְחַיּוֹת כָּל־הַיֹֹּסֵד לְקוֹמֵם הַהֵיכָל -הַזֶּה. On חיות Wellhausen cites 1 Chron. xi. 8, = _restore_ or -_revive_. - -[686] = חֶמְדַּת _longing_, 2 Chron. xxi. 2, and _object of longing_, -Dan. xi. 37. It is the feminine or neuter, and might be rendered as a -collective, _desirable things_. Pusey cites Cicero’s address to his -wife: _Valete, mea desideria, valete_ (_Ep. ad Famil._, xiv. 2 fin.). - -[687] חֲמֻדֹת plural feminine of pass. part., as in Gen. xxvii. 15, -where it is an adjective, but used as a noun = _precious things_, Dan. -xi. 38, 43, which use meets the objection of Pusey, _in loco_, where he -wrongly maintains that _precious things_, if intended, must have been -expressed by מַחֲמַדֵּי. - -[688] ἥξει τὰ ἐκλεκτὰ πάντων τῶν ἐθνῶν. Theodore of Mopsuestia takes it -as _elect persons of all nations_, to which a few moderns adhere. - -[689] Augustini _Contra Donatistas post Collationem_, cap. xx. 30 -(Migne, _Latin Patrology_, XLIII., p. 671). - -[690] Calvin, _Comm. in Haggai_, ii. 6-9. - -[691] Deut. xvii. 8 ff.: עַל־פּי הַתּוֹרָה אֲשֶׁר יוֹרוּךָ. Compare the -expression כּוֹהֵן מוֹרֶה, in 2 Chron. xv. 3, and the duties of the -teaching priests assigned by the Chronicler (2 Chron. xvii. 7-9) to the -days of Jehoshaphat. - -[692] Note that it is not _the Torah_, but _a Torah_. - -[693] The nearest passage to the _deliverance_ of the priests to Haggai -is Lev. vi. 20, 21 (Heb.), 27, 28 (Eng.). This is part of the Priestly -Code not promulgated till 445 B.C., but based, of course, on long -extant custom, some of it very ancient. _Everything that touches the -flesh_ (of the sin-offering, which is holy) _shall be holy_—יִקְדַּשׁ, -the verb used by the priests in their answer to Haggai—_and when any -of its blood has been sprinkled on a garment, that whereon it was -sprinkled shall be washed in a holy place. The earthen vessel wherein -it has been boiled shall be broken, and if it has been boiled in a -brazen vessel, this shall be scoured and rinsed with water._ - -[694] So several old edd. and many codd., and adopted by Baer (see his -note _in loco_) in his text. But most of the edd. of the Massoretic -text read ביד after Cod. Hill. For the importance of the question see -above, p. 227. - -[695] Torah. - -[696] תְּמֵא נֶפֶשׁ. - -[697] There does not appear to be the contrast between indirect contact -with a holy thing and direct contact with a polluted which Wellhausen -says there is. In either case the articles whose character is in -question stand second from the source of holiness and pollution—the -holy flesh and the corpse. - -[698] See above, p. 245, n. 693. - -[699] Pusey, _in loco_. - -[700] The LXX. have here found inserted three other clauses: ἕνεκεν τὼν -λημμάτων αὐτῶν τῶν ὀρθρινῶν, ὀδυνηθήσονται ἀπὸ προσώπου πόνων αὐτῶν, -καὶ ἐμισεῖτε ἐν πύλαις ἐλέγχοντας. The first clause is a misreading -(Wellhausen), יַעַן לִקְחֹתָם שַׁחַר for יַעַן לְקַחְתֶּם שֹׁחַד, -_because ye take a bribe_, and goes well with the third clause, -modified from Amos v. 10: שָׂנְאוּ בַשַּׁעַר מוֹכִיחַ, _they hate him -who reproves in the gate_. These may have been inserted into the Hebrew -text by some one puzzled to know what the source of the people’s -pollution was, and who absurdly found it in sins which in Haggai’s time -it was impossible to impute to them. The middle clause, יִתְעַנּוּ -מִפְּנֵי עַצְבֵיהֶם, _they vex themselves with their labours_, is -suitable to the sense of the Hebrew text of the verse, as Wellhausen -points out, but besides gives a connection with what follows. - -[701] From this day and onward. - -[702] Heb. literally _since they were_. A.V. _since those days were_. - -[703] Winevat, יֶקֶב, is distinguished from winepress, גת, in Josh. -ix. 13, and is translated by the Greek ὑπολήνιον Mark xii. I, ληνόν -Matt. xxi. 33, _dug a pit for the winepress_; but the name is applied -sometimes to the whole winepress—Hosea ix. 2 etc., Job xxiv. 11, _to -tread the winepress_. The word translated _measures_, as in LXX. -μετρητάς, is פּוּרָה, and that is properly the vat in which the grapes -were trodden (Isa. lxiii. 3), but here it can scarcely mean fifty -_vatfuls_, but must refer to some smaller measure—cask? - -[704] See above, pp. 228 f., n. 625. - -[705] The words omitted cannot be construed in the Hebrew, -וְאֵין־אֶתְכֶם אֵלַי, literally _and not you_ (acc.) _to Me_. Hitzig, -etc., propose to read אִתְּכם and render _there was none with you_ who -turned _to Me_. Others propose אֵינְכֶם, _as if none of you_ turned _to -Me_. Others retain אֶתְכֶם and render _as for you_. The versions LXX. -Syr., Vulg. _ye will not return_ or _did not return to Me_, reading -perhaps for לאֹ שָׁבְתֶּם ,אֵין אֶתְכֶם, which is found in Amos iv. 9, -of which the rest of the verse is an echo. Wellhausen deletes the whole -verse as a gloss. It is certainly suspicious, and remarkable in that -the LXX. text has already introduced two citations from Amos. See above -on ver. 14. - -[706] Heb. _from this day backwards_. - -[707] The date Wellhausen thinks was added by a later hand. - -[708] This is the ambiguous clause on different interpretations -of which so much has been founded: לְמִן־הַיּוֹם אֲשֶׁר־יֻסַּד -הֵיכַל־יְהוָֹה. Does this clause, in simple parallel to the previous -one, describe the day on which the prophet was speaking, _the -twenty-fourth day of the ninth month_, the _terminus a quo_ of the -people’s retrospect? In that case Haggai regards the foundation-stone -of the Temple as laid on the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month 520 -B.C., and does not know, or at least ignores, any previous laying -of a foundation-stone. So Kuenen, Kosters, Andrée, etc. Or does למן -signify _up to the time the foundation-stone was laid_, and state a -_terminus ad quem_ for the people’s retrospect? So Ewald and others, -who therefore find in the verse a proof that Haggai knew of an earlier -laying of the foundation-stone. But that למן is ever used for ועד -cannot be proved, and indeed is disproved by Jer. vii. 7, where it -occurs in contrast to ועד. Van Hoonacker finds the same, but in a more -subtle translation of מן .למן, he says, is never used except of a -date distant from the speaker or writer of it; למן (if I understand -him aright) refers therefore to a date previous to Haggai to which -the people’s thoughts are directed by the ל and then brought back -from it to the date at which he was speaking by means of the מן: “la -préposition ל signifie la direction de l’esprit vers une époque du passé -d’où il est ramené par la préposition מן.” But surely מן can be used -(as indeed Haggai has just used it) to signify extension backwards from -the standpoint of the speaker; and although in the passages cited by -Van Hoonacker of the use of למן it always refers to a past date—Deut. -ix. 7, Judg. xix. 30, 2 Sam. vi. 11, Jer. vii. 7 and 25—still, as it -is there nothing but a pleonastic form for מן, it surely might be -employed as מן is sometimes employed for departure from the present -backwards. Nor in any case is it used to express what Van Hoonacker -seeks to draw from it here, the idea of direction of the mind to a -past event and then an immediate return from that. Had Haggai wished -to express that idea he would have phrased it thus: למן היום אשר יסד -היכל יהוה ועד היום הזה (as Kosters remarks). Besides, as Kosters has -pointed out (pp. 7 ff. of the Germ. trans. of _Het Herstel_, etc.), -even if Van Hoonacker’s translation of למן were correct, the context -would show that it might refer only to a laying of the foundation-stone -since Haggai’s first address to the people, and therefore the question -of an earlier foundation-stone under Cyrus would remain unsolved. -Consequently Haggai ii. 18 cannot be quoted as a proof of the latter. -See above, p. 216. - -[709] Meaning _there is none_. - -[710] ועוד or וְעֹד for וְעַד, after LXX. καὶ εἰ ἔτι. - -[711] The twenty-fourth day of the sixth month, according to chap. i. -15. - -[712] See above, p. 228. - -[713] - - “For I believe the devil’s voice - Sinks deeper in our ear, - Than any whisper sent from heaven, - However sweet and clear.” - - -[714] Only in xxxiv. 24, xxxvii. 22, 24. - -[715] נשׂיא: cf. Skinner, _Ezekiel_ (Expositor’s Bible Series), pp. -447 ff., who, however, attributes the diminution of the importance of -the civil head in Israel, not to the feeling that he would henceforth -always be subject to a foreign emperor, but to the conviction that in -the future he will be “overshadowed by the personal presence of Jehovah -in the midst of His people.” - -[716] See above, p. 227. - -[717] LXX. enlarges: _and the sea and the dry land_. - -[718] Heb. sing. collect. LXX. plural. - -[719] Again a sing. coll. - - - - - _ZECHARIAH_ - - (_I.-VIII._) - - - - - _Not by might, and not by force, but by My Spirit, saith Jehovah of - Hosts._ - - _Be not afraid, strengthen your hands! Speak truth, every man to his - neighbour; truth and wholesome judgment judge ye in your gates, and in - your hearts plan no evil for each other, nor take pleasure in false - swearing, for all these things do I hate—oracle of Jehovah._ - - - - - CHAPTER XIX - - _THE BOOK OF ZECHARIAH (I.-VIII.)_ - - -The Book of Zechariah, consisting of fourteen chapters, falls clearly -into two divisions: _First_, chaps. i.—viii., ascribed to Zechariah -himself and full of evidence for their authenticity; _Second_, chaps. -ix.—xiv., which are not ascribed to Zechariah, and deal with conditions -different from those upon which he worked. The full discussion of the -date and character of this second section we shall reserve till we -reach the period at which we believe it to have been written. Here an -introduction is necessary only to chaps. i.—viii. - -These chapters may be divided into five sections. - - I. Chap. i. 1-6.—A Word of Jehovah which came to Zechariah in the - eighth month of the second year of Darius, that is in November 520 - B.C., or between the second and the third oracles of Haggai.[720] In - this the prophet’s place is affirmed in the succession of the prophets - of Israel. The ancient prophets are gone, but their predictions have - been fulfilled in the calamities of the Exile, and God’s Word abides - for ever. - - II. Chap. i. 7—vi. 9.—A Word of Jehovah which came to Zechariah on the - twenty-fourth of the eleventh month of the same year, that is January - or February 519, and which he reproduces in the form of eight Visions - by night. (1) The Vision of the Four Horsemen: God’s new mercies to - Jerusalem (chap. i. 7-17). (2) The Vision of the Four Horns, or Powers - of the World, and the Four Smiths, who smite them down (ii. 1-4 Heb., - but in the Septuagint and in the English Version i. 18-21). (3) The - Vision of the Man with the Measuring Rope: Jerusalem shall be rebuilt, - no longer as a narrow fortress, but spread abroad for the multitude of - her population (chap. ii. 5-9 Heb., ii. 1-5 LXX. and Eng.). To this - Vision is appended a lyric piece of probably older date calling upon - the Jews in Babylon to return, and celebrating the joining of many - peoples to Jehovah, now that He takes up again His habitation in - Jerusalem (chap. ii. 10-17 Heb., ii. 6-13 LXX. and Eng.). (4) The - Vision of Joshua, the High Priest, and the Satan or Accuser: the Satan - is rebuked, and Joshua is cleansed from his foul garments and clothed - with a new turban and festal apparel; the land is purged and secure - (chap. iii.). (5) The Vision of the Seven-Branched Lamp and the Two - Olive-Trees (chap. iv. 1-6_a_, 10_b_-14): into the centre of this has - been inserted a Word of Jehovah to Zerubbabel (vv. 6_b_-10_a_), which - interrupts the Vision and ought probably to come at the close of it. - (6) The Vision of the Flying Book: it is the curse of the land, which - is being removed, but after destroying the houses of the wicked (chap. - v. 1-4). (7) The Vision of the Bushel and the Woman: that is the guilt - of the land and its wickedness; they are carried off and planted in - the land of Shin‘ar (v. 5-11). (8) The Vision of the Four Chariots: - they go forth from the Lord of all the earth, to traverse the earth - and bring His Spirit, or anger, to bear on the North country (chap. - vi. 1-8). - - III. Chap. vi. 9-15.—A Word of Jehovah, undated (unless it is to be - taken as of the same date as the Visions to which it is attached), - giving directions as to the gifts sent to the community at Jerusalem - from the Babylonian Jews. A crown is to be made from the silver and - gold, and, according to the text, placed upon the head of Joshua. But, - as we shall see,[721] the text gives evident signs of having been - altered in the interest of the High Priest; and probably the crown - was meant for Zerubbabel, at whose right hand the priest is to stand, - and there shall be a counsel of peace between the two of them. The - far-away shall come and assist at the building of the Temple. This - section breaks off in the middle of a sentence. - - IV. Chap. vii.—The Word of Jehovah which came to Zechariah on the - fourth of the ninth month of the fourth year of Darius, that is nearly - two years after the date of the Visions. The Temple was approaching - completion; and an inquiry was addressed to the priests who were in it - and to the prophets concerning the Fasts, which had been maintained - during the Exile, while the Temple lay desolate (chap. vii. 1-3). This - inquiry drew from Zechariah a historical explanation of how the Fasts - arose (chap. vii. 4-14). - - V. Chap. viii.—Ten short undated oracles, each introduced by the same - formula, _Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts_, and summarising all - Zechariah’s teaching since before the Temple began up to the question - of the cessation of the Fasts upon its completion—with promises for - the future. (1) A Word affirming Jehovah’s new zeal for Jerusalem and - His Return to her (vv. 1, 2). (2) Another of the same (ver. 3). (3) A - Word promising fulness of old folk and children in her streets (vv. 4, - 5). (4) A Word affirming that nothing is too wonderful for Jehovah - (ver. 6). (5) A Word promising the return of the people from east and - west (vv. 7, 8). (6 and 7) Two Words contrasting, in terms similar to - Haggai i., the poverty of the people before the foundation of the - Temple with their new prosperity: from a curse Israel shall become a - blessing. This is due to God’s anger having changed into a purpose of - grace to Jerusalem. But the people themselves must do truth and - justice, ceasing from perjury and thoughts of evil against each other - (vv. 9-17). (8) A Word which recurs to the question of Fasting, and - commands that the four great Fasts, instituted to commemorate the - siege and overthrow of Jerusalem, and the murder of Gedaliah, be - changed to joy and gladness (vv. 18, 19). (9) A Word predicting the - coming of the Gentiles to the worship of Jehovah at Jerusalem (vv. - 20-22). (10) Another of the same (ver. 23). - -There can be little doubt that, apart from the few interpolations -noted, these eight chapters are genuine prophecies of Zechariah, who is -mentioned in the Book of Ezra as the colleague of Haggai, and -contemporary of Zerubbabel and Joshua at the time of the rebuilding of -the Temple.[722] Like the oracles of Haggai, these prophecies are dated -according to the years of Darius the king, from his second year to his -fourth. Although they may contain some of the exhortations to build the -Temple, which the Book of Ezra informs us that Zechariah made along -with Haggai, the most of them presuppose progress in the work, and seek -to assist it by historical retrospect and by glowing hopes of the -Messianic effects of its completion. Their allusions suit exactly the -years to which they are assigned. Darius is king. The Exile has lasted -about seventy years.[723] Numbers of Jews remain in Babylon,[724] and -are scattered over the rest of the world.[725] The community at -Jerusalem is small and weak: it is the mere colony of young men and men -in middle life who came to it from Babylon; there are few children and -old folk.[726] Joshua and Zerubbabel are the heads of the community, -and the pledges for its future.[727] The exact conditions are recalled -as recent which Haggai spoke of a few years before.[728] Moreover, -there is a steady and orderly progress throughout the prophecies, in -harmony with the successive dates at which they were delivered. In -November 520 they begin with a cry to repentance and lessons drawn from -the past of prophecy.[729] In January 519 Temple and City are still to -be built.[730] Zerubbabel has laid the foundation; the completion is -yet future.[731] The prophet’s duty is to quiet the people’s -apprehensions about the state of the world,[732] to provoke their -zeal,[733] give them confidence in their great men,[734] and, above -all, assure them that God is returned to them[735] and their sin -pardoned.[736] But in December 518 the Temple is so far built that the -priests are said to belong to it;[737] there is no occasion for -continuing the fasts of the Exile,[738] the future has opened and the -horizon is bright with the Messianic hopes.[739] Most of all, it is -felt that the hard struggle with the forces of nature is over, and the -people are exhorted to the virtues of the civic life.[740] They have -time to lift their eyes from their work and see the nations coming from -afar to Jerusalem.[741] - -These features leave no room for doubt that the great bulk of the first -eight chapters of the Book of Zechariah are by the prophet himself, and -from the years to which he assigns them, November 520 to December 518. -The point requires no argument. - -There are, however, three passages which provoke further -examination—two of them because of the signs they bear of an earlier -date, and one because of the alteration it has suffered in the -interests of a later day in Israel’s history. - -The lyric passage which is appended to the Second Vision (chap. ii -10-17 Heb., 6-13 LXX. and Eng.) suggests questions by its singularity: -there is no other such among the Visions. But in addition to this it -speaks not only of the Return from Babylon as still future[742]—this -might still be said after the First Return of the exiles in -536[743]—but it differs from the language of all the Visions proper in -describing the return of Jehovah Himself to Zion as still future. The -whole, too, has the ring of the great odes in Isaiah xl.—lv., and seems -to reflect the same situation, upon the eve of Cyrus’ conquest of -Babylon. There can be little doubt that we have here inserted in -Zechariah’s Visions a song of twenty years earlier, but we must confess -inability to decide whether it was adopted by Zechariah himself or -added by a later hand.[744] - -Again, there are the two passages called the Word of Jehovah to -Zerubbabel, chap. iv. 6_b_-10_a_; and the Word of Jehovah concerning -the gifts which came to Jerusalem from the Jews in Babylon, chap. vi. -9-15. The first, as Wellhausen has shown,[745] is clearly out of place; -it disturbs the narrative of the Vision, and is to be put at the end -of the latter. The second is undated, and separate from the Visions. -The second plainly affirms that the building of the Temple is still -future. The man whose name is Branch or Shoot is designated: _and he -shall build the Temple of Jehovah_. The first is in the same temper -as the first two oracles of Haggai. It is possible then that these -two passages are not, like the Visions with which they are taken, to -be dated from 519, but represent that still earlier prophesying of -Zechariah with which we are told he assisted Haggai in instigating the -people to begin to build the Temple. - - * * * * * - -The style of the prophet Zechariah betrays special features almost only -in the narrative of the Visions. Outside these his language is simple, -direct and pure, as it could not but be, considering how much of it is -drawn from, or modelled upon, the older prophets,[746] and chiefly -Hosea and Jeremiah. Only one or two lapses into a careless and -degenerate dialect show us how the prophet might have written, had he -not been sustained by the music of the classical periods of the -language.[747] - -This directness and pith is not shared by the language in which the -Visions are narrated.[748] Here the style is involved and redundant. -The syntax is loose; there is a frequent omission of the copula, and of -other means by which, in better Hebrew, connection and conciseness are -sustained. The formulas, _thus saith_ and _saying_, are repeated to -weariness. At the same time it is fair to ask, how much of this -redundancy was due to Zechariah himself? Take the Septuagint version. -The Hebrew text, which it followed, not only included a number of -repetitions of the formulas, and of the designations of the personages -introduced into the Visions, which do not occur in the Massoretic -text,[749] but omitted some which are found in the Massoretic -text.[750] These two sets of phenomena prove that from an early date -the copiers of the original text of Zechariah must have been busy in -increasing its redundancies. Further, there are still earlier -intrusions and expansions, for these are shared by both the Hebrew and -the Greek texts: some of them very natural efforts to clear up the -personages and conversations recorded in the dreams,[751] some of them -stupid mistakes in understanding the drift of the argument.[752] There -must of course have been a certain amount of redundancy in the original -to provoke such aggravations of it, and of obscurity or tortuousness of -style to cause them to be deemed necessary. But it would be very unjust -to charge all the faults of our present text to Zechariah himself, -especially when we find such force and simplicity in the passages -outside the Visions. Of course the involved and misty subjects of the -latter naturally forced upon the description of them a laboriousness of -art, to which there was no provocation in directly exhorting the people -to a pure life, or in straightforward predictions of the Messianic era. - -Beyond the corruptions due to these causes, the text of Zechariah -i.—viii. has not suffered more than that of our other prophets. There -are one or two clerical errors;[753] an occasional preposition or -person of a verb needs to be amended. Here and there the text has been -disarranged;[754] and as already noticed, there has been one serious -alteration of the original.[755] - -From the foregoing paragraphs it must be apparent what help and -hindrance in the reconstruction of the text is furnished by the -Septuagint. A list of its variant readings and of its mistranslations -is appended.[756] - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[720] See above, pp. 225 ff. - -[721] Below, p. 308. - -[722] Ezra v. 1, vi. 14. - -[723] i. 12, vii. 5: reckoning in round numbers from 590, midway -between the two Exiles of 597 and 586, that brings us to about 520, the -second year of Darius. - -[724] ii. 6 (Eng., Heb. 10). On the question whether the Book of -Zechariah gives no evidence of a previous Return from Babylon see -above, pp. 208 ff. - -[725] viii. 7, etc. - -[726] viii. 4, 5. - -[727] iii. 1-10, iv. 6-10, vi. 11 ff. - -[728] viii. 9, 10. - -[729] i. 1-6. - -[730] i. 7-17. - -[731] iv. 6-10. - -[732] i. 7-21 (Eng., Heb. i. 7—ii. 4). - -[733] iv. 6 ff. - -[734] iii., iv. - -[735] i. 16. - -[736] v. - -[737] vii. 3. - -[738] vii. 1-7, viii. 18, 19. - -[739] viii. 20-23. - -[740] viii. 16, 17. - -[741] viii. 20-23. - -[742] ii. 10 f. Heb., 6 f. LXX. and Eng. - -[743] Though the expression _I have scattered you to the four winds of -heaven_ seems to imply the Exile before any return. - -[744] For the bearing of this on Kosters’ theory of the Return see pp. -211 f. - -[745] See below, p. 300. - -[746] Outside the Visions the prophecies contain these echoes or -repetitions of earlier writers: chap. i. 1-6 quotes the constant -refrain of prophetic preaching before the Exile, and in chap. vii. 7-14 -(ver. 8 must be deleted) is given a summary of that preaching; in chap. -viii. ver. 3 echoes Isa. i. 21, 26, _city of troth_, and Jer. xxxi. 23, -_mountain of holiness_ (there is really no connection, as Kuenen holds, -between ver. 4 and Isa. lxv. 20; it would create more interesting -questions as to the date of the latter if there were); ver. 8 is based -on Hosea ii. 15 Heb., 19 Eng., and Jer. xxxi. 33; ver. 12 is based on -Hosea ii. 21 f. (Heb. 23 f.); with ver. 13 compare Jer. xlii. 18, _a -curse_; vv. 21 ff. with Isa. ii. 3 and Micah iv. 2. - -[747] _E.g._ vii. 5, צַמְתֻּנִי אָנִי for צַמְתֶּם לִי: cf. Ewald, -_Syntax_, § 315_b_. The curious use of the acc. in the following verse -is perhaps only apparent; part of the text may have fallen out. - -[748] Though there are not wanting, of course, echoes here as in the -other prophecies of older writings, _e.g._ i. 12, 17. - -[749] לאמר, _saying_, ii. 8 (Gr. ii. 4); iv. 5, _And the angel who -spoke with me said_; i. 17, cf. vi. 5. _All_ is inserted in i. 11, iii. -9; _lord_ in ii. 2; _of hosts_ (after _Jehovah_) viii. 17; and there -are other instances of palpable expansion, _e.g._ i. 6, 8, ii. 4 bis, -6, viii. 19. - -[750] _E.g._ ii. 2, iv. 2, 13, v. 9, vi. 12 bis, vii. 8: cf. also vi. -13. - -[751] i. 8 ff., iii. 4 ff.: cf. also vi. 3 with vv. 6 f. - -[752] _E.g._ (but this is outside the Visions) the very flagrant -misunderstanding to which the insertion of vii. 8 is due. - -[753] v. 6, עינם for עונם as in LXX., and the last words of v. 11; -perhaps vi. 10; and almost certainly vii. 2_a_. - -[754] Chap. iv. On 6_a_, 10_b_-14 should immediately follow, and -6_b_-10_a_ come after 14. - -[755] vi. 11 ff. See below, pp. 308 f. - -[756] Chief variants: i. 8, 10; ii. 15; iii. 4; iv. 7, 12; v. 1, 3, 4, -9; vi. 10, 13; vii. 3; viii. 8, 9, 12, 20. Obvious mistranslations or -misreadings: ii. 9, 10, 15, 17; iii. 4; iv. 7, 10; v. 1, 4, 9; vi. 10, -cf. 14; vii. 3. - - - - - CHAPTER XX - - _ZECHARIAH THE PROPHET_ - - ZECHARIAH i. 1-6, etc.; EZRA v. 1, vi. 14 - - -Zechariah is one of the prophets whose personality as distinguished -from their message exerts some degree of fascination on the student. -This is not due, however, as in the case of Hosea or Jeremiah, to -the facts of his life, for of these we know extremely little; but to -certain conflicting symptoms of character which appear through his -prophecies. - -His name was a very common one in Israel, Zekher-Yah, _Jehovah -remembers_.[757] In his own book he is described as _the son of -Berekh-Yah, the son of Iddo_,[758] and in the Aramaic document of the -Book of Ezra as _the son of Iddo_.[759] Some have explained this -difference by supposing that Berekhyah was the actual father of the -prophet, but that either he died early, leaving Zechariah to the care -of the grandfather, or else that he was a man of no note, and Iddo was -more naturally mentioned as the head of the family. There are several -instances in the Old Testament of men being called the sons of their -grandfathers:[760] as in these cases the grandfather was the reputed -founder of the house, so in that of Zechariah Iddo was the head of his -family when it came out of Babylon and was anew planted in Jerusalem. -Others, however, have contested the genuineness of the words _son of -Berekh-Yah_, and have traced their insertion to a confusion of the -prophet with Zechariah son of Yĕbherekh-Yahu, the contemporary of -Isaiah.[761] This is precarious, while the other hypothesis is a very -natural one.[762] Whichever be correct, the prophet Zechariah was a -member of the priestly family of Iddo, that came up to Jerusalem from -Babylon under Cyrus.[763] The Book of Nehemiah adds that in the -high-priesthood of Yoyakim, the son of Joshua, the head of the house of -Iddo was a Zechariah.[764] If this be our prophet, then he was probably -a young man in 520,[765] and had come up as a child in the caravans -from Babylon. The Aramaic document of the Book of Ezra[766] assigns to -Zechariah a share with Haggai in the work of instigating Zerubbabel and -Jeshua to begin the Temple. None of his oracles is dated previous to -the beginning of the work in August 520, but we have seen[767] that -among those undated there are one or two which by referring to the -building of the Temple as still future may contain some relics of that -first stage of his ministry. From November 520 we have the first of his -dated oracles; his Visions followed in January 519, and his last -recorded prophesying in December 518.[768] - -These are all the certain events of Zechariah’s history. But in the -well-attested prophecies he has left we discover, besides some obvious -traits of character, certain problems of style and expression which -suggest a personality of more than usual interest. Loyalty to the great -voices of old, the temper which appeals to the experience, rather than -to the dogmas, of the past, the gift of plain speech to his own times, -a wistful anxiety about his reception as a prophet[769] combined with -the absence of all ambition to be original or anything but the clear -voice of the lessons of the past and of the conscience of to-day—these -are the qualities which characterise Zechariah’s orations to the -people. But how to reconcile them with the strained art and obscure -truths of the Visions—it is this which invests with interest the study -of his personality. We have proved that the obscurity and redundancy of -the Visions cannot all have been due to himself. Later hands have -exaggerated the repetitions and ravelled the processes of the original. -But these gradual blemishes have not grown from nothing: the original -style must have been sufficiently involved to provoke the -interpolations of the scribes, and it certainly contained all the weird -and shifting apparitions which we find so hard to make clear to -ourselves. The problem, therefore, remains—how one who had gift of -speech, so straight and clear, came to torture and tangle his style; -how one who presented with all plainness the main issues of his -people’s history found it laid upon him to invent, for the further -expression of these, symbols so laboured and intricate. - -We begin with the oracle, which opens his book and illustrates those -simple characteristics of the man that contrast so sharply with the -temper of his Visions. - -_In the eighth month, in the second year of Darius, the word of Jehovah -came to the prophet Zechariah, son of Berekhyah, son of Iddo,[770] -saying: Jehovah was very wroth[771] with your fathers. And thou shalt -say unto them: Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: Turn ye to Me—oracle of -Jehovah of Hosts—that I may turn to you, saith Jehovah of Hosts! Be not -like your fathers, to whom the former prophets preached, saying: “Thus -saith Jehovah of Hosts, Turn now from your evil ways and from[772] your -evil deeds,” but they hearkened not, and paid no attention to Me—oracle -of Jehovah. Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they -live for ever? But[773] My words and My statutes, with which I charged -My servants the prophets, did they not overtake your fathers? till -these turned and said, As Jehovah of Hosts did purpose to do unto us, -according to our deeds and according to our ways, so hath He dealt with -us._ - -It is a sign of the new age which we have reached, that its prophet -should appeal to the older prophets with as much solemnity as they -did to Moses himself. The history which led to the Exile has become -to Israel as classic and sacred as her great days of deliverance from -Egypt and of conquest in Canaan. But still more significant is what -Zechariah seeks from that past; this we must carefully discover, if we -would appreciate with exactness his rank as a prophet. - -The development of religion may be said to consist of a struggle -between two tempers, both of which indeed appeal to the past, but from -very opposite motives. The one proves its devotion to the older -prophets by adopting the exact formulas of their doctrine, counts these -sacred to the letter, and would enforce them in detail upon the minds -and circumstances of the new generation. It conceives that truth has -been promulgated once for all in forms as enduring as the principles -they contain. It fences ancient rites, cherishes old customs and -institutions, and when these are questioned it becomes alarmed and even -savage. The other temper is no whit behind this one in its devotion to -the past, but it seeks the ancient prophets not so much for what they -have said as for what they have been, not for what they enforced but -for what they encountered, suffered and confessed. It asks not for -dogmas but for experience and testimony. He who can thus read the past -and interpret it to his own day—he is the prophet. In his reading he -finds nothing so clear, nothing so tragic, nothing so convincing as the -working of the Word of God. He beholds how this came to men, haunted -them and was entreated by them. He sees that it was their great -opportunity, which being rejected became their judgment. He finds -abused justice vindicated, proud wrong punished, and all God’s -neglected commonplaces achieving in time their triumph. He reads how -men came to see this, and to confess their guilt. He is haunted by the -remorse of generations who know how they might have obeyed the Divine -call, but wilfully did not. And though they have perished, and the -prophets have died and their formulas are no more applicable, the -victorious Word itself still lives and cries to men with the terrible -emphasis of their fathers’ experience. All this is the vision of the -true prophet, and it was the vision of Zechariah. - -His generation was one whose chief temptation was to adopt towards -the past the other attitude we have described. In their feebleness -what could the poor remnant of Israel do but cling servilely to the -former greatness? The vindication of the Exile had stamped the Divine -authority of the earlier prophets. The habits, which the life in -Babylon had perfected, of arranging and codifying the literature of -the past, and of employing it, in place of altar and ritual, in the -stated service of God, had canonised Scripture and provoked men to -the worship of its very letter. Had the real prophet not again been -raised, these habits might have too early produced the belief that the -Word of God was exhausted, and must have fastened upon the feeble life -of Israel that mass of stiff and stark dogmas, the literal application -of which Christ afterwards found crushing the liberty and the force of -religion. Zechariah prevented this—for a time. He himself was mighty -in the Scriptures of the past: no man in Israel makes larger use of -them. But he employs them as witnesses, not as dogmas; he finds in them -not authority, but experience.[774] He reads their testimony to the -ever-living presence of God’s Word with men. And seeing that, though -the old forms and figures have perished with the hearts which shaped -them, the Word itself in its bare truth has vindicated its life by -fulfilment in history, he knows that it lives still, and hurls it upon -his people, not in the forms published by this or that prophet of long -ago, but in its essence and direct from God Himself, as His Word for -to-day and now. _The fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they -live for ever? But My words and My statutes, with which I charged My -servants the prophets, have they not overtaken your fathers? Thus saith -Jehovah of Hosts, Be ye not like your fathers, but turn ye to Me that I -may turn to you._ - -The argument of this oracle might very naturally have been narrowed -into a credential for the prophet himself as sent from God. About his -reception as Jehovah’s messenger Zechariah shows a repeated anxiety. -Four times he concludes a prediction with the words, _And ye shall know -that Jehovah hath sent me_,[775] as if after his first utterances he -had encountered that suspicion and unbelief which a prophet never -failed to suffer from his contemporaries. But in this oracle there is -no trace of such personal anxiety. The oracle is pervaded only with the -desire to prove the ancient Word of God as still alive, and to drive it -home in its own sheer force. Like the greatest of his order, Zechariah -appears with the call to repent: _Turn ye to Me—oracle of Jehovah of -Hosts—that I may turn to you_. This is the pivot on which history has -turned, the one condition on which God has been able to help men. -Wherever it is read as the conclusion of all the past, wherever it is -proclaimed as the conscience of the present, there the true prophet is -found and the Word of God has been spoken. - -The same possession by the ethical spirit reappears, as we shall see, -in Zechariah’s orations to the people after the anxieties of building -are over and the completion of the Temple is in sight. In these he -affirms again that the whole essence of God’s Word by the older -prophets has been moral—to judge true judgment, to practise mercy, to -defend the widow and orphan, the stranger and poor, and to think no -evil of one another. For the sad fasts of the Exile Zechariah enjoins -gladness, with the duty of truth and the hope of peace. Again and again -he enforces sincerity and the love without dissimulation. His ideals -for Jerusalem are very high, including the conversion of the nations to -her God. But warlike ambitions have vanished from them, and -his pictures of her future condition are homely and practical. -Jerusalem shall be no more a fortress, but spread village-wise without -walls.[776] Full families, unlike the present colony with its few -children and its men worn out in middle life by harassing warfare with -enemies and a sullen nature; streets rife with children playing and -old folk sitting in the sun; the return of the exiles; happy harvests -and springtimes of peace; solid gain of labour for every man, with no -raiding neighbours to harass, nor the mutual envies of peasants in -their selfish struggle with famine. - -It is a simple, hearty, practical man whom such prophesying reveals, -the spirit of him bent on justice and love, and yearning for the -unharassed labour of the field and for happy homes. No prophet has more -beautiful sympathies, a more direct word of righteousness, or a braver -heart. _Fast not, but love truth and peace. Truth and wholesome justice -set ye up in your gates. Be not afraid; strengthen your hands! Old men -and women shall yet sit in the streets of Jerusalem, each with staff in -hand for the fulness of their years; the city’s streets shall be rife -with boys and girls at play._ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[757] זֶכֶרְיָה; LXX. Ζαχαρίας. - -[758] i. 1: בֶּן־בֶרֶכְיָה בֶּן־עִדּוֹ. In i. 7: בֶּרֶכְיָהוּ -בֶּן־עִדּוֹא. - -[759] Ezra v. 1, vi. 14: בַּר־עִדּוֹא. - -[760] Gen. xxiv. 47, cf. xxix. 5; 1 Kings xix. 16, cf. 2 Kings ix. 14, -20. - -[761] Isa. viii. 2: בֶּן־יְבֶרֶכְיָהוּ. This confusion, which existed -in early Jewish and Christian times, Knobel, Von Ortenberg, Bleek, -Wellhausen and others take to be due to the effort to find a second -Zechariah for the authorship of chaps. ix. ff. - -[762] So Vatke, König and many others. Marti prefers it (_Der Prophet -Sacharja_, p. 58). See also Ryle on Ezra v. 1. - -[763] Neh. xii. 4. - -[764] _Ib._ 16. - -[765] This is not proved, as Pusey, König (_Einl._, p. 364) and others -think, by נַעַר, or young man, of the Third Vision (ii. 8 Heb., ii. 4 -LXX. and Eng.). Cf. Wright, _Zechariah and his Prophecies_, p. xvi. - -[766] v. 1, vi. 14. - -[767] Above, p. 260. - -[768] More than this we do not know of Zechariah. The Jewish and -Christian traditions of him are as unfounded as those of other -prophets. According to the Jews he was, of course, a member of the -mythical Great Synagogue. See above on Haggai, pp. 232 f. As in the -case of the prophets we have already treated, the Christian traditions -of Zechariah are found in (Pseud-)Epiphanius, _De Vitis Prophetarum_, -Dorotheus, and Hesychius, as quoted above, p. 80. They amount to this, -that Zechariah, after predicting in Babylon the birth of Zerubbabel, -and to Cyrus his victory over Crœsus and his treatment of the Jews, -came in his old age to Jerusalem, prophesied, died and was buried near -Beit-Jibrin—another instance of the curious relegation by Christian -tradition of the birth and burial places of so many of the prophets to -that neighbourhood. Compare Beit-Zakharya, 12 miles from Beit-Jibrin. -Hesychius says he was born in Gilead. Dorotheus confuses him, as the -Jews did, with Zechariah of Isa. viii. 1. See above, p. 265, n. 1. - -Zechariah was certainly not the Zechariah whom our Lord describes as -slain between the Temple and the Altar (Matt. xxiii. 35; Luke xi. -51). In the former passage alone is this Zechariah called the son of -Barachiah. In the _Evang. Nazar._ Jerome read _the son of Yehoyada_. -Both readings may be insertions. According to 2 Chron. xxiv. 21, in the -reign of Joash, Zechariah, the son of Yehoyada the priest, was stoned -in the court of the Temple, and according to Josephus (IV. _Wars_, v. -4), in the year 68 A.D. Zechariah son of Baruch was assassinated in the -Temple by two zealots. The latter murder may, as Marti remarks (pp. 58 -f.), have led to the insertion of Barachiah into Matt. xxiii. 35. - -[769] ii. 13, 15; iv. 9; vi. 15. - -[770] LXX. Ἀδδω. See above, p. 264. - -[771] Heb. _angered with anger_; Gr. _with great anger_. - -[772] As in LXX. - -[773] LXX. has misunderstood and expanded this verse. - -[774] It is to be noticed that Zechariah appeals to the Torah of the -prophets, and does not mention any Torah of the priests. Cf. Smend, _A. -T. Rel. Gesch._, pp. 176 f. - -[775] Page 267, n. 769. - -[776] This picture is given in one of the Visions: the Third. - - - - - CHAPTER XXI - - _THE VISIONS OF ZECHARIAH_ - - ZECHARIAH i. 7—vi. - - -The Visions of Zechariah do not lack those large and simple views -of religion which we have just seen to be the charm of his other -prophecies. Indeed it is among the Visions that we find the most -spiritual of all his utterances:[777] _Not by might, and not by force, -but by My Spirit, saith Jehovah of Hosts_. The Visions express the need -of the Divine forgiveness, emphasise the reality of sin, as a principle -deeper than the civic crimes in which it is manifested, and declare the -power of God to banish it from His people. The Visions also contain -the remarkable prospect of Jerusalem as the City of Peace, her only -wall the Lord Himself.[778] The overthrow of the heathen empires is -predicted by the Lord’s own hand, and from all the Visions there are -absent both the turmoil and the glory of war. - -We must also be struck by the absence of another element, which is a -cause of complexity in the writings of many prophets—the polemic -against idolatry. Zechariah nowhere mentions the idols. We have already -seen what proof this silence bears for the fact that the community to -which he spoke was not that half-heathen remnant of Israel which had -remained in the land, but was composed of worshippers of Jehovah who at -His word had returned from Babylon.[779] Here we have only to do with -the bearing of the fact upon Zechariah’s style. That bewildering -confusion of the heathen pantheon and its rites, which forms so much of -our difficulty in interpreting some of the prophecies of Ezekiel and -the closing chapters of the Book of Isaiah, is not to blame for any of -the complexity of Zechariah’s Visions. - -Nor can we attribute the latter to the fact that the Visions are -dreams, and therefore bound to be more involved and obscure than the -words of Jehovah which came to Zechariah in the open daylight of his -people’s public life. In chaps. i. 7—vi. we have not the narrative of -actual dreams, but a series of conscious and artistic allegories—the -deliberate translation into a carefully constructed symbolism of the -Divine truths with which the prophet was entrusted by his God. Yet this -only increases our problem—why a man with such gifts of direct speech, -and such clear views of his people’s character and history, should -choose to express the latter by an imagery so artificial and involved? -In his orations Zechariah is very like the prophets whom we have known -before the Exile, thoroughly ethical and intent upon the public -conscience of his time. He appreciates what they were, feels himself -standing in their succession, and is endowed both with their spirit and -their style. But none of them constructs the elaborate allegories which -he does, or insists upon the religious symbolism which he enforces as -indispensable to the standing of Israel with God. Not only are their -visions few and simple, but they look down upon the visionary temper as -a rude stage of prophecy and inferior to their own, in which the Word -of God is received by personal communion with Himself, and conveyed to -His people by straight and plain words. Some of the earlier prophets -even condemn all priesthood and ritual; none of them regards these as -indispensable to Israel’s right relations with Jehovah; and none -employs those superhuman mediators of the Divine truth, by whom -Zechariah is instructed in his Visions. - - - 1. THE INFLUENCES WHICH MOULDED THE VISIONS. - -The explanation of this change that has come over prophecy must be -sought for in certain habits which the people formed in exile. During -the Exile several causes conspired to develop among Hebrew writers -the tempers both of symbolism and apocalypse. The chief of these was -their separation from the realities of civic life, with the opportunity -their political leisure afforded them of brooding and dreaming. -Facts and Divine promises, which had previously to be dealt with -by the conscience of the moment, were left to be worked out by the -imagination. The exiles were not responsible citizens or statesmen, -but dreamers. They were inspired by mighty hopes for the future, and -not fettered by the practical necessities of a definite historical -situation upon which these hopes had to be immediately realised. They -had a far-off horizon to build upon, and they occupied the whole -breadth of it. They had a long time to build, and they elaborated the -minutest details of their architecture. Consequently their construction -of the future of Israel, and their description of the processes by -which it was to be reached, became colossal, ornate and lavishly -symbolic. Nor could the exiles fail to receive stimulus for all this -from the rich imagery of Babylonian art by which they were surrounded. - -Under these influences there were three strong developments in Israel. -One was that development of Apocalypse the first beginnings of which we -traced in Zephaniah—the representation of God’s providence of the world -and of His people, not by the ordinary political and military processes -of history, but by awful convulsions and catastrophes, both in nature -and in politics, in which God Himself appeared, either alone in sudden -glory or by the mediation of heavenly armies. The second—and it was but -a part of the first—was the development of a belief in Angels: -superhuman beings who had not only a part to play in the apocalyptic -wars and revolutions; but, in the growing sense, which characterises -the period, of God’s distance and awfulness, were believed to act as -His agents in the communication of His Word to men. And, thirdly, there -was the development of the Ritual. To some minds this may appear the -strangest of all the effects of the Exile. The fall of the Temple, its -hierarchy and sacrifices, might be supposed to enforce more spiritual -conceptions of God and of His communion with His people. And no doubt -it did. The impossibility of the legal sacrifices in exile opened the -mind of Israel to the belief that God was satisfied with the sacrifices -of the broken heart, and drew near, without mediation, to all who were -humble and pure of heart. But no one in Israel therefore understood -that these sacrifices were for ever abolished. Their interruption was -regarded as merely temporary even by the most spiritual of Jewish -writers. The Fifty-First Psalm, for instance, which declares that _the -sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and a contrite heart, O -Lord, Thou wilt not despise_, immediately follows this declaration by -the assurance that _when God builds again the walls of Jerusalem_, He -will once more take delight in _the legal sacrifices: burnt offering -and whole burnt offering, the oblation of bullocks upon Thine -altar_.[780] For men of such views the ruin of the Temple was not its -abolition with the whole dispensation which it represented, but rather -the occasion for its reconstruction upon wider lines and a more -detailed system, for the planning of which the nation’s exile afforded -the leisure and the carefulness of art described above. The ancient -liturgy, too, was insufficient for the stronger convictions of guilt -and need of purgation, which sore punishment had impressed upon the -people. Then, scattered among the heathen as they were, they learned to -require stricter laws and more drastic ceremonies to restore and -preserve their holiness. Their ritual, therefore, had to be expanded -and detailed to a degree far beyond what we find in Israel’s earlier -systems of worship. With the fall of the monarchy and the absence of -civic life the importance of the priesthood was proportionately -enhanced; and the growing sense of God’s aloofness from the world, -already alluded to, made the more indispensable human, as well as -superhuman, mediators between Himself and His people. Consider these -things, and it will be clear why prophecy, which with Amos had begun a -war against all ritual, and with Jeremiah had achieved a religion -absolutely independent of priesthood and Temple, should reappear after -the Exile, insistent upon the building of the Temple, enforcing the -need both of priesthood and sacrifice, and while it proclaimed the -Messianic King and the High Priest as the great feeders of the national -life and worship, finding no place beside them for the Prophet -himself.[781] - -The force of these developments of Apocalypse, Angelology and the -Ritual appears both in Ezekiel and in the exilic codification of the -ritual which forms so large a part of the Pentateuch. Ezekiel carries -Apocalypse far beyond the beginnings started by Zephaniah. He -introduces, though not under the name of angels, superhuman mediators -between himself and God. The Priestly Code does not mention angels, and -has no Apocalypse; but like Ezekiel it develops, to an extraordinary -degree, the ritual of Israel. Both its author and Ezekiel base on the -older forms, but build as men who are not confined by the lines of an -actually existing system. The changes they make, the innovations they -introduce, are too numerous to mention here. To illustrate their -influence upon Zechariah, it is enough to emphasise the large place -they give in the ritual to the processes of propitiation and cleansing -from sin, and the increased authority with which they invest the -priesthood. In Ezekiel Israel has still a Prince, though he is not -called King. He arranges the cultus,[782] and sacrifices are offered -for him and the people,[783] but the priests teach and judge the -people.[784] In the Priestly Code[785] the priesthood is more -rigorously fenced than by Ezekiel from the laity, and more regularly -graded. At its head appears a High Priest (as he does not in Ezekiel), -and by his side the civil rulers are portrayed in lesser dignity and -power. Sacrifices are made, no longer as with Ezekiel for Prince and -People, but for Aaron and the Congregation; and throughout the -narrative of ancient history, into the form of which this Code projects -its legislation, the High Priest stands above the captain of the host, -even when the latter is Joshua himself. God’s enemies are defeated not -so much by the wisdom and valour of the secular powers, as by the -miracles of Jehovah Himself, mediated through the priesthood. Ezekiel -and the Priestly Code both elaborate the sacrifices of atonement and -sanctification beyond all the earlier uses. - - - 2. GENERAL FEATURES OF THE VISIONS. - -It was beneath these influences that Zechariah grew up, and to them we -may trace, not only numerous details of his Visions, but the whole of -their involved symbolism. He was himself a priest and the son of a -priest, born and bred in the very order to which we owe the -codification of the ritual, and the development of those ideas of guilt -and uncleanness that led to its expansion and specialisation. The -Visions in which he deals with these are the Third to the Seventh. As -with Haggai there is a High Priest, in advance upon Ezekiel and in -agreement with the Priestly Code. As in the latter the High Priest -represents the people, and carries their guilt before God.[786] He and -his colleagues are pledges and portents of the coming Messiah. But the -civil power is not yet diminished before the sacerdotal, as in the -Priestly Code. We shall find indeed that a remarkable attempt has been -made to alter the original text of a prophecy appended to the -Visions,[787] in order to divert to the High Priest the coronation and -Messianic rank there described. But any one who reads the passage -carefully can see for himself that the crown (a single crown, as the -verb which it governs proves[788]) which Zechariah was ordered to make -was designed for Another than the priest, that the priest was but to -stand at this Other’s right hand, and that there was to be concord -between the two of them. This Other can only have been the Messianic -King, Zerubbabel, as was already proclaimed by Haggai.[789] The altered -text is due to a later period, when the High Priest became the civil as -well as the religious head of the community. To Zechariah he was still -only the right hand of the monarch in government; but, as we have seen, -the religious life of the people was already gathered up and -concentrated in him. It is the priests, too, who by their perpetual -service and holy life bring on the Messianic era.[790] Men come to the -Temple to propitiate Jehovah, for which Zechariah uses the -anthropomorphic expression _to make smooth_ or _placid His face_.[791] -No more than this is made of the sacrificial system, which was not in -full course when the Visions were announced. But the symbolism of the -Fourth Vision is drawn from the furniture of the Temple. It is -interesting that the great candelabrum seen by the prophet should be -like, not the ten lights of the old Temple of Solomon, but the -seven-branched candlestick described in the Priestly Code. In the Sixth -and Seventh Visions, the strong convictions of guilt and uncleanness, -which were engendered in Israel by the Exile, are not removed by the -sacrificial means enforced in the Priestly Code, but by symbolic -processes in the style of the visions of Ezekiel. - -The Visions in which Zechariah treats of the outer history of the world -are the first two and the last, and in these we notice the influence of -the Apocalypse developed during the Exile. In Zechariah’s day Israel -had no stage for their history save the site of Jerusalem and its -immediate neighbourhood. So long as he keeps to this Zechariah is as -practical and matter-of-fact as any of the prophets, but when he has to -go beyond it to describe the general overthrow of the heathen, he is -unable to project that, as Amos or Isaiah did, in terms of historic -battle, and has to call in the apocalyptic. A people such as that poor -colony of exiles, with no issue upon history, is forced to take refuge -in Apocalypse, and carries with it even those of its prophets whose -conscience, like Zechariah’s, is most strongly bent upon the practical -present. Consequently these three historical Visions are the most vague -of the eight. They reveal the whole earth under the care of Jehovah and -the patrol of His angels. They definitely predict the overthrow of the -heathen empires. But, unlike Amos or Isaiah, the prophet does not see -by what political movements this is to be effected. The world _is_ -still _quiet and at peace_.[792] The time is hidden in the Divine -counsels; the means, though clearly symbolised in _four smiths_ who -come forward to smite the horns of the heathen,[793] and in a chariot -which carries God’s wrath to the North,[794] are obscure. The prophet -appears to have intended, not any definite individuals or political -movements of the immediate future, but God’s own supernatural forces. -In other words, the Smiths and Chariots are not an allegory of history, -but powers apocalyptic. The forms of the symbols were derived by -Zechariah from different sources. Perhaps that of the _smiths_ who -destroy the horns in the Second Vision was suggested by the _smiths of -destruction_ threatened upon Ammon by Ezekiel.[795] In the horsemen of -the First Vision and the chariots of the Eighth, Ewald sees a -reflection of the couriers and posts which Darius organised throughout -the empire; they are more probably, as we shall see, a reflection of -the military bands and patrols of the Persians. But from whatever -quarter Zechariah derived the exact aspect of these Divine messengers, -he found many precedents for them in the native beliefs of Israel. They -are, in short, angels, incarnate as Hebrew angels always were, and in -fashion like men. But this brings up the whole subject of the angels, -whom he also sees employed as the mediators of God’s Word to him; and -that is large enough to be left to a chapter by itself.[796] - -We have now before us all the influences which led Zechariah to the -main form and chief features of his Visions. - - - 3. EXPOSITION OF THE SEVERAL VISIONS. - -For all the Visions there is one date, _in the twenty-fourth day of the -eleventh month, the month Shebat, in the second year of Darius_, that -is January or February 519; and one Divine impulse, _the Word of -Jehovah came to the prophet Zekharyah, son of Berekhyahu, son of Iddo, -as follows_. - - - THE FIRST VISION: THE ANGEL-HORSEMEN (i. 7-17). - -The seventy years which Jeremiah had fixed for the duration of the -Babylonian servitude were drawing to a close. Four months had elapsed -since Haggai promised that in a little while God would shake all -nations.[797] But the world was not shaken: there was no political -movement which promised to restore her glory to Jerusalem. A very -natural disappointment must have been the result among the Jews. -In this situation of affairs the Word came to Zechariah, and both -situation and Word he expressed by his First Vision. - -It was one of the myrtle-covered glens in the neighbourhood of -Jerusalem:[798] Zechariah calls it _the_ Glen or Valley-Bottom, either -because it was known under that name to the Jews, or because he was -himself wont to frequent it for prayer. He discovers in it what seems -to be a rendezvous of Persian cavalry-scouts,[799] the leader of the -troop in front, and the rest behind him, having just come in with their -reports. Soon, however, he is made aware that they are angels, and with -that quick, dissolving change both of function and figure, which marks -all angelic apparitions,[800] they explain to him their mission. Now it -is an angel-interpreter at his side who speaks, and now the angel on -the front horse. They are scouts of God come in from their survey of -the whole earth. The world lies quiet. Whereupon _the angel of Jehovah_ -asks Him how long His anger must rest on Jerusalem and nothing be done -to restore her; and the prophet hears a kind and comforting answer. The -nations have done more evil to Israel than God empowered them to do. -Their aggravations have changed His wrath against her to pity, and in -pity He is come back to her. She shall soon be rebuilt and overflow -with prosperity. The only perplexity in all this is the angels’ report -that the whole earth lies quiet. How this could have been in 519 is -difficult to understand. The great revolts against Darius were then in -active progress, the result was uncertain and he took at least three -more years to put them all down. They were confined, it is true, to the -east and north-east of the empire, but some of them threatened Babylon, -and we can hardly ascribe the report of the angels to such a limitation -of the Jews’ horizon at this time as shut out Mesopotamia or the lands -to the north of her. There remain two alternatives. Either these -far-away revolts made only more impressive the stagnancy of the tribes -of the rest of the empire, and the helplessness of the Jews and their -Syrian neighbours was convincingly shown by their inability to take -advantage even of the desperate straits to which Darius was reduced; or -else in that month of vision Darius had quelled one of the rebellions -against him, and for the moment there was quiet in the world. - -_By night I had a vision, and behold! a man riding a brown horse,[801] -and he was standing between the myrtles that are in the Glen;[802] and -behind him horses brown, bay[803] and white. And I said, What are -these, my lord? And the angel who talked with me said, I will show you -what these are. And the man who was standing among the myrtles answered -and said, These are they whom Jehovah hath sent to go to and fro -through the earth. And they answered the angel of Jehovah who stood -among the myrtles,[804] and said, We have gone up and down through the -earth, and lo! the whole earth is still and at peace.[805] And the -angel of Jehovah answered and said, Jehovah of Hosts, how long hast -Thou no pity for Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, with which[806] -Thou hast been wroth these seventy years? And Jehovah answered the -angel who talked with me,[807] kind words and comforting. And the angel -who talked with me said to me, Proclaim now as follows: Thus saith -Jehovah of Hosts, I am zealous for Jerusalem and for Zion, with a great -zeal; but with great wrath am I wroth against the arrogant Gentiles. -For I was but a little angry_ with Israel, _but they aggravated the -evil.[808] Therefore thus saith Jehovah, I am returned to Jerusalem -with mercies. My house shall be built in her—oracle of Jehovah of -Hosts—and the measuring line shall be drawn over Jerusalem. Proclaim -yet again, saying: Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts, My cities shall yet -overflow with prosperity, and Jehovah shall again comfort Zion, and -again make choice of Jerusalem._. - -Two things are to be noted in this oracle. No political movement is -indicated as the means of Jerusalem’s restoration: this is to be the -effect of God’s free grace in returning to dwell in Jerusalem, which is -the reward of the building of the Temple. And there is an interesting -explanation of the motive for God’s new grace: in executing His -sentence upon Israel, the heathen had far exceeded their commission, -and now themselves deserved punishment. That is to say, the restoration -of Jerusalem and the resumption of the worship are not enough for the -future of Israel. The heathen must be chastised. But Zechariah does not -predict any overthrow of the world’s power, either by earthly or by -heavenly forces. This is entirely in harmony with the insistence upon -peace which distinguishes him from other prophets. - - - THE SECOND VISION: THE FOUR HORNS AND THE - FOUR SMITHS (ii. 1-4 Heb., i. 18-21 Eng.). - -The Second Vision supplies what is lacking in the First, the -destruction of the tyrants who have oppressed Israel. The prophet sees -four horns, which, he is told by his interpreting angel, are the powers -that have scattered Judah. The many attempts to identify these with -four heathen nations are ingenious but futile. “_Four_ horns were seen -as representing the totality of Israel’s enemies—her enemies from all -quarters.”[809] And to destroy these horns four smiths appear. Because -in the Vision the horns are of iron, in Israel an old symbol of power, -the first verb used of the action can hardly be, as in the Hebrew text, -to terrify. The Greek reads _sharpen_, and probably some verb meaning -_to cut_ or _chisel_ stood in the original.[810] - -_And I lifted mine eyes and looked, and lo! four horns. And I said to -the angel who spoke with me, What are these? And he said to me, These -are the horns which have scattered Judah, Israel and Jerusalem.[811] -And Jehovah showed me four smiths. And I said, What are these coming to -do? And He spake, saying, These are the horns which scattered Judah, so -that none lifted up his head;[812] and these are come to ...[813] them, -to strike down the horns of the nations, that lifted the horn against -the land of Judah to scatter it._ - - - THE THIRD VISION: THE CITY OF PEACE (ii. 5-9 Heb., ii. 1-5 Eng.). - -Like the Second Vision, the Third follows from the First, another, but -a still more significant, supplement. The First had promised the -rebuilding of Jerusalem, and now the prophet beholds _a young man_—by -this term he probably means _a servant_ or _apprentice_—who is -attempting to define the limits of the new city. In the light of what -this attempt encounters, there can be little doubt that the prophet -means to symbolise by it the intention of building the walls upon the -old lines, so as to make Jerusalem again the mountain fortress she had -previously been. Some have considered that the young man goes forth -only to see, or to show, the extent of the city in the approaching -future. But if this had been his motive, there would have been no -reason in interrupting him with other orders. The point is, that he has -narrow ideas of what the city should be, and is prepared to define it -upon its old lines of a fortress. For the interpreting angel who _comes -forward_[814] is told by another angel to run and tell the young man -that in the future Jerusalem shall be a large unwalled town, and this, -not only because of the multitude of its population, for even then it -might still have been fortified like Niniveh, but because Jehovah -Himself shall be its wall. The young man is prevented, not merely from -making it small, but from making it a citadel. And this is in -conformity with all the singular absence of war from Zechariah’s -Visions, both of the future deliverance of Jehovah’s people and of -their future duties before Him. It is indeed remarkable how Zechariah -not only develops none of the warlike elements of earlier Messianic -prophecies, but tells us here of how God Himself actually prevented -their repetition, and insists again and again only on those elements of -ancient prediction which had filled the future of Israel with peace. - -_And I lifted mine eyes and looked, and lo! a man with a measuring rope -in his hand. So I said, Whither art thou going? And he said to me, To -measure Jerusalem: to see how much its breadth and how much its length -should be. And lo! the angel who talked with me came forward,[815] and -another angel came forward to meet him. And he said to him, Run and -speak to yonder young man thus:_ Like _a number of open villages shall -Jerusalem remain, because of the multitude of men and cattle in the -midst of her. And I Myself will be to her—oracle of Jehovah—a wall of -fire round about, and for glory will I be in her midst._ - -In this Vision Zechariah gives us, with his prophecy, a lesson in the -interpretation of prophecy. His contemporaries believed God’s promise -to rebuild Jerusalem, but they defined its limits by the conditions of -an older and a narrower day. They brought forth their measuring rods, -to measure the future by the sacred attainments of the past. Such -literal fulfilment of His Word God prevented by that ministry of angels -which Zechariah beheld. He would not be bound by those forms which His -Word had assumed in suitableness to the needs of ruder generations. The -ideal of many of the returned exiles must have been that frowning -citadel, those gates of everlastingness,[816] which some of them -celebrated in Psalms, and from which the hosts of Sennacherib had been -broken and swept back as the angry sea is swept from the fixed line of -Canaan’s coast.[817] What had been enough for David and Isaiah was -enough for them, especially as so many prophets of the Lord had -foretold a Messianic Jerusalem that should be a counterpart of the -historical. But God breaks the letter of His Word to give its spirit a -more glorious fulfilment. Jerusalem shall not _be builded as a city -that is compact together_,[818] but open and spread abroad village-wise -upon her high mountains, and God Himself her only wall. - -The interest of this Vision is therefore not only historical. For -ourselves it has an abiding doctrinal value. It is a lesson in the -method of applying prophecy to the future. How much it is needed -we must feel as we remember the readiness of men among ourselves -to construct the Church of God upon the lines His own hand drew -for our fathers, and to raise again the bulwarks behind which they -sufficiently sheltered His shrine. Whether these ancient and sacred -defences be dogmas or institutions, we have no right, God tells us, to -cramp behind them His powers for the future. And the great men whom -He raises to remind us of this, and to prevent by their ministry the -timid measurements of the zealous but servile spirits who would confine -everything to the exact letter of ancient Scripture—are they any less -His angels to us than those ministering spirits whom Zechariah beheld -preventing the narrow measures of the poor apprentice of his dream? - -To the Third Vision there has been appended the only lyrical piece -which breaks the prose narrative of the Visions. We have already seen -that it is a piece of earlier date. Israel is addressed as still -scattered to the four winds of heaven, and still inhabiting Babylon. -While in Zechariah’s own oracles and visions Jehovah has returned to -Jerusalem, His return according to this piece is still future. There -is nothing about the Temple: God’s holy dwelling from which He has -roused Himself is Heaven. The piece was probably inserted by Zechariah -himself: its lines are broken by what seems to be a piece of prose, -in which the prophet asserts his mission, in words he twice uses -elsewhere. But this is uncertain. - - _Ho, ho! Flee from the Land of the North (oracle of Jehovah); - For as the four winds have I spread you abroad[819] (oracle - of Jehovah). - Ho! to Zion escape, thou inhabitress of Babel._[820] - -_For thus saith Jehovah of Hosts[821] to the nations that plunder you -(for he that toucheth you toucheth the apple of His eye), that, lo! I -am about to wave My hand over them, and they shall be plunder to their -own servants, and ye shall know that Jehovah of Hosts hath sent me._ - - _Sing out and rejoice, O daughter of Zion; - For, lo! I come, and will dwell in thy midst (oracle - of Jehovah). - And many nations shall join themselves to Jehovah in that day, - And shall be to Him[822] a people. - And I will dwell in thy midst - (And thou shalt know that Jehovah of Hosts hath sent me to thee). - And Jehovah will make Judah His heritage, - His portion shall be upon holy soil, - And make choice once more of Jerusalem. - Silence, all flesh, before Jehovah;[823] - For He hath roused Himself up from His holy dwelling._ - - - THE FOURTH VISION: THE HIGH PRIEST AND THE - SATAN (Chap. iii.). - -The next Visions deal with the moral condition of Israel and their -standing before God. The Fourth is a judgment scene. The Angel of -Jehovah, who is not to be distinguished from Jehovah Himself,[824] -stands for judgment, and there appear before him Joshua the High Priest -and the Satan or Adversary who has come to accuse him. Now those who -are accused by the Satan—see next chapter of this volume upon the -Angels of the Visions—are, according to Jewish belief, those who have -been overtaken by misfortune. The people who are standing at God’s bar -in the person of their High Priest still suffer from the adversity in -which Haggai found them, and the continuance of which so disheartened -them after the Temple had begun. The evil seasons and poor harvests -tormented their hearts with the thought that the Satan still slandered -them in the court of God. But Zechariah comforts them with the vision -of the Satan rebuked. Israel has indeed been sorely beset by calamity, -a brand much burned, but now of God’s grace plucked from the fire. The -Satan’s role is closed, and he disappears from the Vision.[825] Yet -something remains: Israel is rescued, but not sanctified. The nation’s -troubles are over: their uncleanness has still to be removed. Zechariah -sees that the High Priest is clothed in filthy garments, while he -stands before the Angel of Judgment. The Angel orders his servants, -those _that stand before him_,[826] to give him clean festal robes. And -the prophet, breaking out in sympathy with what he sees, for the first -time takes part in the Visions. _Then I said, Let them also put a clean -turban on his head_—the turban being the headdress, in Ezekiel of the -Prince of Israel, and in the Priestly Code of the High Priest.[827] -This is done, and the national effect of his cleansing is explained to -the High Priest. If he remains loyal to the law of Jehovah, he, the -representative of Israel, shall have right of entry to Jehovah’s -presence among the angels who stand there. But more, he and his -colleagues the priests are a portent of the coming of the Messiah—_the -Servant of Jehovah, the Branch_, as he has been called by many -prophets.[828] A stone has already been set before Joshua, with seven -eyes upon it. God will engrave it with inscriptions, and on the same -day take away the guilt of the land. Then shall be the peace upon which -Zechariah loves to dwell. - -_And he showed me Joshua, the high priest, standing before the Angel of -Jehovah, and the Satan[829] standing at his right hand to accuse -him.[830] And Jehovah[831] said to the Satan: Jehovah rebuke thee, O -Satan! Jehovah who makes choice of Jerusalem rebuke thee! Is not this a -brand saved from the fire? But Joshua was clothed in foul garments -while he stood before the Angel. And he_—the Angel—_answered and said -to those who stood in his presence, Take the foul garments from off him -(and he said to him, See, I have made thy guilt to pass away from -thee),[832] and clothe him[833] in fresh clothing. And I said,[834] Let -them put a clean turban[835] on his head. And they put the clean turban -upon his head, and clothed him with garments, the Angel of Jehovah -standing up_ the while.[836] _And the Angel of Jehovah certified unto -Joshua, saying: Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts, If in My ways thou -walkest, and if My charges thou keepest in charge, then thou also shall -judge My house, and have charge of My courts, and I will give thee -entry[837] among these who stand in My presence. Hearken now, O Joshua, -high priest, thou and thy fellows who sit before thee are men of omen, -that, lo! I am about to bring My servant, Branch. For see the stone -which I have set before Joshua, one stone with seven eyes.[838] Lo, I -will etch the engraving upon it (oracle of Jehovah), and I will wash -away the guilt of that land in one day. In that day (oracle of Jehovah -of Hosts) ye will invite one another in under vine and under fig-tree._ - -The theological significance of the Vision is as clear as its -consequences in the subsequent theology and symbolism of Judaism. The -uncleanness of Israel which infests their representative before God is -not defined. Some[839] hold that it includes the guilt of Israel’s -idolatry. But they have to go back to Ezekiel for this, and we have -seen that Zechariah nowhere mentions or feels the presence of idols -among his people. The Vision itself supplies a better explanation. -Joshua’s filthy garments are replaced by festal and official robes. He -is warned to walk in the whole law of the Lord, ruling the Temple and -guarding Jehovah’s court. The uncleanness was the opposite of all this. -It was not ethical failure: covetousness, greed, immorality. It was, as -Haggai protested, the neglect of the Temple, and of the whole worship -of Jehovah. If this be now removed, in all fidelity to the law, the -High Priest shall have access to God, and the Messiah will come. The -High Priest himself shall not be the Messiah—this dogma is left to a -later age to frame. But before God he will be as one of the angels, and -himself and his faithful priesthood omens of the Messiah. We need not -linger on the significance of this for the place of the priesthood in -later Judaism. Note how the High Priest is already the religious -representative of his people: their uncleanness is his; when he is -pardoned and cleansed, _the uncleanness of the land_ is purged away. In -such a High Priest Christian theology has seen the prototype of Christ. - -The stone is very difficult to explain. Some have thought of it as the -foundation-stone of the Temple, which had already been employed as a -symbol of the Messiah and which played so important a part in later -Jewish symbolism.[840] Others prefer the top-stone of the Temple, -mentioned in chap. iv. 7,[841] and others an altar or substitute for -the ark.[842] Again, some take it to be a jewel, either on the -breastplate of the High Priest,[843] or upon the crown afterwards -prepared for Zerubbabel.[844] To all of these there are objections. It -is difficult to connect with the foundation-stone an engraving still to -be made; neither the top-stone of the Temple, nor a jewel on the -breastplate of the priest, nor a jewel on the king’s crown, could -properly be said to be set _before_ the High Priest. We must rather -suppose that the stone is symbolic of the finished Temple.[845] The -Temple is the full expression of God’s providence and care—His _seven -eyes_. Upon it shall His will be engraved, and by its sacrifices the -uncleanness of the land shall be taken away. - - - THE FIFTH VISION: THE TEMPLE CANDLESTICK AND - THE TWO OLIVE-TREES (Chap. iv.). - -As the Fourth Vision unfolded the dignity and significance of the High - Priest, so in the Fifth we find discovered the joint glory of himself - and Zerubbabel, the civil head of Israel. And to this is appended a - Word for Zerubbabel himself. In our present text this Word has become - inserted in the middle of the Vision, vv. 6_b_-10_a_; in the - translation which follows it has been removed to the end of the - Vision, and the reasons for this will be found in the notes. - - The Vision is of the great golden lamp which stood in the Temple. In -the former Temple, light was supplied by ten several candlesticks.[846] -But the Levitical Code ordained one seven-branched lamp, and such -appears to have stood in the Temple built while Zechariah was -prophesying.[847] The lamp Zechariah sees has also seven branches, but -differs in other respects, and especially in some curious fantastic -details only possible in dream and symbol. Its seven lights were fed by -seven pipes from a bowl or reservoir of oil which stood higher than -themselves, and this was fed, either directly from two olive-trees -which stood to the right and left of it, or, if ver. 12 be genuine, by -two tubes which brought the oil from the trees. The seven lights are -the seven eyes of Jehovah—if, as we ought, we run the second half of -ver. 10 on to the first half of ver. 6. The pipes and reservoir are -given no symbolic force; but the olive-trees which feed them are called -_the two sons of oil which stand before the Lord of all the earth_. -These can only be the two anointed heads of the community—Zerubbabel, -the civil head, and Joshua, the religious head. Theirs was the equal -and co-ordinate duty of sustaining the Temple, figured by the whole -candelabrum, and ensuring the brightness of the sevenfold revelation. -The Temple, that is to say, is nothing without the monarchy and the -priesthood behind it; and these stand in the immediate presence of God. -Therefore this Vision, which to the superficial eye might seem to be a -glorification of the mere machinery of the Temple and its ritual, is -rather to prove that the latter derive all their power from the -national institutions which are behind them, from the two -representatives of the people who in their turn stand before God -Himself. The Temple so near completion will not of itself reveal God: -let not the Jews put their trust in it, but in the life behind it. And -for ourselves the lesson of the Vision is that which Christian theology -has been so slow to learn, that God’s revelation under the old covenant -shone not directly through the material framework, but was mediated by -the national life, whose chief men stood and grew fruitful in His -presence. - -One thing is very remarkable. The two sources of revelation are the -King and the Priest. The Prophet is not mentioned beside them. Nothing -could prove more emphatically the sense in Israel that prophecy was -exhausted. - -The appointment of so responsible a position for Zerubbabel demanded -for him a special promise of grace. And therefore, as Joshua had his -promise in the Fourth Vision, we find Zerubbabel’s appended to the -Fifth. It is one of the great sayings of the Old Testament: there is -none more spiritual and more comforting. Zerubbabel shall complete the -Temple, and those who scoffed at its small beginnings in the day of -small things shall frankly rejoice when they see him set the top-stone -by plummet in its place. As the moral obstacles to the future were -removed in the Fourth Vision by the vindication of Joshua and by his -cleansing, so the political obstacles, all the hindrances described by -the Book of Ezra in the building of the Temple, shall disappear. -_Before Zerubbabel the great mountain shall become a plain._ And this, -because he shall not work by his own strength, but the Spirit of -Jehovah of Hosts shall do everything. Again we find that absence of -expectation in human means, and that full trust in God’s own direct -action, which characterise all the prophesying of Zechariah. - -_Then the angel who talked with me returned and roused me like a man -roused out of his sleep. And he said to me, What seest thou? And I -said, I see, and lo! a candlestick all of gold, and its bowl upon the -top of it, and its seven lamps on it, and seven[848] pipes to the lamps -which are upon it. And two olive-trees stood over against it, one on -the right of the bowl,[849] and one on the left. And I began[850] and -said to the angel who talked with me,[851] What be these, my lord? And -the angel who talked with me answered and said, Knowest thou not what -these be? And I said, No, my lord! And he answered and said to me,[852] -These seven are the eyes of Jehovah, which sweep through the whole -earth. And I asked and said to him, What are these two olive-trees on -the right of the candlestick and on its left? And again I asked and -said to him, What are the two olive-branches which are beside the two -golden tubes that pour forth the oil[853] from them?[854] And he said -to me, Knowest thou not what these be? And I said, No, my lord! And he -said, These are the two sons of oil which stand before the Lord of all -the earth._ - -_This is Jehovah’s Word to Zerubbabel, and it says:[855] Not by might, -and not by force, but by My Spirit, saith Jehovah of Hosts. What art -thou, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel be thou level! And he[856] -shall bring forth the top-stone with shoutings, Grace, grace to -it![857] And the Word of Jehovah came to me, saying, The hands of -Zerubbabel have founded this house, and his hands shall complete it, -and thou shall know that Jehovah of Hosts hath sent me to you. For -whoever hath despised the day of small things, they shall rejoice when -they see the plummet[858] in the hand of Zerubbabel._ - - - THE SIXTH VISION: THE WINGED VOLUME (Chap. v. 1-4). - -The religious and political obstacles being now removed from the future -of Israel, Zechariah in the next two Visions beholds the land purged of -its crime and wickedness. These Visions are very simple, if somewhat -after the ponderous fashion of Ezekiel. - -The first of them is the Vision of the removal of the curse brought -upon the land by its civic criminals, especially thieves and -perjurers—the two forms which crime takes in a poor and rude community -like the colony of the returned exiles. The prophet tells us he beheld -a roll flying. He uses the ordinary Hebrew name for the rolls of skin -or parchment upon which writing was set down. But the proportions of -its colossal size—twenty cubits by ten—prove that it was not a -cylindrical but an oblong shape which he saw. It consisted, therefore, -of sheets laid on each other like our books, and as our word “volume,” -which originally meant, like his own term, a roll, means now an oblong -article, we may use this in our translation. The volume is the record -of the crime of the land, and Zechariah sees it flying from the land. -But it is also the curse upon this crime, and so again he beholds it -entering every thief’s and perjurer’s house and destroying it. Smend -gives a possible explanation of this: “It appears that in ancient times -curses were written on pieces of paper and sent down the wind into the -houses”[859] of those against whom they were directed. But the figure -seems rather to be of birds of prey. - -_And I turned and lifted my eyes and looked, and lo! a volume[860] -flying. And he said unto me, What dost thou see? And I said, I see a -volume flying, its length twenty cubits and its breadth ten. And he -said unto me, This is the curse that is going out upon the face of all -the land. For every thief is hereby purged away from hence,[861] and -every perjurer is hereby purged away from hence. I have sent it -forth—oracle of Jehovah of Hosts—and it shall enter the thief’s house, -and the house of him that hath sworn falsely by My name, and it shall -roost[862] in the midst of his house and consume it, with its beams and -its stones._[863] - - - THE SEVENTH VISION: THE WOMAN IN THE BARREL - (Chap. v. 5-11). - -It is not enough that the curse fly from the land after destroying -every criminal. The living principle of sin, the power of temptation, -must be covered up and removed. This is the subject of the Seventh -Vision. - -The prophet sees an ephah, the largest vessel in use among the Jews, -of more than seven gallons capacity, and round[864] like a barrel. -Presently the leaden top is lifted, and the prophet sees a woman -inside. This is Wickedness, feminine because she figures the power -of temptation. She is thrust back into the barrel, the leaden lid is -pushed down, and the whole carried off by two other female figures, -winged like the strong, far-flying stork, into the land of Shin‘ar, -“which at that time had the general significance of the counterpart of -the Holy Land,”[865] and was the proper home of all that was evil. - -_And the angel of Jehovah who spake with me came forward[866] and said -to me, Lift now thine eyes and see what this is that comes forth. And I -said, What is it? And he said, This is a bushel coming forth. And he -said, This is their transgression[867] in all the land.[868] And -behold! the round leaden _top_ was lifted up, and lo![869] a woman -sitting inside the bushel. And he said, This is the Wickedness, and he -thrust her back into the bushel, and thrust the leaden disc upon the -mouth of it. And I lifted mine eyes and looked, and lo! two women came -forth with the wind in their wings, for they had wings like storks’ -wings, and they bore the bushel betwixt earth and heaven. And I said to -the angel that talked with me, Whither do they carry the bushel? And he -said to me, To build it a house in the land of Shin‘ar, that it may be -fixed and brought to rest there on a place of its own._[870] - -We must not allow this curious imagery to hide from us its very -spiritual teaching. If Zechariah is weighted in these Visions by the -ponderous fashion of Ezekiel, he has also that prophet’s truly moral -spirit. He is not contented with the ritual atonement for sin, nor with -the legal punishment of crime. The living power of sin must be banished -from Israel; and this cannot be done by any efforts of men themselves, -but by God’s action only, which is thorough and effectual. If the -figures by which this is illustrated appear to us grotesque and heavy, -let us remember how they would suit the imagination of the prophet’s -own day. Let us lay to heart their eternally valid doctrine, that sin -is not a formal curse, nor only expressed in certain social crimes, nor -exhausted by the punishment of these, but, as a power of attraction and -temptation to all men, it must be banished from the heart, and can be -banished only by God. - - - THE EIGHTH VISION: THE CHARIOTS OF THE FOUR WINDS - (Chap. vi. 1-8). - -As the series of Visions opened with one of the universal providence -of God, so they close with another of the same. The First Vision had -postponed God’s overthrow of the nations till His own time, and this -the Last Vision now describes as begun, the religious and moral needs -of Israel having meanwhile been met by the Visions which come between, -and every obstacle to God’s action for the deliverance of His people -being removed. - -The prophet sees four chariots, with horses of different colour in -each, coming out from between two mountains of brass. The horsemen of -the First Vision were bringing in reports: these chariots are coming -forth with their commissions from the presence of the Lord of all the -earth. They are the four winds of heaven, servants of Him who maketh -the winds His angels. They are destined for different quarters of the -world. The prophet has not been admitted to the Presence, and does not -know what exactly they have been commissioned to do; that is to say, -Zechariah is ignorant of the actual political processes by which the -nations are to be overthrown and Israel glorified before them. But his -Angel-interpreter tells him that the black horses go north, the white -west, and the dappled south, while the horses of the fourth chariot, -impatient because no direction is assigned to them, are ordered to roam -up and down through the earth. It is striking that none are sent -eastward.[871] This appears to mean that, in Zechariah’s day, no power -oppressed or threatened Israel from that direction; but in the north -there was the centre of the Persian Empire, to the south Egypt, still a -possible master of the world, and to the west the new forces of Europe -that in less than a generation were to prove themselves a match for -Persia. The horses of the fourth chariot are therefore given the charge -to exercise supervision upon the whole earth—unless in ver. 7 we should -translate, not _earth_, but _land_, and understand a commission to -patrol the land of Israel. The centre of the world’s power is in the -north, and therefore the black horses, which are dispatched in that -direction, are explicitly described as charged to bring God’s spirit, -that is His anger or His power, to bear on that quarter of the world. - -_And once more[872] I lifted mine eyes and looked, and lo! four -chariots coming forward from between two mountains, and the mountains -were mountains of brass. In the first chariot were brown horses, and in -the second chariot black horses, and in the third chariot white horses, -and in the fourth chariot dappled ...[873] horses. And I broke in and -said to the angel who talked with me, What are these, my lord? And the -angel answered and said to me, These be the four winds of heaven that -come forth from presenting themselves before the Lord of all the -earth._[874] That _with the black horses goes forth to the land of the -north, while the white go out west_[875] (?), _and the dappled go to -the land of the south. And the ...[876] go forth and seek to go, to -march up and down on the earth. And he said, Go, march up and down on -the earth; and they marched up and down on the earth. And he called me -and spake to me, saying, See they that go forth to the land of the -north have brought my spirit to bear[877] on the land of the north._ - - - THE RESULT OF THE VISIONS: THE CROWNING OF THE - KING OF ISRAEL (Chap. vi. 9-15). - -The heathen being overthrown, Israel is free, and may have her king -again. Therefore Zechariah is ordered—it would appear on the same day -as that on which he received the Visions—to visit a certain deputation -from the captivity in Babylon, Heldai, Tobiyah and Yedayah, at the -house of Josiah the son of Zephaniah, where they have just arrived; and -to select from the gifts they have brought enough silver and gold to -make circlets for a crown. The present text assigns this crown to -Joshua, the high priest, but as we have already remarked, and will -presently prove in the notes to the translation, the original text -assigned it to Zerubbabel, the civil head of the community, and gave -Joshua, the priest, a place at his right hand—the two to act in perfect -concord with each other. The text has suffered some other injuries, -which it is easy to amend; and the end of it has been broken off in the -middle of a sentence. - -_And the Word of Jehovah came to me, saying: Take from the Gôlah,[878] -from Heldai[879] and from Tobiyah and from Yeda‛yah; and do thou go on -the same day, yea, go thou to the house of Yosiyahu, son of Ṣephanyah, -whither they have arrived from Babylon.[880] And thou shall take silver -and gold, and make a crown, and set it on the head of....[881] And say -to him: Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts, Lo! a man called Branch; from his -roots shall a branch come, and he shall build the Temple of Jehovah. -Yea, he shall build Jehovah’s Temple,[882] and he shall wear the royal -majesty and sit and rule upon his throne, and Joshua[883] shall be -priest on his right hand,[884] and there will be a counsel of peace -between the two of them.[885] And the crown shall be for Heldai[886] -and Tobiyah and Yeda‛yah, and for the courtesy[887] of the son of -Ṣephanyah, for a memorial in the Temple of Jehovah. And the far-away -shall come and build at the Temple of Jehovah, and ye shall know that -Jehovah of Hosts hath sent me to you; and it shall be if ye hearken lo -the voice of Jehovah your God...._[888] - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[777] iv. 6. Unless this be taken as an earlier prophecy. See above, p. -260. - -[778] ii. 9, 10 Heb., 5, 6 LXX. and Eng. - -[779] See above, p. 214, where this is stated as an argument against -Kosters’ theory that there was no Return from Babylon in the reign of -Cyrus. - -[780] Vv. 17 and 19. - -[781] See Zechariah’s Fifth Vision. - -[782] xliv. 1 ff. - -[783] xlv. 22. - -[784] xliv. 23, 24. - -[785] Its origin was the Exile, whether its date be before or after the -First Return under Cyrus in 537 B.C. - -[786] Fourth Vision, chap. iii. - -[787] vi. 9-15. - -[788] See ver. 11. - -[789] ii. 20-23. - -[790] iii. 8. - -[791] חִלָּה אֶת־פְּנֵי יהוה. The verb (Piel) originally means _to make -weak_ or _flaccid_ (the Kal means _to be sick_), and so _to soften_ or -_weaken by flattery_. 1 Sam. xiii. 12; 1 Kings xiii. 6, etc. - -[792] First Vision, chap. i. 11. - -[793] Second Vision, ii. 1-4 Heb., i. 18-21 LXX. and Eng. - -[794] Eighth Vision, chap. vi. 1-8. - -[795] xxi. 36 Heb., 31 Eng.: _skilful to destroy_. - -[796] See next chapter. - -[797] Jer. xxv. 12; Hag. ii. 7. - -[798] Myrtles were once common in the Holy Land, and have been recently -found (Hasselquist, _Travels_). For their prevalence near Jerusalem see -Neh. viii. 15. They do not appear to have any symbolic value in the -Vision. - -[799] For a less probable explanation see above, p. 282. - -[800] See pp. 311, 313, etc. - -[801] Ewald omits _riding a brown horse_, as “marring the lucidity of -the description, and added from a misconception by an early hand.” But -we must not expect lucidity in a phantasmagoria like this. - -[802] מְצֻלָה, Meṣullah, either _shadow_ from צלל, or for מְצוּלָה, -_ravine_, or else a proper name. The LXX., which uniformly for -הֲדַסִּים, _myrtles_, reads הרים, _mountains_, renders אשר במצלה by τῶν -κατασκίων. Ewald and Hitzig read מְצִלָּה, Arab, mizhallah, _shadowing_ -or _tent_. - -[803] Heb. שרקים, only here. For this LXX. gives two kinds, καὶ ψαροὶ -καὶ ποικίλοι, _and dappled and piebald_. Wright gives a full treatment -of the question, pp. 531 ff. He points out that the cognate word in -Arabic means sorrel, or yellowish red. - -[804] _Who stood among the myrtles_ omitted by Nowack. - -[805] Isa. xxxvii. 29; Jer. xlviii. 11; Psalm cxxiii. 4; Zeph. i. 12. - -[806] Or _for_. - -[807] _Who talked with me_ omitted by Nowack. - -[808] Heb. _helped for evil_, or _till it became a calamity_. - -[809] Marcus Dods, _Hag., Zech. and Mal._, p. 71. Orelli: “In -distinction from Daniel, Zechariah is fond of a simultaneous survey, -not the presenting of a succession.” - -[810] For the symbolism of iron horns see Micah iv. 13, and compare -Orelli’s note, in which it is pointed out that the destroyers must -be smiths as in Isa. xliv. 12, _workmen of iron_, and not as in LXX. -_carpenters_. - -[811] Wellhausen and Nowack delete _Israel and Jerusalem_; the latter -does not occur in Codd. A, Q, of Septuagint. - -[812] Wellhausen reads, after Mal. ii. 9, כפי אשר, _so that it lifted -not its head_; but in that case we should not find ראׁׁשׁוֹ, but -ראׁׁשָׁהּ. - -[813] החריד, but LXX. read החדיד, and either that or some verb of -cutting must be read. - -[814] The Hebrew, literally _comes forth_, is the technical term -throughout the Visions for the entrance of the figures upon the stage -of vision. - -[815] LXX. ἵστηκει, _stood up_: adopted by Nowack. - -[816] Psalm xxiv. - -[817] Isa. xvii. 12-14. - -[818] Psalm cxxii. 3. - -[819] Some codd. read _with the four winds_. LXX. _from the four winds -will I gather you_ (σὺνάξω ὑμᾶς), and this is adopted by Wellhausen and -Nowack. But it is probably a later change intended to adapt the poem to -its new context. - -[820] _Dweller of the daughter of Babel._ But בת, _daughter_, is mere -dittography of the termination of the preceding word. - -[821] A curious phrase here occurs in the Heb. and versions, _After -glory hath He sent me_, which we are probably right in omitting. In any -case it is a parenthesis, and ought to go not with _sent me_ but with -_saith Jehovah of Hosts_. - -[822] So LXX. Heb. _to me_. - -[823] Cf. Zeph. i. 7; Hab. ii. 20. “Among the Arabians, after the -slaughter of the sacrificial victim, the participants stood for some -time in silence about the altar. That was the moment in which the Deity -approached in order to take His share in the sacrifice.” (Smend, _A. T. -Rel. Gesch._, p. 124). - -[824] Cf. vv. 1 and 2. - -[825] See below, p. 318. - -[826] In this Vision the verb _to stand before_ is used in two -technical senses: (_a_) of the appearance of plaintiff and defendant -before their judge (vv. 1 and 3); (_b_) of servants before their -masters (vv. 4 and 7). - -[827] See below, p. 294, n. 835. - -[828] Isa. iv. 2, xi. 1; Jer. xxiii. 5, xxxiii. 15; Isa. liii. 2. -Stade (_Gesch. des Volkes Isr._, II. 125), followed by Marti (_Der -Proph. Sach._, 85 n.), suspects the clause _I will bring in My Servant -the Branch_ as a later interpolation, entangling the construction and -finding in this section no further justification. - -[829] Or _Adversary_; see p. 317. - -[830] _To Satan him_: _slander_, or _accuse, him_. - -[831] That is _the Angel of Jehovah_, which Wellhausen and Nowack read; -but see below, p. 314. - -[832] This clause interrupts the Angel’s speech to the servants. Wellh. -and Nowack omit it. העביר cf. 2 Sam. xii. 13; Job vii. 21. - -[833] So LXX. Heb. has a degraded grammatical form, _clothe thyself_ -which has obviously been made to suit the intrusion of the previous -clause, and is therefore an argument against the authenticity of the -latter. - -[834] LXX. omits _I said_ and reads _Let them put_ as another -imperative, _Do ye put_, following on the two of the previous verse. -Wellhausen adopts this (reading שימו for ישימו). Though it is difficult -to see how ואמר dropped out of the text if once there, it is equally so -to understand why if not original it was inserted. The whole passage -has been tampered with. If we accept the Massoretic text, then we have -a sympathetic interference in the vision of the dreamer himself which -is very natural; and he speaks, as is proper, not in the direct, but -indirect, imperative, _Let them put_. - -[835] צָנִיף, the headdress of rich women (Isa. iii. 23), as of -eminent men (Job xxix. 14), means something wound round and round the -head (cf. the use of צנף to form like a ball in Isa. xxii. 18, and the -use of חבשׁ (to wind) to express the putting on of the headdress (Ezek. -xvi. 10, etc.)). Hence _turban_ seems to be the proper rendering. -Another form from the same root, מצנפת, is the name of the headdress of -the Prince of Israel (Ezek. xxi. 31); and in the Priestly Codex of the -Pentateuch the headdress of the high priest (Exod. xxviii. 37, etc.). - -[836] Wellhausen takes the last words of ver. 5 with ver. 6, reads -עָמַד and renders _And the Angel of Jehovah stood up or stepped -forward_. But even if עָמַד be read, the order of the words would -require translation in the pluperfect, which would come to the same as -the original text. And if Wellhausen’s proposal were correct the words -_Angel of Jehovah_ in ver. 6 would be superfluous. - -[837] Read מַהֲלָכִים (Smend, _A. T. Rel. Gesch._, p. 324, n. 2). - -[838] Or _facets_. - -[839] _E.g._ Marti, _Der Prophet Sacharja_, p. 83. - -[840] Hitzig, Wright and many others. On the place of this stone in the -legends of Judaism see Wright, pp. 75 f. - -[841] Ewald, Marcus Dods. - -[842] Von Orelli, Volck. - -[843] Bredenkamp. - -[844] Wellhausen, _in loco_, and Smend, _A. T. Rel. Gesch._, 345. - -[845] So Marti, p. 88. - -[846] 1 Kings vii. 49. - -[847] 1 Macc. i. 21; iv. 49, 50. Josephus, XIV. _Ant._ iv. 4. - -[848] LXX. Heb. has _seven sevens_ of pipes. - -[849] Wellhausen reads _its right_ and deletes _the bowl_. - -[850] ואען. ענה is not only _to answer_, but to take part in a -conversation, whether by starting or continuing it. LXX. rightly -ἐπηρώτησα. - -[851] Heb. _saying_. - -[852] In the Hebrew text, followed by the ancient and modern versions, -including the English Bible, there here follows 6_b_-10_a_, the Word -to Zerubbabel. They obviously disturb the narrative of the Vision, and -Wellhausen has rightly transferred them to the end of it, where they -come in as naturally as the word of hope to Joshua comes in at the end -of the preceding Vision. Take them away, and, as can be seen above, -ver. 10_b_ follows quite naturally upon 6_a_. - -[853] Heb. _gold_. So LXX. - -[854] Wellhausen omits the whole of this second question (ver. 12) as -intruded and unnecessary. So also Smend as a doublet on ver. 11 (_A. T. -Rel. Gesch._, 343 n.). So also Nowack. - -[855] Heb. _saying_. - -[856] LXX. _I_. - -[857] Or _Fair, fair is it!_ Nowack. - -[858] _The stone, the leaden_. Marti, _St. u. Kr._, 1892, p. 213 n., -takes _the leaden_ for a gloss, and reads simply _the stone_, _i.e._ -the top-stone; but the plummet is the last thing laid to the building -to test the straightness of the top-stone. - -[859] _A. T. Rel. Gesch._, 312 n. - -[860] מגלה _roll_ or _volume_. LXX. δρέπανον, _sickle_, מַגָּל. - -[861] A group of difficult expressions. The verb נִקָּה is Ni. of a -root which originally had the physical meaning to _clean out of a -place_, and this Ni. is so used of a plundered town in Isa. iii. 26. -But its more usual meaning is to be spoken free from guilt (Psalm -xix. 14, etc.). Most commentators take it here in the physical sense, -Hitzig quoting the use of καθαρίζω in Mark vii. 19. מִזֶה כָמוֹהָ are -variously rendered. מזה is mostly understood as locative, _hence_, -_i.e._ from the land just mentioned, but some take it with _steal_ -(Hitzig), some with _cleaned out_ (Ewald, Orelli, etc.). כָמוֹהָ is -rendered _like it_—the flying roll (Ewald, Orelli), which cannot be, -since the roll flies upon the face of the land, and the sinner is to be -purged out of it; or in accordance with the roll or its curse (Jerome, -Köhler). But Wellhausen reads מִזֶה כַמֶּה, and takes נִקָּה in its -usual meaning and in the past tense, and renders _Every thief has for -long remained unpunished_; and so in the next clause. So, too, Nowack. -LXX. _Every thief shall be condemned to death_, ἕως θανάτου ἐκδιθήσεται. - -[862] Heb. _lodge_, _pass the night_: cf. Zeph. ii. 14 (above, p. 65), -_pelican and bittern shall roost upon the capitals_. - -[863] Smend sees a continuation of Ezekiel’s idea of the guilt of man -overtaking him (iii. 20, xxxiv.). Here God’s curse does all. - -[864] This follows from the shape of the disc that fits into it. Seven -gallons are seven-eighths of the English bushel: that in use in Canada -and the United States is somewhat smaller. - -[865] Ewald. - -[866] Upon the stage of vision. - -[867] For Heb. עֵינָם read עוֹנָם with LXX. - -[868] By inserting איפה after מה in ver. 5, and deleting -ויאמר ... היוצאת in ver. 6, Wellhausen secures the more concise -text: _And see what this bushel is that comes forth. And I said, What is -it? And he said, That is the evil of the people in the whole land_. But -to reduce the redundancies of the Visions is to delete the most -characteristic feature of their style. Besides, Wellhausen’s result -gives no sense. The prophet would not be asked to see what a bushel is: -the angel is there to tell him this. So Wellhausen in his translation -has to omit the מה of ver. 5, while telling us in his note to replace -האיפה after it. His emendation is, therefore, to be rejected. Nowack, -however, accepts it. - -[869] LXX. Heb. _this_. - -[870] In the last clause the verbal forms are obscure if not corrupt. -LXX. καὶ ἕτοιμασαι καὶ θήσουσιν αὐτο ἐκεῖ = לְהָכִין וַהֲנִיחֻהָ שָׁם; but see -Ewald, _Syntax_, 131 _d_. - -[871] Wellhausen suggests that in the direction assigned to the white -horses, אחריהם (ver. 6), which we have rendered _westward_, we might -read ארץ הקדם, _land of the east_; and that from ver. 7 _the west_ has -probably fallen out after _they go forth_. - -[872] Heb. _I turned again and_. - -[873] Hebrew reads אֲמֻּצִּים, _strong_; LXX. ψαροί, _dappled_, and for the -previous בְּרֻדּים, _spotted_ or _dappled_, it reads ποικίλοι, _piebald_. -Perhaps we should read חמצים (cf. Isa. lxiii. 1), _dark red_ or -_sorrel_, with _grey spots_. So Ewald and Orelli. Wright keeps -_strong_. - -[874] Wellhausen, supplying ל before ארבע, renders _These go forth to -the four winds of heaven after they have presented themselves_, etc. - -[875] Heb. _behind them_. - -[876] אמצים, the second epithet of the horses of the fourth -chariot, ver. 3. See note there. - -[877] Or _anger to bear_, Heb. _rest_. - -[878] The collective name for the Jews in exile. - -[879] LXX. παρὰ τῶν ἀρχόντων, מִחֹרִים; but since an accusative -is wanted to express the articles taken, Hitzig proposes to read -מַחֲמַדַּי, _My precious things_. The LXX. reads the other two names -καὶ παρὰ τῶν χρησίμων αὐτῆς καὶ παρὰ τῶν ἐπεγνωκότων αὐτήν. - -[880] The construction of ver. 10 is very clumsy; above it is rendered -literally. Wellhausen proposes to delete _and do thou go ... to the -house of_, and take Yosiyahu’s name as simply a fourth with the others, -reading the last clause _who have come from Babylon_. This is to cut, -not disentangle, the knot. - -[881] The Hebrew text here has _Joshua son of Jehosadak, the high -priest_, but there is good reason to suppose that the crown was meant -for Zerubbabel, but that the name of Joshua was inserted instead in a -later age, when the high priest was also the king—see below, note. For -these reasons Ewald had previously supposed that the whole verse was -genuine, but that there had fallen out of it the words _and on the head -of Zerubbabel_. Ewald found a proof of this in the plural form עטרות, -which he rendered _crowns_. (So also Wildeboer, _A. T._ _Litteratur_, -p. 297.) But עטרות is to be rendered _crown_; see ver. 11, where it is -followed by a singular verb. The plural form refers to the several -circlets of which it was woven. - -[882] Some critics omit the repetition. - -[883] So Wellhausen proposes to insert. The name was at least -understood in the original text. - -[884] So LXX. Heb. _on his throne_. - -[885] With this phrase, vouched for by both the Heb. and the Sept., -the rest of the received text cannot be harmonised. There were two: -one is the priest just mentioned who is to be at the right hand of the -crowned. The received text makes this crowned one to be the high priest -Joshua. But if there are two and the priest is only secondary, the -crowned one must be Zerubbabel, whom Haggai has already designated as -Messiah. Nor is it difficult to see why, in a later age, when the high -priest was sovereign in Israel, Joshua’s name should have been inserted -in place of Zerubbabel’s, and at the same time the phrase _priest at -his right hand_, to which the LXX. testifies in harmony with _the two -of them_, should have been altered to the reading of the received text, -_priest upon his throne_. With the above agree Smend, _A. T. Rel. -Gesch._, 343 n., and Nowack. - -[886] Heb. חֵלֶם, Hēlem, but the reading Heldai, חלדי, is proved by -the previous occurrence of the name and by the LXX. reading here, τοῖς -ὑπομένουσιν, _i.e._ from root חלד, _to last_. - -[887] חן, but Wellhausen and others take it as abbreviation or -misreading for the name of Yosiyahu (see ver. 10). - -[888] Here the verse and paragraph break suddenly off in the middle of -a sentence. On the passage see Smend, 343 and 345. - - - - - CHAPTER XXII - - _THE ANGELS OF THE VISIONS_ - - ZECHARIAH i. 7—vi. 8 - - -Among the influences of the Exile which contributed the material of -Zechariah’s Visions we included a considerable development of Israel’s -belief in Angels. The general subject is in itself so large, and the -Angels play so many parts in the Visions, that it is necessary to -devote to them a separate chapter. - -From the earliest times the Hebrews had conceived their Divine King to -be surrounded by a court of ministers, who besides celebrating His -glory went forth from His presence to execute His will upon earth. In -this latter capacity they were called Messengers, Male’akim, which the -Greeks translated Angeloi, and so gave us our Angels. The origin of -this conception is wrapt in obscurity. It may have been partly due to a -belief, shared by all early peoples, in the existence of superhuman -beings inferior to the gods,[889] but even without this it must have -sprung up in the natural tendency to provide the royal deity of a -people with a court, an army and servants. In the pious minds of early -Israel there must have been a kind of necessity to believe and develop -this—a necessity imposed _firstly_ by the belief in Jehovah’s residence -as confined to one spot, Sinai or Jerusalem, from which He Himself went -forth only upon great occasions to the deliverance of His people as a -whole; and _secondly_ by the unwillingness to conceive of His personal -appearance in missions of a menial nature, or to represent Him in the -human form in which, according to primitive ideas, He could alone hold -converse with men. - -It can easily be understood how a religion, which was above all a -religion of revelation, should accept such popular conceptions in its -constant record of the appearance of God and His Word in human life. -Accordingly, in the earliest documents of the Hebrews, we find angels -who bring to Israel the blessings, curses and commands of Jehovah.[890] -Apart from this duty and their human appearance, these beings are not -conceived to be endowed either with character or, if we may judge by -their namelessness,[891] with individuality. They are the Word of God -personified. Acting as God’s mouthpiece, they are merged in Him, and so -completely that they often speak of themselves by the Divine _I_.[892] -“The _function_ of an Angel so overshadows his _personality_ that the -Old Testament does not ask who or what this Angel is, but what he does. -And the answer to the last question is, that he represents God to man -so directly and fully that when he speaks or acts God Himself is felt -to speak or act.”[893] Besides the carriage of the Divine Word, angels -bring back to their Lord report of all that happens: kings are said, in -popular language, to be _as wise as the wisdom of an angel of God, to -know all the things that are in the earth_.[894] They are also employed -in the deliverance and discipline of His people.[895] By them come the -pestilence,[896] and the restraint of those who set themselves against -God’s will.[897] - -Now the prophets before the Exile had so spiritual a conception of God, -worked so immediately from His presence, and above all were so -convinced of His personal and practical interest in the affairs of His -people, that they felt no room for Angels between Him and their hearts, -and they do not employ Angels, except when Isaiah in his inaugural -vision penetrates to the heavenly palace and court of the Most -High.[898] Even when Amos sees a plummet laid to the walls of -Jerusalem, it is by the hands of Jehovah Himself,[899] and we have not -encountered an Angel in the mediation of the Word to any of the -prophets whom we have already studied. But Angels reappear, though not -under the name, in the visions of Ezekiel, the first prophet of the -Exile. They are in human form, and he calls them _Men_. Some execute -God’s wrath upon Jerusalem,[900] and one, whose appearance is as the -appearance of brass, acts as the interpreter of God’s will to the -prophet, and instructs him in the details of the building of City and -Temple.[901] When the glory of Jehovah appears and Jehovah Himself -speaks to the prophet out of the Temple, this _Man_ stands by the -prophet,[902] distinct from the Deity, and afterwards continues his -work of explanation. “Therefore,” as Dr. Davidson remarks, “it is not -the sense of distance to which God is removed that causes Ezekiel to -create these intermediaries.” The necessity for them rather arises from -the same natural feeling, which we have suggested as giving rise to the -earliest conceptions of Angels: the unwillingness, namely, to engage -the Person of God Himself in the subordinate task of explaining the -details of the Temple. Note, too, how the Divine Voice, which speaks to -Ezekiel out of the Temple, blends and becomes one with the _Man_ -standing at his side. Ezekiel’s Angel-interpreter is simply one -function of the Word of God. - -Many of the features of Ezekiel’s Angels appear in those of Zechariah. -_The four smiths_ or smiters of the four horns recall the six -executioners of the wicked in Jerusalem.[903] Like Ezekiel’s -Interpreter, they are called _Men_,[904] and like him one appears as -Zechariah’s instructor and guide: _he who talked with me_.[905] But -while Zechariah calls these beings Men, he also gives them the ancient -name, which Ezekiel had not used, of Male’akim, _messengers_, _angels_. -The Instructor is _the Angel who talked with me_. In the First Vision, -_the Man riding the brown horse, the Man that stood among the myrtles_, -is _the Angel of Jehovah that stood among the myrtles_.[906] The -Interpreter is also called _the Angel of Jehovah_, and if our text of -the First Vision be correct, the two of them are curiously mingled, as -if both were functions of the same Word of God, and in personality not -to be distinguished from each other. The Reporting Angel among the -myrtles takes up the duty of the Interpreting Angel and explains the -Vision to the prophet. In the Fourth Vision this dissolving view is -carried further, and the Angel of Jehovah is interchangeable with -Jehovah Himself;[907] just as in the Vision of Ezekiel the Divine Voice -from the Glory and the Man standing beside the prophet are curiously -mingled. Again in the Fourth Vision we hear of those _who stand in the -presence of Jehovah_,[908] and in the Eighth of executant angels coming -out from His presence with commissions upon the whole earth.[909] - -In the Visions of Zechariah, then, as in the earlier books, we see the -Lord of all the earth, surrounded by a court of angels, whom He sends -forth in human form to interpret His Word and execute His will, and in -their doing of this there is the same indistinctness of individuality, -the same predominance of function over personality. As with Ezekiel, -one stands out more clearly than the rest, to be the prophet’s -interpreter, whom, as in the earlier visions of angels, Zechariah calls -_my lord_,[910] but even he melts into the figures of the rest. These -are the old and borrowed elements in Zechariah’s doctrine of Angels. -But he has added to them in several important particulars, which make -his Visions an intermediate stage between the Book of Ezekiel and the -very intricate angelology of later Judaism. - -In the first place, Zechariah is the earliest prophet who introduces -orders and ranks among the angels. In his Fourth Vision the Angel of -Jehovah is the Divine Judge _before whom_[911] Joshua appears with the -Adversary. He also has others standing _before him_[912] to execute his -sentences. In the Third Vision, again, the Interpreting Angel does not -communicate directly with Jehovah, but receives his words from another -Angel who has come forth.[913] All these are symptoms, that even with a -prophet, who so keenly felt as Zechariah did the ethical directness of -God’s word and its pervasiveness through public life, there had yet -begun to increase those feelings of God’s sublimity and awfulness, -which in the later thought of Israel lifted Him to so far a distance -from men, and created so complex a host of intermediaries, human and -superhuman, between the worshipping heart and the Throne of Grace. We -can best estimate the difference in this respect between Zechariah and -the earlier prophets whom we have studied by remarking that his -characteristic phrase _talked with me_, literally _spake in_ or _by -me_, which he uses of the Interpreting Angel, is used by Habakkuk of -God Himself.[914] To the same awful impressions of the Godhead is -perhaps due the first appearance of the Angel as intercessor. Amos, -Isaiah and Jeremiah themselves directly interceded with God for the -people; but with Zechariah it is the Interpreting Angel who intercedes, -and who in return receives the Divine comfort.[915] In this angelic -function, the first of its kind in Scripture, we see the small and -explicable beginnings of a belief destined to assume enormous -dimensions in the development of the Church’s worship. The supplication -of Angels, the faith in their intercession and in the prevailing -prayers of the righteous dead, which has been so egregiously multiplied -in certain sections of Christendom, may be traced to the same -increasing sense of the distance and awfulness of God, but is to be -corrected by the faith Christ has taught us of the nearness of our -Father in Heaven, and of His immediate care of His every human child. - -The intercession of the Angel in the First Vision is also a step -towards that identification of special Angels with different peoples -which we find in the Book of Daniel. This tells us of heavenly -princes not only for Israel—_Michael, your prince, the great prince -which standeth up for the children of thy people_[916]—but for the -heathen nations, a conception the first beginnings of which we see in -a prophecy that was perhaps not far from being contemporaneous with -Zechariah.[917] Zechariah’s Vision of a hierarchy among the angels was -also destined to further development. The head of the patrol among -the myrtles, and the Judge-Angel before whom Joshua appears, are the -first Archangels. We know how these were further specialised, and had -even personalities and names given them by both Jewish and Christian -writers.[918] - -Among the Angels described in the Old Testament, we have seen some -charged with powers of hindrance and destruction—_a troop of angels of -evil_.[919] They too are the servants of God, who is the author of all -evil as well as good,[920] and the instruments of His wrath. But the -temptation of men is also part of His Providence. Where wilful souls -have to be misled, the _spirit_ who does so, as in Ahab’s case, comes -from Jehovah’s presence.[921] All these spirits are just as devoid of -character and personality as the rest of the angelic host. They work -evil as mere instruments: neither malice nor falseness is attributed to -themselves. They are not rebel nor fallen angels, but obedient to -Jehovah. Nay, like Ezekiel’s and Zechariah’s Angels of the Word, the -Angel who tempts David to number the people is interchangeable with God -Himself.[922] Kindred to the duty of tempting men is that of -discipline, in its forms both of restraining or accusing the guilty, -and of vexing the righteous in order to test them. For both of these -the same verb is used, “to satan,”[923] in the general sense of -_withstanding_, or antagonising. The Angel of Jehovah stood in Balaam’s -way _to satan him_.[924] The noun, _the Satan_, is used repeatedly of a -human foe.[925] But in two passages, of which Zechariah’s Fourth Vision -is one, and the other the Prologue to Job,[926] the name is given to an -Angel, one of _the sons of Elohim_, or Divine powers who receive their -commission from Jehovah. The noun is not yet, what it afterwards -became,[927] a proper name; but has the definite article, _the -Adversary_ or _Accuser_—that is, the Angel to whom that function was -assigned. With Zechariah his business is the official one of prosecutor -in the supreme court of Jehovah, and when his work is done he -disappears. Yet, before he does so, we see for the first time in -connection with any angel a gleam of character. This is revealed by the -Lord’s rebuke of him. There is something blameworthy in the accusation -of Joshua: not indeed false witness, for Israel’s guilt is patent in -the foul garments of their High Priest, but hardness or malice, that -would seek to prevent the Divine grace. In the Book of Job _the Satan_ -is also a function, even here not a fallen or rebel angel, but one of -God’s court,[928] the instrument of discipline or chastisement. Yet, in -that he himself suggests his cruelties and is represented as forward -and officious in their infliction, a character is imputed to him even -more clearly than in Zechariah’s Vision. But the Satan still shares -that identification with his function which we have seen to -characterise all the angels of the Old Testament, and therefore he -disappears from the drama so soon as his place in its high argument is -over.[929] - -In this description of the development of Israel’s doctrine of Angels, -and of Zechariah’s contributions to it, we have not touched upon the -question whether the development was assisted by Israel’s contact with -the Persian religion and with the system of Angels which the latter -contains. For several reasons the question is a difficult one. But so -far as present evidence goes, it makes for a negative answer. Scholars, -who are in no way prejudiced against the theory of a large Persian -influence upon Israel, declare that the religion of Persia affected the -Jewish doctrine of Angels “only in secondary points,” such as their -“number and personality, and the existence of demons and evil -spirits.”[930] Our own discussion has shown us that Zechariah’s Angels, -in spite of the new features they introduce, are in substance one with -the Angels of pre-exilic Israel. Even the Satan is primarily a -function, and one of the servants of God. If he has developed an -immoral character, this cannot be attributed to the influence of -Persian belief in a Spirit of evil opposed to the Spirit of good in the -universe, but may be explained by the native, or selfish, resentment of -Israel against their prosecutor before the bar of Jehovah. Nor can we -fail to remark that this character of evil appears in the Satan, not, -as in the Persian religion, in general opposition to goodness, but as -thwarting that saving grace which was so peculiarly Jehovah’s own. And -Jehovah said to the Satan, _Jehovah rebuke thee, O Satan, yea, Jehovah -who hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee! Is not this a brand plucked from -the burning?_ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[889] So Robertson Smith, art. “Angels” in the _Encyc. Brit._, 9th ed. - -[890] So already in Deborah’s Song, Judg. v. 23, and throughout both J -and E. - -[891] Cf. especially Gen. xxxii. 29. - -[892] Judg. vi. 12 ff. - -[893] Robertson Smith, as above. - -[894] 2 Sam. xiv. 20. - -[895] Exod. xiv. 19 (?), xxiii. 20, etc.; Josh. v. 13. - -[896] 2 Sam. xxiv. 16, 17; 2 Kings xix. 35; Exod. xii. 23. In Eccles. -v. 6 this destroying angel is the minister of God: cf. Psalm lxxviii. -49_b_, _hurtful angels_—Cheyne, _Origin of Psalter_, p. 157. - -[897] Balaam: Num. xxii. 23, 31. - -[898] vi. 2-6. - -[899] Vol. I., p. 114. - -[900] ix. - -[901] xl. 3 ff. - -[902] xliii. 6. - -[903] Zech. i. 18 ff.; Ezek. ix. 1 ff. - -[904] Zech. i. 8: so even in the Book of Daniel we have _the man_ -Gabriel—ix. 21. - -[905] i. 9, 19; ii. 3; iv. 1, 4, 5; v. 5, 10; vi. 4. But see above, pp. -261 f. - -[906] i. 8, 10, 11. - -[907] iii. 1 compared with 2. - -[908] iii. 6, 7. - -[909] vi. 5. - -[910] i. 9, etc. - -[911] iii. 1. _Stand before_ is here used forensically: cf. the N.T. -phrases to _stand before God_, Rev. xx. 12; _before the judgment-seat -of Christ_, Rom. xiv. 10; and _be acquitted_, Luke xxi. 36. - -[912] iii. 4. Here the phrase is used domestically of servants in the -presence of their master. See above, p. 293, n. 826. - -[913] ii. 3, 4. - -[914] Hab. ii. 1: cf. also Num. xii. 6-9. - -[915] First Vision, i. 12. - -[916] x. 21, xii. 1. - -[917] Isa. xxiv. 21. - -[918] Book of Daniel x., xii.; Tobit xii. 15; Book of Enoch _passim_; -Jude 9; Rev. viii. 2, etc. - -[919] Psalm lxxviii. 49. See above, p. 312, n. 896. - -[920] Amos iii. 6. - -[921] 1 Kings xxii. 20 ff. - -[922] 2 Sam. xxiv. 1; 1 Chron. xxi. 1. Though here difference of age -between the two documents may have caused the difference of view. - -[923] There are two forms of the verb, שׂטן, satan, and שׂטם, satam, -the latter apparently the older. - -[924] Num. xxii. 22, 32. - -[925] 1 Sam. xxix. 4; 2 Sam. xix. 23 Heb., 22 Eng.; 1 Kings v. 18, xi. -14, etc. - -[926] Zech. iii. 1 ff.; Job i. 6 ff. - -[927] 1 Chron. xxi. 1. - -[928] i. 6_b_. - -[929] See Davidson in _Cambridge Bible for Schools_ on Job i. 6-12, -especially on ver. 9: “The Satan of this book may show the beginnings -of a personal malevolence against man, but he is still rigidly -subordinated to Heaven, and in all he does subserves its interests. His -function is as the minister of God to try the sincerity of man; hence -when his work of trial is over he is no more found, and no place is -given him among the _dramatis personæ_ of the poem.” - -[930] Cheyne, _The Origin of the Psalter_, p. 272. Read carefully on -this point the very important remarks on pp. 270 ff. and 281 f. - - - - - CHAPTER XXIII - - “_THE SEED OF PEACE_” - - ZECHARIAH vii., viii. - - -The Visions have revealed the removal of the guilt of the land, the -restoration of Israel to their standing before God, the revival of the -great national institutions, and God’s will to destroy the heathen -forces of the world. With the Temple built, Israel should be again in -the position which she enjoyed before the Exile. Zechariah, therefore, -proceeds to exhort his people to put away the fasts which the Exile had -made necessary, and address themselves, as of old, to the virtues and -duties of the civic life. And he introduces his orations to this end by -a natural appeal to the experience of the former days. - -The occasion came to him when the Temple had been building for two -years, and when some of its services were probably resumed.[931] A -deputation of Jews appeared in Jerusalem and raised the question of the -continuance of the great Fasts of the Exile. Who the deputation were is -not certain: probably we ought to delete _Bethel_ from the second -verse, and read either _El-sar’eser sent Regem-Melekh and his men to -the house of Jehovah to propitiate Jehovah_, or else _the house of -El-sar’eser sent Regem-Melekh and his men to propitiate Jehovah_. It -has been thought that they came from the Jews in Babylon: this would -agree with their arrival in the ninth month to inquire about a fast in -the fifth month. But Zechariah’s answer is addressed to Jews in Judæa. -The deputation limited their inquiry to the fast of the fifth month, -which commemorated the burning of the Temple and the City, now -practically restored. But with a breadth of view which reveals the -prophet rather than the priest, Zechariah replies, in the following -chapter, upon all the fasts by which Israel for seventy years had -bewailed her ruin and exile. He instances two, that of the fifth month, -and that of the seventh month, the date of the murder of Gedaliah, when -the last poor remnant of a Jewish state was swept away.[932] With a -boldness which recalls Amos to the very letter, Zechariah asks his -people whether in those fasts they fasted at all to their God. Jehovah -had not charged them, and in fasting they had fasted for themselves, -just as in eating and drinking they had eaten and drunken to -themselves. They should rather hearken to the words He really sent -them. In a passage, the meaning of which has been perverted by the -intrusion of the eighth verse, that therefore ought to be deleted, -Zechariah recalls what those words of Jehovah had been in the former -times when the land was inhabited and the national life in full course. -They were not ceremonial; they were ethical: they commanded justice, -kindness, and the care of the helpless and the poor. And it was in -consequence of the people’s disobedience to those words that all the -ruin came upon them for which they now annually mourned. The moral is -obvious if unexpressed. Let them drop their fasts, and practise the -virtues the neglect of which had made their fasts a necessity. It is a -sane and practical word, and makes us feel how much Zechariah has -inherited of the temper of Amos and Isaiah. He rests, as before, upon -the letter of the ancient oracles, but only so as to bring out their -spirit. With such an example of the use of ancient Scripture, it is -deplorable that so many men, both among the Jews and the Christians, -should have devoted themselves to the letter at the expense of the -spirit. - -_And it came to pass in the fourth year of Darius the king, that the -Word of Jehovah came to Zechariah on the fourth of the ninth month, -Kislev. For there sent to _the_ house _of Jehovah,_ El-sar’eser and -Regem-Melekh and his men,[933] to propitiate[934] Jehovah, to ask of -the priests which were in the house of Jehovah of Hosts and of the -prophets as follows: Shall I weep in the fifth month with fasting as I -have now done so many years? And the Word of Jehovah of Hosts came to -me: Speak now to all the people of the land, and to the priests, -saying: When ye fasted and mourned in the fifth and in the seventh -month,[935] and this for seventy years, did ye fast at all to Me? And -when ye eat and when ye drink, are not ye the eaters and ye the -drinkers? Are not these[936] the words which Jehovah proclaimed by the -hand of the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and at peace, -with her cities round about her, and the Negeb and the Shephelah were -inhabited?_ - -[937]_Thus spake Jehovah of Hosts: Judge true judgment, and practise -towards each other kindness and mercy; oppress neither widow nor -orphan, stranger nor poor, and think not evil in your hearts towards -one another. But they refused to hearken, and turned a rebellious -shoulder,[938] and their ears they dulled from listening. And their -heart they made adamant, so as not to hear the Torah and the words -which Jehovah of Hosts sent through His Spirit by the hand of the -former prophets; and there was great wrath from Jehovah of Hosts. And -it came to pass that, as He had called and they heard not, so they -shall call and I will not hear, said Jehovah of Hosts, but I will -whirl[939] them away among nations whom they know not. And the land was -laid waste behind them, without any to pass to and fro, and they made -the pleasant land desolate._ - -There follow upon this deliverance ten other short oracles: chap. viii. -Whether all of this decalogue are to be dated from the same time as the -answer to the deputation about the fasts is uncertain. Some of them -appear rather to belong to an earlier date, for they reflect the -situation, and even the words, of Haggai’s oracles, and represent the -advent of Jehovah to Jerusalem as still future. But they return to the -question of the fasts, treating it still more comprehensively than -before, and they close with a promise, fitly spoken as the Temple grew -to completion, of the coming of the heathen to worship at Jerusalem. - -We have already noticed the tender charm and strong simplicity of these -prophecies,[940] and there is little now to add except the translation -of them. As with the older prophets, and especially the great -Evangelist of the Exile, they start from the glowing love of Jehovah -for His people, to which nothing is impossible;[941] they promise a -complete return of the scattered Jews to their land, and are not -content except with the assurance of a world converted to the faith of -their God. With Haggai Zechariah promises the speedy end of the poverty -of the little colony; and he adds his own characteristic notes of a -reign of peace to be used for hearty labour, bringing forth a great -prosperity. Only let men be true and just and kind, thinking no evil of -each other, as in those hard days when hunger and the fierce rivalry -for sustenance made every one’s neighbour his enemy, and the petty -life, devoid of large interests for the commonweal, filled their hearts -with envy and malice. For ourselves the chief profit of these beautiful -oracles is their lesson that the remedy for the sordid tempers and -cruel hatreds, engendered by the fierce struggle for existence, is -found in civic and religious hopes, in a noble ideal for the national -life, and in the assurance that God’s Love is at the back of all, with -nothing impossible to it. Amid these glories, however, the heart will -probably thank Zechariah most for his immortal picture of the streets -of the new Jerusalem: old men and women sitting in the sun, boys and -girls playing in all the open places. The motive of it, as we have -seen, was found in the circumstances of his own day. Like many another -emigration, for religion’s sake, from the heart of civilisation to a -barren coast, the poor colony of Jerusalem consisted chiefly of men, -young and in middle life. The barren years gave no encouragement to -marriage. The constant warfare with neighbouring tribes allowed few to -reach grey hairs. It was a rough and a hard society, unblessed by the -two great benedictions of life, childhood and old age. But this should -all be changed, and Jerusalem filled with placid old men and women, and -with joyous boys and girls. The oracle, we say, had its motive in -Zechariah’s day. But what an oracle for these times of ours! Whether in -the large cities of the old world, where so few of the workers may hope -for a quiet old age, sitting in the sun, and the children’s days of -play are shortened by premature toil and knowledge of evil; or in the -newest fringes of the new world, where men’s hardness and coarseness -are, in the struggle for gold, unawed by reverence for age and -unsoftened by the fellowship of childhood,—Zechariah’s great promise is -equally needed. Even there shall it be fulfilled if men will remember -his conditions—that the first regard of a community, however straitened -in means, be the provision of religion, that truth and whole-hearted -justice abound in the gates, with love and loyalty in every heart -towards every other. - -_And the Word of Jehovah of Hosts came, saying:—_ - -1. _Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: I am jealous for Zion with a great -jealousy, and with great anger am I jealous for her._ - -2. _Thus saith Jehovah: I am returned to Zion, and I dwell in the midst -of Jerusalem, and Jerusalem shall be called the City of Troth,[942] -and the mountain of Jehovah of Hosts the Holy Mountain._ - -3. _Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: Old men and old women shall yet sit in -the streets of Jerusalem, each with staff in hand, for fulness of days; -and the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in -her streets._ - -4. _Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: Because it seems too wonderful to the -remnant of this people in those days, shall it also seem too wonderful -to Me?—oracle of Jehovah of Hosts._ - -5. _Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: Lo! I am about to save My people out -of the land of the rising and out of the land of the setting of the -sun; and I will bring them home, and they shall dwell in the midst of -Jerusalem, and they shall be to Me for a people,[943] and I will be to -them for God, in troth and in righteousness._ - -6. _Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: Strengthen your hands, O ye who have -heard in such days such words from the mouth of the prophets, -since[944] the day when the House of Jehovah of Hosts was founded: the -sanctuary was to be built! For before those days there was no gain for -man,[945] and none to be made by cattle; and neither for him that went -out nor for him that came in was there any peace from the adversary, -and I set every man’s hand against his neighbour. But not now as in the -past days am I towards the remnant of this people—oracle of Jehovah of -Hosts. For I am sowing the seed of peace.[946] The vine shall yield her -fruit, and the land yield her increase, and the heavens yield their -dew, and I will give them all for a heritage to the remnant of this -people. And it shall come to pass, that as ye have been a curse among -the nations, O house of Judah and house of Israel, so will I save you -and ye shall be a blessing! Be not afraid, strengthen your hands!_ - -7. _For thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: As I have planned to do evil to -you, for the provocation your fathers gave Me, saith Jehovah of Hosts, -and did not relent, so have I turned and planned in these days to do -good to Jerusalem and the house of Judah. Be not afraid! These are -the things which ye shall do: Speak truth to one another; truth and -wholesome judgment decree ye in your gates; and plan no evil to each -other in your hearts, nor take pleasure in false swearing: for it is -all these that I hate—oracle of Jehovah._ - -_And the Word of Jehovah of Hosts came to me, saying:—_ - -8. _Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: The fast of the fourth month, and the -fast of the fifth, and the fast of the seventh, and the fast of the -tenth, shall become to the house of Judah joy and gladness and happy -feasts.[947] But love ye truth and peace._ - -9. _Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: There shall yet come peoples and -citizens of great cities; and the citizens of one city[948] will go to -another city, saying: “Let us go to propitiate Jehovah, and to seek -Jehovah of Hosts!” “I will go too!” And many peoples and strong nations -shall come to seek Jehovah of Hosts in Jerusalem and to propitiate -Jehovah._ - -10. _Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: In those days ten men, of all -languages of the nations, shall take hold of the skirt of a Jew and -say, We will go with you, for we have heard that God is with you._ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[931] Cf. chap. vii. 3: _the priests which were of the house of -Jehovah_. - -[932] Jer. xli. 2; 2 Kings xxv. 25. - -[933] The Hebrew text is difficult if not impossible to construe: _For -Bethel sent Sar’eser_ (without sign of accusative) _and Regem-Melekh -and his men_. Wellhausen points out that Sar’eser is a defective name, -requiring the name or title of deity in front of it, and Marti proposes -to find this in the last syllable of Bethel, and to read ’El-sar’eser. -It is tempting to find in the first syllable of Bethel the remnant of -the phrase _to the house of Jehovah_. - -[934] To stroke the face of. - -[935] The fifth month Jerusalem fell, the seventh month Gedaliah was -murdered: Jer. lii. 12 f.; 2 Kings xxv. 8 f., 25. - -[936] So LXX. Heb. has acc. sign before _words_, perhaps implying _Is -it not rather necessary to do the words?_ etc. - -[937] Omit here ver. 8, _And the Word of Jehovah came to Zechariah, -saying_. It is obviously a gloss by a scribe who did not notice that -the כה אמר of ver. 9 is God’s statement by the former prophets. - -[938] Cf. the phrase _with one shoulder_, _i.e._ unanimously. - -[939] So Heb. and LXX.; but perhaps we ought to point _and I whirled -them away_, taking the clause with the next. - -[940] See above, pp. 271 f. - -[941] Cf. especially Isa. xl. ff. - -[942] Isa. i. 26. - -[943] Not merely _My people_ (Wellhausen), but their return shall -constitute them a people once more. The quotation is from Hosea ii. 25. - -[944] So LXX. - -[945] _But he that made wages made them to put them into a bag with -holes_, Haggai i. 6. - -[946] Read כי אזרעה השלום for כי זרע השלום of the text, _for the seed -of peace_. The LXX. makes זרע a verb. Cf. Hosea ii. 23 ff., which the -next clauses show to be in the mind of our prophet. Klostermann and -Nowack prefer זַרְעָהּ שָׁלוֹם, _her_ (the remnant’s) _seed shall be -peace_. - -[947] In the tenth month the siege of Jerusalem had begun (2 Kings -xxv. 1); on the ninth of the fourth month Jerusalem was taken (Jer. -xxxix. 2); on the seventh of the fifth City and Temple were burnt down -(2 Kings xxv. 8); in the seventh month Gedaliah was assassinated and -the poor relics of a Jewish state swept from the land (Jer. xli.). See -above, pp. 30 ff. - -[948] LXX. _the citizens of five cities will go to one_. - - - - - “_MALACHI_” - - - - - _Have we not all One Father? Why then are we unfaithful to each other?_ - - _The lips of a Priest guard knowledge, and men seek instruction from - his mouth, for he is the Angel of Jehovah of Hosts._ - - - - - CHAPTER XXIV - - _THE BOOK OF “MALACHI”_ - - -This book, the last in the arrangement of the prophetic canon, bears -the title: _Burden_ or _Oracle of the Word of Jehovah to Israel by the -hand of malĕ’akhi_. Since at least the second century of our era the -word has been understood as a proper name, Malachi or Malachias. But -there are strong objections to this, as well as to the genuineness of -the whole title, and critics now almost universally agree that the book -was originally anonymous. - -It is true that neither in form nor in meaning is there any insuperable -obstacle to our understanding “malĕ’akhi” as the name of a person. If -so, however, it cannot have been, as some have suggested, an -abbreviation of Malĕ’akhiyah, for, according to the analogy of other -names of such formation, this could only express the impossible meaning -_Jehovah is Angel_.[949] But, as it stands, it might have meant _My -Angel_ or _Messenger_, or it may be taken as an adjective, -_Angelicus_.[950] Either of these meanings would form a natural name -for a Jewish child, and a very suitable one for a prophet. There is -evidence, however, that some of the earliest Jewish interpreters did -not think of the title as containing the name of a person. The -Septuagint read _by the hand of His messenger_,[951] “malĕ’akho”; and -the Targum of Jonathan, while retaining “malĕ’akhi,” rendered it _My -messenger_, adding that it was Ezra the Scribe who was thus -designated.[952] This opinion was adopted by Calvin. - -Recent criticism has shown that, whether the word was originally -intended as a personal name or not, it was a purely artificial one -borrowed from chap. iii. 1, _Behold, I send My messenger_, “malĕ’akhi,” -for the title, which itself has been added by the editor of the Twelve -Prophets in the form in which we now have them. The peculiar words of -the title, _Burden_ or _Oracle of the Word of Jehovah_, occur nowhere -else than in the titles of the two prophecies which have been appended -to the Book of Zechariah, chap. ix. 1 and chap. xii. 1, and immediately -precede this Book of “Malachi.” In chap. ix. 1 _the Word of Jehovah_ -belongs to the text; _Burden_ or _Oracle_ has been inserted before it -as a title; then the whole phrase has been inserted as a title in chap. -xii. 1. These two pieces are anonymous, and nothing is more likely than -that another anonymous prophecy should have received, when attached to -them, the same heading.[953] The argument is not final, but it is the -most probable explanation of the data, and agrees with the other facts. -The cumulative force of all that we have stated—the improbability of -malĕ’akhi being a personal name, the fact that the earliest versions do -not treat it as such, the obvious suggestion for its invention in the -malĕ’akhi of chap. iii. 1, the absence of a father’s name and place of -residence, and the character of the whole title—is enough for the -opinion rapidly spreading among critics that our book was, like so much -more in the Old Testament, originally anonymous.[954] The author -attacks the religious authorities of his day; he belongs to a pious -remnant of his people, who are overborne and perhaps oppressed by the -majority.[955] In these facts, which are all we know of his -personality, he found sufficient reason for not attaching his name to -his prophecy. - -The book is also undated, but it reflects its period almost as clearly -as do the dated Books of Haggai and Zechariah. The conquest of Edom -by the Nabateans, which took place during the Exile,[956] is already -past.[957] The Jews are under a Persian viceroy.[958] They are in touch -with a heathen power, which does not tyrannise over them, for this -book is the first to predict no judgment upon the heathen, and the -first, moreover, to acknowledge that among the heathen the true God -is worshipped _from the rising to the setting of the sun_.[959] The -only judgment predicted is one upon the false and disobedient portion -of Israel, whose arrogance and success have cast true Israelites into -despair.[960] All this reveals a time when the Jews were favourably -treated by their Persian lords. The reign must be that of Artaxerxes -Longhand, 464—424. - -The Temple has been finished,[961] and years enough have elapsed to -disappoint those fervid hopes with which about 518 Zechariah expected -its completion. The congregation has grown worldly and careless. In -particular the priests are corrupt and partial in the administration of -the Law.[962] There have been many marriages with the heathen women of -the land;[963] and the laity have failed to pay the tithes and other -dues to the Temple.[964] These are the evils against which we find -strenuous measures directed by Ezra, who returned from Babylon in -458,[965] and by Nehemiah, who visited Jerusalem as its governor for -the first time in 445 and for the second time in 433. Besides, “the -religious spirit of the book is that of the prayers of Ezra and -Nehemiah. A strong sense of the unique privileges of the children of -Jacob, the objects of electing love,[966] the children of the Divine -Father,[967] is combined with an equally strong assurance of Jehovah’s -righteousness amidst the many miseries that pressed on the unhappy -inhabitants of Judæa.... Obedience to the Law is the sure path to -blessedness.”[968] But the question still remains whether the Book of -“Malachi” prepared for, assisted or followed up the reforms of Ezra and -Nehemiah. An ancient tradition already alluded to[969] assigned the -authorship to Ezra himself. - -Recent criticism has been divided among the years immediately before -Ezra’s arrival in 458, those immediately before Nehemiah’s first visit -in 445, those between his first government and his second, and those -after Nehemiah’s disappearance from Jerusalem. But the years in which -Nehemiah held office may be excluded, because the Jews are represented -as bringing gifts to the governor, which Nehemiah tells us he did not -allow to be brought to him.[970] The whole question depends upon what -Law was in practice in Israel when the book was written. In 445 Ezra -and Nehemiah, by solemn covenant between the people and Jehovah, -instituted the code which we now know as the Priestly Code of the -Pentateuch. Before that year the ritual and social life of the Jews -appear to have been directed by the Deuteronomic Code. Now the Book of -“Malachi” enforces a practice with regard to the tithes, which agrees -more closely with the Priestly Code than it does with Deuteronomy. -Deuteronomy commands that every third year the whole tithe is to be -given to the Levites and the poor who reside _within the gates_ of the -giver, and is there to be eaten by them. “Malachi” commands that the -whole tithe be brought into the storehouse of the Temple for the -Levites in service there; and so does the Priestly Code.[971] On this -ground many date the Book of “Malachi” after 445.[972] But “Malachi’s” -divergence from Deuteronomy on this point may be explained by the fact -that in his time there were practically no Levites outside Jerusalem; -and it is to be noticed that he joins the tithe with the tĕrûmah or -heave-offering exactly as Deuteronomy does.[973] On other points of the -Law he agrees rather with Deuteronomy than with the Priestly Code. He -follows Deuteronomy in calling the priests _sons of Levi_,[974] while -the Priestly Code limits the priesthood to the sons of Aaron. He seems -to quote Deuteronomy when forbidding the oblation of blind, lame and -sick beasts;[975] appears to differ from the Priestly Code which allows -the sacrificial beast to be male or female, when he assumes that it is -a male;[976] follows the expressions of Deuteronomy and not those of -the Priestly Code in detailing the sins of the people;[977] and uses -the Deuteronomic phrases _the Law of Moses_, _My servant Moses_, -_statutes and judgments_, and _Horeb_ for the Mount of the Law.[978] -For the rest, he echoes or implies only Ezekiel and that part of the -Priestly Code[979] which is regarded as earlier than the rest, and -probably from the first years of exile. Moreover he describes the Torah -as not yet fully codified.[980] The priests still deliver it in a way -improbable after 445. The trouble of the heathen marriages with which -he deals (if indeed the verses on this subject be authentic and not a -later intrusion[981]) was that which engaged Ezra’s attention on his -arrival in 458, but Ezra found that it had already for some time been -vexing the heads of the community. While, therefore, we are obliged to -date the Book of “Malachi” before 445 B.C., it is uncertain whether it -preceded or followed Ezra’s attempts at reform in 458. Most critics now -think that it preceded them.[982] - -The Book of “Malachi” is an argument with the prophet’s contemporaries, -not only with the wicked among them, who in forgetfulness of what -Jehovah is corrupt the ritual, fail to give the Temple its dues, abuse -justice, marry foreign wives,[983] divorce their own, and commit -various other sins; but also with the pious, who, equally forgetful -of God’s character, are driven by the arrogance of the wicked to -ask, whether He loves Israel, whether He is a God of justice, and -to murmur that it is vain to serve Him. To these two classes of his -contemporaries the prophet has the following answers. God does love -Israel. He is worshipped everywhere among the heathen. He is the Father -of all Israel. He will bless His people when they put away all abuses -from their midst and pay their religious dues; and His Day of Judgment -is coming, when the good shall be separated from the wicked. But before -it come, Elijah the prophet will be sent to attempt the conversion of -the wicked, or at least to call the nation to decide for Jehovah. This -argument is pursued in seven or perhaps eight paragraphs, which do not -show much consecutiveness, but are addressed, some to the wicked, and -some to the despairing adherents of Jehovah. - - 1. Chap. i. 2-5.—To those who ask how God loves Israel, the proof of - Jehovah’s election of Israel is shown in the fall of the Edomites. - - 2. Chap. i. 6-14.—Charge against the people of - dishonouring their God, whom even the heathen reverence. - - 3. Chap. ii. 1-9.—Charge against the priests, who have broken the - covenant God made of old with Levi, and debased their high office by - not reverencing Jehovah, by misleading the people and by perverting - justice. A curse is therefore fallen on them—they are contemptible in - the people’s eyes. - - 4. Chap. ii. 10-16.—A charge against the people for their treachery to - each other; instanced in the heathen marriages, if the two verses, 11 - and 12, upon this be authentic, and in their divorce of their wives. - - 5. Chap. ii. 17—iii. 5 or 6.—Against those who in the midst of such - evils grow sceptical about Jehovah. His Angel, or Himself, will come - _first_ to purge the priesthood and ritual that there may be pure - sacrifices, and _second_ to rid the land of its criminals and sinners. - - 6. Chap. iii. 6 or 7-12.—A charge against the people of neglecting - tithes. Let these be paid, disasters shall cease and the land be - blessed. - - 7. Chap. iii. 13-21 Heb., Chap. iii. 13—iv. 2 LXX. and Eng.—Another - charge against the pious for saying it is vain to serve God. God will - rise to action and separate between the good and bad in the terrible - Day of His coming. - - 8. To this, Chap. iii. 22-24 Heb., Chap. iv. 3-5 Eng., adds a call to - keep the Law, and a promise that Elijah will be sent to see whether he - may not convert the people before the Day of the Lord comes upon them - with its curse. - -The authenticity of no part of the book has been till now in serious -question. Böhme,[984] indeed, took the last three verses for a later -addition, on account of their Deuteronomic character, but, as Kuenen -points out, this is in agreement with other parts of the book. -Sufficient attention has not yet been paid to the question of the -integrity of the text. The Septuagint offers a few emendations.[985] -There are other passages obviously or probably corrupt.[986] The text -of the title, as we have seen, is uncertain, and probably a later -addition. Professor Robertson Smith has called attention to chap. ii. -16, where the Massoretic punctuation seems to have been determined with -the desire to support the rendering of the Targum “if thou hatest her -put her away,” and so pervert into a permission to divorce a passage -which forbids divorce almost as clearly as Christ Himself did. But in -truth the whole of this passage, chap. ii. 10-16, is in such a curious -state that we can hardly believe in its integrity. It opens with the -statement that God is the Father of all us Israelites, and with the -challenge, why then are we faithless to each other?—ver. 10. But vv. 11 -and 12 do not give an instance of this: they describe the marriages -with the heathen women of the land, which is not a proof of -faithlessness between Israelites. Such a proof is furnished only by vv. -13-16, with their condemnation of those who divorce the wives of their -youth. The verses, therefore, cannot lie in their proper order, and vv. -13-16 ought to follow immediately upon ver. 10. This raises the -question of the authenticity of vv. 11 and 12, against the heathen -marriages. If they bear such plain marks of having been intruded into -their position, we can understand the possibility of such an intrusion -in subsequent days, when the question of the heathen marriages came to -the front with Ezra and Nehemiah. Besides, these verses 11 and 12 lack -the characteristic mark of all the other oracles of the book: they do -not state a general charge against the people, and then introduce the -people’s question as to the particulars of the charge. On the whole, -therefore, these verses are suspicious. If not a later intrusion, they -are at least out of place where they now lie. The peculiar remark in -ver. 13, _and this secondly ye do_, must have been added by the editor -to whom we owe the present arrangement. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[949] מלאכיה or מלאכיהו. To judge from the analogy of other cases -of the same formation (_e.g._ Abiyah = Jehovah is Father, and not -Father of Jehovah), this name, if ever extant, could not have borne the -meaning, which Robertson Smith, Cornill, Kirkpatrick, etc., suppose it -must have done, of _Angel of Jehovah_. These scholars, it should be -added, oppose, for various reasons, the theory that it is a proper -name. - -[950] Cf. the suggested meaning of Haggai, Festus. Above, p. 231. - -[951] And added the words, _lay_ it _to your hearts_: ἐν χειρὶ ἀγγέλοῦ -αὐτοῦ θέσθε δὴ ἐπὶ τὰς καρδίας ὑμῶν. Bachmann (_A. T. Untersuch._, -Berlin, 1894, pp. 109 ff.) takes this added clause as a translation of -וְשִׂימוּ בַלֵּב, and suggests that it may be a corruption of an original וּשְְׁמוֹ -כָלֵב, _and his name was Kaleb_. But the reading וְשִׂימוּ בַלֵּב is not the -exact equivalent of the Greek phrase. - -[952] מַלְאֲכִי דְיִתְקְרֵי שְׁמֵיהּ עֶזְרָא סָפְרָא. - -[953] See Stade, _Z.A.T.W._, 1881, p. 14; 1882, p. 308; Cornill, -_Einleitung_, 4th ed., pp. 207 f. - -[954] So (besides Calvin, who takes it as a title) even Hengstenberg in -his _Christology of the O. T._, Ewald, Kuenen, Reuss, Stade, Rob. -Smith, Cornill, Wellhausen, Kirkpatrick (probably), Wildeboer, Nowack. -On the other side Hitzig, Vatke, Nägelsbach and Volck (in Herzog), Von -Orelli, Pusey and Robertson hold it to be a personal name—Pusey with -this qualification, “that the prophet may have framed it for himself,” -similarly Orelli. They support their opinion by the fact that even the -LXX. entitle the book Μαλαχιας; that the word was regarded as a proper -name in the early Church, and that it is a possible name for a Hebrew. -In opposition to the hypothesis that it was borrowed from chap. iii. 1, -Hitzig suggests the converse that in the latter the prophet plays upon -his own name. None of these critics, however, meets the objections to -the name drawn from the peculiar character of the title and its -relations to Zech. ix. 1, xii. 1. The supposed name of the prophet gave -rise to the legend supported by many of the Fathers that Malachi, like -Haggai and John the Baptist, was an incarnate angel. This is stated and -condemned by Jerome, _Comm. ad Hag._ i. 13, but held by Origen, -Tertullian and others. The existence of such an opinion is itself proof -for the impersonal character of the name. As in the case of the rest of -the prophets, Christian tradition furnishes the prophet with the -outline of a biography. See (Pseud-)Epiphanius and other writers quoted -above, p. 232. - -[955] iii. 16 ff. - -[956] See above on Obadiah, p. 169, and below on the passage itself. - -[957] i. 2-5. - -[958] i. 8. - -[959] i. 11: the verbs here are to be taken in the present, not as in -A.V. in the future, tense. - -[960] _Passim_: especially iii. 13 ff., 24. - -[961] i. 10; iii. 1, 10. - -[962] ii. 1-9. - -[963] ii. 10-16. - -[964] iii. 7-12. - -[965] See above, pp. 195 f. - -[966] i. 2. - -[967] ii. 10. - -[968] ii. 17—iii. 12; iii. 22 f., Eng. iv. The above sentences are from -Robertson Smith, art. “Malachi,” _Encyc. Brit._, 9th ed. - -[969] Above, p. 332, n. 952. - -[970] “Mal.” i. 8; Neh. v. - -[971] Deut. xii. 11, xxvi. 12; “Mal.” iii. 8, 10; Num. xviii. 21 ff. -(P). - -[972] Vatke (contemporaneous with Nehemiah), Schrader, Keil, Kuenen -(perhaps in second governorship of Nehemiah, but see above, p. 335, for -a decisive reason against this), Köhler, Driver, Von Orelli (between -Nehemiah’s first and second visit), Kirkpatrick, Robertson. - -[973] Deut. xii. 11. In P tĕrûmah is a due paid to priests as distinct -from Levites. - -[974] ii. 4-8: cf. Deut. xxxiii. 8. - -[975] i. 8; Deut. xv. 21. - -[976] i. 14; Lev. iii. 1, 6. - -[977] iii. 5; Deut. v. 11 ff., xviii. 10, xxiv. 17 ff.; Lev. xix. 31, -33 f., xx. 6. - -[978] iii. 22 Heb., iv. 4 Eng. _Law of Moses_ and _Moses My servant_ -are found only in the Deuteronomistic portions of the Hexateuch and -historical books and here. In P Sinai is the Mount of the Law. To the -above may be added _segullah_, iii. 17, which is found in the -Pentateuch only outside P and in Psalm cxxxv. 4. All these resemblances -between “Malachi” and Deuteronomy and “Malachi’s” divergences from P -are given in Robertson Smith’s _Old Test. in the Jewish Church_, 2nd -ed., 425 ff.: cf. 444 ff. - -[979] Lev. xvii.—xxvi. From this and Ezekiel he received the conception -of the profanation of the sanctuary by the sins of the people—ii. 11: -cf. also ii. 2, iii. 3, 4, for traces of Ezekiel’s influence. - -[980] ii. 6 ff. - -[981] See below, pp. 340, 363, 365. - -[982] Herzfeld, Bleek, Stade, Kautzsch (probably), Wellhausen -(_Gesch._, p. 125), Nowack before the arrival of Ezra, Cornill either -soon before or soon after 458, Robertson Smith either before or soon -after 445. Hitzig at first put it before 458, but was afterwards -moved to date it after 358, as he took the overthrow of the Edomites -described in chap. i. 2-5 to be due to a campaign in that year by -Artaxerxes Ochus (cf. Euseb., _Chron._, II. 221). - -[983] But see below, pp. 340, 365. - -[984] _Z.A.T.W._, 1887, 210 ff. - -[985] i. 11, for גדול δεδόξασται; perhaps ii. 12, עד for ער; perhaps -iii. 8 ff., for עקב קבע; 16, for או ταῦτα. - -[986] i. 11 ff.; ii. 3, and perhaps 12, 15. - - - - - CHAPTER XXV - - _FROM ZECHARIAH TO “MALACHI”_ - - -Between the completion of the Temple in 516 and the arrival of Ezra in -458, we have almost no record of the little colony round Mount Zion. -The Jewish chronicles devote to the period but a few verses of -unsupported tradition.[987] After 517 we have nothing from Zechariah -himself; and if any other prophet appeared during the next -half-century, his words have not survived. We are left to infer what -was the true condition of affairs, not less from this ominous silence -than from the hints which are given to us in the writings of “Malachi,” -Ezra and Nehemiah after the period was over. Beyond a partial attempt -to rebuild the walls of the city in the reign of Artaxerxes I.,[988] -there seems to have been nothing to record. It was a period of -disillusion, disheartening and decay. The completion of the Temple did -not bring in the Messianic era. Zerubbabel, whom Haggai and Zechariah -had crowned as the promised King of Israel, died without reaching -higher rank than a minor satrapy in the Persian Empire, and even in -that he appears to have been succeeded by a Persian official.[989] The -re-migrations from Babylon and elsewhere, which Zechariah predicted, -did not take place. The small population of Jerusalem were still -harassed by the hostility, and their morale sapped by the -insidiousness, of their Samaritan neighbours: they were denied the -stimulus, the purgation, the glory of a great persecution. Their -Persian tyrants for the most part left them alone. The world left them -alone. Nothing stirred in Palestine except the Samaritan intrigues. -History rolled away westward, and destiny seemed to be settling on the -Greeks. In 490 Miltiades defeated the Persians at Marathon. In 480 -Thermopylæ was fought and the Persian fleet broken at Salamis. In 479 a -Persian army was destroyed at Platæa, and Xerxes lost Europe and most -of the Ionian coast. In 460 Athens sent an expedition to Egypt to -assist the Egyptian revolt against Persia, and in 457 “her slain fell -in Cyprus, in Egypt, in Phœnicia, at Haliæ, in Ægina, and in Megara in -the same year.” - -Thus severely left to themselves and to the petty hostilities of their -neighbours, the Jews appear to have sunk into a careless and sordid -manner of life. They entered the period, it is true, with some sense of -their distinction.[990] In exile they had suffered God’s anger,[991] -and had been purged by it. But out of discipline often springs pride, -and there is no subtler temptation of the human heart. The returned -Israel felt this to the quick, and it sorely unfitted them for -encountering the disappointment and hardship which followed upon the -completion of the Temple. The tide of hope, which rose to flood with -that consummation, ebbed rapidly away, and left God’s people -struggling, like any ordinary tribe of peasants, with bad seasons and -the cruelty of their envious neighbours. Their pride was set on edge, -and they fell, not as at other periods of disappointment into despair, -but into a bitter carelessness and a contempt of their duty to God. -This was a curious temper, and, so far as we know, new in Israel. It -led them to despise both His love and His holiness.[992] They neglected -their Temple dues, and impudently presented to their God polluted bread -and blemished beasts which they would not have dared to offer to their -Persian governor.[993] Like people like priest: the priesthood lost not -reverence only, but decency and all conscience of their office.[994] -They _despised the Table of the Lord_, ceased to instruct the people -and grew partial in judgment. As a consequence they became contemptible -in the eyes of the community. Immorality prevailed among all classes: -_every man dealt treacherously with his brother_.[995] Adultery, -perjury, fraud and the oppression of the poor were very rife. - -One particular fashion, in which the people’s wounded pride spited -itself, was the custom of marriage which even the best families -contracted with the half-heathen _people of the land_. Across Judah -there were scattered the descendants of those Jews whom Nebuchadrezzar -had not deemed worth removing to Babylon. Whether regarded from a -social or a religious point of view, their fathers had been the dregs -of the old community. Their own religion, cut off as they were from the -main body of Israel and scattered among the old heathen shrines of the -land, must have deteriorated still further; but in all probability they -had secured for themselves the best portions of the vacant soil, and -now enjoyed a comfort and a stability of welfare far beyond that which -was yet attainable by the majority of the returned exiles. More -numerous than these dregs of ancient Jewry were the very mixed race of -the Samaritans. They possessed a rich land, which they had cultivated -long enough for many of their families to be settled in comparative -wealth. With all these half-pagan Jews and Samaritans, the families of -the true Israel, as they regarded themselves, did not hesitate to form -alliances, for in the precarious position of the colony, such alliances -were the surest way both to wealth and to political influence. How much -the Jews were mastered by their desire for them is seen from the fact -that, when the relatives of their half-heathen brides made it a -condition of the marriages that they should first put away their old -wives, they readily did so. Divorce became very frequent, and great -suffering was inflicted on the native Jewish women.[996] - -So the religious condition of Israel declined for nearly two -generations, and then about 460 the Word of God, after long silence, -broke once more through a prophet’s lips. - -We call this prophet “Malachi,” following the error of an editor of -his book, who, finding it nameless, inferred or invented that name -from its description of the priest as the “Malĕ’ach,” or _messenger, -of the Lord of Hosts_.[997] But the prophet gave himself no name. -Writing from the midst of a poor and persecuted group of the people, -and attacking the authorities both of church and state, he preferred to -publish his charge anonymously. His name was in _the Lord’s own book of -remembrance_.[998] - -The unknown prophet addressed himself both to the sinners of his -people, and to those querulous adherents of Jehovah whom the success of -the sinners had tempted to despair in their service of God. His style -shares the practical directness of his predecessors among the returned -exiles. He takes up one point after another, and drives them home in a -series of strong, plain paragraphs of prose. But it is sixty years -since Haggai and Zechariah, and in the circumstances we have described, -a prophet could no longer come forward as a public inspirer of his -nation. Prophecy seems to have been driven from public life, from the -sudden enforcement of truth in the face of the people to the more -deliberate and ordered argument which marks the teacher who works in -private. In the Book of “Malachi” there are many of the principles and -much of the enthusiasm of the ancient Hebrew seer. But the discourse is -broken up into formal paragraphs, each upon the same academic model. -First a truth is pronounced, or a charge made against the people; then -with the words _but ye will say_ the prophet states some possible -objection of his hearers, proceeds to answer it by detailed evidence, -and only then drives home his truth, or his charge, in genuine -prophetic fashion. To the student of prophecy this peculiarity of the -book is of the greatest interest, for it is no merely personal -idiosyncrasy. We rather feel that prophecy is now assuming the temper -of the teacher. The method is the commencement of that which later on -becomes the prevailing habit in Jewish literature. Just as with -Zephaniah we saw prophecy passing into Apocalypse, and with Habakkuk -into the speculation of the schools of Wisdom, so now in “Malachi” we -perceive its transformation into the scholasticism of the Rabbis. - -But the interest of this change of style must not prevent us from -appreciating the genuine prophetic spirit of our book. Far more fully -than, for instance, that of Haggai, to the style of which its practical -simplicity is so akin, it enumerates the prophetic principles: the -everlasting Love of Jehovah for Israel, the Fatherhood of Jehovah and -His Holiness, His ancient Ideals for Priesthood and People, the need of -a Repentance proved by deeds, the consequent Promise of Prosperity, the -Day of the Lord, and Judgment between the evil and the righteous. Upon -the last of these the book affords a striking proof of the delinquency -of the people during the last half-century, and in connection with it -the prophet introduces certain novel features. To Haggai and Zechariah -the great Tribulation had closed with the Exile and the rebuilding -of the Temple: Israel stood on the margin of the Messianic age. But -the Book of “Malachi” proclaims the need of another judgment as -emphatically as the older prophets had predicted the Babylonian doom. -“Malachi” repeats their name for it, _the great and terrible Day of -Jehovah_. But he does not foresee it, as they did, in the shape of -a historical process. His description of it is pure Apocalypse—_the -fire of the smelter and the fuller’s acid: the day that burns like -a furnace_, when all wickedness is as stubble, and all evil men are -devoured, but to the righteous _the Sun of Righteousness shall arise -with healing in His wings_, and they shall tread the wicked under -foot.[999] To this the prophet adds a novel promise. God is so much the -God of love,[1000] that before the Day comes He will give His people -an opportunity of conversion. He will send them Elijah the prophet to -change their hearts, that He may be prevented from striking the land -with His Ban. - -In one other point the book is original, and that is in its attitude -towards the heathen. Among the heathen, it boldly says, Jehovah is -held in higher reverence than among His own people.[1001] In such a -statement we can hardly fail to feel the influence upon Israel of their -contact, often close and personal, with their wise and mild tyrants -the Persians. We may emphasise the verse as the first note of that -recognition of the real religiousness of the heathen, which we shall -find swelling to such fulness and tenderness in the Book of Jonah. - -Such are in brief the style and the principles of the Book of -“Malachi,” whose separate prophecies we may now proceed to take up in -detail. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[987] Ezra iv. 6-23. - -[988] This is recorded in the Aramean document which has been -incorporated in our Book of Ezra, and there is no reason to doubt its -reality. In that document we have already found, in spite of its -comparatively late date, much that is accurate history. See above, p. -212. And it is clear that, the Temple being finished, the Jews must -have drawn upon themselves the same religious envy of the Samaritans -which had previously delayed the construction of the Temple. To meet -it, what more natural than that the Jews should have attempted to raise -the walls of their city? It is almost impossible to believe that they -who had achieved the construction of the Temple in 516 should not, in -the next fifty years, make some effort to raise their fallen walls. And -indeed Nehemiah’s account of his own work almost necessarily implies -that they had done so, for what he did after 445 was not to build new -walls, but rather to repair shattered ones. - -[989] See above, p. 335, n. 970, and below, p. 354, on “Mal.” i. 8. - -[990] Cf. Stade, _Gesch. des Volkes Israel_, II., pp. 128-138, the best -account of this period. - -[991] “Mal.” iii. 14. - -[992] “Mal.” i. 2, 6; iii. 8 f. - -[993] _Id._ i. 7 f., 12-14. - -[994] _Id._ i. 6 f., ii. - -[995] _Id._ ii, 10. - -[996] “Mal.” ii. 10-16. - -[997] For proof of this see above, pp. 331 f. - -[998] “Mal.” iii. 16. - -[999] iii. 2, 19 ff. Heb., iv. 1 ff. Eng. - -[1000] iii. 6. - -[1001] i. 11. - - - - - CHAPTER XXVI - - _PROPHECY WITHIN THE LAW_ - - “MALACHI” i.—iv. - - -Beneath this title we may gather all the eight sections of the Book of -“Malachi.” They contain many things of perennial interest and validity: -their truth is applicable, their music is still musical, to ourselves. -But their chief significance is historical. They illustrate the -development of prophecy _within_ the Law. Not _under_ the Law, be it -observed. For if one thing be more clear than another about “Malachi’s” -teaching, it is that the spirit of prophecy is not yet crushed by the -legalism which finally killed it within Israel. “Malachi” observes and -enforces the demands of the Deuteronomic law under which his people -had lived since the Return from Exile. But he traces each of these -to some spiritual principle, to some essential of religion in the -character of Israel’s God, which is either doubted or neglected by his -contemporaries in their lax performance of the Law. That is why we may -entitle his book Prophecy within the Law. - - * * * * * - -The essential principles of the religion of Israel which had been -shaken or obscured by the delinquency of the people during the -half-century after the rebuilding of the Temple were three—the -distinctive Love of Jehovah for His people, His Holiness, and His -Righteousness. The Book of “Malachi” takes up each of these in turn, -and proves or enforces it according as the people have formally doubted -it or in their carelessness done it despite. - - - 1. GOD’S LOVE FOR ISRAEL AND HATRED OF EDOM - (Chap. i. 2-5). - -He begins with God’s Love, and in answer to the disappointed[1002] -people’s cry, _Wherein hast Thou loved us?_ he does not, as the older -prophets did, sweep the whole history of Israel, and gather proofs of -Jehovah’s grace and unfailing guidance in all the great events from the -deliverance from Egypt to the deliverance from Babylon. But he confines -himself to a comparison of Israel with the Gentile nation, which was -most akin to Israel according to the flesh, their own brother Edom. It -is possible, of course, to see in this a proof of our prophet’s -narrowness, as contrasted with Amos or Hosea or the great Evangelist of -the Exile. But we must remember that out of all the history of Israel -“Malachi” could not have chosen an instance which would more strongly -appeal to the heart of his contemporaries. We have seen from the Book -of Obadiah how ever since the beginning of the Exile Edom had come to -be regarded by Israel as their great antithesis.[1003] If we needed -further proof of this we should find it in many Psalms of the Exile, -which like the Book of Obadiah remember with bitterness the hostile -part that Edom played in the day of Israel’s calamity. The two nations -were utterly opposed in genius and character. Edom was a people of as -unspiritual and self-sufficient a temper as ever cursed any of God’s -human creatures. Like their ancestor they were _profane_,[1004] without -repentance, humility or ideals, and almost without religion. Apart, -therefore, from the long history of war between the two peoples, it was -a true instinct which led Israel to regard their brother as -representative of that heathendom against which they had to realise -their destiny in the world as God’s own nation. In choosing the -contrast of Edom’s fate to illustrate Jehovah’s love for Israel, -“Malachi” was not only choosing what would appeal to the passions of -his contemporaries, but what is the most striking and constant -antithesis in the whole history of Israel: the absolutely diverse -genius and destiny of these two Semitic nations who were nearest -neighbours and, according to their traditions, twin-brethren after the -flesh. If we keep this in mind we shall understand Paul’s use of the -antithesis in the passage in which he clenches it by a quotation from -“Malachi”: _as it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I -hated_.[1005] In these words the doctrine of the Divine election of -individuals appears to be expressed as absolutely as possible. But it -would be unfair to read the passage except in the light of Israel’s -history. In the Old Testament it is a matter of fact that the doctrine -of the Divine preference of Israel to Esau appeared only after the -respective characters of the nations were manifested in history, and -that it grew more defined and absolute only as history discovered more -of the fundamental contrast between the two in genius and -destiny.[1006] In the Old Testament, therefore, the doctrine is the -result, not of an arbitrary belief in God’s bare fiat, but of -historical experience; although, of course, the distinction which -experience proves is traced back, with everything else of good or evil -that happens, to the sovereign will and purpose of God. Nor let us -forget that the Old Testament doctrine of election is of election to -service only. That is to say, the Divine intention in electing covers -not the elect individual or nation only, but the whole world and its -needs of God and His truth. - -The event to which “Malachi” appeals as evidence for God’s rejection -of Edom is _the desolation_ of the latter’s ancient _heritage_, _and_ -the abandonment of it to the _jackals of the desert_. Scholars used -to think that these vague phrases referred to some act of the Persian -kings: some removal of the Edomites from the lands of the Jews in -order to make room for the returned exiles.[1007] But “Malachi” says -expressly that it was Edom’s own _heritage_ which was laid desolate. -This can only be Mount Esau or Se’ir, and the statement that it was -delivered _to the jackals of the desert_ proves that the reference is -to that same expulsion of Edom from their territory by the Nabatean -Arabs which we have already seen the Book of Obadiah relate about the -beginning of the Exile.[1008] - -But it is now time to give in full the opening passage of “Malachi,” in -which he appeals to this important event as proof of God’s distinctive -love for Israel, and, “Malachi” adds, of His power beyond Israel’s -border (“Mal.” chap. i. 2-5). - -_I have loved you, saith Jehovah. But ye say, “Wherein hast Thou loved -us?” Is not Esau brother to Jacob?—oracle of Jehovah—and I have loved -Jacob and Esau have I hated. I have made his mountains desolate, and -given his heritage to the jackals of the desert. Should _the people -of_ Edom say,[1009] “We are destroyed, but we will rebuild the waste -places,” thus saith Jehovah of Hosts, They may build, but I will pull -down: men shall call them “The Border of Wickedness” and “The People -with whom Jehovah is wroth for ever.” And your eyes shall see it, and -yourselves shall say, “Great is Jehovah beyond Israel’s border.”_ - - - 2. “HONOUR THY FATHER” (Chap. i. 6-14). - -From God’s Love, which Israel have doubted, the prophet passes to His -Majesty or Holiness, which they have wronged. Now it is very remarkable -that the relation of God to the Jews in which the prophet should see -His Majesty illustrated is not only His lordship over them but His -Fatherhood: _A son honours a father, and a servant his lord; but if I -be Father, where is My honour? and if I be Lord, where is there -reverence for Me? saith Jehovah of Hosts_.[1010] We are so accustomed -to associate with the Divine Fatherhood only ideas of love and pity -that the use of the relation to illustrate not love but Majesty, and -the setting of it in parallel to the Divine Kingship, may seem to us -strange. Yet this was very natural to Israel. In the old Semitic world, -even to the human parent, honour was due before love. _Honour thy -father and thy mother_, said the Fifth Commandment; and when, after -long shyness to do so, Israel at last ventured to claim Jehovah as the -Father of His people, it was at first rather with the view of -increasing their sense of His authority and their duty of reverencing -Him, than with the view of bringing Him near to their hearts and -assuring them of His tenderness. The latter elements, it is true, were -not absent from the conception. But even in the Psalter, in which we -find the most intimate and tender fellowship of the believer with God, -there is only one passage in which His love for His own is compared to -the love of a human father.[1011] And in the other very few passages of -the Old Testament where He is revealed or appealed to as the Father of -the nation, it is, with two exceptions,[1012] in order either to -emphasise His creation of Israel or His discipline. So in -Jeremiah,[1013] and in an anonymous prophet of the same period perhaps -as “Malachi.”[1014] This hesitation to ascribe to God the name of -Father, and this severe conception of what Fatherhood meant, was -perhaps needful for Israel in face of the sensuous ideas of the Divine -Fatherhood cherished by their heathen neighbours.[1015] But, however -this may be, the infrequency and austerity of Israel’s conception of -God’s Fatherhood, in contrast with that of Christianity, enables us to -understand why “Malachi” should employ the relation as proof, not of -the Love, but of the Majesty and Holiness of Jehovah. - -This Majesty and this Holiness have been wronged, he says, by low -thoughts of God’s altar, and by offering upon it, with untroubled -conscience, cheap and blemished sacrifices. The people would have been -ashamed to present such to their Persian governor: how can God be -pleased with them? Better that sacrifice should cease than that such -offerings should be presented in such a spirit! _Is there no one_, -cries the prophet, _to close the doors_ of the Temple altogether, so -that _the altar_ smoke not _in vain_? - -The passage shows us what a change has passed over the spirit of Israel -since prophecy first attacked the sacrificial ritual. We remember how -Amos would have swept it all away as an abomination to God.[1016] So, -too, Isaiah and Jeremiah. But their reason for this was very different -from “Malachi’s.” Their contemporaries were assiduous and lavish in -sacrificing, and were devoted to the Temple and the ritual with a -fanaticism which made them forget that Jehovah’s demands upon His -people were righteousness and the service of the weak. But “Malachi” -condemns his generation for depreciating the Temple, and for being -stingy and fraudulent in their offerings. Certainly the post-exilic -prophet assumes a different attitude to the ritual from that of his -predecessors in ancient Israel. They wished it all abolished, and -placed the chief duties of Israel towards God in civic justice and -mercy. But he emphasises it as the first duty of the people towards -God, and sees in their neglect the reason of their misfortunes and the -cause of their coming doom. In this change which has come over prophecy -we must admit the growing influence of the Law. From Ezekiel onwards -the prophets become more ecclesiastical and legal. And though at first -they do not become less ethical, yet the influence which was at work -upon them was of such a character as was bound in time to engross their -interest, and lead them to remit the ethical elements of their religion -to a place secondary to the ceremonial. We see symptoms of this even in -“Malachi,” we shall find more in Joel, and we know how aggravated these -symptoms afterwards became in all the leaders of Jewish religion. At -the same time we ought to remember that this change of emphasis, which -many will think to be for the worse, was largely rendered necessary by -the change of temper in the people to whom the prophets ministered. -“Malachi” found among his contemporaries a habit of religious -performance which was not only slovenly and indecent, but mean and -fraudulent, and it became his first practical duty to attack this. -Moreover the neglect of the Temple was not due to those spiritual -conceptions of Jehovah and those moral duties He demanded, in the -interests of which the older prophets had condemned the ritual. At -bottom the neglect of the Temple was due to the very same reasons as -the superstitious zeal and fanaticism in sacrificing which the older -prophets had attacked—false ideas, namely, of God Himself, and of what -was due to Him from His people. And on these grounds, therefore, we may -say that “Malachi” was performing for his generation as needful and as -Divine a work as Amos and Isaiah had performed for theirs. Only, be it -admitted, the direction of “Malachi’s” emphasis was more dangerous for -religion than that of the emphasis of Amos or Isaiah. How liable the -practice he inculcated was to exaggeration and abuse is sadly proved in -the later history of his people: it was against that exaggeration, -grown great and obdurate through three centuries, that Jesus delivered -His most unsparing words. - -_A son honours a father, and a servant his lord. But if I am Father, -where is My honour? and if I am Lord, where is reverence for Me? saith -Jehovah of Hosts to you, O priests, who despise My Name. Ye say, “How -then have we despised Thy Name?” Ye are bringing polluted food to Mine -Altar. Ye say, “How have we polluted Thee?”[1017] By saying,[1018] “The -Table of Jehovah may be despised”; and when ye bring a blind _beast_ to -sacrifice, “No harm!” or when ye bring a lame or sick one, “No -harm!”[1019] Pray, take it to thy Satrap: will he be pleased with thee, -or accept thy person? saith Jehovah of Hosts. But now, propitiate[1020] -God, that He may be gracious to us. When _things_ like this come from -your hands, can He accept your persons? saith Jehovah of Hosts. Who is -there among you to close the doors_ of the Temple altogether, _that ye -kindle not Mine Altar in vain? I have no pleasure in you, saith Jehovah -of Hosts, and I will not accept an offering from your hands. For from -the rising of the sun and to its setting My Name is glorified[1021] -among the nations; and in every sacred place[1022] incense is offered -to My Name, and a pure offering:[1023] for great is My Name among the -nations, saith Jehovah of Hosts. But ye are profaning it, in that ye -think[1024] that the Table of the Lord is polluted, and[1025] its food -contemptible. And ye say, What a weariness! and ye sniff at it,[1026] -saith Jehovah of Hosts. _When_ ye bring what has been plundered,[1027] -and the lame and the diseased, yea,_ when _ye_ so _bring an offering, -can I accept it with grace from your hands? saith Jehovah. Cursed be -the cheat in whose flock is a male_ beast _and he vows it,[1028] and -slays for the Lord a miserable beast.[1029] For a great King am I, -saith Jehovah of Hosts, and My Name is reverenced among the nations._ - -Before we pass from this passage we must notice in it one very -remarkable feature—perhaps the most original contribution which the -Book of “Malachi” makes to the development of prophecy. In contrast to -the irreverence of Israel and the wrong they do to Jehovah’s Holiness, -He Himself asserts that not only is _His Name great and glorified among -the heathen, from the rising to the setting of the sun_, but that _in -every sacred place incense and a pure offering are offered to His -Name_. This is so novel a statement, and, we may truly say, so -startling, that it is not wonderful that the attempt should have been -made to interpret it, not of the prophet’s own day, but of the -Messianic age and the kingdom of Christ. So, many of the Christian -Fathers, from Justin and Irenæus to Theodoret and Augustine;[1030] so, -our own Authorised Version, which boldly throws the verbs into the -future; and so, many modern interpreters like Pusey, who declares that -the style is “a vivid present such as is often used to describe the -future; but the things spoken of show it to be future.” All these take -the passage to be an anticipation of Christ’s parables declaring the -rejection of the Jews and ingathering of the Gentiles to the kingdom of -heaven, and of the argument of the Epistle to the Hebrews, that the -bleeding and defective offerings of the Jews were abrogated by the -sacrifice of the Cross. But such an exegesis is only possible by -perverting the text and misreading the whole argument of the prophet. -Not only are the verbs of the original in the present tense—so also in -the early versions—but the prophet is obviously contrasting the -contempt of God’s own people for Himself and His institutions with the -reverence paid to His Name among the heathen. It is not the mere -question of there being righteous people in every nation, well-pleasing -to Jehovah because of their lives. The very sacrifices of the heathen -are pure and acceptable to Him. Never have we had in prophecy, even the -most far-seeing and evangelical, a statement so generous and so -catholic as this. Why it should appear only now in the history of -prophecy is a question we are unable to answer with certainty. Many -have seen in it the result of Israel’s intercourse with their tolerant -and religious masters the Persians. None of the Persian kings had up to -this time persecuted the Jews, and numbers of pious and large-minded -Israelites must have had opportunity of acquaintance with the very pure -doctrines of the Persian religion, among which it is said that there -was already numbered the recognition of true piety in men of all -religions.[1031] If Paul derived from his Hellenic culture the -knowledge which made it possible for him to speak as he did in Athens -of the religiousness of the Gentiles, it was just as probable that Jews -who had come within the experience of a still purer Aryan faith should -utter an even more emphatic acknowledgment that the One True God had -those who served Him in spirit and in truth all over the world. But, -whatever foreign influences may have ripened such a faith in Israel, we -must not forget that its roots were struck deep in the native soil of -their religion. From the first they had known their God as a God of a -grace so infinite that it was impossible it should be exhausted on -themselves. If His righteousness, as Amos showed, was over all the -Syrian states, and His pity and His power to convert, as Isaiah showed, -covered even the cities of Phœnicia, the great Evangelist of the Exile -could declare that He quenched not the smoking wicks of the dim heathen -faiths. - -As interesting, however, as the origin of “Malachi’s” attitude to -the heathen, are two other points about it. In the first place, it is -remarkable that it should occur, especially in the form of emphasising -the purity of heathen sacrifices, in a book which lays such heavy -stress upon the Jewish Temple and ritual. This is a warning to us not -to judge harshly the so-called legal age of Jewish religion, nor to -despise the prophets who have come under the influence of the Law. And -in the second place, we perceive in this statement a step towards the -fuller acknowledgment of Gentile religiousness which we find in the -Book of Jonah. It is strange that none of the post-exilic Psalms strike -the same note. They often predict the conversion of the heathen; but -they do not recognise their native reverence and piety. Perhaps the -reason is that in a body of song, collected for the national service, -such a feature would be out of place. - - - 3. THE PRIESTHOOD OF KNOWLEDGE (Chap. ii. 1-9). - -In the third section of his book “Malachi” addresses himself to the -priests. He charges them not only with irreverence and slovenliness in -their discharge of the Temple service—for this he appears to intend by -the phrase _filth of your feasts_—but with the neglect of their -intellectual duties to the people. _The lips of a priest guard -knowledge, and men seek instruction from his mouth, for he is the -Angel_—the revealing Angel—_of Jehovah of Hosts_. Once more, what a -remarkable saying to come from the legal age of Israel’s religion, and -from a writer who so emphasises the ceremonial law! In all the range of -prophecy there is not any more in harmony with the prophetic ideal. How -needed it is in our own age!—needed against those two extremes of -religion from which we suffer, the limitation of the ideal of -priesthood to the communication of a magic grace, and its evaporation -in a vague religiosity from which the intellect is excluded as if it -were perilous, worldly and devilish.[1032] “Surrender of the intellect” -indeed! This is the burial of the talent in the napkin, and, as in the -parable of Christ, it is still in our day preached and practised by the -men of one talent. Religion needs all the brains we poor mortals can -put into it. There is a priesthood of knowledge, a priesthood of the -intellect, says “Malachi,” and he makes this a large part of God’s -covenant with Levi. Every priest of God is a priest of truth; and it is -very largely by the Christian ministry’s neglect of their intellectual -duties that so much irreligion prevails. As in “Malachi’s” day, so now, -“the laity take hurt and hindrance by our negligence.”[1033] And just -as he points out, so with ourselves, the consequence is the growing -indifference with which large bodies of the Christian ministry are -regarded by the thoughtful portions both of our labouring and -professional classes. Were the ministers of all the Churches to awake -to their ideal in this matter, there would surely come a very great -revival of religion among us. - -_And now this Charge for you, O priests: If ye hear not, and lay not to -heart to give glory to My Name, saith Jehovah of Hosts, I will send -upon you the curse, and will curse your blessings—yea, I have cursed -them[1034]—for none of you layeth it to heart. Behold, I ... you -...[1035] and I will scatter filth in your faces, the filth of your -feasts....[1036] And ye shall know that I have sent to you this Charge, -to be My covenant with Levi,[1037] saith Jehovah of Hosts. My covenant -was with him life and peace,[1038] and I gave them to him, fear and he -feared Me, and humbled himself before My Name.[1039] The revelation of -truth was in his mouth, and wickedness was not found upon his lips. In -whole-heartedness[1040] and integrity he walked with Me, and turned -many from iniquity. For the lips of a priest guard knowledge, and men -seek instruction[1041] from his mouth, for he is the Angel of Jehovah -of Hosts. But ye have turned from the way, ye have tripped up many by -the Torah, ye have spoiled the covenant of Levi, saith Jehovah of -Hosts. And I on My part[1042] have made you contemptible to all the -people, and abased in proportion as ye kept not My ways and had respect -of persons in_ delivering your _Torah_. - - - 4. THE CRUELTY OF DIVORCE (Chap. ii. 10-17). - -In his fourth section, upon his countrymen’s frequent divorce of their -native wives in order to marry into the influential families of their -half-heathen neighbours,[1043] “Malachi” makes another of those wide -and spiritual utterances which so distinguish his prophecy and redeem -his age from the charge of legalism that is so often brought against -it. To him the Fatherhood of God is not merely a relation of power -and authority, requiring reverence from the nation. It constitutes -the members of the nation one close brotherhood, and against this -divorce is a crime and unnatural cruelty. Jehovah makes the _wife of a -man’s youth his mate_ for life _and his wife by covenant_. He _hates -divorce_, and His altar is so wetted by the tears of the wronged women -of Israel that the gifts upon it are no more acceptable in His sight. -No higher word on marriage was spoken except by Christ Himself. It -breathes the spirit of our Lord’s utterance: if we were sure of the -text of ver. 15, we might almost say that it anticipated the letter. -Certain verses, 11-13_a_, which disturb the argument by bringing in the -marriages with heathen wives are omitted in the following translation, -and will be given separately. - -_Have we not all One Father? Hath not One God created us? Why then are -we unfaithful to one another, profaning the covenant of our -fathers?...[1044] Ye cover with tears the altar of Jehovah, with -weeping and with groaning, because respect is no longer had to the -offering, and acceptable gifts are not taken from your hands. And ye -say, “Why?” Because Jehovah has been witness between thee and the wife -of thy youth, with whom thou hast broken faith, though she is thy -mate[1045] and thy wife by covenant. And ...[1046] And what is the one -seeking? A Divine Seed. Take heed, then, to your spirit, and be not -unfaithful to the wife of thy youth.[1047] For I hate divorce, saith -Jehovah, God of Israel, and that a man cover his clothing[1048] with -cruelty, saith Jehovah of Hosts. So take heed to your spirit, and deal -not faithlessly._ - -The verses omitted in the above translation treat of the foreign -marriages, which led to this frequent divorce by the Jews of their -native wives. So far, of course, they are relevant to the subject -of the passage. But they obviously disturb its argument, as already -pointed out.[1049] They have nothing to do with the principle from -which it starts that Jehovah is the Father of the whole of Israel. -Remove them and the awkward clause in ver. 13_a_, by which some editor -has tried to connect them with the rest of the paragraph, and the -latter runs smoothly. The motive of their later addition is apparent, -if not justifiable. Here they are by themselves:— - -_Judah was faithless, and abomination was practised in Israel[1050], -and in Jerusalem, for Judah hath defiled the sanctuary of Jehovah, -which was dear to Him, and hath married the daughter of a strange -god. May Jehovah cut off from the man, who doeth this, witness and -champion[1051] from the tents of Jacob, and offerer of sacrifices to -Jehovah of Hosts._[1052] - - - 5. “WHERE IS THE GOD OF JUDGMENT?” - -(Chap. ii. 17—iii. 5). - -In this section “Malachi” turns from the sinners of his people to those -who weary Jehovah with the complaint that sin is successful, or, as -they put it, _Every one that does evil is good in the eyes of Jehovah, -and He delighteth in them_; and again, _Where is the God of Judgment?_ -The answer is, The Lord Himself shall come. His Angel shall prepare His -way before Him, and suddenly shall the Lord come to His Temple. His -coming shall be for judgment, terrible and searching. Its first object -(note the order) shall be the cleansing of the priesthood, that proper -sacrifices may be established, and its second the purging of the -immorality of the people. Mark that although the coming of the Angel is -said to precede that of Jehovah Himself, there is the same blending of -the two as we have seen in previous accounts of angels.[1053] It is -uncertain whether this section closes with ver. 5 or 6: the latter goes -equally well with it and with the following section. - -_Ye have wearied Jehovah with your words; and ye say, “In what have we -wearied_ Him _?” In that ye say, “Every one that does evil is good in -the eyes of Jehovah, and He delighteth in them”; or else, “Where is the -God of Judgment?” Behold, I will send My Angel, to prepare the way -before Me, and suddenly shall come to His Temple the Lord whom ye seek -and the Angel of the Covenant whom ye desire. Behold, He comes! saith -Jehovah of Hosts. But who may bear the day of His coming, and who stand -when He appears? For He is like the fire of the smelter and the acid of -the fullers. He takes His seat to smelt and to purge;[1054] and He will -purge the sons of Levi, and wash them out like gold or silver, and they -shall be to Jehovah bringers of an offering in righteousness. And the -offering of Judah and Jerusalem shall be pleasing to Jehovah, as in the -days of old and as in long past years. And I will come near you to -judgment, and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers and the -adulterers and the perjurers, and against those who wrong the hireling -in his wage, and the widow and the orphan, and oppress the stranger, -and fear not Me, saith Jehovah of Hosts._ - - - 6. REPENTANCE BY TITHES (Chap. iii. 6-12). - -This section ought perhaps to follow on to the preceding. Those whom it -blames for not paying the Temple tithes may be the sceptics addressed -in the previous section, who have stopped their dues to Jehovah out of -sheer disappointment that He does nothing. And ver. 6, which goes well -with either section, may be the joint between the two. However this -be, the new section enforces the need of the people’s repentance and -return to God, if He is to return to them. And when they ask, how are -they to return, “Malachi” plainly answers, By the payment of the tithes -they have not paid. In withholding these they robbed God, and to this, -their crime, are due the locusts and bad seasons which have afflicted -them. In our temptation to see in this a purely legal spirit, let us -remember that the neglect to pay the tithes was due to a religious -cause, unbelief in Jehovah, and that the return to belief in Him could -not therefore be shown in a more practical way than by the payment of -tithes. This is not prophecy subject to the Law, but prophecy employing -the means and vehicles of grace with which the Law at that time -provided the people. - -_For I Jehovah have not changed, but ye sons of Jacob have not done -with (?).[1055] In the days of your fathers ye turned from My statutes -and did not keep them. Return to Me, and I will return to you, saith -Jehovah of Hosts. But you say, “How then shall we return?” Can a man -rob[1056] God? yet ye are robbing Me. But ye say, “In what have we -robbed Thee?” In the tithe and the tribute.[1057] With the curse are ye -cursed, and yet Me ye are robbing, the whole people of you. Bring in -the whole tithe to the storehouse, that there may be provision[1058] in -My House, and pray, prove Me in this, saith Jehovah of Hosts—whether -I will not open to you the windows of heaven, and pour blessing -upon you till there is no more need. And I will check for you the -devourer,[1059] and he shall not destroy for you the fruit of the -ground, nor the vine in the field miscarry, saith Jehovah of Hosts. And -all nations shall call you happy, for ye shall be a land of delight, -saith Jehovah of Hosts._ - - - 7. THE JUDGMENT TO COME - (Chap. iii. 13-21 Heb., iii. 13—iv. 2 Eng.). - -This is another charge to the doubters among the pious remnant of -Israel, who, seeing the success of the wicked, said it is vain to -serve God. Deuteronomy was their Canon, and Deuteronomy said that if -men sinned they decayed, if they were righteous they prospered. How -different were the facts of experience! The evil men succeeded: the -good won no gain by their goodness, nor did their mourning for the -sins of their people work any effect. Bitterest of all, they had to -congratulate wickedness in high places, and Jehovah Himself suffered -it to go unpunished. _Such things_, says “Malachi,” _spake they that -feared God to each other_—tempted thereto by the dogmatic form of their -religion, and forgetful of all that Jeremiah and the Evangelist of the -Exile had taught them of the value of righteous sufferings. Nor does -“Malachi” remind them of this. His message is that the Lord remembers -them, has their names written before Him, and when the day of His -action comes they shall be separated from the wicked and spared. This -is simply to transfer the fulfilment of the promise of Deuteronomy to -the future and to another dispensation. Prophecy still works within the -Law. - -The Apocalypse of this last judgment is one of the grandest in all -Scripture. To the wicked it shall be a terrible fire, root and branch -shall they be burned out, but to the righteous a fair morning of God, -as when dawn comes to those who have been sick and sleepless through -the black night, and its beams bring healing, even as to the popular -belief of Israel it was the rays of the morning sun which distilled the -dew.[1060] They break into life and energy, like young calves leaping -from the dark pen into the early sunshine. To this morning landscape a -grim figure is added. They shall tread down the wicked and the arrogant -like ashes beneath their feet. - -_Your words are hard upon Me, saith Jehovah. Ye say, “What have we -said against Thee?” Ye have said, “It is vain to serve God,” and “What -gain is it to us to have kept His charge, or to have walked in funeral -garb before Jehovah of Hosts? Even now we have got to congratulate the -arrogant; yea, the workers of wickedness are fortified; yea, they tempt -God and escape!” Such things[1061] spake they that fear Jehovah to each -other. But Jehovah gave ear and heard, and a book of remembrance[1062] -was written before Him about those who fear Jehovah, and those who keep -in mind[1063] His Name. And they shall be Mine own property, saith -Jehovah of Hosts, in the day when I rise to action,[1064] and I will -spare them even as a man spares his son that serves him. And ye shall -once more see_ the difference _between righteous and wicked, between -him that serves God and him that does not serve Him._ - -_For, lo! the day is coming that shall burn like a furnace, and all the -overweening and every one that works wickedness shall be as stubble, -and the day that is coming shall devour them, saith Jehovah of Hosts, -so that there be left them neither root nor branch. But to you that -fear My Name the Sun of Righteousness shall rise with healing in His -wings, and ye shall go forth and leap[1065] like calves of the -stall.[1066] And ye shall tread down the wicked, for they shall be as -ashes[1067] beneath the soles of your feet, in the day that I_ begin to -_do, saith Jehovah of Hosts._ - - - 8. THE RETURN OF ELIJAH - (Chap. iii. 22-24 Heb., iv. 3-5 Eng.). - -With his last word the prophet significantly calls upon the people to -remember the Law. This is their one hope before the coming of the great -and terrible day of the Lord. But, in order that the Law may have full -effect, Prophecy will be sent to bring it home to the hearts of the -people—Prophecy in the person of her founder and most drastic -representative. Nothing could better gather up than this conjunction -does that mingling of Law and of Prophecy which we have seen to be so -characteristic of the work of “Malachi.” Only we must not overlook the -fact that “Malachi” expects this prophecy, which with the Law is to -work the conversion of the people, not in the continuance of the -prophetic succession by the appearance of original personalities, -developing further the great principles of their order, but in the -return of the first prophet Elijah. This is surely the confession of -Prophecy that the number of her servants is exhausted and her message -to Israel fulfilled. She can now do no more for the people than she has -done. But she will summon up her old energy and fire in the return of -her most powerful personality, and make one grand effort to convert the -nation before the Lord come and strike it with judgment. - -_Remember the Torah of Moses, My servant, with which I charged him in -Horeb for all Israel: statutes and judgments. Lo! I am sending to you -Elijah the prophet, before the coming of the great and terrible day of -Jehovah. And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the sons, and -the heart of the sons to their fathers, ere I come and strike the land -with the Ban._ - - * * * * * - -“Malachi” makes this promise of the Law in the dialect of Deuteronomy: -_statutes and judgments with which Jehovah charged Moses for Israel_. -But the Law he enforces is not that which God delivered to Moses on the -plains of Shittim, but that which He gave him in Mount Horeb. And so -it came to pass. In a very few years after “Malachi” prophesied Ezra -the Scribe brought from Babylon the great Levitical Code, which appears -to have been arranged there, while the colony in Jerusalem were still -organising their life under the Deuteronomic legislation. In 444 B.C. -this Levitical Code, along with Deuteronomy, became by covenant between -the people and their God their Canon and Law. And in the next of our -prophets, Joel, we shall find its full influence at work. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1002] See above, p. 343. - -[1003] See above, Chapter XIV. on “Edom and Israel.” - -[1004] Heb. xii. 16. - -[1005] Romans ix. 13. The citation is from the LXX.: τὸν Ἰακὼβ ἠγάπησα, -τὸν δὲ Ἠσαῦ ἐμίσησα. - -[1006] This was mainly _after_ the beginning of exile. Shortly before -that Deut. xxiii. 7 says: _Thou shalt not abhor an Edomite, for he is -thy brother_. - -[1007] So even so recently as 1888, Stade, _Gesch. des Volkes Israel_, -II., p. 112. - -[1008] See above, p. 169. This interpretation is there said to be -Wellhausen’s; but Cheyne, in a note contributed to the _Z.A.T.W._, -1894, p. 142, points out that Grätz, in an article “Die Anfänge -der Nabatäer-Herrschaft” in the _Monatschrift für Wissenschaft u. -Geschichte des Judenthums_, 1875, pp. 60-66, had already explained -“Mal.” i. 1-5 as describing the conquest of Edom by the Nabateans. This -is adopted by Buhl in his _Gesch. der Edomiter_, p. 79. - -[1009] The verb in the feminine indicates that the population of Edom -is meant. - -[1010] i. 6. - -[1011] Psalm ciii. 9. In Psalm lxxiii. 15 believers are called _His -children_; but elsewhere sonship is claimed only for the king—ii. 7, -lxxxix. 27 f. - -[1012] Hosea xi. 1 ff. (though even here the idea of discipline is -present) and Isa. lxiii. 16. - -[1013] iii. 4. - -[1014] Isa. lxiv. 8, cf. Deut. xxxii. 11 where the discipline of -Israel by Jehovah, shaking them out of their desert circumstance -and tempting them to their great career in Palestine, is likened to -the father-eagle’s training of his new-fledged brood to fly: A.V. -mother-eagle. - -[1015] Cf. Cheyne, _Origin of the Psalter_, p. 305, n. O. - -[1016] Vol. I., Chap. IX. - -[1017] Or used polluted things with respect to Thee. For similar -construction see Zech. vii. 5: צמתוני. This in answer to Wellhausen, -who, on the ground that the phrase gives גאל a wrong object and -destroys the connection, deletes it. Further he takes מגאל, not in the -sense of pollution, but as equivalent to נבזה, _despised_. - -[1018] Obviously _in their hearts = thinking_. - -[1019] LXX. _is there no harm?_ - -[1020] _Pacify the face of_, as in Zechariah. - -[1021] So LXX. Heb. _is great_, but the phrase is probably written by -mistake from the instance further on: _is glorified_ could scarcely -have been used in the very literal version of the LXX. unless it had -been found in the original. - -[1022] מקום, here to be taken in the sense it bears in Arabic of -_sacred place_. See on Zeph. ii. 11: above, p. 64, n. 159. - -[1023] Wellhausen deletes מגש as a gloss on מקטר, and the vau before -מנחה. - -[1024] Heb. _say_. - -[1025] Heb. also has ניבו, found besides only in Keri of Isa. lvii. 19. -But Robertson Smith (_O.T.J.C._, 2, p. 444) is probably right in -considering this an error for נבזה, which has kept its place after the -correction was inserted. - -[1026] This clause is obscure, and comes in awkwardly before that which -follows it. Wellhausen omits. - -[1027] גָּזוּל. Wellhausen emends אֶת־הָעִוֵּר borrowing the first three -letters from the previous word. LXX. ἁρπάγματα. - -[1028] LXX. - -[1029] Cf. Lev. iii. 1, 6. - -[1030] Quoted by Pusey, _in loco_. - -[1031] See Cheyne, _Origin of the Psalter_, 292 and 305 f. - -[1032] _Isaiah i.—xxxix._ (Expositor’s Bible), p. 188. - -[1033] See most admirable remarks on this subject in Archdeacon -Wilson’s _Essays and Addresses_, No. III. “The Need of giving Higher -Biblical Teaching, and Instruction on the Fundamental Questions of -Religion and Christianity.” London: Macmillan, 1887. - -[1034] Doubtful. LXX. adds καὶ διεσκεδάσω τῆν εὐλόγιαν ὑμῶν κὰι οὐκ -ἔσται ἐν ὑμῖν: obvious redundancy, if not mere dittography. - -[1035] An obscure phrase, הִנְנִי גֹּדֵעַ לָכֶם אֶת־הַזֶרַע, _Behold, I rebuke you -the seed_. LXX. _Behold_, _I separate from you the arm_ or _shoulder_, -reading זְרֹעַ for זֶרַע and perhaps גֹּדֵעַ for גֹּעֵר, both of which readings -Wellhausen adopts, and Ewald the former. The reference may be to the -arm of the priest raised in blessing. Orelli reads _seed = posterity_. -It may mean the whole _seed_ or _class_ or _kind_ of the priests. The -next clause tempts one to suppose that את־הזרע contains the verb of -this one, as if scattering something. - -[1036] Heb. וְנָשָָׂא אֶתְכֶם אֵלָיו, _and one shall bear you to it_. -Hitzig: filth shall be cast on them, and they on the filth. - -[1037] Others would render _My covenant being with Levi_. Wellhausen: -_for My covenant was with Levi_. But this new Charge or covenant seems -contrasted with a former covenant in the next verse. - -[1038] Num. xxv. 12. - -[1039] This sentence is a literal translation of the Hebrew. With other -punctuation Wellhausen renders _My covenant was with him, life and -peace I gave them to him, fear..._ - -[1040] Or _peace_, שָׁלוֹם. - -[1041] Or _revelation_, Torah. - -[1042] וְנַם־אֲנִי: cf. Amos iv. - -[1043] See above, p. 344. - -[1044] Here occur the two verses and a clause, 11-13_a_, upon the -foreign marriages, which seem to be an intrusion. - -[1045] See Vol. I., p. 259. - -[1046] Heb. literally: _And not one did, and a remnant of spirit was -his_; which (1) A.V. renders: _And did not he make one? Yet he had the -residue of the spirit_, which Pusey accepts and applies to Adam and -Eve, interpreting the second clause as _the breath of life_, by which -Adam _became a living soul_ (Gen. ii. 7). In Gen. i. 27 Adam and Eve -are called one. In that case the meaning would be that the law of -marriage was prior to that of divorce, as in the words of our Lord, -Matt. xix. 4-6. (2) The Hebrew might be rendered, _Not one has done -this who had any spirit left in him_. So Hitzig and Orelli. In that -case the following clauses of the verse are referred to Abraham. _“But -what about the One?”_ (LXX. insert _ye say_ after _But_)—the one who -did put away his wife. Answer: _He was seeking a Divine seed_. The -objection to this interpretation is that Abraham did not cast off the -wife of his youth, Sarah, but the foreigner Hagar. (3) Ewald made a -very different proposal: _And has not One created them, and all the -Spirit_ (cf. Zeph. i. 4) _is His? And what doth the One seek? A Divine -seed._ So Reinke. Similarly Kirkpatrick (_Doct. of the Proph._, p. -502): _And did not One make_[you both]_? And why_ [did]_the One _[do -so]_? Seeking a goodly seed_. (4) Wellhausen goes further along the -same line. Reading הלא for ולא, and וישאר for ושאר, and לנו for לו, he -translates: _Hath not the same God created and sustained your (? our) -breath? And what does He desire? A seed of God._ - -[1047] Literally: _let none be unfaithful to the wife of thy youth_, -a curious instance of the Hebrew habit of mixing the pronominal -references. Wellhausen’s emendation is unnecessary. - -[1048] See Gesenius and Ewald for Arabic analogies for the use of -clothing = wife. - -[1049] See above, p. 340. - -[1050] Wellhausen omits. - -[1051] Heb. עֵר וְעֹנֶה, _caller and answerer_. But LXX. read עד, -_witness_ (see iii. 5), though it pointed it differently. - -[1052] 13_a_, _But secondly ye do this_, is the obvious addition of the -editor in order to connect his intrusion with what follows. - -[1053] See above, pp. 311, 313 f. - -[1054] Delete _silver_: the longer LXX. text shows how easily it was -added. - -[1055] _Made an end of_, reading the verb as Piel (Orelli). LXX. -_refrain from_. _Your sins_ are understood, the sins which have always -characterised the people. LXX. connects the opening of the next verse -with this, and with a different reading of the first word translates -_from the sins of your fathers_. - -[1056] Heb. קבע, only here and Prov. xxii. 32. LXX. read עקב, -_supplant_, _cheat_, which Wellhausen adopts. - -[1057] תְּרוּמָה, _the heave offering_, the tax or tribute given to -the sanctuary or priests and associates with the tithes, as here in -Deut. xii. 11, to be eaten by the offerer (_ib._ 17), but in Ezekiel by -the priests (xliv. 30); taken by the people and the Levites to the -Temple treasury for the priests (Neh. x. 38, xii. 44): corn, wine and -oil. In the Priestly Writing it signifies the part of each sacrifice -which was the priests’ due. Ezekiel also uses it of the part of the -Holy Land that fell to the prince and priests. - -[1058] טֵרֶף in its later meaning: cf. Job xxiv. 5; Prov. xxxi. 15. - -[1059] _I.e._ locust. - -[1060] _A dew of lights._ See _Isaiah i.—xxxix._ (Expositor’s Bible), -pp. 448 f. - -[1061] So LXX.; Heb. _then_. - -[1062] Ezek. xiii. 9. - -[1063] חשב, _to think_, _plan_, has much the same meaning as here -in Isa. xiii. 17, xxxiii. 8, liii. 3. - -[1064] Heb. _when I am doing_; but in the sense in which the word is -used of Jehovah’s decisive and final doing, Psalms xx., xxxii., etc. - -[1065] Hab. i. 8. - -[1066] See note to Amos vi. 4: Vol. I., p. 174, n. 3. - -[1067] Or _dust_. - - - - - _JOEL_ - - - - - _The Day of Jehovah is great and very awful, and who may abide it?_ - - _But now the oracle of Jehovah—Turn ye to Me with all your heart, and - with fasting and with weeping and with mourning. And rend your hearts - and not your garments, and turn to Jehovah your God, for gracious and - merciful is He, long-suffering and abounding in love._ - - - - - CHAPTER XXVII - - _THE BOOK OF JOEL_ - - -In the criticism of the Book of Joel there exist differences of -opinion—upon its date, the exact reference of its statements and its -relation to parallel passages in other prophets—as wide as even those -by which the Book of Obadiah has been assigned to every century between -the tenth and the fourth before Christ.[1068] As in the case of -Obadiah, the problem is not entangled with any doctrinal issue or -question of accuracy; but while we saw that Obadiah was not involved in -the central controversy of the Old Testament, the date of the Law, not -a little in Joel turns upon the latter. And, besides, certain -descriptions raise the large question between a literal and an -allegorical interpretation. Thus the Book of Joel carries the student -further into the problems of Old Testament Criticism, and forms an even -more excellent introduction to the latter, than does the Book of -Obadiah. - - - 1. THE DATE OF THE BOOK. - -In the history of prophecy the Book of Joel must be either very early -or very late, and with few exceptions the leading critics place it -either before 800 B.C. or after 500. So great a difference is due to -most substantial reasons. Unlike every other prophet, except Haggai, -“Malachi” and “Zechariah” ix.—xiv., Joel mentions neither Assyria, -which emerged upon the prophetic horizon about 760,[1069] nor the -Babylonian Empire, which had fallen by 537. The presumption is that he -wrote before 760 or after 537. Unlike all the prophets, too,[1070] Joel -does not charge his people with civic or national sins; nor does his -book bear any trace of the struggle between the righteous and -unrighteous in Israel, nor of that between the spiritual worshippers of -Jehovah and the idolaters. The book addresses an undivided nation, who -know no God but Jehovah; and again the presumption is that Joel wrote -before Amos and his successors had started the spiritual antagonisms -which rent Israel in twain, or after the Law had been accepted by the -whole people under Nehemiah.[1071] The same wide alternative is -suggested by the style and phraseology. Joel’s Hebrew is simple and -direct. Either he is an early writer, or imitates early writers. His -book contains a number of phrases and verses identical, or nearly -identical, with those of prophets from Amos to “Malachi.” Either they -all borrowed from Joel, or he borrowed from them.[1072] - -Of this alternative modern criticism at first preferred the earlier -solution, and dated Joel before Amos. So Credner in his Commentary in -1831, and following him Hitzig, Bleek, Ewald, Delitzsch, Keil, Kuenen -(up to 1864),[1073] Pusey and others. So, too, at first some living -critics of the first rank, who, like Kuenen, have since changed their -opinion. And so, even still, Kirkpatrick (on the whole), Von Orelli, -Robertson,[1074] Stanley Leathes and Sinker.[1075] The reasons which -these scholars have given for the early date of Joel are roughly as -follows.[1076] His book occurs among the earliest of the Twelve: while -it is recognised that the order of these is not strictly chronological, -it is alleged that there is a division between the pre-exilic and -post-exilic prophets, and that Joel is found among the former. The -vagueness of his representations in general, and of his pictures of the -Day of Jehovah in particular, is attributed to the simplicity of the -earlier religion of Israel, and to the want of that analysis of its -leading conceptions which was the work of later prophets.[1077] His -horror of the interruption of the daily offerings in the Temple, caused -by the plague of locusts,[1078] is ascribed to a fear which pervaded -the primitive ages of all peoples.[1079] In Joel’s attitude towards -other nations, whom he condemns to judgment, Ewald saw “the old -unsubdued warlike spirit of the times of Deborah and David.” The -prophet’s absorption in the ravages of the locusts is held to reflect -the feeling of a purely agricultural community, such as Israel was -before the eighth century. The absence of the name of Assyria from the -book is assigned to the same unwillingness to give the name as we see -in Amos and the earlier prophecies of Isaiah, and it is thought by some -that, though not named, the Assyrians are symbolised by the locusts. -The absence of all mention of the Law is also held by some to prove an -early date: though other critics, who believe that the Levitical -legislation was extant in Israel from the earliest times, find proof of -this in Joel’s insistence upon the daily offering. The absence of all -mention of a king and the prominence given to the priests are explained -by assigning the prophecy to the minority of King Joash of Judah, when -Jehoyada the priest was regent;[1080] the charge against Egypt and Edom -of spilling innocent blood by Shishak’s invasion of Judah,[1081] and by -the revolt of the Edomites under Jehoram;[1082] the charge against the -Philistines and Phœnicians by the Chronicler’s account of Philistine -raids[1083] in the reign of Jehoram of Judah, and by the oracles of -Amos against both nations;[1084] and the mention of the Vale of -Jehoshaphat by that king’s defeat of Moab, Ammon and Edom in the Vale -of Berakhah.[1085] These allusions being recognised, it was deduced -from them that the parallels between Joel and Amos were due to Amos -having quoted from Joel.[1086] - -These reasons are not all equally cogent,[1087] and even the strongest -of them do not prove more than the possibility of an early date for -Joel.[1088] Nor do they meet every historical difficulty. The minority -of Joash, upon which they converge, fell at a time when Aram was not -only prominent to the thoughts of Israel, but had already been felt to -be an enemy as powerful as the Philistines or Edomites. But the Book of -Joel does not mention Aram. It mentions the Greeks,[1089] and, although -we have no right to say that such a notice was impossible in Israel -in the ninth century, it was not only improbable, but no other Hebrew -document from before the Exile speaks of Greece, and in particular -Amos does not when describing the Phœnicians as slave-traders.[1090] -The argument that the Book of Joel must be early because it was placed -among the first six of the Twelve Prophets by the arrangers of the -Prophetic Canon, who could not have forgotten Joel’s date had he lived -after 450, loses all force from the fact that in the same group of -pre-exilic prophets we find the exilic Obadiah and the post-exilic -Jonah, both of them in precedence to Micah. - -The argument for the early date of Joel is, therefore, not conclusive. -But there are besides serious objections to it, which make for the -other solution of the alternative we started from, and lead us to place -Joel after the establishment of the Law by Ezra and Nehemiah in 444 B.C. - -A post-exilic date was first proposed by Vatke,[1091] and then -defended by Hilgenfeld,[1092] and by Duhm in 1875.[1093] From this -time the theory made rapid way, winning over many who had previously -held the early date of Joel, like Oort,[1094] Kuenen,[1095] A. B. -Davidson,[1096] Driver and Cheyne,[1097] perhaps also Wellhausen,[1098] -and finding acceptance and new proofs from a gradually increasing -majority of younger critics, Merx,[1099] Robertson Smith,[1100] -Stade,[1101] Matthes and Scholz,[1102] Holzinger,[1103] Farrar,[1104] -Kautzsch,[1105] Cornill,[1106] Wildeboer,[1107] G. B. Gray[1108] and -Nowack.[1109] The reasons which have led to this formidable change of -opinion in favour of the late date of the Book of Joel are as follows. - -In the first place, the Exile of Judah appears in it as already past. -This is proved, not by the ambiguous phrase, _when I shall bring again -the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem_,[1110] but by the plain statement -that _the heathen have scattered Israel among the nations and divided -their land_.[1111] The plunder of the Temple seems also to be -implied.[1112] Moreover, no great world-power is pictured as either -threatening or actually persecuting God’s people; but Israel’s active -enemies and enslavers are represented as her own neighbours, Edomites, -Philistines and Phœnicians, and the last are represented as selling -Jewish captives to the Greeks. All this suits, if it does not -absolutely prove, the Persian age, before the reign of Artaxerxes -Ochus, who was the first Persian king to treat the Jews with -cruelty.[1113] The Greeks, Javan, do not appear in any Hebrew writer -before the Exile;[1114] the form in which their name is given by Joel, -B’ne ha-Jevanim, has admittedly a late sound about it,[1115] and we -know from other sources that it was in the fifth and fourth centuries -that Syrian slaves were in demand in Greece.[1116] Similarly with the -internal condition of the Jews as reflected in Joel. No king is -mentioned; but the priests are prominent, and the elders are introduced -at least once.[1117] It is an agricultural calamity, and that alone, -unmixed with any political alarm, which is the omen of the coming Day -of the Lord. All this suits the state of Jerusalem under the Persians. -Take again the religious temper and emphasis of the book. The latter is -laid, as we have seen, very remarkably upon the horror of the -interruption by the plague of locusts of the daily meal and drink -offerings, and in the later history of Israel the proofs are many of -the exceeding importance with which the regularity of this was -regarded.[1118] This, says Professor A. B. Davidson, “is very unlike -the way in which all other prophets down to Jeremiah speak of the -sacrificial service.” The priests, too, are called to take the -initiative; and the summons to a solemn and formal fast, without any -notice of the particular sins of the people or exhortations to distinct -virtues, contrasts with the attitude to fasts of the earlier prophets, -and with their insistence upon a change of life as the only acceptable -form of penitence.[1119] And another contrast with the earliest -prophets is seen in the general apocalyptic atmosphere and colouring of -the Book of Joel, as well as in some of the particular figures in which -this is expressed, and which are derived from later prophets like -Zephaniah and Ezekiel.[1120] - -These evidences for a late date are supported, on the whole, by the -language of the book. Of this Merx furnishes many details, and by a -careful examination, which makes due allowance for the poetic form of -the book and for possible glosses, Holzinger has shown that there are -symptoms in vocabulary, grammar and syntax which at least are more -reconcilable with a late than with an early date.[1121] There are a -number of Aramaic words, of Hebrew words used in the sense in which -they are used by Aramaic, but by no other Hebrew, writers, and several -terms and constructions which appear only in the later books of the Old -Testament or very seldom in the early ones.[1122] It is true that these -do not stand in a large proportion to the rest of Joel’s vocabulary and -grammar, which is classic and suitable to an early period of the -literature; but this may be accounted for by the large use which the -prophet makes of the very words of earlier writers. Take this large use -into account, and the unmistakable Aramaisms of the book become even -more emphatic in their proof of a late date. - -The literary parallels between Joel and other writers are unusually -many for so small a book. They number at least twenty in seventy-two -verses. The other books of the Old Testament in which they occur are -about twelve. Where one writer has parallels with many, we do not -necessarily conclude that he is the borrower, unless we find that some -of the phrases common to both are characteristic of the other writers, -or that, in his text of them, there are differences from theirs which -may reasonably be reckoned to be of a later origin. But that both of -these conditions are found in the parallels between Joel and other -prophets has been shown by Prof. Driver and Mr. G. B. Gray. “Several of -the parallels—either in their entirety or by virtue of certain words -which they contain—have their affinities solely or chiefly in the later -writings. But the significance [of this] is increased when the very -difference between a passage in Joel and its parallel in another book -consists in a word or phrase characteristic of the later centuries. -That a passage in a writer of the ninth century should differ from its -parallel in a subsequent writer by the presence of a word elsewhere -confined to the later literature would be strange; a single instance -would not, indeed, be inexplicable in view of the scantiness of -extant writings; but every additional instance—though itself not -very convincing—renders the strangeness greater.” And again, “the -variations in some of the parallels as found in Joel have other common -peculiarities. This also finds its natural explanation in the fact -that Joel quotes: for that the _same_ author even when quoting from -different sources should quote with variations of the same character -is natural, but that _different_ authors quoting from a common source -should follow the same method of quotation is improbable.”[1123] “While -in some of the parallels a comparison discloses indications that the -phrase in Joel is probably the later, in other cases, even though the -expression may in itself be met with earlier, it becomes frequent only -in a later age, and the use of it by Joel increases the presumption -that he stands by the side of the later writers.”[1124] - -In face of so many converging lines of evidence, we shall not wonder -that there should have come about so great a change in the opinion of -the majority of critics on the date of Joel, and that it should now be -assigned by them to a post-exilic date. Some place it in the sixth -century before Christ,[1125] some in the first half of the fifth before -“Malachi” and Nehemiah,[1126] but the most after the full establishment -of the Law by Ezra and Nehemiah in 444 B.C.[1127] It is difficult, -perhaps impossible, to decide. Nothing certain can be deduced from the -mention of the _city wall_ in chap. ii. 9, from which Robertson Smith -and Cornill infer that Nehemiah’s walls were already built. Nor can we -be sure that Joel quotes the phrase, _before the great and terrible day -of Jehovah come_, from “Malachi,”[1128] although this is rendered -probable by the character of Joel’s other parallels. But the absence of -all reference to the prophets as a class, the promise of the rigorous -exclusion of foreigners from Jerusalem,[1129] the condemnation to -judgment of all the heathen, and the strong apocalyptic character of -the book, would incline us to place it after Ezra rather than before. -How far after, it is impossible to say, but the absence of feeling -against Persia requires a date before the cruelties inflicted by -Artaxerxes about 360.[1130] - -One solution, which has lately been offered for the problems of date -presented by the Book of Joel, deserves some notice. In his German -translation of Driver’s _Introduction to the Old Testament_,[1131] -Rothstein questions the integrity of the prophecy, and alleges reasons -for dividing it into two sections. Chaps. i. and ii. (Heb.; i.—ii. 27 -Eng.) he assigns to an early author, writing in the minority of King -Joash, but chaps. iii. and iv. (Heb.; ii. 28—iii. Eng.) to a date after -the Exile, while ii. 20, which, it will be remembered, Robertson Smith -takes as a gloss, he attributes to the editor who has joined the two -sections together. His reasons are that chaps. i. and ii. are entirely -taken up with the physical plague of locusts, and no troubles from -heathen are mentioned; while chaps. iii. and iv. say nothing of a -physical plague, but the evils they deplore for Israel are entirely -political, the assaults of enemies. Now it is quite within the bounds -of possibility that chaps. iii. and iv. are from another hand than -chaps. i. and ii.: we have nothing to disprove that. But, on the other -hand, there is nothing to prove it. On the contrary, the possibility of -all four chapters being from the same hand is very obvious. Joel -mentions no heathen in the first chapter, because he is engrossed with -the plague of locusts. But when this has passed, it is quite natural -that he should take up the standing problem of Israel’s history—their -relation to heathen peoples. There is no discrepancy between the two -different subjects, nor between the styles in which they are -respectively treated. Rothstein’s arguments for an early date for -chaps. i. and ii. have been already answered, and when we come to the -exposition of them we shall find still stronger reasons for assigning -them to the end of the fifth century before Christ. The assault on the -integrity of the prophecy may therefore be said to have failed, though -no one who remembers the composite character of the prophetical books -can deny that the question is still open.[1132] - - - 2. THE INTERPRETATION OF THE BOOK: IS IT DESCRIPTION, - ALLEGORY OR APOCALYPSE? - -Another question to which we must address ourselves before we can pass -to the exposition of Joel’s prophecies is of the attitude and intention -of the prophet. Does he describe or predict? Does he give history or -allegory? - -Joel starts from a great plague of locusts, which he describes not only -in the ravages they commit upon the land, but in their ominous -foreshadowing of the Day of the Lord. They are the heralds of God’s -near judgment upon the nation. Let the latter repent instantly with a -day of fasting and prayer. Peradventure Jehovah will relent, and spare -His people. So far chap. i. 2—ii. 17. Then comes a break. An uncertain -interval appears to elapse; and in chap. ii. 18 we are told that -Jehovah’s zeal for Israel has been stirred, and He has had pity on His -folk. Promises follow, _first_, of deliverance from the plague and of -restoration of the harvests it has consumed, and _second_, of the -outpouring of the Spirit on all classes of the community: chap. ii. -17-32 (Eng.; ii. 17—iii. Heb.). Chap. iii. (Eng.; iv. Heb.) gives -another picture of the Day of Jehovah, this time described as a -judgment upon the heathen enemies of Israel. They shall be brought -together, condemned judicially by Him, and slain by His hosts, His -“supernatural” hosts. Jerusalem shall be freed from the feet of -strangers, and the fertility of the land restored. - -These are the contents of the book. Do they describe an actual plague -of locusts, already experienced by the people? Or do they predict this -as still to come? And again, are the locusts which they describe real -locusts, or a symbol and allegory of the human foes of Israel? To these -two questions, which in a measure cross and involve each other, three -kinds of answer have been given. - -A large and growing majority of critics of all schools[1133] hold that -Joel starts, like other prophets, from the facts of experience. His -locusts, though described with poetic hyperbole—for are they not the -vanguard of the awful Day of God’s judgment?—are real locusts; their -plague has just been felt by his contemporaries, whom he summons to -repent, and to whom, when they have repented, he brings promises of the -restoration of their ruined harvests, the outpouring of the Spirit, and -judgment upon their foes. Prediction is therefore found only in the -second half of the book (ii. 18 onwards): it rests upon a basis of -narrative and exhortation which fills the first half. - -But a number of other critics have argued (and with great force) -that the prophet’s language about the locusts is too aggravated and -too ominous to be limited to the natural plague which these insects -periodically inflicted upon Palestine. Joel (they reason) would hardly -have connected so common an adversity with so singular and ultimate a -crisis as the Day of the Lord. Under the figure of locusts he must be -describing some more fateful agency of God’s wrath upon Israel. More -than one trait of his description appears to imply a human army. It can -only be one or other, or all, of those heathen powers whom at different -periods God raised up to chastise His delinquent people; and this -opinion is held to be supported by the facts that chap. ii. 20 speaks -of them as the Northern and chap. iii. (Eng.; iv. Heb.) deals with the -heathen. The locusts of chaps. i. and ii. are the same as the heathen -of chap. iii. In chaps. i. and ii. they are described as threatening -Israel, but on condition of Israel repenting (chap. ii. 18 ff.) the -Day of the Lord which they herald shall be their destruction and not -Israel’s (chap. iii.).[1134] - -The supporters of this allegorical interpretation of Joel are, however, -divided among themselves as to whether the heathen powers symbolised by -the locusts are described as having already afflicted Israel or are -predicted as still to come. Hilgenfeld,[1135] for instance, says that -the prophet in chaps. i. and ii. speaks of their ravages as already -past. To him their fourfold plague described in chap. i. 4 symbolises -four Persian assaults upon Palestine, after the last of which in 358 -the prophecy must therefore have been written.[1136] Others read them -as still to come. In our own country Pusey has been the strongest -supporter of this theory.[1137] To him the whole book, written before -Amos, is prediction. “It extends from the prophet’s own day to the end -of time.” Joel calls the scourge the Northern: he directs the priests -to pray for its removal, that _the heathen may not rule over God’s -heritage_;[1138] he describes the agent as a responsible one;[1139] his -imagery goes far beyond the effects of locusts, and threatens drought, -fire and plague,[1140] the assault of cities and the terrifying of -peoples.[1141] The scourge is to be destroyed in a way physically -inapplicable to locusts;[1142] and the promises of its removal include -the remedy of ravages which mere locusts could not inflict: the -captivity of Judah is to be turned, and the land recovered from -foreigners who are to be banished from it.[1143] Pusey thus reckons as -future the relenting of God, consequent upon the people’s penitence: -chap. ii. 18 ff. The past tenses in which it is related, he takes as -instances of the well-known prophetic perfect, according to which the -prophets express their assurance of things to come by describing them -as if they had already happened. - -This is undoubtedly a strong case for the predictive and allegorical -character of the Book of Joel; but a little consideration will show -us that the facts on which it is grounded are capable of a different -explanation than that which it assumes, and that Pusey has overlooked -a number of other facts which force us to a literal interpretation of -the locusts as a plague already past, even though we feel they are -described in the language of poetical hyperbole. - -For, in the first place, Pusey’s theory implies that the prophecy is -addressed to a future generation, who shall be alive when the predicted -invasions of heathen come upon the land. Whereas Joel obviously -addresses his own contemporaries. The prophet and his hearers are -one. _Before our eyes_, he says, _the food has been cut off_.[1144] -As obviously, he speaks of the plague of locusts as of something that -has just happened. His hearers can compare its effects with past -disasters, which it has far exceeded;[1145] and it is their duty to -hand down the story of it to future generations.[1146] Again, his -description is that of a physical, not of a political, plague. Fields -and gardens, vines and figs, are devastated by being stripped and -gnawed. Drought accompanies the locusts, the seed shrivels beneath the -clods, the trees languish, the cattle pant for want of water.[1147] -These are not the trail which an invading army leave behind them. In -support of his theory that human hosts are meant, Pusey points to -the verses which bid the people pray _that the heathen rule not over -them_, and which describe the invaders as attacking cities.[1148] But -the former phrase may be rendered with equal propriety, _that the -heathen make not satirical songs about them_;[1149] and as to the -latter, not only do locusts invade towns exactly as Joel describes, -but his words that the invader steals into houses like _a thief_ are -far more applicable to the insidious entrance of locusts than to the -bold and noisy assault of a storming party. Moreover Pusey and the -other allegorical interpreters of the book overlook the fact that Joel -never so much as hints at the invariable effects of a human invasion, -massacre and plunder. He describes no slaying and no looting; but when -he comes to the promise that Jehovah will restore the losses which have -been sustained by His people, he defines them as the years which His -army has _eaten_.[1150] But all this proof is clenched by the fact that -Joel compares the locusts to actual soldiers.[1151] They are _like_ -horsemen, the sound of them is _like_ chariots, they run _like_ horses, -and _like_ men of war they leap upon the wall. Joel could never have -compared a real army to itself! - -The allegorical interpretation is therefore untenable. But some -critics, while admitting this, are yet not disposed to take the first -part of the book for narrative. They admit that the prophet means -a plague of locusts, but they deny that he is speaking of a plague -already past, and hold that his locusts are still to come, that they -are as much a part of the future as the pouring out of the -Spirit[1152] and the judgment of the heathen in the Valley of -Jehoshaphat.[1153] All alike, they are signs or accompaniments of -the Day of Jehovah, and that Day has still to break. The prophet’s -scenery is apocalyptic; the locusts are “eschatological locusts,” not -historical ones. This interpretation of Joel has been elaborated by Dr. -Adalbert Merx, and the following is a summary of his opinions.[1154] - - After examining the book along all the lines of exposition which have - been proposed, Merx finds himself unable to trace any plan or even - sign of a plan; and his only escape from perplexity is the belief that - no plan can ever have been meant by the author. Joel weaves in one - past, present and future, paints situations only to blot them out and - put others in their place, starts many processes but develops none. - His book shows no insight into God’s plan with Israel, but is purely - external; the bearing and the end of it is the material prosperity of - the little land of Judah. From this Merx concludes that the book is - not an original work, but a mere summary of passages from previous - prophets, that with a few reflections of the life of the Jews after - the Return lead us to assign it to that period of literary culture - which Nehemiah inaugurated by the collection of national writings and - which was favoured by the cessation of all political disturbance. Joel - gathered up the pictures of the Messianic age in the older prophets, - and welded them together in one long prayer by the fervid belief that - that age was near. But while the older prophets spoke upon the ground - of actual fact and rose from this to a majestic picture of the last - punishment, the still life of Joel’s time had nothing such to offer - him and he had to seek another basis for his prophetic flight. It is - probable that he sought this in the relation of Type and Antitype. The - Antitype he found in the liberation from Egypt, the darkness and the - locusts of which he transferred to his canvas from Exodus x. 4-6. The - locusts, therefore, are neither real nor symbolic, but ideal. This is - the method of the Midrash and Haggada in Jewish literature, which - constantly placed over against each other the deliverance from Egypt - and the last judgment. It is a method that is already found in such - portions of the Old Testament as Ezekiel xxxvii. and Psalm lxxviii. - Joel’s locusts are borrowed from the Egyptian plagues, but are - presented as the signs of the Last Day. They will bring it near to - Israel by famine, drought and the interruption of worship described in - chap. i. Chap. ii., which Merx keeps distinct from chap. i., is based - on a study of Ezekiel, from whom Joel has borrowed, among other - things, the expressions _the garden of Eden_ and _the Northerner_. The - two verses generally held to be historic, 18 and 19, Merx takes to be - the continuation of the prayer of the priests, pointing the verbs so - as to turn them from perfects into futures.[1155] The rest of the - book, Merx strives to show, is pieced together from many prophets, - chiefly Isaiah and Ezekiel, but without the tender spiritual feeling - of the one, or the colossal magnificence of the other. Special nations - are mentioned, but in this portion of the work we have to do not with - events already past, but with general views, and these not original, - but conditioned by the expressions of earlier writers. There is no - history in the book: it is all ideal, mystical, apocalyptic. That is - to say, according to Merx, there is no real prophet or prophetic fire, - only an old man warming his feeble hands over a few embers that he has - scraped together from the ashes of ancient fires, now nearly wholly - dead. - - Merx has traced Joel’s relations to other prophets, and reflection of - a late date in Israel’s history, with care and ingenuity; but his - treatment of the text and exegesis of the prophet’s meaning are alike - forced and fanciful. In face of the support which the Massoretic - reading of the hinge of the book, chap. ii. 18 ff., receives from the - ancient versions, and of its inherent probability and harmony with the - context, Merx’s textual emendation is unnecessary, besides being in - itself unnatural.[1156] While the very same objections which we have - already found valid against the allegorical interpretation equally - dispose of this mystical one. Merx outrages the evident features of - the book almost as much as Hengstenberg and Pusey have done. He has - lifted out of time altogether that which plainly purports to be - historical. His literary criticism is as unsound as his textual. It is - only by ignoring the beautiful poetry of chap. i. that he transplants - it to the future. Joel’s figures are too vivid, too actual, to be - predictive or mystical. And the whole interpretation wrecks itself in - the same verse as the allegorical, the verse, viz., in which Joel - plainly speaks of himself as having suffered with his hearers the - plague he describes.[1157] - -We may, therefore, with confidence conclude that the allegorical and -mystical interpretations of Joel are impossible; and that the only -reasonable view of our prophet is that which regards him as calling, -in chap. i. 2—ii. 17, upon his contemporaries to repent in face of -a plague of locusts, so unusually severe that he has felt it to be -ominous of even the Day of the Lord; and in the rest of his book, -as promising material, political and spiritual triumphs to Israel -in consequence of their repentance, either already consummated, or -anticipated by the prophet as certain. - -It is true that the account of the locusts appears to bear features -which conflict with the literal interpretation. Some of these, however, -vanish upon a fuller knowledge of the awful degree which such a plague -has been testified to reach by competent observers within our own -era.[1158] Those that remain may be attributed partly to the poetic -hyperbole of Joel’s style, and partly to the fact that he sees in -the plague far more than itself. The locusts are signs of the Day of -Jehovah. Joel treats them as we found Zephaniah treating the Scythian -hordes of his day. They are as real as the latter, but on them as on -the latter the lurid glare of Apocalypse has fallen, magnifying them -and investing them with that air of ominousness which is the sole -justification of the allegorical and mystic interpretation of their -appearance. - -To the same sense of their office as heralds of the last day, we owe -the description of the locusts as _the Northerner_.[1159] The North -is not the quarter from which locusts usually reach Palestine, nor -is there any reason to suppose that by naming the North Joel meant -only to emphasise the unusual character of these swarms. Rather he -takes a name employed in Israel since Jeremiah’s time to express the -instruments of Jehovah’s wrath in the day of His judgment of Israel. -The name is typical of Doom, and therefore Joel applies it to his -fateful locusts. - - - 3. STATE OF THE TEXT AND THE STYLE OF THE BOOK. - -Joel’s style is fluent and clear, both when he is describing the -locusts, in which part of his book he is most original, and when he -is predicting, in apocalyptic language largely borrowed from earlier -prophets, the Day of Jehovah. To the ease of understanding him we may -attribute the sound state of the text and its freedom from glosses. In -this, like most of the books of the post-exilic prophets, especially -the Books of Haggai, “Malachi” and Jonah, Joel’s book contrasts very -favourably with those of the older prophets; and that also, to some -degree, is proof of the lateness of his date. The Greek translators -have, on the whole, understood Joel easily and with little error. -In their version there are the usual differences of grammatical -construction, especially in the pronominal suffixes and verbs, and of -punctuation; but very few bits of expansion and no real additions. -These are all noted in the translation below. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1068] See above, Chap. XIII. - -[1069] See Vol. I. The Assyria of “Zech.” x. 11 is Syria. See below. - -[1070] The two exceptions, Nahum and Habakkuk, are not relevant to this -question. Their dates are fixed by their references to Assyria and -Babylon. - -[1071] See Rob. Smith, art. “Joel,” _Encyc. Brit._ - -[1072] So obvious is this alternative that all critics may be said to -grant it, except König (_Einl._), on whose reasons for placing Joel -in the end of the seventh century see below, p. 386, n. 1130. Kessner -(_Das Zeitalter der Proph. Joel_, 1888) deems the date unprovable. - -[1073] See _The Religion of Israel_, Vol. I., pp. 86 f. - -[1074] _The O.T. and its Contents_, p. 105. - -[1075] _Lex Mosaica_, pp. 422, 450. - -[1076] See especially Ewald on Joel in his _Prophets of the O.T._, and -Kirkpatrick’s very fair argument in _Doctrine of the Prophets_, pp. 57 -ff. - -[1077] On Joel’s picture of the Day of Jehovah Ewald says: “We have it -here in its first simple and clear form, nor has it become a subject of -ridicule as in Amos.” - -[1078] i. 9, 13, 16, ii. 14. - -[1079] So Ewald. - -[1080] 2 Kings xi. 4-21. - -[1081] 1 Kings xiv. 25 f.: cf. Joel iii. 17_b_, 19. - -[1082] 2 Kings viii. 20-22: cf. Joel iii. 19. - -[1083] 2 Chron. xxi. 16, 17, xxii. 1: cf. Joel iii. 4-6. - -[1084] Amos i.: cf. Joel iii. 4-6. - -[1085] 2 Chron. xx., especially 26: cf. Joel iii. 2. - -[1086] Joel iii. (Eng.; iv. Heb.) 16; Amos i. 2. For a list of the -various periods to which Joel has been assigned by supporters of this -early date see Kuenen, § 68. - -[1087] The reference of Egypt in iii. 19 to Shishak’s invasion appears -particularly weak. - -[1088] Cf. Robertson, _O. T. and its Contents_, 105, and Kirkpatrick’s -cautious, though convinced, statement of the reasons for an early date. - -[1089] iii. 6 (Heb. iv. 6). - -[1090] Amos i. 9. - -[1091] _Bibl. Theol._, I., p. 462; _Einl._, pp. 675 ff. - -[1092] _Ztschr. f. wissensch. Theol._, X., Heft 4. - -[1093] _Theol. der Proph._, pp. 275 ff. - -[1094] _Theol. Tijd._, 1876, pp. 362 ff. (not seen). - -[1095] _Onderz._, § 68. - -[1096] _Expositor_, 1888, Jan.—June, pp. 198 ff. - -[1097] See Cheyne, _Origin of Psalter_, xx.; Driver, _Introd._, in the -sixth edition of which, 1897, he supports the late date of Joel more -strongly than in the first edition, 1892. - -[1098] Wellhausen allowed the theory of the early date of Joel to stand -in his edition of Bleek’s _Einleitung_, but adopts the late date in his -own _Kleine Propheten_. - -[1099] _Die Prophetie des Joels u. ihre Ausleger_, 1879. - -[1100] _Encyc. Brit._, art. “Joel,” 1881. - -[1101] _Gesch._, II. 207. - -[1102] _Theol. Tijdschr._, 1885, p. 151; _Comm._, 1885 (neither seen). - -[1103] “Sprachcharakter u. Abfassungszeit des B. Joels” in _Z.A.T.W._, -1889, pp. 89 ff. - -[1104] _Minor Prophets._ - -[1105] _Bibel._ - -[1106] _Einleit._ - -[1107] _Litteratur des A. T._ - -[1108] _Expositor_, September 1893. - -[1109] _Comm._, 1897. - -[1110] iv. (Heb.; iii. Eng.) 1. For this may only mean _turn again the -fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem_. - -[1111] iv. (Heb.; iii. Eng.) 2. The supporters of a pre-exilic date -either passed this over or understood it of incursions by the heathen -into Israel’s territories in the ninth century. It is, however, too -universal to suit these. - -[1112] iv. (Heb.; iii. Eng.) 5. - -[1113] Kautzsch dates after Artaxerxes Ochus, and _c._ 350. - -[1114] Ezekiel (xxvii. 13, 19) is the first to give the name Javan, -_i.e._ ΙαϜων, or Ionian (earlier writers name Egypt, Edom, Arabia -and Phœnicia as the great slave-markets: Amos i.; Isa. xi. 11; Deut. -xxviii. 68); and Greeks are also mentioned in Isa. lxvi. 19 (a -post-exilic passage); Zech. ix. 13; Dan. viii. 21, x. 20, xi. 2; 1 -Chron. i. 5, 7, and Gen. x. 2. See below, Chap. XXXI. - -[1115] בני היונים instead of בני יון, just as the Chronicler gives -בני הקרחים for בני קרח: see Wildeboer, p. 348, and Matthes, quoted by -Holzinger, p. 94. - -[1116] Movers, _Phön. Alterthum._, II. 1, pp. 70 _sqq._: which -reference I owe to R. Smith’s art. in the _Encyc. Brit._ - -[1117] With these might be taken the use of קהל (ii. 16) in its sense of -a gathering for public worship. The word itself was old in Hebrew, but -as time went on it came more and more to mean the convocation of the -nation for worship or deliberation. Holzinger, pp. 105 f. - -[1118] Cf. Neh. x. 33; Dan. viii. 11, xi. 31, xii. 11. Also Acts xxvi. -7: τὸ δωδεκάφυλον ἡμῶν ἐν ἐκτενεία νύκτα καὶ ἡμέραν λατρεύον. Also the -passages in Jos., XIV. _Ant._ iv. 3, xvi. 2, in which Josephus mentions -the horror caused by the interruption of the daily sacrifice by famine -in the last siege of Jerusalem, and adds that it had happened in no -previous siege of the city. - -[1119] Cf. Jer. xiv. 12; Isa. lviii. 6; Zech. vii. 5, vi. 11, 19, with -Neh. i. 4, ix. 1; Ezra viii. 21; Jonah iii. 5, 7; Esther iv. 3, 16, ix. -31; Dan. ix. 3. - -[1120] The gathering of the Gentiles to judgment, Zeph. iii. 8 (see -above, p. 69) and Ezek. xxxviii. 22; the stream issuing from the Temple -to fill the Wady ha-Shittim, Ezek. xlvii. 1 ff., cf. Zech. xiv. 8; the -outpouring of the Spirit, Ezek. xxxix. 29. - -[1121] _Z.A.T.W._, 1889, pp. 89-136. Holzinger’s own conclusion is -stated more emphatically than above. - -[1122] For an exhaustive list the reader must be referred to -Holzinger’s article (cf. Driver, _Introd._, sixth edition; _Joel and -Amos_, p. 24; G. B. Gray, _Expositor_, September 1893, p. 212). But the -following (a few of which are not given by Holzinger) are sufficient to -prove the conclusion come to above: i. 2, iv. 4, וְאִם ... הֲ— this -is the form of the disjunctive interrogative in later O. T. writings, -replacing the earlier אִם ... הֲ; i. 8, אלי only here in O. T., but -frequent in Aram.; 13, נמנע in Ni. only from Jeremiah onwards, Qal only -in two passages before Jeremiah and in a number after him; 18, נאנחה, -if the correct reading, occurs only in the latest O. T. writings, the -Qal only in these and Aram.; ii. 2, iv. (Heb.; iii. Eng.) 20, דור ודור -first in Deut. xxxii. 7, and then exilic and post-exilic frequently; 8, -שלח, a late word, only in Job xxxiii. 18, xxxvi. 12, 2 Chron. xxiii. -10, xxxii. 5, Neh. iii. 15, iv. 11, 17; 20, סוֹף, _end_, only in 2 -Chron. xx. 16 and Eccles., Aram. of Daniel, and post Bibl. Aram. and -Heb.; iv. (Heb.; iii. Eng.) 4, נמל על, cf. 2 Chron. xx. 11; 10, רמח, -see below on this verse; 11, הנחת, Aram.; 13, בשׁל, in Hebrew to cook -(cf. Ezek. xxiv. 5), and in other forms always with that meaning down -to the Priestly Writing and “Zech.” ix.—xiv., is used here in the sense -of _ripen_, which is frequent in Aram., but does not occur elsewhere -in O. T. Besides, Joel uses for the first personal pronoun אני—ii. 27 -(_bis_), iv. 10, 17—which is by far the most usual form with later -writers, and not אנכי, preferred by pre-exilic writers. (See below on -the language of Jonah.) - -[1123] G. B. Gray, _Expositor_, September 1893, pp. 213 f. For -the above conclusions ample proof is given in Mr. Gray’s detailed -examination of the parallels: pp. 214 ff. - -[1124] Driver, _Joel and Amos_, p. 27. - -[1125] Scholz and Rosenzweig (not seen). - -[1126] Hilgenfeld, Duhm, Oort. Driver puts it “most safely shortly -after Haggai and Zechariah i.—viii., _c._ 500 B.C.” - -[1127] Vernes, Robertson Smith, Kuenen, Matthes, Cornill, Nowack, etc. - -[1128] Joel iii. 4 (Heb.; Eng. ii. 31); “Mal.” iv. 5. - -[1129] iii. (Eng.; iv. Heb.) 17. - -[1130] Perhaps this is the most convenient place to refer to König’s -proposal to place Joel in the last years of Josiah. Some of his -arguments (_e.g._ that Joel is placed among the first of the Twelve) -we have already answered. He thinks that i. 17-20 suit the great -drought in Josiah’s reign (Jer. xiv. 2-6), that the name given to the -locusts, הצפוני, ii. 20, is due to Jeremiah’s enemy _from the north_, -and that the phrases _return with all your heart_, ii. 12, and _return -to Jehovah your God_, 13, imply a period of apostasy. None of these -conclusions is necessary. The absence of reference to the _high places_ -finds an analogy in Isa. i. 13; the מנחה is mentioned in Isa. i. 13: -if Amos viii. 5 testifies to observance of the Sabbath, and Nahum ii. -1 to other festivals, who can say a pre-exilic prophet would not be -interested in the meal and drink offerings? But surely no pre-exilic -prophet would have so emphasised these as Joel has done. Nor is König’s -explanation of iv. 2 as of the Assyrian and Egyptian invasion of Judah -so probable as that which refers the verse to the Babylonian exile. -Nor are König’s objections to a date after “Malachi” convincing. -They are that a prophet near “Malachi’s” time must have specified as -“Malachi” did the reasons for the repentance to which he summoned the -people, while Joel gives none, but is quite general (ii. 13_a_). But -the change of attitude may be accounted for by the covenant and Law of -444. “Malachi” i. 11 speaks of the Gentiles worshipping Jehovah, but -not even in Jonah iii. 5 is any relation of the Gentiles to Jehovah -predicated. Again, the greater exclusiveness of Ezra and his Law may be -the cause. Joel, it is true, as König says, does not mention the Law, -while “Malachi” does (ii. 8, etc.); but this was not necessary if the -people had accepted it in 444. Professor Ryle (_Canon of O.T._, 106 n.) -leaves the question of Joel’s date open. - -[1131] Pages 333 f. n. - -[1132] Vernes, _Histoire des Idées Messianiques depuis Alexandre_, -pp. 13 ff., had already asserted that chaps. i. and ii. must be by -a different author from chaps. iii. and iv., because the former has -to do wholly with the writer’s present, with which the latter has -no connection whatever, but it is entirely eschatological. But in -his _Mélanges de Crit. Relig._, pp. 218 ff., Vernes allows that his -arguments are not conclusive, and that all four chapters may have come -from the same hand. - -[1133] _I.e._ Hitzig, Vatke, Ewald, Robertson Smith, Kuenen, -Kirkpatrick, Driver, Davidson, Nowack, etc. - -[1134] This allegorical interpretation was a favourite one with the -early Christian Fathers: cf. Jerome. - -[1135] _Zeitschr. für wissensch. Theologie_, 1860, pp. 412 ff. - -[1136] Cambyses 525, Xerxes 484, Artaxerxes Ochus 460 and 458. - -[1137] In Germany, among other representatives of this opinion, -are Bertholdt (_Einl._) and Hengstenberg (_Christol._, III. 352 -ff.), the latter of whom saw in the four kinds of locusts the -Assyrian-Babylonian, the Persian, the Greek and the Roman tyrants of -Israel. - -[1138] ii. 17. - -[1139] ii. 20. - -[1140] i. 19, 20. - -[1141] Plur. ii. 6. - -[1142] ii. 20. - -[1143] iii. (Heb. iv.) 1 f., 17. - -[1144] i. 16. - -[1145] i. 2 f. - -[1146] i. 3. - -[1147] i. 17 ff. - -[1148] ii. 17, ii. 9 ff. - -[1149] למשל בם - -[1150] A. B. Davidson, _Expos._, 1888, pp. 200 f. - -[1151] ii. 4 ff. - -[1152] Eng. ii. 28 ff., Heb. iii. - -[1153] Eng. iii., Heb. iv. - -[1154] _Die Prophetie des Joel u. ihre Ausleger_, 1879. The following -summary and criticism of Merx’s views I take from an (unpublished) -review of his work which I wrote in 1881. - -[1155] For וַיְקַנֵּא etc. he reads וִיקַנֵּא etc. - -[1156] “The proposal of Merx, to change the pointing so as to transform -the perfects into futures, ... is an exegetical monstrosity.”—Robertson -Smith, art. “Joel,” _Encyc. Brit._ - -[1157] i. 16. - -[1158] Even the comparison of the ravages of the locusts to burning -by fire. But probably also Joel means that they were accompanied by -drought and forest fires. See below. - -[1159] ii. 20. - - - - - CHAPTER XXVIII - - _THE LOCUSTS AND THE DAY OF THE LORD_ - - JOEL i.—ii. 17 - - -Joel, as we have seen, found the motive of his prophecy in a recent -plague of locusts, the appearance of which and the havoc they worked -are described by him in full detail. Writing not only as a poet but -as a seer, who reads in the locusts signs of the great Day of the -Lord, Joel has necessarily put into his picture several features which -carry the imagination beyond the limits of experience. And yet, if -we ourselves had lived through such a plague, we should be able to -recognise how little license the poet has taken, and that the seer, so -far from unduly mixing with his facts the colours of Apocalypse, must -have experienced in the terrible plague itself enough to provoke all -the religious and monitory use which he makes of it. - -The present writer has seen but one swarm of locusts, in which, though -it was small and soon swept away by the wind, he felt not only many of -the features that Joel describes, but even some degree of that singular -helplessness before a calamity of portent far beyond itself, something -of that supernatural edge and accent, which, by the confession of so -many observers, characterise the locust-plague and the earthquake above -all other physical disasters. One summer afternoon, upon the plain of -Hauran, a long bank of mist grew rapidly from the western horizon. The -day was dull, and as the mist rose athwart the sunbeams, struggling -through clouds, it gleamed cold and white, like the front of a distant -snow-storm. When it came near, it seemed to be more than a mile broad, -and was dense enough to turn the atmosphere raw and dirty, with a chill -as of a summer sea-fog, only that this was not due to any fall in the -temperature. Nor was there the silence of a mist. We were enveloped -by a noise, less like the whirring of wings than the rattle of hail -or the crackling of bush on fire. Myriads upon myriads of locusts -were about us, covering the ground, and shutting out the view in all -directions. Though they drifted before the wind, there was no confusion -in their ranks. They sailed in unbroken lines, sometimes straight, -sometimes wavy; and when they passed pushing through our caravan, they -left almost no stragglers, except from the last battalion, and only the -few dead which we had caught in our hands. After several minutes they -were again but a lustre on the air, and so melted away into some heavy -clouds in the east. - -Modern travellers furnish us with terrible impressions of the -innumerable multitudes of a locust-plague, the succession of their -swarms through days and weeks, and the utter desolation they leave -behind them. Mr. Doughty writes:[1160] “There hopped before our feet a -minute brood of second locusts, of a leaden colour, with budding wings -like the spring leaves, and born of those gay swarms which a few weeks -before had passed over and despoiled the desert. After forty days these -also would fly as a pestilence, yet more hungry than the former, and -fill the atmosphere.” And later: “The clouds of the second locust brood -which the Arabs call ‘Am’dan, _pillars_, flew over us for some days, -invaded the booths and for blind hunger even bit our shins.”[1161] It -was “a storm of rustling wings.”[1162] “This year was remembered for -the locust swarms and great summer heat.”[1163] A traveller in South -Africa[1164] says: “For the space of ten miles on each side of the -Sea-Cow river and eighty or ninety miles in length, an area of sixteen -or eighteen hundred square miles, the whole surface might literally be -said to be covered with them.” In his recently published book on South -Africa, Mr. Bryce writes:—[1165] - -“It is a strange sight, beautiful if you can forget the destruction it -brings with it. The whole air, to twelve or even eighteen feet above -the ground, is filled with the insects, reddish brown in body, with -bright, gauzy wings. When the sun’s rays catch them it is like the sea -sparkling with light. When you see them against a cloud they are like -the dense flakes of a driving snow-storm. You feel as if you had never -before realised immensity in number. Vast crowds of men gathered at a -festival, countless tree-tops rising along the slope of a forest ridge, -the chimneys of London houses from the top of St. Paul’s—all are as -nothing to the myriads of insects that blot out the sun above and cover -the ground beneath and fill the air whichever way one looks. The breeze -carries them swiftly past, but they come on in fresh clouds, a host of -which there is no end, each of them a harmless creature which you can -catch and crush in your hand, but appalling in their power of -collective devastation.” - -And take three testimonies from Syria: “The quantity of these insects -is a thing incredible to any one who has not seen it himself; the -ground is covered by them for several leagues.”[1166] “The whole face -of the mountain[1167] was black with them. On they came like a living -deluge. We dug trenches and kindled fires, and beat and burnt to death -heaps upon heaps, but the effort was utterly useless. They rolled up -the mountain-side, and poured over rocks, walls, ditches and hedges, -those behind covering up and passing over the masses already killed. -For some days they continued to pass. The noise made by them in -marching and foraging was like that of a heavy shower falling upon a -distant forest.”[1168] “The roads were covered with them, all marching -and in regular lines, like armies of soldiers, with their leaders in -front; and all the opposition of man to resist their progress was in -vain.” Having consumed the plantations in the country, they entered the -towns and villages. “When they approached our garden all the farm -servants were employed to keep them off, but to no avail; though our -men broke their ranks for a moment, no sooner had they passed the men, -than they closed again, and marched forward through hedges and ditches -as before. Our garden finished, they continued their march toward the -town, devastating one garden after another. They have also penetrated -into most of our rooms: whatever one is doing one hears their noise -from without, like the noise of armed hosts, or the running of many -waters. When in an erect position their appearance at a little distance -is like that of a well-armed horseman.”[1169] - -Locusts are notoriously adapted for a plague, “since to strength -incredible for so small a creature, they add saw-like teeth, admirably -calculated to eat up all the herbs in the land.”[1170] They are the -incarnation of hunger. No voracity is like theirs, the voracity of -little creatures, whose million separate appetites nothing is too -minute to escape. They devour first grass and leaves, fruit and -foliage, everything that is green and juicy. Then they attack the young -branches of trees, and then the hard bark of the trunks.[1171] “After -eating up the corn, they fell upon the vines, the pulse, the willows, -and even the hemp, notwithstanding its great bitterness.”[1172] “The -bark of figs, pomegranates and oranges, bitter, hard and corrosive, -escaped not their voracity.”[1173] “They are particularly injurious to -the palm-trees; these they strip of every leaf and green particle, the -trees remaining like skeletons with bare branches.”[1174] “For eighty -or ninety miles they devoured every green herb and every blade of -grass.”[1175] “The gardens outside Jaffa are now completely stripped, -even the bark of the young trees having been devoured, and look like a -birch-tree forest in winter.”[1176] “The bushes were eaten quite bare, -though the animals could not have been long on the spot. They sat by -hundreds on a bush gnawing the rind and the woody fibres.”[1177] -“Bamboo groves have been stripped of their leaves and left standing -like saplings after a rapid bush fire, and grass has been devoured so -that the bare ground appeared as if burned.”[1178] “The country did not -seem to be burnt, but to be much covered with snow through the -whiteness of the trees and the dryness of the herbs.”[1179] The fields -finished, they invade towns and houses, in search of stores. Victual of -all kinds, hay, straw, and even linen and woollen clothes and leather -bottles, they consume or tear in pieces.[1180] They flood through the -open, unglazed windows and lattices: nothing can keep them out. - -These extracts prove to us what little need Joel had of hyperbole in -order to read his locusts as signs of the Day of Jehovah; especially if -we keep in mind that locusts are worst in very hot summers, and often -accompany an absolute drought along with its consequence of prairie and -forest fires. Some have thought that, in introducing the effects of -fire, Joel only means to paint the burnt look of a land after locusts -have ravaged it. But locusts do not drink up the streams, nor cause the -seed to shrivel in the earth.[1181] By these the prophet must mean -drought, and by _the flame that has burned all the trees of the -field_,[1182] the forest fire, finding an easy prey in the trees which -have been reduced to firewood by the locusts’ teeth. - -Even in the great passage in which he passes from history to -Apocalypse, from the gloom and terror of the locusts to the lurid dawn -of Jehovah’s Day, Joel keeps within the actual facts of experience:— - - _Day of darkness and murk, - Day of cloud and heavy mist, - Like dawn scattered on the mountains, - A people many and powerful._ - -No one who has seen a cloud of locusts can question the realism even -of this picture: the heavy gloom of the immeasurable mass of them, -shot by gleams of light where a few of the sun’s imprisoned beams have -broken through or across the storm of lustrous wings. This is like -dawn beaten down upon the hilltops, and crushed by rolling masses of -cloud, in conspiracy to prolong the night. No: the only point at which -Joel leaves absolute fact for the wilder combinations of Apocalypse is -at the very close of his description, chap. ii. 10 and 11, and just -before his call to repentance. Here we find, mixed with the locusts, -earthquake and thunderstorm; and Joel has borrowed these from the -classic pictures of the Day of the Lord, using some of the very phrases -of the latter:— - - _Earth trembles before them, - Heaven quakes, - Sun and moon become black, - The stars withdraw their shining, - And Jehovah utters His voice before His army._ - -Joel, then, describes, and does not unduly enhance, the terrors of -an actual plague. At first his whole strength is so bent to make his -people feel these, that, though about to call to repentance, he does -not detail the national sins which require it. In his opening verses he -summons the drunkards,[1183] but that is merely to lend vividness to -his picture of facts, because men of such habits will be the first to -feel a plague of this kind. Nor does Joel yet ask his hearers what the -calamity portends. At first he only demands that they shall feel it, in -its uniqueness and its own sheer force. - -Hence the peculiar style of the passage. Letter for letter, this is -one of the heaviest passages in prophecy. The proportion in Hebrew of -liquids to the other letters is not large; but here it is smaller than -ever. The explosives and dentals are very numerous. There are several -keywords, with hard consonants and long vowels, used again and again: -Shuddadh, ‘ābhlah, ‘umlal, hôbhîsh. The longer lines into which Hebrew -parallelism tends to run are replaced by a rapid series of short, heavy -phrases, falling like blows. Critics have called it rhetoric. But it -is rhetoric of a very high order and perfectly suited to the prophet’s -purpose. Look at chap. i. 10: Shuddadh sadheh, ‘ābhlah ‘adhamah, -shuddadh daghan, hôbhîsh tîrôsh, ‘umlal yiṣḥar.[1184] Joel loads his -clauses with the most leaden letters he can find, and drops them in -quick succession, repeating the same heavy word again and again, as if -he would stun the careless people into some sense of the bare, brutal -weight of the calamity which has befallen them. - -Now Joel does this because he believes that, if his people feel the -plague in its proper violence, they must be convinced that it comes -from Jehovah. The keynote of this part of the prophecy is found in -chap. i. 15: “Keshôdh mishshaddhai,” _like violence from the -All-violent doth it come_. “If you feel this as it is, you will feel -Jehovah Himself in it. By these very blows, He and His Day are near. We -had been forgetting how near.” Joel mentions no crime, nor enforces any -virtue: how could he have done so in so strong a sense that “the Judge -was at the door”? To make men feel that they had forgotten they were in -reach of that Almighty Hand, which could strike so suddenly and so -hard—Joel had time only to make men feel that, and to call them to -repentance. In this we probably see some reflection of the age: an age -when men’s thoughts were thrusting the Deity further and further from -their life; when they put His Law and Temple between Him and -themselves; and when their religion, devoid of the sense of His -Presence, had become a set of formal observances, the rending of -garments and not of hearts. But He, whom His own ordinances had hidden -from His people, has burst forth through nature and in sheer force of -calamity. He has revealed Himself, El-Shaddhai, _God All-violent_, as -He was known to their fathers, who had no elaborate law or ritual to -put between their fearful hearts and His terrible strength, but cowered -before Him, helpless on the stripped soil, and naked beneath His -thunder. By just these means did Elijah and Amos bring God home to the -hearts of ancient Israel. In Joel we see the revival of the old -nature-religion, and the revenge that it was bound to take upon the -elaborate systems which had displaced it, but which by their formalism -and their artificial completeness had made men forget that near -presence and direct action of the Almighty which it is nature’s own -office to enforce upon the heart. - -The thing is true, and permanently valid. Only the great natural -processes can break up the systems of dogma and ritual in which we make -ourselves comfortable and formal, and drive us out into God’s open air -of reality. In the crash of nature’s forces even our particular sins -are forgotten, and we feel, as in the immediate presence of God, our -whole, deep need of repentance. So far from blaming the absence of -special ethics in Joel’s sermon, we accept it as natural and proper to -the occasion. - -Such, then, appears to be the explanation of the first part of the -prophecy, and its development towards the call to repentance, which -follows it. If we are correct, the assertion[1185] is false that -no plan was meant by the prophet. For not only is there a plan, -but the plan is most suitable to the requirements of Israel, after -their adoption of the whole Law in 445, and forms one of the most -necessary and interesting developments of all religion: the revival, -in an artificial period, of those primitive forces of religion which -nature alone supplies, and which are needed to correct formalism and -the forgetfulness of the near presence of the Almighty. We see in -this, too, the reason of Joel’s archaic style, both of conception and -expression: that likeness of his to early prophets which has led so -many to place him between Elijah and Amos.[1186] They are wrong. Joel’s -simplicity is that not of early prophecy, but of the austere forces of -this revived and applied to the artificiality of a later age. - -One other proof of Joel’s conviction of the religious meaning of the -plague might also have been pled by the earlier prophets, but certainly -not in the terms in which Joel expresses it. Amos and Hosea had both -described the destruction of the country’s fertility in their day as -God’s displeasure on His people and (as Hosea puts it) His divorce of -His Bride from Himself.[1187] But by them the physical calamities were -not threatened alone: banishment from the land and from enjoyment of -its fruits was to follow upon drought, locusts and famine. In -threatening no captivity Joel differs entirely from the early prophets. -It is a mark of his late date. And he also describes the divorce -between Jehovah and Israel, through the interruption of the ritual by -the plague, in terms and with an accent which could hardly have been -employed in Israel before the Exile. After the rebuilding of the Temple -and restoration of the daily sacrifices morning and evening, the -regular performance of the latter was regarded by the Jews with a most -superstitious sense of its indispensableness to the national life. -Before the Exile, Jeremiah, for instance, attaches no importance to it, -in circumstances in which it would have been not unnatural for him, -priest as he was, to do so.[1188] But after the Exile, the greater -scrupulousness of the religious life, and its absorption in ritual, -laid extraordinary emphasis upon the daily offering, which increased to -a most painful degree of anxiety as the centuries went on.[1189] The -New Testament speaks of _the Twelve Tribes constantly serving God day -and night_;[1190] and Josephus, while declaring that in no siege of -Jerusalem before the last did the interruption ever take place in spite -of the stress of famine and war combined, records the awful impression -made alike on Jew and heathen by the giving up of the daily sacrifice -on the 17th of July, A.D. 70, during the investment of the city by -Titus.[1191] This disaster, which Judaism so painfully feared at every -crisis in its history, actually happened, Joel tells us, during the -famine caused by the locusts. _Cut off are the meal and the drink -offerings from the house of Jehovah.[1192] Is not food cut off from our -eyes, joy and gladness from the house of our God?[1193] Perhaps He will -turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind Him, meal and drink -offering for Jehovah our God._[1194] The break “of the continual symbol -of gracious intercourse between Jehovah and His people, and the main -office of religion,” means divorce between Jehovah and Israel. _Wail -like a bride girt in sackcloth for the husband of her youth! Wail, O -ministers of the altar, O ministers of God!_[1195] This then was -another reason for reading in the plague of locusts more than a -physical meaning. This was another proof, only too intelligible to -scrupulous Jews, that the great and terrible Day of the Lord was at -hand. - -Thus Joel reaches the climax of his argument. Jehovah is near, His Day -is about to break. From this it is impossible to escape on the narrow -path of disaster by which the prophet has led up to it. But beneath -that path the prophet passes the ground of a broad truth, and on that -truth, while judgment remains still as real, there is room for the -people to turn from it. If experience has shown that God is in the -present, near and inevitable, faith remembers that He is there not -willingly for judgment, but with all His ancient feeling for Israel and -His zeal to save her. If the people choose to turn, Jehovah, as their -God and as one who works for their sake, will save them. Of this God -assures them by His own word. For the first time in the prophecy He -speaks for Himself. Hitherto the prophet has been describing the plague -and summoning to penitence. _But now oracle of Jehovah of Hosts._[1196] -The great covenant name, _Jehovah your God_, is solemnly repeated as if -symbolic of the historic origin and age-long endurance of Jehovah’s -relation to Israel; and the very words of blessing are repeated which -were given when Israel was called at Sinai and the covenant ratified:— - - _For He is gracious and merciful, - Long-suffering and plenteous in leal love, - And relents Him of the evil_ - -He has threatened upon you. Once more the nation is summoned to try Him -by prayer: the solemn prayer of all Israel, pleading that He should not -give His people to reproach. - - - _The Word of Jehovah - which came to Jo’el the son of Pethû’el._[1197] - - _Hear this, ye old men, - And give ear, all inhabitants of the land! - Has the like been in your days, - Or in the days of your fathers? - Tell it to your children, - And your children to their children, - And their children to the generation that follows. - That which the Shearer left the Swarmer hath eaten, - And that which the Swarmer left the Lapper hath eaten. - And that which the Lapper left the Devourer hath eaten._ - -These are four different names for locusts, which it is best to -translate by their literal meaning. Some think that they represent -one swarm of locusts in four stages of development, but this cannot -be, because the same swarm never returns upon its path, to complete -the work of destruction which it had begun in an earlier stage of its -growth. Nor can the first-named be the adult brood from whose eggs the -others spring, as Doughty has described,[1198] for that would account -only for two of the four names. Joel rather describes successive swarms -of the insect, without reference to the stages of its growth, and he -does so as a poet, using, in order to bring out the full force of its -devastation, several of the Hebrew names, that were given to the locust -as epithets of various aspects of its destructive power. The names, -it is true, cannot be said to rise in climax, but at least the most -sinister is reserved to the last.[1199] - - _Rouse ye, drunkards, and weep, - And wail, all ye bibbers of wine! - The new wine is cut off from your mouth! - For a nation is come up on My land, - Powerful and numberless; - His teeth are the teeth of the lion, - And the fangs[1200] of the lioness his. - My vine he has turned to waste, - And My fig-tree to splinters; - He hath peeled it and strawed it, - Bleached are its branches!_ - - _Wail as a bride girt in sackcloth for the spouse of her youth. - Cut off are the meal and drink offerings from the house of Jehovah! - In grief are the priests, the ministers of Jehovah. - The fields are blasted, the ground is in grief, - Blasted is the corn, abashed is the new wine, the oil pines away. - Be ye abashed, O ploughmen! - Wail, O vine-dressers, - For the wheat and the barley; - The harvest is lost from the field! - The vine is abashed, and the fig-tree is drooping; - Pomegranate, palm too and apple, - All trees of the field are dried up: - Yea, joy is abashed_ and _away from the children of men._ - -In this passage the same feeling is attributed to men and to the fruits -of the land: _In grief are the priests, the ground is in grief_. And it -is repeatedly said that all alike are _abashed_. By this heavy word we -have sought to render the effect of the similarly sounding “hôbhîsha,” -that our English version renders _ashamed_. It signifies to be -frustrated, and so _disheartened_, _put out_: _soured_ would be an -equivalent, applicable to the vine and to joy and to men’s hearts. - - _Put on_ mourning _, O priests, beat the breast; - Wail, ye ministers of the altar; - Come, lie down in sackcloth, O ministers of my God: - For meal-offering and drink-offering are cut off - from the house of your God._ - - _Hallow a fast, summon an assembly, - Gather[1201] all the inhabitants of the land to the house - of your God; - And cry to Jehovah: - “Alas for the Day! At hand is the Day of Jehovah! - And as vehemence from the Vehement[1202] doth it come.” - Is not food cut off from before us, - Gladness and joy from the house of our God? - The grains shrivel under their hoes,[1203] - The garners are desolate, the barns broken down, - For the corn is withered—what shall we put in them?[1204] - The herds of cattle huddle together,[1205] for they have no pasture; - Yea, the flocks of sheep are forlorn.[1206] - To Thee, Jehovah, do I cry: - For fire has devoured the pastures of the steppes,[1207] - And the flame hath scorched all the trees of the field. - The wild beasts pant up to Thee: - For the watercourses are dry, - And fire has devoured the pastures of the steppes._ - -Here, with the close of chap. i., Joel’s discourse takes pause, and in -chap. ii. he begins a second with another call to repentance in face -of the same plague. But the plague has progressed. The locusts are -described now in their invasion not of the country but of the towns, to -which they pass after the country is stripped. For illustration of the -latter see above, p. 401. The _horn_ which is to be blown, ver. 1, is -an _alarm horn_,[1208] to warn the people of the approach of the Day -of the Lord, and not the Shophar which called the people to a general -assembly, as in ver. 15. - - _Blow a horn in Zion, - Sound the alarm in My holy mountain! - Let all inhabitants of the land tremble, - For the Day of Jehovah comes—it is near! - Day of darkness and murk, day of cloud and heavy mist.[1209] - Like dawn scattered[1210] on the mountains, - A people many and powerful; - Its like has not been from of old, - And shall not again be for years of generation upon generation. - Before it the fire devours,[1211] - And behind the flame consumes. - Like the garden of Eden[1212] is the land in front, - And behind it a desolate desert; - Yea, it lets nothing escape. - Their visage is the visage of horses, - And like horsemen they run. - They rattle like chariots over the tops of the hills, - Like the crackle of flames devouring stubble, - Like a powerful people prepared for battle. - Peoples are writhing before them, - Every face gathers blackness._ - - _Like warriors they run, - Like fighting-men they come up the wall; - They march every man by himself,[1213] - And they ravel[1214] not their paths. - None jostles his comrade, - They march every man on his track,[1215] - And plunge through the missiles unbroken.[1216] - They scour the city, run upon the walls, - Climb into the houses, and enter the windows like a thief. - Earth trembles before them, - Heaven quakes, - Sun and moon become black, - The stars withdraw their shining. - And Jehovah utters His voice before His army: - For very great is His host; - Yea, powerful is He that performeth His word. - Great is the Day of Jehovah, and very awful: - Who may abide it?_[1217] - - _But now_ hear _the oracle of Jehovah: - Turn ye to Me with all your heart, - And with fasting and weeping and mourning. - Rend ye your hearts and not your garments, - And turn to Jehovah your God: - For He is gracious and merciful, - Long-suffering and plenteous in love, - And relents of the evil. - Who knows but He will turn and relent, - And leave behind Him a blessing, - Meal-offering and drink-offering to Jehovah your God?_ - - _Blow a horn in Zion, - Hallow a fast, summon the assembly! - Gather the people, hallow the congregation, - Assemble the old men,[1218] gather the children, and - infants at the breast; - Let the bridegroom come forth from his chamber, - And the bride from her bower.[1219] - Let the priests, the ministers of Jehovah, weep - between porch and altar; - Let them say, Spare, O Jehovah, Thy people, - And give not Thine heritage to dishonour, for the - heathen to mock them:[1220] - Why should it be said among the nations, Where is - their God?_ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1160] _Arabia Deserta_, p. 307. - -[1161] _Arabia Deserta_, p. 335. - -[1162] _Id._, 396. - -[1163] _Id._, 335. - -[1164] Barrow, _South Africa_, p. 257, quoted by Pusey. - -[1165] _Impressions of South Africa_, by James Bryce: Macmillans, 1897. - -[1166] Volney, _Voyage en Syrie_, I. 277, quoted by Pusey. - -[1167] Lebanon. - -[1168] Abridged from Thomson’s _The Land and the Book_, ed. 1877, -Northern Palestine, pp. 416 ff. - -[1169] From Driver’s abridgment (_Joel and Amos_, p. 90) of an account -in the _Journ. of Sacred Lit._, October 1865, pp. 235 f. - -[1170] Morier, _A Second Journey through Persia_, p. 99, quoted by -Pusey, from whose notes and Driver’s excursus upon locusts in _Joel and -Amos_ the following quotations have been borrowed. - -[1171] Shaw’s _Travels in Barbary_, 1738, pp. 236-8; Jackson’s _Travels -to Morocco_. - -[1172] Adansson, _Voyage au Sénegal_, p. 88. - -[1173] Chénier, _Recherches Historiques sur les Maures_, III., p. 496. - -[1174] Burckhardt, _Notes_, II. 90. - -[1175] Barrow, _South Africa_, p. 257. - -[1176] _Journ. of Sac. Lit._, October 1865. - -[1177] Lichtenstein, _Travels in South Africa_. - -[1178] _Standard_, December 25th, 1896. - -[1179] Fr. Alvarez. - -[1180] Barheb., _Chron. Syr._, p. 784; Burckhardt, _Notes_, II. 90. - -[1181] i. 20, 17. - -[1182] i. 19. - -[1183] i. 5. - -[1184] Cf. i. 12, 13, and many verses in chap. ii. - -[1185] Of Merx and others: see above, p. 394. - -[1186] See above, p. 377. - -[1187] See Vol. I., pp. 242, 245 f. - -[1188] Jer. xiv. - -[1189] Cf. Ezek. xlvi. 15 on the Thamid, and Neh. x. 33; Dan. viii. 11, -xi. 31, xii. 11: cf. p. 382. - -[1190] Acts xxvi. 7. - -[1191] XIV. _Antt._ iv. 3, xvi. 2; VI. _Wars_ ii. 1. - -[1192] i. 9, 13. - -[1193] i. 16. - -[1194] ii. 14. - -[1195] i. 8, 13. - -[1196] ii. 12. - -[1197] LXX. Βαθουήλ - -[1198] See above, pp. 399 f. - -[1199] חסיל from חסל, used in the O.T. only in Deut. xxviii. 38, -_to devour_; but in post-biblical Hebrew _to utterly destroy_, _bring -to an end_. _Talmud Jerus._: Taanith III. 66_d_, “Why is the locust -called חסיל? Because it brings everything to an end.” - -[1200] A.V. _cheek-teeth_, R.V. _jaw-teeth_, or _eye-teeth_. “Possibly -(from the Arabic) _projectors_”: Driver. - -[1201] Heb. text inserts _elders_, which may be taken as vocative, or -with the LXX. as accusative, but after the latter we should expect -_and_. Wellhausen suggests its deletion, and Nowack regards it as an -intrusion. For אספו Wellhausen reads האספו, _be ye gathered_. - -[1202] Keshōdh mishshaddhai (Isa. xiii. 6); Driver, _as overpowering -from the Overpowerer_. - -[1203] A.V. _clods_. מגרפותיהם: the meaning is doubtful, but the -corresponding Arabic word means _besom_ or _shovel_ or (_P.E.F.Q._, -1891, p. 111, with plate) _hoe_, and the Aram. _shovel_. See Driver’s -note. - -[1204] Reading, after the LXX. τί ἀποθήσομεν ἑαυτοῖς (probably an error -for ἐν αὐτοῖς), מה נניחה בהם for the Massoretic מה נאנחה בהמה _How the -beasts sob!_ to which A.V. and Driver adhere. - -[1205] Lit. _press themselves_ in perplexity. - -[1206] Reading, with Wellhausen and Nowack (“perhaps rightly,” Driver) -נשמו for נאשמו, _are guilty_ or _punished_. - -[1207] מדבר, usually rendered _wilderness_ or _desert_, but -literally _place where the sheep are driven_, land not cultivated. See -_Hist. Geog._, p. 656. - -[1208] See on Amos iii. 6: Vol. I., p. 82. - -[1209] Zeph. i. 15. See above, p. 58. - -[1210] פרשׂ in Qal _to spread abroad_, but the passive is here to -be taken in the same sense as the Ni. in Ezek. xvii. 21, _dispersed_. -The figure is of dawn crushed by and struggling with a mass of cloud -and mist, and expresses the gleams of white which so often break -through a locust cloud. See above, p. 404. - -[1211] So travellers have described the effect of locusts. See above, -p. 403. - -[1212] Ezek. xxxvi. 35. - -[1213] Heb. _in his own ways_. - -[1214] יעבטון, an impossible metaphor, so that most read יעבתון, a -root found only in Micah vii. 3 (see Vol. I., p. 428), _to twist_ or -_tangle_; but Wellhausen reads יְעַוְּתוּן, _twist_, Eccles. vii. 13. - -[1215] Heb. _highroad_, as if defined and heaped up for him alone. - -[1216] See above, p. 401. - -[1217] Zeph. i. 14; “Mal.” iii. 2. - -[1218] So (and not _elders_) in contrast to children. - -[1219] _Canopy_ or _pavilion_, bridal tent. - -[1220] למשל בם, which may mean either _rule over them_ or _mock -them_, but the parallelism decides for the latter. - - - - - CHAPTER XXIX - - _PROSPERITY AND THE SPIRIT_ - - JOEL ii. 18-32 (Eng.; ii. 18—iii. Heb.) - - -_Then did Jehovah become jealous for His land, and took pity upon His -people_—with these words Joel opens the second half of his book. Our -Authorised Version renders them in the future tense, as the -continuation of the prophet’s discourse, which had threatened the Day -of the Lord, urged the people to penitence, and now promises that their -penitence shall be followed by the Lord’s mercy. But such a rendering -forces the grammar;[1221] and the Revised English Version is right in -taking the verbs, as the vast majority of critics do, in the past. -Joel’s call to repentance has closed, and has been successful. The fast -has been hallowed, the prayers are heard. Probably an interval has -elapsed between vv. 17 and 18, but in any case, the people having -repented, nothing more is said of their need of doing so, and instead -we have from God Himself a series of promises, vv. 19-27, in answer to -their cry for mercy. These promises relate to the physical calamity -which has been suffered. God will destroy the locusts, still impending -on the land, and restore the years which His great army has eaten. -There follows in vv. 28-32 (Eng.; Heb. chap, iii.) the promise of a -great outpouring of the Spirit on all Israel, amid terrible -manifestations in heaven and earth. - - - 1. THE RETURN OF PROSPERITY (ii. 19-27). - - _And Jehovah answered and said to His people: - Lo, I will send you corn and wine and oil, - And your fill shall ye have of them; - And I will not again make you a reproach among the heathen. - And the Northern_ Foe[1222] _will I remove far from you; - And I will push him into a land barren and waste, - His van to the eastern sea and his rear to the western,[1223] - Till the stench of him rises,[1224] - Because he hath done greatly._ - -Locusts disappear with the same suddenness as they arrive. A wind -springs up and they are gone.[1225] Dead Sea and Mediterranean are at -the extremes of the compass, but there is no reason to suppose that -the prophet has abandoned the realism which has hitherto distinguished -his treatment of the locusts. The plague covered the whole land, on -whose high watershed the winds suddenly veer and change. The dispersion -of the locusts upon the deserts and the opposite seas was therefore -possible at one and the same time. Jerome vouches for an instance in -his own day. The other detail is also true to life. Jerome says that -the beaches of the two seas were strewn with putrifying locusts, and -Augustine[1226] quotes heathen writers in evidence of large masses -of locusts, driven from Africa upon the sea, and then cast up on the -shore, which gave rise to a pestilence. “The south and east winds,” -says Volney of Syria, “drive the clouds of locusts with violence -into the Mediterranean, and drown them in such quantities, that when -their dead are cast on the shore they infect the air to a great -distance.”[1227] The prophet continues, celebrating this destruction -of the locusts as if it were already realised—_the Lord hath done -greatly_, ver. 21. That among the blessings he mentions a full supply -of rain proves that we were right in interpreting him to have spoken of -drought as accompanying the locusts.[1228] - - _Fear not, O Land! Rejoice and be glad, - For Jehovah hath done greatly.[1229] - Fear not, O beasts of the field! - For the pastures of the steppes are springing with new grass, - The trees bear their fruit, - Fig-tree and vine yield their substance. - O sons of Zion, be glad, - And rejoice in Jehovah your God: - For He hath given you the early rain in normal measure,[1230] - And poured[1231] on you winter rain[1232] and latter rain as - before.[1233] - And the threshing-floors shall be full of wheat, - And the vats stream over with new wine and oil. - And I will restore to you the years which the Swarmer has eaten, - The Lapper, the Devourer and the Shearer, - My great army whom I sent among you. - And ye shall eat your food and be full, - And praise the Name of Jehovah your God, - Who hath dealt so wondrously with you; - And My people shall be abashed nevermore. - Ye shall know I am in the midst of Israel, - That I am Jehovah your God and none else; - And nevermore shall My people be abashed._ - - - 2. THE OUTPOURING OF THE SPIRIT - - (ii. 28-32 Eng.; iii. Heb.). - -Upon these promises of physical blessing there follows another of the -pouring forth of the Spirit: the prophecy by which Joel became the -Prophet of Pentecost, and through which his book is best known among -Christians. - -When fertility has been restored to the land, the seasons again run -their normal courses, and the people eat their food and be full—_It -shall come to pass after these things, I will pour out My Spirit upon -all flesh_. The order of events makes us pause to question: does Joel -mean to imply that physical prosperity must precede spiritual fulness? -It would be unfair to assert that he does, without remembering what he -understands by the physical blessings. To Joel these are the token that -God has returned to His people. The drought and the famine produced by -the locusts were signs of His anger and of His divorce of the land. The -proofs that He has relented, and taken Israel back into a spiritual -relation to Himself, can, therefore, from Joel’s point of view, only be -given by the healing of the people’s wounds. In plenteous rains and -full harvests God sets His seal to man’s penitence. Rain and harvest -are not merely physical benefits, but religious sacraments: signs that -God has returned to His people, and that His zeal is again stirred on -their behalf.[1234] This has to be made clear before there can be talk -of any higher blessing. God has to return to His people and to show His -love for them before He pours forth His Spirit upon them. That is what -Joel intends by the order he pursues, and not that a certain stage of -physical comfort is indispensable to a high degree of spiritual feeling -and experience. The early and latter rains, the fulness of corn, wine -and oil, are as purely religious to Joel, though not so highly -religious, as the phenomena of the Spirit in men. - -But though that be an adequate answer to our question so far as Joel -himself is concerned, it does not exhaust the question with regard to -history in general. From Joel’s own standpoint physical blessings may -have been as religious as spiritual; but we must go further, and assert -that for Joel’s anticipation of the baptism of the Spirit by a return -of prosperity there is an ethical reason and one which is permanently -valid in history. A certain degree of prosperity, and even of comfort, -is an indispensable condition of that universal and lavish exercise of -the religious faculties, which Joel pictures under the pouring forth of -God’s Spirit. - -The history of prophecy itself furnishes us with proofs of this. When -did prophecy most flourish in Israel? When had the Spirit of God most -freedom in developing the intellectual and moral nature of Israel? Not -when the nation was struggling with the conquest and settlement of the -land, not when it was engaged with the embarrassments and privations of -the Syrian wars; but an Amos, a Hosea, an Isaiah came forth at the end -of the long, peaceful and prosperous reigns of Jeroboam II. and Uzziah. -The intellectual strength and liberty of the great Prophet of the -Exile, his deep insight into God’s purposes and his large view of the -future, had not been possible without the security and comparative -prosperity of the Jews in Babylon, from among whom he wrote. In Haggai -and Zechariah, on the other hand, who worked in the hunger-bitten -colony of returned exiles, there was no such fulness of the Spirit. -Prophecy, we saw,[1235] was then starved by the poverty and meanness of -the national life from which it rose. All this is very explicable. When -men are stunned by such a calamity as Joel describes, or when they are -engrossed by the daily struggle with bitter enemies and a succession of -bad seasons, they may feel the need of penitence and be able to speak -with decision upon the practical duty of the moment, to a degree not -attainable in better days, but they lack the leisure, the freedom and -the resources amid which their various faculties of mind and soul can -alone respond to the Spirit’s influence. - -Has it been otherwise in the history of Christianity? Our Lord Himself -found His first disciples, not in a hungry and ragged community, but -amid the prosperity and opulence of Galilee. They left all to follow -Him and achieved their ministry in poverty and persecution, but they -brought to that ministry the force of minds and bodies trained in a -very fertile land and by a prosperous commerce.[1236] Paul, in his -apostolate, sustained himself by the labour of his hands, but he was -the child of a rich civilisation and the citizen of a great empire. The -Reformation was preceded by the Renaissance, and on the Continent of -Europe drew its forces, not from the enslaved and impoverished -populations of Italy and Southern Austria, but from the large civic and -commercial centres of Germany. An acute historian, in his recent -lectures on the _Economic Interpretation of History_,[1237] observes -that every religious revival in England has happened upon a basis of -comparative prosperity. He has proved “the opulence of Norfolk during -the epoch of Lollardy,” and pointed out that “the Puritan movement was -essentially and originally one of the middle classes, of the traders in -towns and of the farmers in the country”; that the religious state of -the Church of England was never so low as among the servile and -beggarly clergy of the seventeenth and part of the eighteenth -centuries; that the Nonconformist bodies who kept religion alive during -this period were closely identified with the leading movements of trade -and finance;[1238] and that even Wesley’s great revival of religion -among the labouring classes of England took place at a time when prices -were far lower than in the previous century, wages had slightly risen -and “most labourers were small occupiers; there was therefore in the -comparative plenty of the time an opening for a religious movement -among the poor, and Wesley was equal to the occasion.” He might have -added that the great missionary movement of the nineteenth century is -contemporaneous with the enormous advance of our commerce and our -empire. - -On the whole, then, the witness of history is uniform. Poverty and -persecution, _famine_, _nakedness_, _peril and sword_, put a keenness -upon the spirit of religion, while luxury rots its very fibres; but -a stable basis of prosperity is indispensable to every social and -religious reform, and God’s Spirit finds fullest course in communities -of a certain degree of civilisation and of freedom from sordidness. - -We may draw from this an impressive lesson for our own day. Joel -predicts that, upon the new prosperity of his land, the lowest classes -of society shall be permeated by the spirit of prophecy. Is it not part -of the secret of the failure of Christianity to enlist large portions -of our population, that the basis of their life is so sordid and -insecure? Have we not yet to learn from the Hebrew prophets, that some -amount of freedom in a people and some amount of health are -indispensable to a revival of religion? Lives which are strained and -starved, lives which are passed in rank discomfort and under grinding -poverty, without the possibility of the independence of the individual -or of the sacredness of the home, cannot be religious except in the -most rudimentary sense of the word. For the revival of energetic -religion among such lives we must wait for a better distribution, not -of wealth, but of the bare means of comfort, leisure and security. -When, to our penitence and our striving, God restores the years which -the locust has eaten, when the social plagues of rich men’s selfishness -and the poverty of the very poor are lifted from us, then may we look -for the fulfilment of Joel’s prediction—_even upon all the slaves and -upon the handmaidens will I pour out My Spirit in those days_. - -The economic problem, therefore, has also its place in the warfare for -the kingdom of God. - - _And it shall be that after such things, I will pour out - My Spirit on all flesh; - And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, - Your old men shall dream dreams, - Your young men shall see visions: - And even upon all the slaves and the handmaidens - in those days will I pour out My Spirit. - And I will set signs in heaven and on earth, - Blood and fire and pillars of smoke. - The sun shall be turned to darkness, - And the moon to blood, - Before the coming of the Day of Jehovah, the great and the awful. - And it shall be that every one who calls on the name - of Jehovah shall be saved: - For in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be a remnant, - as Jehovah hath spoken, - And among the fugitives _those_ whom Jehovah calleth._ - -This prophecy divides into two parts—the outpouring of the Spirit, and -the appearance of the terrible Day of the Lord. - -The Spirit of God is to be poured _on all flesh_, says the prophet. -By this term, which is sometimes applied to all things that breathe, -and sometimes to mankind as a whole,[1239] Joel means Israel only: -the heathen are to be destroyed.[1240] Nor did Peter, when he quoted -the passage at the Day of Pentecost, mean anything more. He spoke to -Jews and proselytes: _for the promise is to you and your children, -and to them that are afar off_: it was not till afterwards that he -discovered that the Holy Ghost was granted to the Gentiles, and then -he was unready for the revelation and surprised by it.[1241] But within -Joel’s Israel the operation of the Spirit was to be at once thorough -and universal. All classes would be affected, and affected so that the -simplest and rudest would become prophets. - -The limitation was therefore not without its advantages. In the earlier -stages of all religions, it is impossible to be both extensive and -intensive. With a few exceptions, the Israel of Joel’s time was a -narrow and exclusive body, hating and hated by other peoples. Behind -the Law it kept itself strictly aloof. But without doing so, Israel -could hardly have survived or prepared itself at that time for its -influence on the world. Heathenism threatened it from all sides with -the most insidious of infections; and there awaited it in the near -future a still more subtle and powerful means of disintegration. In the -wake of Alexander’s expeditions, Hellenism poured across all the East. -There was not a community nor a religion, save Israel’s, which was not -Hellenised. That Israel remained Israel, in spite of Greek arms and the -Greek mind, was due to the legalism of Ezra and Nehemiah, and to what -we call the narrow enthusiasm of Joel. The hearts which kept their -passion so confined felt all the deeper for its limits. They would be -satisfied with nothing less than the inspiration of every Israelite, -the fulfilment of the prayer of Moses: _Would to God that all Jehovah’s -people were prophets!_ And of itself this carries Joel’s prediction to -a wider fulfilment. A nation of prophets is meant for the world. But -even the best of men do not see the full force of the truth God gives -to them, nor follow it even to its immediate consequences. Few of the -prophets did so, and at first none of the apostles. Joel does not -hesitate to say that the heathen shall be destroyed. He does not think -of Israel’s mission as foretold by the Second Isaiah; nor of -“Malachi’s” vision of the heathen waiting upon Jehovah. But in the near -future of Israel there was waiting another prophet to carry Joel’s -doctrine to its full effect upon the world, to rescue the gospel of -God’s grace from the narrowness of legalism and the awful pressure of -Apocalypse, and by the parable of Jonah, the type of the prophet -nation, to show to Israel that God had granted to the Gentiles also -repentance unto life. - -That it was the lurid clouds of Apocalypse, which thus hemmed in our -prophet’s view, is clear from the next verses. They bring the terrible -manifestations of God’s wrath in nature very closely upon the lavish -outpouring of the Spirit: _the sun turned to darkness and the moon -to blood, the great and terrible Day of the Lord_. Apocalypse must -always paralyse the missionary energies of religion. Who can think of -converting the world, when the world is about to be convulsed? There is -only time for a remnant to be saved. - -But when we get rid of Apocalypse, as the Book of Jonah does, then we -have time and space opened up again, and the essential forces of such -a prophecy of the Spirit as Joel has given us burst their national and -temporary confines, and are seen to be applicable to all mankind. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1221] A.V., adhering to the Massoretic text, in which the verbs are -pointed for the past, has evidently understood them as instances of the -prophetic perfect. But “this is grammatically indefensible”: Driver, -_in loco_; see his _Heb. Tenses_, § 82, _Obs._ Calvin and others, who -take the verbs of ver. 18 as future, accept those of the next verse -as past and with it begin the narrative. But if God’s answer to His -people’s prayer be in the past, so must His jealousy and pity. All -these verbs are in the same sequence of time. Merx proposes to change -the vowel-points of the verbs and turn them into futures. But see -above, p. 395. Ver. 21 shows that Jehovah’s action is past, and Nowack -points out the very unusual character of the construction that would -follow from Merx’s emendation. Ewald, Hitzig, Kuenen, Robertson Smith, -Davidson, Robertson, Steiner, Wellhausen, Driver, Nowack, etc., all -take the verbs in the past. - -[1222] This is scarcely a name for the locusts, who, though they -might reach Palestine from the N.E. under certain circumstances, -came generally from E. and S.E. But see above, p. 397: so Kuenen, -Wellhausen, Nowack. W. R. Smith suggests the whole verse as an -allegorising gloss. Hitzig thought of the locusts only, and rendered -הצפוני ὁ τυφωνικός, Acts xxvii. 14; but this is not proved. - -[1223] _I.e._ the Dead Sea (Ezek. xlvii. 18; Zech. xiv. 8) and the -Mediterranean. - -[1224] The construction shows that the clause preceding this, ועלה -באשו, is a gloss. So Driver. But Nowack gives the other clause as the -gloss. - -[1225] Nah. iii. 17; Exod. x. 19. - -[1226] _De Civitate Dei_, III. 31. - -[1227] I. 278, quoted by Pusey. - -[1228] i. 17-20: see above, p. 403. - -[1229] Prophetic past: Driver. - -[1230] Opinion is divided as to the meaning of this phrase: לצדקה -= _for righteousness_. A. There are those who take it as having a -_moral_ reference; and (1) this is so emphatic to some that they -render the word for _early rain_, מורה, which also means _teacher_ or -_revealer_, in the latter significance. So (some of them applying it -to the Messiah) Targum, Symmachus, the Vulgate, _doctorem justitiæ_, -some Jews, _e.g._ Rashi and Abarbanel, and some moderns, _e.g._ (at -opposite extremes) Pusey and Merx. But, as Calvin points out (this -is another instance of his sanity as an exegete, and refusal to be -led by theological presuppositions: he says, “I do not love strained -expositions”), this does not agree with the context, which speaks not -of spiritual but wholly of physical blessings. (2) Some, who take -מורה as _early rain_, give לצדקה the meaning _for righteousness_, -_ad justitiam_, either in the sense that God will give the rain as a -token of His own righteousness, or in order to restore or vindicate -the people’s righteousness (so Davidson, _Expositor_, 1888, I., p. 203 -n.), in the frequent sense in which צדקה is employed in Isa. xl. ff. -(see _Isaiah xl.—lxvi._, Expositor’s Bible, pp. 219 ff.). Cf. Hosea -x. 13, צדק; above, Vol. I., p. 289, n. 2. This of course is possible, -especially in view of Israel having been made by their plagues a -reproach among the heathen. Still, if Joel had intended this meaning, -he would have applied the phrase, not to the _early rain_ only, but -to the whole series of blessings by which the people were restored to -their standing before God. B. It seems, therefore, right to take לצדקה -in a purely physical sense, of the measure or quality of the _early -rain_. So even Calvin, _rain according to what is just_ or _fit_; -A.V. _moderately_ (inexact); R.V. _in just measure_; Siegfried-Stade -_sufficient_. The root-meaning of צדק is probably _according to norm_ -(cf. _Isaiah xl.—lxvi._, p. 215), and in that case the meaning would -be _rain of normal quantity_. This too suits the parallel in the next -clause: _as formerly_. In Himyaritic the word is applied to good -harvests. A man prays to God for אפקל ואתֹמר צדקם, _full_ or _good -harvests and fruits_: _Corp. Inscr. Sem._, Pars Quarta, Tomus I., No. -2, lin. 1-5; cf. the note. - -[1231] Driver, _in loco_. - -[1232] Heb. also repeats here _early rain_, but redundantly. - -[1233] בראשון, _in the first_. A.V. adds _month_. But LXX. and Syr. -read כראשננה, which is probably the correct reading, _as before_ or -_formerly_. - -[1234] i. 18. - -[1235] Above, p. 189. - -[1236] Cf. _Hist. Geog._, Chap. XXI., especially p. 463. - -[1237] By Thorold Rogers, pp. 80 ff. - -[1238] _E.g._ the Quakers and the Independents. The Independents of the -seventeenth century “were the founders of the Bank of England.” - -[1239] All living things, Gen. vi. 17, 19, etc.; mankind, Isa. xl. 5, -xlix. 26. See Driver’s note. - -[1240] Next chapter. - -[1241] Acts x. 45. - - - - - CHAPTER XXX - - _THE JUDGMENT OF THE HEATHEN_ - - JOEL iii. (Eng.; iv. Heb.) - - -Hitherto Joel has spoken no syllable of the heathen, except to pray -that God by His plagues will not give Israel to be mocked by them. -But in the last chapter of the Book we have Israel’s captivity to the -heathen taken for granted, a promise made that it will be removed and -their land set free from the foreigner. Certain nations are singled -out for judgment, which is described in the terms of Apocalypse; and -the Book closes with the vision, already familiar in prophecy, of a -supernatural fertility for the land. - -It is quite another horizon and far different interests from those of -the preceding chapter. Here for the first time we may suspect the unity -of the Book, and listen to suggestions of another authorship than -Joel’s. But these can scarcely be regarded as conclusive. Every -prophet, however national his interests, feels it his duty to express -himself upon the subject of foreign peoples, and Joel may well have -done so. Only, in that case, his last chapter was delivered by him at -another time and in different circumstances from the rest of his -prophecies. Chaps. i.—ii. (Eng.; i.—iii. Heb.) are complete in -themselves. Chap. iii. (Eng.; iv. Heb.) opens without any connection of -time or subject with those that precede it.[1242] - -The time of the prophecy is a time when Israel’s fortunes are at low -ebb,[1243] her sons scattered among the heathen, her land, in part at -least, held by foreigners. But it would appear (though this is not -expressly said, and must rather be inferred from the general proofs of -a post-exilic date) that Jerusalem is inhabited. Nothing is said to -imply that the city needs to be restored.[1244] - -All the heathen nations are to be brought together for judgment into a -certain valley, which the prophet calls first the Vale of Jehoshaphat -and then the Vale of Decision. The second name leads us to infer that -the first, which means _Jehovah-judges_, is also symbolic. That is to -say, the prophet does not single out a definite valley already called -Jehoshaphat. In all probability, however, he has in his mind’s eye some -vale in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, for since Ezekiel[1245] the -judgment of the heathen in face of Jerusalem has been a standing -feature in Israel’s vision of the last things; and as no valley about -that city lends itself to the picture of judgment so well as the valley -of the Kedron with the slopes of Olivet, the name Jehoshaphat has -naturally been applied to it.[1246] Certain nations are singled out by -name. These are not Assyria and Babylon, which had long ago perished, -nor the Samaritans, Moab and Ammon, which harassed the Jews in the -early days of the Return from Babylon, but Tyre, Sidon, Philistia, Edom -and Egypt. The crime of the first three is the robbery of Jewish -treasures, not necessarily those of the Temple, and the selling into -slavery of many Jews. The crime of Edom and Egypt is that they have -shed the innocent blood of Jews. To what precise events these charges -refer we have no means of knowing in our present ignorance of Syrian -history after Nehemiah. That the chapter has no explicit reference to -the cruelties of Artaxerxes Ochus in 360 would seem to imply for it a -date earlier than that year. But it is possible that ver. 17 refers to -that, the prophet refraining from accusing the Persians for the very -good reason that Israel was still under their rule. - -Another feature worthy of notice is that the Phœnicians are accused of -selling Jews to the sons of the Jevanîm, Ionians or Greeks.[1247] The -latter lie on the far horizon of the prophet,[1248] and we know from -classical writers that from the fifth century onwards numbers of Syrian -slaves were brought to Greece. The other features of the chapter are -borrowed from earlier prophets. - - _For, behold, in those days and in that time, - When I bring again the captivity[1249] of Judah and Jerusalem, - I will also gather all the nations, - And bring them down to the Vale of Jehoshaphat;[1250] - And I will enter into judgment with them there, - For My people and for My heritage Israel, - Whom they have scattered among the heathen, - And My land have they divided. - And they have cast lots for My people:[1251] - They have given a boy for a harlot,[1252] - And a girl have they sold for wine and drunk it. - And again, what are ye to Me, Tyre and Sidon and - all circuits of Philistia?[1253] - Is it any deed of Mine ye are repaying? - Or are ye doing anything to Me?[1254] - Swiftly, speedily will I return your deed on your head, - Who have taken My silver and My gold, - And My goodly jewels ye have brought into your palaces. - The sons of Judah and the sons of Jerusalem have ye - sold to the sons of the Greeks, - In order that ye might set them as far _as possible_ - from their own border. - Lo! I will stir them up from the place to which ye - have sold them, - And I will return your deed upon your head. - I will sell your sons and your daughters into the - hands of the sons of Judah, - And they shall sell them to the Shebans,[1255] - To a nation far off; for Jehovah hath spoken. - Proclaim this among the heathen, hallow a war. - Wake up the warriors, let all the fighting-men muster - and go up.[1256] - Beat your ploughshares into swords, - And your pruning-hooks into lances. - Let the weakling say, I am strong. - ...[1257] and come, all ye nations round about, - And gather yourselves together. - Thither bring down Thy warriors, Jehovah. - Let the heathen be roused, - And come up to the Vale of Jehoshaphat, - For there will I sit to judge all the nations round about. - Put in the sickle,[1258] for ripe is the harvest. - Come, get you down; for the press is full, - The vats overflow, great is their wickedness. - Multitudes, multitudes in the Vale of Decision! - For near is Jehovah’s day in the Vale of Decision. - Sun and moon have turned black, - And the stars withdrawn their shining. - Jehovah thunders from Zion, - And from Jerusalem gives[1259] forth His voice: - Heaven and earth do quake. - But Jehovah is a refuge to His people, - And for a fortress to the sons of Israel. - And ye shall know that I am Jehovah your God, - Who dwell in Zion, the mount of My holiness; - And Jerusalem shall be holy, - Strangers shall not pass through her again. - And it shall be on that day - The mountains shall drop sweet wine, - And the hills be liquid with milk, - And all the channels of Judah flow with water; - A fountain shall spring from the house of Jehovah, - And shall water the Wady of Shittim.[1260] - Egypt shall be desolation, - And Edom desert-land, - For the outrage done to the children of Judah, - Because they shed innocent blood in their land. - Judah shall abide peopled for ever, - And Jerusalem for generation upon generation. - And I will declare innocent their blood,[1261] which I have - not declared innocent, - By[1262] Jehovah who dwelleth in Zion._ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1242] I am unable to feel Driver’s and Nowack’s arguments for a -connection conclusive. The only reason Davidson gives is (p. 204) that -the judgment of the heathen is an essential element in the Day of -Jehovah, a reason which does not make Joel’s authorship of the last -chapter certain, but only possible. - -[1243] The phrase of ver. 1, _when I turn again the captivity of Judah -and Jerusalem_, may be rendered _when I restore the fortunes of Israel_. - -[1244] See above, p. 386, especially n. 1130. - -[1245] xxxviii. - -[1246] Some have unnecessarily thought of the Vale of Berakhah, in -which Jehoshaphat defeated Moab, Ammon and Edom (2 Chron. xx.). - -[1247] See above, p. 381, nn. 1114, 1115. - -[1248] Ver. 6_b_. - -[1249] Or _turn again the fortunes_. - -[1250] _Jehovah-judges._ See above, p. 432. - -[1251] See above, Obadiah 11 and Nahum iii. 10. - -[1252] בזונה. Oort suggests במזון, _for food_. - -[1253] Gelilôth, the plural feminine of Galilee—the _circuit_ (of the -Gentiles). _Hist. Geog._, p. 413. - -[1254] Scil. _that I must repay_. - -[1255] LXX. _they shall give them into captivity_. - -[1256] Technical use of עלה, _to go up to war_. - -[1257] עושו, not found elsewhere, but supposed to mean _gather_. -Cf. Zeph. ii. 1. Others read חושו, _hasten_ (Driver); Wellhausen עורו. - -[1258] מגּל, only here and in Jer. l. 16: other Heb. word for -sickle ḥermesh (Deut. xvi. 9, xxiii. 26). - -[1259] Driver, future. - -[1260] Not the well-known scene of early Israel’s camp across Jordan, -but it must be some dry and desert valley near Jerusalem (so most -comm.). Nowack thinks of the Wadi el Sant on the way to Askalon, but -this did not need watering and is called the Vale of Elah. - -[1261] Merx applies this to the Jews of the Messianic era. LXX. read -ἐκζητήσω = ונקמתי. So Syr. Cf. 2 Kings ix. 7. - -Steiner: _Shall I leave their blood unpunished? I will not leave it -unpunished._ Nowack deems this to be unlikely, and suggests, _I will -avenge their blood; I will not leave unpunished_ the shedders of it. - -[1262] Heb. construction is found also in Hosea xii. 5. - - - - - INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPHETS OF THE GRECIAN PERIOD - - (331—— B.C.) - - - - - CHAPTER XXXI - - _ISRAEL AND THE GREEKS_ - - -Apart from the author of the tenth chapter of Genesis, who defines -Javan or Greece as the father of Elishah and Tarshish, of Kittim or -Cyprus and Rodanim or Rhodes,[1263] the first Hebrew writer who -mentions the Greeks is Ezekiel,[1264] _c._ 580 B.C. He describes them -as engaged in commerce with the Phœnicians, who bought slaves from -them. Even while Ezekiel wrote in Babylonia, the Babylonians were in -touch with the Ionian Greeks through the Lydians.[1265] The latter were -overthrown by Cyrus about 545, and by the beginning of the next century -the Persian lords of Israel were in close struggle with the Greeks for -the supremacy of the world, and had virtually been defeated so far as -concerned Europe, the west of Asia Minor, and the sovereignty of the -Mediterranean and Black Seas. In 460 Athens sent an expedition to Egypt -to assist a revolt against Persia, and even before that Greek fleets -had scoured the Levant and Greek soldiers, though in the pay of Persia, -had trodden the soil of Syria. Still Joel, writing towards 400 B.C., -mentions Greece[1266] only as a market to which the Phœnicians carried -Jewish slaves; and in a prophecy which some take to be contemporary -with Joel, Isaiah lxvi., the coasts of Greece are among the most -distant of Gentile lands.[1267] In 401 the younger Cyrus brought to the -Euphrates to fight against Artaxerxes Mnemon the ten thousand Greeks -whom, after the battle of Cunaxa, Xenophon led north to the Black Sea. -For nearly seventy years thereafter Athenian trade slowly spread -eastward, but nothing was yet done by Greece to advertise her to the -peoples of Asia as a claimant for the world’s throne. Then suddenly in -334 Alexander of Macedon crossed the Hellespont, spent a year in the -conquest of Asia Minor, defeated Darius at Issus in 332, took Damascus, -Tyre and Gaza, overran the Delta and founded Alexandria. In 331 he -marched back over Syria, crossed the Euphrates, overthrew the Persian -Empire on the field of Arbela, and for the next seven years till his -death in 324 extended his conquests to the Oxus and the Indus. The -story, that on his second passage of Syria Alexander visited -Jerusalem,[1268] is probably false. But he must have encamped -repeatedly within forty miles of it, and he visited Samaria.[1269] It -is impossible that he received no embassy from a people who had not -known political independence for centuries and must have been only too -ready to come to terms with the new lord of the world. Alexander left -behind him colonies of his veterans, both to the east and west of the -Jordan, and in his wake there poured into all the cities of the Syrian -seaboard a considerable volume of Greek immigration.[1270] It is from -this time onward that we find in Greek writers the earliest mention of -the Jews by name. Theophrastus and Clearchus of Soli, disciples of -Aristotle, both speak of them; but while the former gives evidence of -some knowledge of their habits, the latter reports that in the -perspective of his great master they had been so distant and vague as -to be confounded with the Brahmins of India, a confusion which long -survived among the Greeks.[1271] - -Alexander’s death delivered his empire to the ambitions of his -generals, of whom four contested for the mastery of Asia and -Egypt—Antigonus, Ptolemy, Lysimachus and Seleucus. Of these Ptolemy and -Seleucus emerged victorious, the one in possession of Egypt, the other -of Northern Syria and the rest of Asia. Palestine lay between them, and -both in the wars which led to the establishment of the two kingdoms and -in those which for centuries followed, Palestine became the -battle-field of the Greeks. - -Ptolemy gained Egypt within two years of Alexander’s death, and from -its definite and strongly entrenched territory he had by 320 conquered -Syria and Cyprus. In 315 or 314 Syria was taken from him by Antigonus, -who also expelled Seleucus from Babylon. Seleucus fled to Egypt and -stirred up Ptolemy to the reconquest of Syria. In 312 Ptolemy defeated -Demetrius, the general of Antigonus, at Gaza, but the next year was -driven back into Egypt by Antigonus himself. Meanwhile Seleucus -regained Babylon.[1272] In 311 the three made peace with each other, -but Antigonus retained Syria. In 306 they assumed the title of kings, -and in the same year renewed their quarrel. After a naval battle -Antigonus wrested Cyprus from Ptolemy, but in 301 he was defeated and -slain by Seleucus and Lysimachus at the battle of Ipsus in Phrygia. His -son Demetrius retained Cyprus and part of the Phœnician coast till 287, -when he was forced to yield them to Seleucus, who had moved the centre -of his power from Babylon to the new Antioch on the Orontes, with a -seaport at Seleucia. Meanwhile in 301 Ptolemy had regained what the -Greeks then knew as Cœle-Syria, that is all Syria to the south of -Lebanon except the Phœnician coast.[1273] Damascus belonged to -Seleucus. But Ptolemy was not allowed to retain Palestine in peace, for -in 297 Demetrius appears to have invaded it, and Seleucus, especially -after his marriage with Stratonike, the daughter of Demetrius, never -wholly resigned his claims to it.[1274] Ptolemy, however, established a -hold upon the land, which continued practically unbroken for a century, -and yet during all that time had to be maintained by frequent wars, in -the course of which the land itself must have severely suffered -(264—248). - -Therefore, as in the days of their earliest prophets, the people of -Israel once more lay between two rival empires. And as Hosea and Isaiah -pictured them in the eighth century, the possible prey either of Egypt -or Assyria, so now in these last years of the fourth they were tossed -between Ptolemy and Antigonus, and in the opening years of the third -were equally wooed by Ptolemy and Seleucus. Upon this new alternative -of tyranny the Jews appear to have bestowed the actual names of their -old oppressors. Ptolemy was Egypt to them; Seleucus, with one of his -capitals at Babylon, was still Assyria, from which came in time the -abbreviated Greek form of Syria.[1275] But, unlike the ancient empires, -these new rival lords were of one race. Whether the tyranny came from -Asia or Africa, its quality was Greek; and in the sons of Javan the -Jews saw the successors of those world-powers of Egypt, Assyria and -Babylonia, in which had been concentrated against themselves the whole -force of the heathen world. Our records of the times are fragmentary, -but though Alexander spared the Jews it appears that they had not long -to wait before feeling the force of Greek arms. Josephus quotes[1276] -from Agatharchides of Cnidos (180—145 B.C.) to the effect that Ptolemy -I. surprised Jerusalem on a Sabbath day and easily took it; and he adds -that at the same time he took a great many captives from the -hill-country of Judæa, from Jerusalem and from Samaria, and led them -into Egypt. Whether this was in 320 or 312 or 301[1277] we cannot tell. -It is possible that the Jews suffered in each of these Egyptian -invasions of Syria, as well as during the southward marches of -Demetrius and Antigonus. The later policy, both of the Ptolemies, who -were their lords, and of the Seleucids, was for a long time exceedingly -friendly to Israel. Their sufferings from the Greeks were therefore -probably over by 280, although they cannot have remained unscathed by -the wars between 264 and 248. - -The Greek invasion, however, was not like the Assyrian and Babylonian, -of arms alone; but of a force of intellect and culture far surpassing -even the influences which the Persians had impressed upon the religion -and mental attitude of Israel. The ancient empires had transplanted the -nations of Palestine to Assyria and Babylonia. The Greeks did not need -to remove them to Greece; for they brought Greece to Palestine. “The -Orient,” says Wellhausen, “became their America.” They poured into -Syria, infecting, exploiting, assimilating its peoples. With dismay the -Jews must have seen themselves surrounded by new Greek colonies, and -still more by the old Palestinian cities Hellenised in polity and -religion. The Greek translator of Isaiah ix. 12 renders Philistines by -Hellenes. Israel were compassed and penetrated by influences as subtle -as the atmosphere: not as of old uprooted from their fatherland, but -with their fatherland itself infected and altered beyond all powers of -resistance. The full alarm of this, however, was not felt for many -years to come. It was at first the policy both of the Seleucids and the -Ptolemies to flatter and foster the Jews. They encouraged them to feel -that their religion had its own place beside the forces of Greece, and -was worth interpreting to the world. Seleucus I. gave to Jews the -rights of citizenship in Asia Minor and Northern Syria; and Ptolemy I. -atoned for his previous violence by granting them the same in -Alexandria. In the matter of the consequent tribute Seleucus respected -their religious scruples; and it was under Ptolemy Philadelphus -(283—247), if not at his instigation, that the Law was first translated -into Greek. - - * * * * * - -To prophecy, before it finally expired, there was granted the -opportunity to assert itself, upon at least the threshold of this new -era of Israel’s history. - -We have from the first half-century of the era perhaps three or four, -but certainly two, prophetic pieces. By many critics Isaiah -xxiv.—xxvii. are assigned to the years immediately following -Alexander’s campaigns. Others assign Isaiah xix. 16-25 to the last -years of Ptolemy I.[1278] And of our Book of the Twelve Prophets, the -chapters attached to the genuine prophecies of Zechariah, or chaps, -ix.—xiv. of his book, most probably fall to be dated from the contests -of Syria and Egypt for the possession of Palestine; while somewhere -about 300 is the most likely date for the Book of Jonah. - -In “Zech.” ix.—xiv. we see prophecy perhaps at its lowest ebb. The -clash with the new foes produces a really terrible thirst for the blood -of the heathen: there are schisms and intrigues within Israel which in -our ignorance of her history during this time it is not possible for -us to follow: the brighter gleams, which contrast so forcibly with the -rest, may be more ancient oracles that the writer has incorporated with -his own stern and dark Apocalypse. - -In the Book of Jonah, on the other hand, we find a spirit and a style -in which prophecy may not unjustly be said to have given its highest -utterance. And this alone suffices, in our uncertainty as to the exact -date of the book, to take it last of all our Twelve. For “in this -book,” as Cornill has finely said, “the prophecy of Israel quits the -scene of battle as victor, and as victor in its severest struggle—that -against self.” - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1263] Gen. x. 2, 4. יון Javan, is Ιαϝων, or Ιαων, the older form of -the name of the Ionians, the first of the Greek race with whom Eastern -peoples came into contact. They are perhaps named on the Tell-el-Amarna -tablets as “Yivana,” serving “in the country of Tyre” (_c._ 1400 B.C.); -and on an inscription of Sargon (_c._ 709) Cyprus is called Yâvanu. - -[1264] xxvii. 13. - -[1265] _Isaiah xl.—lxvi._ (Expositor’s Bible), 108 f. - -[1266] iii. 6 (Eng.; iv. 6 Heb.). - -[1267] The sense of distance between the two peoples was mutual. -Writing in the middle of the fifth century B.C., Herodotus has heard of -the Jews only as a people that practise circumcision and were defeated -by Pharaoh Necho at Megiddo (II. 104, 159; on the latter passage see -_Hist. Geog._, p. 405 n.). He does not even know them by name. The -fragment of Chœrilos of Samos, from the end of the fifth century, which -Josephus cites (_Contra Apionem_, I. 22) as a reference to the Jews, -is probably of a people in Asia Minor. Even in the last half of the -fourth century and before Alexander’s campaigns, Aristotle knows of the -Dead Sea only by a vague report (_Meteor._, II. iii. 39). His pupil -Theophrastus (_d._ 287) names and describes the Jews (Porphyr. _de -Abstinentia_, II. 26; Eusebius, _Prepar. Evang._, IX. 2: cf. Josephus, -_C. Apion._, I. 22); and another pupil, Clearchus of Soli, records the -mention by Aristotle of a travelled Jew of Cœle-Syria, but “Greek in -soul as in tongue,” whom the great philosopher had met, and learned -from him that the Jews were descended from the philosophers of India -(quoted by Josephus, _C. Apion._, I. 22). - -[1268] Jos., XI. _Antt._ iv. 5. - -[1269] _Hist. Geog._, p. 347. - -[1270] _Hist. Geog._, pp. 593 f. - -[1271] See above, p. 440, n. 1267. - -[1272] Hence the Seleucid era dates from 312. - -[1273] _Hist. Geog._, 538. - -[1274] Cf. Ewald, _Hist._ (Eng. Ed.), V. 226 f. - -[1275] Asshur or Assyria fell in 607 (as we have seen), but her name -was transferred to her successor Babylon (2 Kings xxiii. 29; Jer. ii. -18; Lam. v. 6), and even to Babylon’s successor Persia (Ezra vi. 22). -When Seleucus secured what was virtually the old Assyrian Empire with -large extensions to Phrygia on the west and the Punjaub on the east, -the name would naturally be continued to his dominion, especially as -his first capital was Babylon, from his capture of which in 312 the -Seleucid era took its start. There is actual record of this. Brugsch -(_Gesch. Aeg._, p. 218) states that in the hieroglyphic inscriptions of -the Ptolemæan period the kingdom of the Seleucids is called Asharu (cf. -Stade, _Z.A.T.W._, 1882, p. 292, and Cheyne, _Book of Psalms_, p. 253, -and _Introd. to Book of Isaiah_, p. 107, n. 3). As the Seleucid kingdom -shrank to this side of the Euphrates, it drew the name Assyria with it. -But in Greek mouths this had long ago (cf. Herod.) been shortened to -Syria: Herodotus also appears to have applied it only to the west of -the Euphrates. Cf. _Hist. Geog._, pp. 3 f. - -[1276] XII. _Antt._ i.: cf. _Con. Apion._, I. 22. - -[1277] See above, p. 442. Eusebius, _Chron. Arm._, II. 225, assigns it -to 320. - -[1278] Cheyne, _Introd. to Book of Isaiah_, p. 105. - - - - - “_ZECHARIAH_” - - (_IX.—XIV._) - - - - -_Lo, thy King cometh to thee, vindicated and victorious, meek and -riding on an ass, and on a colt, the foal of an ass._ - -_Up, Sword, against My Shepherd!... Smite the Shepherd, that the sheep -may be scattered!_ - -_And I will pour upon the house of David and upon all the inhabitants -of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and of supplication, and they shall -look to Him whom they have pierced; and they shall lament for Him, as -with lamentation for an only son, and bitterly grieve for Him, as with -grief for a first-born._ - - - - - CHAPTER XXXII - - _CHAPTERS IX.—XIV. OF “ZECHARIAH”_ - - -We saw that the first eight chapters of the Book of Zechariah were, -with the exception of a few verses, from the prophet himself. No one -has ever doubted this. No one could doubt it: they are obviously -from the years of the building of the Temple, 520—516 B.C. They hang -together with a consistency exhibited by few other groups of chapters -in the Old Testament. - -But when we pass into chap. ix. we find ourselves in circumstances and -an atmosphere altogether different. Israel is upon a new situation of -history, and the words addressed to her breathe another spirit. There -is not the faintest allusion to the building of the Temple—the subject -from which all the first eight chapters depend. There is not a single -certain reflection of the Persian period, under the shadow of which the -first eight chapters were all evidently written. We have names of -heathen powers mentioned, which not only do not occur in the first -eight chapters, but of which it is not possible to think that they had -any interest whatever for Israel between 520 and 516: Damascus, -Hadrach, Hamath, Assyria, Egypt and Greece. The peace, and the love of -peace, in which Zechariah wrote, has disappeared.[1279] Nearly -everything breathes of war actual or imminent. The heathen are spoken -of with a ferocity which finds few parallels in the Old Testament. -There is a revelling in their blood, of which the student of the -authentic prophecies of Zechariah will at once perceive that gentle -lover of peace could not have been capable. And one passage figures the -imminence of a thorough judgment upon Jerusalem, very different from -Zechariah’s outlook upon his people’s future from the eve of the -completion of the Temple. It is not surprising, therefore, that one of -the earliest efforts of Old Testament criticism should have been to -prove another author than Zechariah for chaps. ix.—xiv. of the book -called by his name. - -The very first attempt of this kind was made so far back as 1632 by the -Cambridge theologian Joseph Mede,[1280] who was moved thereto by the -desire to vindicate the correctness of St. Matthew’s ascription[1281] -of “Zech.” xi. 13 to the prophet Jeremiah. Mede’s effort was developed -by other English exegetes. Hammond assigned chaps. x.—xii., Bishop -Kidder[1282] and William Whiston, the translator of Josephus, chaps. -ix.—xiv., to Jeremiah. Archbishop Newcome[1283] divided them, and -sought to prove that while chaps. ix.—xi. must have been written before -721, or a century earlier than Jeremiah, because of the heathen powers -they name, and the divisions between Judah and Israel, chaps. xii.—xiv. -reflect the imminence of the Fall of Jerusalem. In 1784 Flügge[1284] -offered independent proof that chaps. ix.—xiv. were by Jeremiah; and in -1814 Bertholdt[1285] suggested that chaps. ix.—xi. might be by -Zechariah the contemporary of Isaiah,[1286] and on that account -attached to the prophecies of his younger namesake. These opinions gave -the trend to the main volume of criticism, which, till fifteen years -ago, deemed “Zech.” ix.—xiv. to be pre-exilic. So Hitzig, who at first -took the whole to be from one hand, but afterwards placed xii.—xiv. by -a different author under Manasseh. So Ewald, Bleek, Kuenen (at first), -Samuel Davidson, Schrader, Duhm (in 1875), and more recently König and -Orelli, who assign chaps. ix.—xi. to the reign of Ahaz, but xii.—xiv. -to the eve of the Fall of Jerusalem, or even a little later. - -Some critics, however, remained unmoved by the evidence offered for a -pre-exilic date. They pointed out in particular that the geographical -references were equally suitable to the centuries after the Exile. -Damascus, Hadrach and Hamath,[1287] though politically obsolete by 720, -entered history again with the campaigns of Alexander the Great in -332—331, and the establishment of the Seleucid kingdom in Northern -Syria.[1288] Egypt and Assyria[1289] were names used after the Exile -for the kingdom of the Ptolemies, and for those powers which still -threatened Israel from the north, or Assyrian quarter. Judah and Joseph -or Ephraim[1290] were names still used after the Exile to express the -whole of God’s Israel; and in chaps. ix.—xiv. they are presented, not -divided as before 721, but united. None of the chapters give a hint of -any king in Jerusalem; and all of them, while representing the great -Exile of Judah as already begun, show a certain dependence in style and -even in language upon Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Isaiah xl.—lxvi. Moreover -the language is post-exilic, sprinkled with Aramaisms and with other -words and phrases used only, or mainly, by Hebrew writers from Jeremiah -onwards. - -But though many critics judged these grounds to be sufficient to -prove the post-exilic origin of “Zech.” ix.—xiv., they differed as -to the author and exact date of these chapters. Conservatives like -Hengstenberg,[1291] Delitzsch, Keil, Köhler and Pusey used the evidence -to prove the authorship of Zechariah himself after 516, and interpreted -the references to the Greek period as pure prediction. Pusey says[1292] -that chaps. ix.—xi. extend from the completion of the Temple and its -deliverance during the invasion of Alexander, and from the victories of -the Maccabees, to the rejection of the true shepherd and the curse upon -the false; and chaps. xi.—xii. “from a future repentance for the death -of Christ to the final conversion of the Jews and Gentiles.”[1293] - -But on the same grounds Eichhorn[1294] saw in the chapters not a -prediction but a reflection of the Greek period. He assigned chaps. ix. -and x. to an author in the time of Alexander the Great; xi.—xiii. 6 he -placed a little later, and brought down xiii. 7—xiv. to the Maccabean -period. Böttcher[1295] placed the whole in the wars of Ptolemy and -Seleucus after Alexander’s death; and Vatke, who had at first selected -a date in the reign of Artaxerxes Longhand, 464—425, finally decided -for the Maccabean period, 170 ff.[1296] - -In recent times the most thorough examination of the chapters has -been that by Stade,[1297] and the conclusion he comes to is that -chaps. ix.—xiv. are all from one author, who must have written during -the early wars between the Ptolemies and Seleucids about 280 B.C., -but employed, especially in chaps. ix., x., an earlier prophecy. A -criticism and modification of Stade’s theory is given by Kuenen. -He allows that the present form of chaps. ix.—xiv. must be of -post-exilic origin: this is obvious from the mention of the Greeks as -a world-power; the description of a siege of Jerusalem by _all_ the -heathen; the way in which (chaps. ix. 11 f., but especially x. 6-9) -the captivity is presupposed, if not of all Israel, yet of Ephraim; -the fact that the House of David are not represented as governing; -and the thoroughly priestly character of all the chapters. But Kuenen -holds that an ancient prophecy of the eighth century underlies -chaps. ix.—xi., xiii. 7-9, in which several actual phrases of it -survive;[1298] and that in their present form xii.—xiv. are older than -ix.—xi., and probably by a contemporary of Joel, about 400 B.C. - -In the main Cheyne,[1299] Cornill,[1300] Wildeboer[1301] and -Staerk[1302] adhere to Stade’s conclusions. Cheyne proves the unity of -the six chapters and their date _before_ the Maccabean period. Staerk -brings down xi. 4-17 and xiii. 7-9 to 171 B.C. Wellhausen argues for -the unity, and assigns it to the Maccabean times. Driver judges -ix.—xi., with its natural continuation xiii. 7-9, as not earlier than -333; and the rest of xii.—xiv. as certainly post-exilic, and probably -from 432—300. Rubinkam[1303] places ix. 1-10 in Alexander’s time, the -rest in that of the Maccabees, but Zeydner[1304] all of it to the -latter. Kirkpatrick,[1305] after showing the post-exilic character of -all the chapters, favours assigning ix.—xi. to a different author from -xii.—xiv. Asserting that to the question of the exact date it is -impossible to give a definite answer, he thinks that the whole may be -with considerable probability assigned to the first sixty or seventy -years of the Exile, and is therefore in its proper place between -Zechariah and “Malachi.” The reference to the sons of Javan he takes to -be a gloss, probably added in Maccabean times.[1306] - -It will be seen from this catalogue of conclusions that the prevailing -trend of recent criticism has been to assign “Zech.” ix.—xiv. to -post-exilic times, and to a different author from chaps. i.—viii.; and -that while a few critics maintain a date soon after the Return, the -bulk are divided between the years following Alexander’s campaigns and -the time of the Maccabean struggles.[1307] - -There are, in fact, in recent years only two attempts to support the -conservative position of Pusey and Hengstenberg that the whole book is -a genuine work of Zechariah the son of Iddo. One of these is by C. H. -H. Wright in his Bampton Lectures. The other is by George L. Robinson, -now Professor at Toronto, in a reprint (1896) from the _American -Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures_, which offers a valuable -history of the discussion of the whole question from the days of Mede, -with a careful argument of all the evidence on both sides. The very -original conclusion is reached that the chapters reflect the history of -the years 518—516 B.C. - -In discussing the question, for which our treatment of other prophets -has left us too little space, we need not open that part of it which -lies between a pre-exilic and a post-exilic date. Recent criticism of -all schools and at both extremes has tended to establish the latter -upon reasons which we have already stated,[1308] and for further -details of which the student may be referred to Stade’s and Eckardt’s -investigations in the _Zeitschrift für A. T. Wissenschaft_ and to -Kirkpatrick’s impartial summary. There remain the questions of the -unity of chaps. ix.—xiv.; their exact date or dates after the Exile, -and as a consequence of this their relation to the authentic prophecies -of Zechariah in chaps. i.—viii. - -On the question of unity we take first chaps. ix.—xi., to which must be -added (as by most critics since Ewald) xiii. 7-9, which has got out of -its place as the natural continuation and conclusion of chap. xi. - -Chap. ix. 1-8 predicts the overthrow of heathen neighbours of Israel, -their possession by Jehovah and His safeguard of Jerusalem. Vv. 9-12 -follow with a prediction of the Messianic King as the Prince of Peace; -but then come vv. 13-17, with no mention of the King, but Jehovah -appears alone as the hero of His people against the Greeks, and there -is indeed sufficiency of war and blood. Chap. x. makes a new start: the -people are warned to seek their blessings from Jehovah, and not from -Teraphim and diviners, whom their false shepherds follow. Jehovah, -visiting His flock, shall punish these, give proper rulers, make the -people strong and gather in their exiles to fill Gilead and Lebanon. -Chap. xi. opens with a burst of war on Lebanon and Bashan and the -overthrow of the heathen (vv. 1-3), and follows with an allegory, in -which the prophet first takes charge from Jehovah of the people as -their shepherd, but is contemptuously treated by them (4-14), and then -taking the guise of an evil shepherd represents what they must suffer -from their next ruler (15-17). This tyrant, however, shall receive -punishment, two-thirds of the nation shall be scattered, but the rest, -further purified, shall be God’s own people (xiii. 7-9). - -In the course of this prophesying there is no conclusive proof of a -double authorship. The only passage which offers strong evidence for -this is chap. ix. The verses predicting the peaceful coming of Messiah -(9-12) do not accord in spirit with those which follow predicting the -appearance of Jehovah with war and great shedding of blood. Nor is the -difference altogether explained, as Stade thinks, by the similar order -of events in chap. x., where Judah and Joseph are first represented as -saved and brought back in ver. 6, and then we have the process of their -redemption and return described in vv. 7 ff. Why did the same writer -give statements of such very different temper as chap. ix. 9-12 and -13-17? Or, if these be from different hands, why were they ever put -together? Otherwise there is no reason for breaking up chaps. ix.—xi., -xiii. 7-9. Rubinkam, who separates ix. 1-10 by a hundred and fifty -years from the rest; Bleek, who divides ix. from x.; and Staerk, who -separates ix.—xi. 3 from the rest, have been answered by Robinson and -others.[1309] On the ground of language, grammar and syntax, Eckardt -has fully proved that ix.—xi. are from the same author of a late date, -who, however, may have occasionally followed earlier models and even -introduced their very phrases.[1310] - -More supporters have been found for a division of authorship between -chaps. ix.—xi., xiii. 7-9, and chaps. xii.—xiv. (less xiii. 7-9). Chap. -xii. opens with a title of its own. A strange element is introduced -into the historical relation. Jerusalem is assaulted not by the heathen -only, but by Judah, who, however, turns on finding that Jehovah fights -for Jerusalem, and is saved by Jehovah before Jerusalem in order that -the latter may not boast over it (xii. 1-9). A spirit of grace and -supplication is poured upon the guilty city, a fountain opened for -uncleanness, idols abolished, and the prophets, who are put on a level -with them, abolished too, where they do not disown their profession -(xii. 10—xiii. 6). Another assault of the heathen on Jerusalem is -described, half of the people being taken captive. Jehovah appears, and -by a great earthquake saves the rest. The land is transformed. And then -the prophet goes back to the defeat of the heathen assault on the city, -in which Judah is again described as taking part; and the surviving -heathen are converted, or, if they refuse to be, punished by the -withholding of rain. Jerusalem is holy to the Lord (xiv.). In all this -there is more that differs from chaps. ix.—xi., xiii. 7-9, than the -strange opposition of Judah and Jerusalem. Ephraim, or Joseph, is not -mentioned, nor any return of exiles, nor punishment of the shepherds, -nor coming of the Messiah,[1311] the latter’s place being taken by -Jehovah. But in answer to this we may remember that the Messiah, after -being described in ix. 9-12, is immediately lost behind the warlike -coming of Jehovah. Both sections speak of idolatry, and of the heathen, -their punishment and conversion, and do so in the same apocalyptic -style. Nor does the language of the two differ in any decisive fashion. -On the contrary, as Eckardt[1312] and Kuiper have shown, the language -is on the whole an argument for unity of authorship.[1313] There is, -then, nothing conclusive against the position, which Stade so clearly -laid down and strongly fortified, that chaps. ix.—xiv. are from the -same hand, although, as he admits, this cannot be proved with absolute -certainty. So also Cheyne: “With perhaps one or two exceptions, chaps. -ix.—xi. and xii.—xiv. are so closely welded together that even analysis -is impossible.”[1314] - -The next questions we have to decide are whether chaps. ix.—xiv. offer -any evidence of being by Zechariah, the author of chaps. i.—viii., and -if not to what other post-exilic date they may be assigned. - -It must be admitted that in language and in style the two parts of the -Book of Zechariah have features in common. But that these have been -exaggerated by defenders of the unity there can be no doubt. We cannot -infer anything from the fact[1315] that both parts contain specimens of -clumsy diction, of the repetition of the same word, of phrases (not the -same phrases) unused by other writers;[1316] or that each is lavish in -vocatives; or that each is variable in his spelling. Resemblances of -that kind they share with other books: some of them are due to the fact -that both sections are post-exilic. On the other hand, as Eckardt has -clearly shown, there exists a still greater number of differences -between the two sections, both in language and in style.[1317] Not only -do characteristic words occur in each which are not found in the other, -not only do chaps. ix.—xiv. contain many more Aramaisms than chaps. -i.—viii., and therefore symptoms of a later date; but both parts use -the same words with more or less different meanings, and apply -different terms to the same objects. There are also differences of -grammar, of favourite formulas, and of other features of the -phraseology, which, if there be any need, complete the proof of a -distinction of dialect so great as to require to account for it -distinction of authorship. - -The same impression is sustained by the contrast of the historical -circumstances reflected in each of the two sections. Zech. i.—viii. -were written during the building of the Temple. There is no echo of the -latter in “Zech.” ix.—xiv. Zech. i.—viii. picture the whole earth as at -peace, which was true at least of all Syria: they portend no danger to -Jerusalem from the heathen, but describe her peace and fruitful -expansion in terms most suitable to the circumstances imposed upon her -by the solid and clement policy of the earlier Persian kings. This is -all changed in “Zech.” ix.—xiv. The nations are restless; a siege of -Jerusalem is imminent, and her salvation is to be assured only by much -war and a terrible shedding of blood. We know exactly how Israel fared -and felt in the early sections of the Persian period: her interests in -the politics of the world, her feelings towards her governors and her -whole attitude to the heathen were not at that time those which are -reflected in “Zech.” ix.—xiv. - -Nor is there any such resemblance between the religious principles -of the two sections of the Book of Zechariah as could prove identity -of origin. That both are spiritual, or that they have a similar -expectation of the ultimate position of Israel in the history of -the world, proves only that both were late offshoots from the same -religious development, and worked upon the same ancient models. Within -these outlines, there are not a few divergences. Zech. i.—viii. were -written before Ezra and Nehemiah had imposed the Levitical legislation -upon Israel; but Eckardt has shown the dependence on the latter of -“Zech.” ix.—xiv. - -We may, therefore, adhere to Canon Driver’s assertion, that Zechariah -in chaps. i.—viii. “uses a different phraseology, evinces different -interests and moves in a different circle of ideas from those which -prevail in chaps. ix.—xiv.”[1318] Criticism has indeed been justified -in separating, by the vast and growing majority of its opinions, the -two sections from each other. This was one of the earliest results -which modern criticism achieved, and the latest researches have but -established it on a firmer basis. - -If, then, chaps. ix.—xiv. be not Zechariah’s, to what date may we -assign them? We have already seen that they bear evidence of being -upon the whole later than Zechariah, though they appear to contain -fragments from an earlier period. Perhaps this is all we can with -certainty affirm. Yet something more definite is at least probable. -The mention of the Greeks, not as Joel mentions them about 400, the -most distant nation to which Jewish slaves could be carried, but as -the chief of the heathen powers, and a foe with whom the Jews are in -touch and must soon cross swords,[1319] appears to imply that the -Syrian campaign of Alexander is happening or has happened, or even -that the Greek kingdoms of Syria and Egypt are already contending for -the possession of Palestine. With this agrees the mention of Damascus, -Hadrach and Hamath, the localities where the Seleucids had their chief -seats.[1320] In that case Asshur would signify the Seleucids and Egypt -the Ptolemies:[1321] it is these, and not Greece itself, from whom the -Jewish exiles have still to be redeemed. All this makes probable the -date which Stade has proposed for the chapters, between 300 and 280 -B.C. To bring them further down, to the time of the Maccabees, as some -have tried to do, would not be impossible so far as the historical -allusions are concerned; but had they been of so late a date as that, -viz. 170 or 160, we may assert that they could not have found a place -in the prophetic canon, which was closed by 200, but must have fallen -along with Daniel into the Hagiographa. - -The appearance of these prophecies at the close of the Book of -Zechariah has been explained, not quite satisfactorily, as follows. -With the Book of “Malachi” they formed originally three anonymous -pieces,[1322] which because of their anonymity were set at the end of -the Book of the Twelve. The first of them begins with the very peculiar -construction “Massa’ Dĕbar Jehovah,” _oracle of the word of Jehovah_, -which, though partly belonging to the text, the editor read as a title, -and attached as a title to each of the others. It occurs nowhere else. -The Book of “Malachi” was too distinct in character to be attached to -another book, and soon came to have the supposed name of its author -added to its title.[1323] But the other two pieces fell, like all -anonymous works, to the nearest writing with an author’s name. Perhaps -the attachment was hastened by the desire to make the round number of -Twelve Prophets. - - -ADDENDA. - - Whiston’s work (p. 450) is _An Essay towards restoring the True Text - of the O. T. and for vindicating the Citations made thence in the - N. T._, 1722, pp. 93 ff. (not seen). Besides those mentioned on p. - 452 (see n. 1293) as supporting the unity of Zechariah there ought - to be named De Wette, Umbreit, von Hoffmann, Ebrard, etc. Kuiper’s - work (p. 458) is _Zacharia_ 9-14, Utrecht, 1894 (not seen). Nowack’s - conclusions are: ix.—xi. 3 date from the Greek period (we cannot - date them more exactly, unless ix. 8 refers to Ptolemy’s capture of - Jerusalem in 320); xi., xiii. 7-9, are post-exilic; xii.—xiii. 6 long - after Exile; xiv. long after Exile, later than “Malachi.” - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1279] Except in the passage ix. 10-12, which seems strangely out of -place in the rest of ix.—xiv. - -[1280] _Works_, 4th ed. 1677, pp. 786 ff. (1632), 834. Mede died 1638. - -[1281] Matt. xxvii. 9. - -[1282] _Demonstration of the Messias_, 1700. - -[1283] _An Attempt towards an Improved Version of the Twelve Minor -Prophets_, 1785 (not seen). See also Wright on Archbishop Seeker. - -[1284] _Die Weissagungen, welche bei den Schriften des Proph. Sacharja -beygebogen sind, übersetzt_, etc., Hamburg (not seen). - -[1285] _Einleitung in A. u. N. T._ (not seen). - -[1286] Isa. viii. 2. See above, p. 265. - -[1287] ix. 1. - -[1288] See above, Chap. XXXI. - -[1289] x. 10. - -[1290] ix. 10, 13, etc. - -[1291] _Dan. u. Sacharja._ - -[1292] Page 503. - -[1293] See Addenda, p. 462. - -[1294] _Einl._ in the beginning of the century. - -[1295] _Neue Exeg. krit. Aehrenlese z. A. T._, 1864. - -[1296] _Einl._, 1882, p. 709. - -[1297] _Z.A.T.W._, 1881, 1882. See further proof of the late character -of language and style, and of the unity, by Eckardt, _Z.A.T.W._, 1893, -pp. 76 ff. - -[1298] § 81, n. 3, 10. See p. 457, end of note 1310. - -[1299] _Jewish Quart. Review_, 1889. - -[1300] _Einl._⁴ - -[1301] _A. T. Litt._ - -[1302] _Untersuchung über die Komposition u. Abfassungszeit von Zach._ -9-14, etc. Halle, 1891 (not seen). - -[1303] 1892: quoted by Wildeboer. - -[1304] 1893: quoted by Wildeboer. - -[1305] _Doctrine of the Prophets_, 438 ff., in which the English reader -will find a singularly lucid and fair treatment of the question. See, -too, Wright. - -[1306] Page 472, Note A. - -[1307] Kautzsch—the Greek period. - -[1308] Above, pp. 451 f. - -[1309] Robinson, pp. 76 ff. - -[1310] _Z.A.T.W._, 1893, 76 ff. See also the summaries of linguistic -evidence given by Robinson. Kuenen finds in ix.—xi. the following -pre-exilic elements: ix. 1-5, 8-10, 13_a_ (?); x. 1 f., 10 f.; xi. 4-14 -or 17. - -[1311] Kuenen. - -[1312] See above, p. 453, n. 1297. - -[1313] See also Robinson. - -[1314] _Jewish Quarterly Review_, 1889, p. 81. - -[1315] As Robinson, _e.g._, does. - -[1316] E.g. _holy land_, ii. 16, and _Mount of Olives_, xiv. 4. - -[1317] _Op. cit._, 103-109: cf. Driver, _Introd._⁶, 354. - -[1318] _Introd._⁶, p. 354. - -[1319] ix. 13. - -[1320] ix. 1 f. - -[1321] x. 11. See above, p. 451. - -[1322] See above, pp. 331 ff., for proof of the original anonymity of -the Book of “Malachi.” - -[1323] Above, p. 331. - - - - - CHAPTER XXXIII - - _THE CONTENTS OF “ZECHARIAH” IX.—XIV._ - - -From the number of conflicting opinions which prevail upon the subject, -we have seen how impossible it is to decide upon a scheme of division -for “Zech.” ix.—xiv. These chapters consist of a number of separate -oracles, which their language and general conceptions lead us on the -whole to believe were put together by one hand, and which, with the -possible exception of some older fragments, reflect the troubled times -in Palestine that followed on the invasion of Alexander the Great. But -though the most of them are probably due to one date and possibly come -from the same author, these oracles do not always exhibit a connection, -and indeed sometimes show no relevance to each other. It will therefore -be simplest to take them piece by piece, and, before giving the -translation of each, to explain the difficulties in it and indicate the -ruling ideas. - - - 1. THE COMING OF THE GREEKS (ix. 1-8). - -This passage runs exactly in the style of the early prophets. It -figures the progress of war from the north of Syria southwards by -the valley of the Orontes to Damascus, and then along the coasts of -Phœnicia and the Philistines. All these shall be devastated, but -Jehovah will camp about His own House and it shall be inviolate. -This is exactly how Amos or Isaiah might have pictured an Assyrian -campaign, or Zephaniah a Scythian. It is not surprising, therefore, -that even some of those who take the bulk of “Zech.” ix.—xiv. as -post-exilic should regard ix. 1-5 as earlier even than Amos, with -post-exilic additions only in vv. 6-8.[1324] This is possible. Vv. 6-8 -are certainly post-exilic, because of their mention of the half-breeds, -and their intimation that Jehovah will take unclean food out of the -mouth of the heathen; but the allusions in vv. 1-5 suit an early date. -They equally suit, however, a date in the Greek period. The progress of -war from the Orontes valley by Damascus and thence down the coast of -Palestine follows the line of Alexander’s campaign in 332, which must -also have been the line of Demetrius in 315 and of Antigonus in 311. -The evidence of language is mostly in favour of a late date.[1325] If -Ptolemy I. took Jerusalem in 320,[1326] then the promise, no assailant -shall return (ver. 8), is probably later than that. - -In face then of Alexander’s invasion of Palestine, or of another -campaign on the same line, this oracle repeats the ancient confidence -of Isaiah. God rules: His providence is awake alike for the heathen -and for Israel. _Jehovah hath an eye for mankind, and all the tribes -of Israel._[1327] The heathen shall be destroyed, but Jerusalem rest -secure; and the remnant of the heathen be converted, according to the -Levitical notion, by having unclean foods taken out of their mouths. - - - _Oracle._ - -_The Word of Jehovah is on the land of Hadrach, and Damascus is its -goal[1328]—for Jehovah hath an eye _upon_ the heathen,[1329] and all -the tribes of Israel—and on[1330] Hamath, _which_ borders upon it, Tyre -and Sidon, for they were very wise.[1331] And Tyre built her a -fortress, and heaped up silver like dust, and gold like the dirt of the -streets. Lo, the Lord will dispossess her, and strike her rampart[1332] -into the sea, and she shall be consumed in fire. Ashḳlon shall see and -shall fear, and Gaza writhe in anguish, and Ekron, for her -confidence[1333] is abashed, and the king shall perish from Gaza and -Ashḳlon lie uninhabited. Half-breeds[1334] shall dwell in Ashdod, and I -will cut down the pride of the Philistines. And I will take their blood -from their mouth and their abominations from between their teeth,[1335] -and even they shall be left for our God, and shall become like a clan -in Judah, and Ekron shall be as the Jebusite. And I shall encamp for a -guard[1336] to My House, so that none pass by or return, and no -assailant again pass upon them, for now do I regard it with Mine eyes._ - - - 2. THE PRINCE OF PEACE (ix. 9-12). - -This beautiful picture, applied by the Evangelist with such fitness -to our Lord upon His entry to Jerusalem, must also be of post-exilic -date. It contrasts with the warlike portraits of the Messiah drawn in -pre-exilic times, for it clothes Him with humility and with peace. The -coming King of Israel has the attributes already imputed to the Servant -of Jehovah by the prophet of the Babylonian captivity. The next verses -also imply the Exile as already a fact. On the whole, too, the language -is of a late rather than of an early date.[1337] Nothing in the passage -betrays the exact point of its origin after the Exile. - -The epithets applied to the Messiah are of very great interest. He does -not bring victory or salvation, but is the passive recipient of -it.[1338] This determines the meaning of the preceding adjective, -_righteous_, which has not the moral sense of _justice_, but rather -that of _vindication_, in which _righteousness_ and _righteous_ are so -frequently used in Isa. xl.—lv.[1339] He is _lowly_, like the Servant -of Jehovah; and comes riding not the horse, an animal for war, because -the next verse says that horses and chariots are to be removed from -Israel,[1340] but the ass, the animal not of lowliness, as some have -interpreted, but of peace. To this day in the East asses are used, as -they are represented in the Song of Deborah, by great officials, but -only when these are upon civil, and not upon military, duty. - -It is possible that this oracle closes with ver. 10, and that we should -take vv. 11 and 12, on the deliverance from exile, with the next. - -_Rejoice mightily, daughter of Zion! shout aloud, daughter of -Jerusalem! Lo, thy King cometh to thee, vindicated and victorious,[1341] -meek and riding on an ass,[1342] and on a colt the she-ass’ foal.[1343] -And I[1344] will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the horse from -Jerusalem, and the war-bow shall be cut off, and He shall speak peace -to the nations, and His rule shall be from sea to sea and from the -river even to the ends of the earth. Thou, too,—by thy covenant-blood, -[1345] I have set free thy prisoners from the pit.[1346] Return to the -fortress, ye prisoners of hope; even to-day do I proclaim: Double will -I return to thee._[1347] - - - 3. THE SLAUGHTER OF THE GREEKS (ix. 13-17). - -The next oracle seems singularly out of keeping with the spirit of the -last, which declared the arrival of the Messianic peace, while this -represents Jehovah as using Israel for His weapons in the slaughter of -the Greeks and heathens, in whose blood they shall revel. But Stade has -pointed out how often in chaps. ix.—xiv. a result is first stated and -then the oracle goes on to describe the process by which it is -achieved. Accordingly we have no ground for affirming ix. 13-17 to be -by another hand than ix. 9-12. The apocalyptic character of the means -by which the heathen are to be overthrown, and the exultation displayed -in their slaughter, as in a great sacrifice (ver. 15), betray Israel in -a state of absolute political weakness, and therefore suit a date after -Alexander’s campaigns, which is also made sure by the reference to the -_sons of Javan_, as if Israel were now in immediate contact with them. -Kirkpatrick’s note should be read, in which he seeks to prove _the sons -of Javan_ a late gloss;[1348] but his reasons do not appear conclusive. -The language bears several traces of lateness.[1349] - -_For I have drawn Judah for My bow, I have charged_ it _with Ephraim; -and I will urge thy sons, O Zion, against the sons of[1350] Javan, and -make thee like the sword of a hero. Then will Jehovah appear above -them, and His shaft shall go forth like lightning; and the Lord Jehovah -shall blow a blast on the trumpet, and travel in the storms of the -south.[1351] Jehovah will protect them, and they shall devour -_(?)_[1352] and trample ...;[1353] and they shall drink their -blood[1354] like wine, and be drenched with it, like a bowl and like -the corners of the altar. And Jehovah their God will give them victory -in that day....[1355] How good it[1356] is, and how beautiful! Corn -shall make the young men flourish and new wine the maidens._ - - - 4. AGAINST THE TERAPHIM AND SORCERERS (x. 1, 2). - -This little piece is connected with the previous one only through the -latter’s conclusion upon the fertility of the land, while this opens -with rain, the requisite of fertility. It is connected with the piece -that follows only by its mention of the shepherdless state of the -people, the piece that follows being against the false shepherds. These -connections are extremely slight. Perhaps the piece is an independent -one. The subject of it gives no clue to the date. Sorcerers are -condemned both by the earlier prophets, and by the later.[1357] Stade -points out that this is the only passage of the Old Testament in which -the Teraphim are said to speak.[1358] The language has one symptom of a -late period.[1359] - -After emphasising the futility of images, enchantments and dreams, this -little oracle says, therefore the people wander like sheep: they have -no shepherd. Shepherd in this connection cannot mean civil ruler, but -must be religious director. - -_Ask from Jehovah rain in the time of the latter rain.[1360] Jehovah is -the maker of the lightning-flashes, and the winter rain He gives to -them—to every man herbage in the field. But the Teraphim speak -nothingness, and the sorcerers see lies, and dreams discourse vanity, -and they comfort in vain. Wherefore they wander (?)[1361] like a flock -of sheep, and flee about,[1362] for there is no shepherd._ - - - 5. AGAINST EVIL SHEPHERDS (x. 3-12). - -The unity of this section is more apparent than its connection with the -preceding, which had spoken of the want of a shepherd, or religious -director, of Israel, while this is directed against their shepherds and -leaders, meaning their foreign tyrants.[1363] The figure is taken from -Jeremiah xxiii. 1 ff., where, besides, _to visit upon_[1364] is used in -a sense of punishment, but the simple _visit_[1365] in the sense of to -look after, just as within ver. 3 of this tenth chapter. Who these -foreign tyrants are is not explicitly stated, but the reference to -Egypt and Assyria as lands whence the Jewish captives shall be brought -home, while at the same time there is a Jewish nation in Judah, suits -only the Greek period, after Ptolemy had taken so many Jews to -Egypt,[1366] and there were numbers still scattered throughout the -other great empire in the north, to which, as we have already seen, the -Jews applied the name of Assyria. The reference can hardly suit the -years after Seleucus and Ptolemy granted to the Jews in their -territories the rights of citizens. The captive Jews are to be brought -back to Gilead and Lebanon. Why exactly these are mentioned, and -neither Samaria nor Galilee, forms a difficulty, to whatever age we -assign the chapter. The language of x. 3-12 has several late -features.[1367] Joseph or Ephraim, here and elsewhere in these -chapters, is used of the portion of Israel still in captivity, in -contrast to Judah, the returned community. - -The passage predicts that Jehovah will change His poor leaderless -sheep, the Jews, into war-horses, and give them strong chiefs and -weapons of war. They shall overthrow the heathen, and Jehovah will -bring back His exiles. The passage is therefore one with chap. ix. - -_My wrath is hot against the shepherds, and I will make visitation on -the he-goats:[1368] yea, Jehovah of Hosts will[1369] visit His flock, -the house of Judah, and will make them like His splendid war-horses. -From Him the corner-stone, from Him the stay,[1370] from Him the -war-bow, from Him the oppressor—shall go forth together. And in battle -shall they trample on heroes as on the dirt of the streets,[1371] and -fight, for Jehovah is with them, and the riders on horses shall be -abashed. And the house of Judah will I make strong and work salvation -for the house of Joseph, and bring them back,[1372] for I have pity -for them,[1373] and they shall be as though I had not put them -away,[1373] for I am Jehovah their God[1373] and I will hold converse -with them.[1373] And Ephraim shall be as heroes,[1374] and their heart -shall be glad as with wine, and their children shall behold and be -glad: their heart shall rejoice in Jehovah. I will whistle for them and -gather them in, for I have redeemed them, and they shall be as many as -they once were. I scattered them[1375] among the nations, but among the -far-away they think of Me, and they will bring up[1376] their children, -and come back. And I will fetch them home from the land of Miṣraim, and -from Asshur[1377] will I gather them, and to the land of Gilead and -Lebānon will I bring them in, though_ these _be not found_ sufficient -_for them. And they[1378] shall pass through the sea of Egypt,[1379] -and He shall smite the sea of breakers, and all the deeps of the Nile -shall be dried, and the pride of Assyria brought down, and the sceptre -of Egypt swept aside. And their strength[1380] shall be in Jehovah, and -in His Name shall they boast themselves[1381]—oracle of Jehovah._ - - - 6. WAR UPON THE SYRIAN TYRANTS (xi. 1-3). - -This is taken by some with the previous chapter, by others with the -passage following. Either connection seems precarious. No conclusion as -to date can be drawn from the language. But the localities threatened -were on the southward front of the Seleucid kingdom. _Open, Lebānon, -thy doors_ suits the Egyptian invasions of that kingdom. To which of -these the passage refers cannot of course be determined. The shepherds -are the rulers. - -_Open, Lebānon, thy doors, that the fire may devour in thy cedars. -Wail, O pine-tree, for the cedar is fallen;[1382] wail, O oaks of -Bashan, for fallen is the impenetrable[1383] wood. Hark to the wailing -of the shepherds! for their glory is destroyed. Hark how the lions -roar! for blasted is the pride[1384] of Jordan._ - - - 7. THE REJECTION AND MURDER OF THE GOOD SHEPHERD - (xi. 4-17, xiii. 7-9). - -There follows now, in the rest of chap. xi., a longer oracle, to which -Ewald and most critics after him have suitably attached chap. xiii. 7-9. - -This passage appears to rise from circumstances similar to those of the -preceding and from the same circle of ideas. Jehovah’s people are His -flock and have suffered. Their rulers are their shepherds; and the -rulers of other peoples are their shepherds. A true shepherd is sought -for Israel in place of the evil ones which have distressed them. The -language shows traces of a late date.[1385] No historical allusion is -obvious in the passage. The _buyers_ and _sellers_ of God’s sheep might -reflect the Seleucids and Ptolemies between whom Israel were exchanged -for many years, but probably mean their native leaders. The _three -shepherds cut off in a month_ were interpreted by the supporters of the -pre-exilic date of the chapters as Zechariah and Shallum (2 Kings xv. -8-13), and another whom these critics assume to have followed them to -death, but of him the history has no trace. The supporters of a -Maccabean date for the prophecy recall the quick succession of high -priests before the Maccabean rising. The _one month_ probably means -nothing more than a very short time. - -The allegory which our passage unfolds is given, like so many more in -Hebrew prophecy, to the prophet himself to enact. It recalls the -pictures in Jeremiah and Ezekiel of the overthrow of the false -shepherds of Israel, and the appointment of a true shepherd.[1386] -Jehovah commissions the prophet to become shepherd to His sheep that -have been so cruelly abused by their guides and rulers. Like the -shepherds of Palestine, the prophet took two staves to herd his flock. -He called one _Grace_, the other _Union_. In a month he cut off three -shepherds—both _month_ and _three_ are probably formal terms. But he -did not get on well with his charge. They were wilful and quarrelsome. -So he broke his staff Grace, in token that his engagement was -dissolved. The dealers of the sheep saw that he acted for God. He asked -for his wage, if they cared to give it. They gave him thirty pieces of -silver, the price of an injured slave,[1387] which by God’s command he -cast into the treasury of the Temple, as if in token that it was God -Himself whom they paid with so wretched a sum. And then he broke his -other staff, to signify that the brotherhood between Judah and Israel -was broken. Then, to show the people that by their rejection of the -good shepherd they must fall a prey to an evil one, the prophet assumed -the character of the latter. But another judgment follows. In chap. -xiii. 7-9 the good shepherd is smitten and the flock dispersed. - -The spiritual principles which underlie this allegory are obvious. -God’s own sheep, persecuted and helpless though they be, are yet -obstinate, and their obstinacy not only renders God’s good-will to them -futile, but causes the death of the one man who could have done them -good. The guilty sacrifice the innocent, but in this execute their own -doom. That is a summary of the history of Israel. But had the writer of -this allegory any special part of that history in view? Who were the -_dealers of the flock_? - -_Thus saith Jehovah my God:[1388] Shepherd the flock of slaughter, -whose purchasers slaughter them impenitently, and whose sellers -say,[1389] Blessed be Jehovah, for I am rich!—and their shepherds do -not spare them. [For I will no more spare the inhabitants of the -land—oracle of Jehovah; but lo! I am about to give mankind[1390] over, -each into the hand of his shepherd,[1391] and into the hand of his -king; and they shall destroy the land, and I will not secure it from -their hands.[1392]] And I shepherded the flock of slaughter for the -sheep merchants,[1393] and I took to me two staves—the one I called -Grace, and the other I called Union[1394]—and so I shepherded the -sheep. And I destroyed the three shepherds in one month. Then was my -soul vexed with them, and they on their part were displeased with me. -And I said: I will not shepherd you: what is dead, let it die; and what -is destroyed, let it be destroyed; and those that survive, let them -devour one another’s flesh! And I took my staff Grace, and I brake it -so as to annul my covenant which I made with all the peoples.[1395] And -in that day it was annulled, and the dealers of the sheep,[1396] who -watched me, knew that it was Jehovah’s word. And I said to them, If it -be good in your sight, give me my wage, and if it be not good, let it -go! And they weighed out my wage, thirty pieces of silver. Then said -Jehovah to me, Throw it into the treasury[1397] (the precious wage at -which I[1398] had been valued of them). So I took the thirty pieces of -silver, and cast them to the House of Jehovah, to the treasury.[1399] -And I brake my second staff, Union, so as to dissolve the brotherhood -between Judah and Israel.[1400] And Jehovah said to me: Take again to -thee the implements of a worthless shepherd: for lo! I am about to -appoint a shepherd over the land; the destroyed he will not visit, the -...[1401] he will not seek out, the wounded he will not heal, the -...;[1402] he will not cherish, but he will devour the flesh of the fat -and....[1403] Woe to My worthless[1404] shepherd, that deserts the -flock! The sword be upon his arm and his right eye! May his arm wither, -and his right eye be blinded._ - -Upon this follows the section xiii. 7-9, which develops the tragedy of -the nation to its climax in the murder of the good shepherd. - -_Up, Sword, against My shepherd and the man My compatriot[1405]—oracle -of Jehovah of Hosts. Smite[1406] the shepherd, that the sheep may be -scattered; and I will turn My hand against the little ones.[1407] And -it shall come to pass in all the land—oracle of Jehovah—that two-thirds -shall be cut off in it, and perish, but a third shall be left in it. -And I shall bring the third into the fire, and smelt it as _men_ smelt -silver and try it as _men_ try gold. It shall call upon My Name, and I -will answer it. And I will[1408] say, It is My people, and it will say, -Jehovah my God!_ - - - 8. JUDAH _versus_ JERUSALEM (xii. 1-7). - -A title, though probably of later date than the text,[1409] introduces -with the beginning of chap. xii. an oracle plainly from circumstances -different from those of the preceding chapters. The nations, not -particularised as they have been, gather to the siege of Jerusalem, -and, very singularly, Judah is gathered with them against her own -capital. But God makes the city like one of those great boulders, -deeply embedded, which husbandmen try to pull up from their fields, but -it tears and wounds the hands of those who would remove it. Moreover -God strikes with panic all the besiegers, save only Judah, who, her -eyes being opened, perceives that God is with Jerusalem and turns to -her help. Jerusalem remains in her place; but the glory of the victory -is first Judah’s, so that the house of David may not have too much fame -nor boast over the country districts. The writer doubtless alludes to -some temporary schism between the capital and country caused by the -arrogance of the former. But we have no means of knowing when this took -place. It must often have been imminent in the days both before and -especially after the Exile, when Jerusalem had absorbed all the -religious privilege and influence of the nation. The language is -undoubtedly late.[1410] - -The figure of Jerusalem as a boulder, deeply bedded in the soil, which -tears the hands that seek to remove it, is a most true and expressive -summary of the history of heathen assaults upon her. Till she herself -was rent by internal dissensions, and the Romans at last succeeded in -tearing her loose, she remained planted on her own site.[1411] This -was very true of all the Greek period. Seleucids and Ptolemies alike -wounded themselves upon her. But at what period did either of them -induce Judah to take part against her? Not in the Maccabean. - - - _Oracle of the Word of Jehovah upon Israel._ - -_Oracle of Jehovah, who stretched out the heavens and founded the -earth, and formed the spirit of man within him: Lo, I am about to make -Jerusalem a cup of reeling for all the surrounding peoples, and even -Judah[1412] shall be at the siege of Jerusalem. And it shall come to -pass in that day that I will make Jerusalem a stone to be lifted[1413] -by all the peoples—all who lift it do indeed wound[1414] themselves—and -there are gathered against it all nations of the earth. In that -day—oracle of Jehovah—I will smite every horse with panic, and their -riders with madness; but as for the house of Judah, I will open -its[1415] eyes, though every horse of the peoples I smite with -blindness. Then shall the chiefs[1416] of Judah say in their hearts, -...[1417] the inhabitants of Jerusalem through Jehovah of Hosts their -God. In that day will I make the districts of Judah like a pan of fire -among timber and like a torch among sheaves, so that they devour right -and left all the peoples round about, but Jerusalem shall still abide -on its own site.[1418] And Jehovah shall first give victory to the -tents[1419] of Judah, so that the fame of the house of David and the -fame of the inhabitants of Jerusalem be not too great in contrast to -Judah._ - - - 9. FOUR RESULTS OF JERUSALEM’S DELIVERANCE - (xii. 8—xiii. 6). - -Upon the deliverance of Jerusalem, by the help of the converted Judah, -there follow four results, each introduced by the words that it -happened _in that day_ (xii. 8, 9, xiii. 1, 2). First, the people of -Jerusalem shall themselves be strengthened. Second, the hostile heathen -shall be destroyed, but on the house of David and all Jerusalem the -spirit of penitence shall be poured, and they will lament for the good -shepherd whom they slew. Third, a fountain for sin and uncleanness -shall be opened. Fourth, the idols, the unclean spirit, and prophecy, -now so degraded, shall all be abolished. The connection of these -oracles with the preceding is obvious, as well as with the oracle -describing the murder of the good shepherd (xiii. 7-9). When we see how -this is presupposed by xii. 9 ff., we feel more than ever that its -right place is between chaps. xi. and xii. There are no historical -allusions. But again the language gives evidence of a late date.[1420] -And throughout the passage there is a repetition of formal phrases -which recalls the Priestly Code and the general style of the -post-exilic age.[1421] Notice that no king is mentioned, although there -are several points at which, had he existed, he must have been -introduced. - -1. The first of the four effects of Jerusalem’s deliverance from the -heathen is the promotion of her weaklings to the strength of her -heroes, and of her heroes to divine rank (xii. 8). _In that day Jehovah -will protect the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and the lame among them -shall in that day be like David_ himself _, and the house of David like -God, like the Angel of Jehovah before them_. - -2. The second paragraph of this series very remarkably emphasises that -upon her deliverance Jerusalem shall not give way to rejoicing, but to -penitent lamentation for the murder of him whom she has pierced—the -good shepherd whom her people have rejected and slain. This is one of -the few ethical strains which run through these apocalyptic chapters. -It forms their highest interest for us. Jerusalem’s mourning is -compared to that for _Hadad-Rimmon in the valley_ or _plain of -Megiddo_. This is the classic battle-field of the land, and the theatre -upon which Apocalypse has placed the last contest between the hosts of -God and the hosts of evil.[1422] In Israel’s history it had been the -ground not only of triumph but of tears. The greatest tragedy of that -history, the defeat and death of the righteous Josiah, took place -there;[1423] and since the earliest Jewish interpreters the _mourning -of Hadad-Rimmon in the valley of Megiddo_ has been referred to the -mourning for Josiah.[1424] Jerome identifies Hadad-Rimmon with -Rummâni,[1425] a village on the plain still extant, close to Megiddo. -But the lamentation for Josiah was at Jerusalem; and it cannot be -proved that Hadad-Rimmon is a place-name. It may rather be the name of -the object of the mourning, and as Hadad was a divine name among -Phœnicians and Arameans, and Rimmôn the pomegranate was a sacred tree, -a number of critics have supposed this to be a title of Adonis, and the -mourning like that excessive grief which Ezekiel tells us was yearly -celebrated for Tammuz.[1426] This, however, is not fully proved.[1427] -Observe, further, that while the reading Hadad-Rimmon is by no means -past doubt, the sanguine blossoms and fruit of the pomegranate, -“red-ripe at the heart,” would naturally lead to its association with -the slaughtered Adonis. - -_And it shall come to pass in that day that I will seek to destroy all -the nations who have come in upon Jerusalem. And I will pour upon the -house of David and upon all the inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of -grace and of supplication, and they shall look to him[1428] whom they -have pierced; and they shall lament for him, as with lamentation for an -only son, and bitterly grieve for him, as with grief for a first-born. -In that day lamentation shall be as great in Jerusalem as the -lamentation for Hadad-Rimmon[1429] in the valley of Megiddo. And the -land shall mourn, every family by itself: the family of the house of -David by itself, and their wives by themselves; the family of the house -of Nathan by itself, and their wives by themselves; the family of the -house of Levi by itself, and their wives by themselves; the family of -Shime’i[1430] by itself, and their wives by themselves; all the -families who are left, every family by itself, and their wives by -themselves._ - -3. The third result of Jerusalem’s deliverance from the heathen -shall be the opening of a fountain of cleansing. This purging of -her sin follows fitly upon her penitence just described. _In that -day a fountain shall be opened for the house of David, and for the -inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for uncleanness._[1431] - -4. The fourth consequence is the removal of idolatry, of the unclean -spirit and of the degraded prophets from her midst. The last is -especially remarkable: for it is not merely false prophets, as -distinguished from true, who shall be removed; but prophecy in general. -It is singular that in almost its latest passage the prophecy of Israel -should return to the line of its earliest representative, Amos, who -refused to call himself prophet. As in his day, the prophets had become -mere professional and mercenary oracle-mongers, abjured to the point of -death by their own ashamed and wearied relatives. - -_And it shall be in that day—oracle of Jehovah of Hosts—I will cut off -the names of the idols from the land, and they shall not be remembered -any more. And also the prophets and the unclean spirit will I expel -from the land. And it shall come to pass, if any man prophesy again, -then shall his father and mother who begat him say to him, Thou shall -not live, for thou speakest falsehood in the name of Jehovah; and his -father and mother who begat him shall stab him for his prophesying. And -it shall be in that day that the prophets shall be ashamed of their -visions when they prophesy, and shall not wear the leather cloak in -order to lie. And he will say, No prophet am I! A tiller of the ground -I am, for the ground is my possession[1432] from my youth up. And they -shall say to him, What are these wounds in[1433] thy hands? and he -shall say, What I was wounded with in the house of my lovers!_ - - - 10. JUDGMENT OF THE HEATHEN AND SANCTIFICATION - OF JERUSALEM (xiv.). - -In another apocalyptic vision the prophet beholds Jerusalem again beset -by the heathen. But Jehovah Himself intervenes, appearing in person, -and an earthquake breaks out at His feet. The heathen are smitten, as -they stand, into mouldering corpses. The remnant of them shall be -converted to Jehovah and take part in the annual Feast of Booths. If -any refuse they shall be punished with drought. But Jerusalem shall -abide in security and holiness: every detail of her equipment shall be -consecrate. The passage has many resemblances to the preceding -oracles.[1434] The language is undoubtedly late, and the figures are -borrowed from other prophets, chiefly Ezekiel. It is a characteristic -specimen of the Jewish Apocalypse. The destruction of the heathen is -described in verses of terrible grimness: there is no tenderness nor -hope exhibited for them. And even in the picture of Jerusalem’s -holiness we have no really ethical elements, but the details are purely -ceremonial. - -_Lo! a day is coming for Jehovah,[1435] when thy spoil will be divided -in thy midst. And I will gather all the nations to besiege Jerusalem, -and the city will be taken and the houses plundered and the women -ravished, and the half of the city shall go into captivity, but the -rest of the people shall not be cut off from the city. And Jehovah -shall go forth and do battle with those nations, as in the day when He -fought in the day of contest. And His feet shall stand in that day on -the Mount of Olives which is over against Jerusalem on the east, and -the Mount of Olives shall be split into halves from east to west by a -very great ravine, and half of the Mount will slide northwards and half -southwards. ...,[1436] for the ravine of mountains[1437] shall extend -to ‘Aṣal,[1438] and ye shall flee as ye fled from before the earthquake -in the days of Uzziah king of Judah,[1439] and Jehovah my God will come -and[1440] all the holy ones with Him.[1441] And in that day there shall -not be light, ... congeal.[1442] And it shall be one[1443] day—it is -known to Jehovah[1444]—neither day nor night; and it shall come to pass -that at evening time there shall be light._ - -_And it shall be in that day that living waters shall flow forth from -Jerusalem, half of them to the eastern sea and half of them to the -western sea:_ both _in summer and in winter shall it be. And Jehovah -shall be King over all the earth: in that day Jehovah will be One and -His Name One. All the land shall be changed to plain,[1445] from Geba -to Rimmon,[1446] south of Jerusalem; but she shall be high and abide in -her place[1447] from the Gate of Benjamin up to the place of the First -Gate, up to the Corner Gate, and from the Tower of Hanan’el as far as -the King’s Winepresses. And they shall dwell in it, and there shall be -no more Ban,[1448] and Jerusalem shall abide in security. And this -shall be the stroke with which Jehovah will smite all the peoples who -have warred against Jerusalem: He will make their flesh moulder while -they still stand upon their feet, and their eyes shall moulder in their -sockets, and their tongue shall moulder in their mouth._ - -[_And it shall come to pass in that day, there shall be a great -confusion from Jehovah among them, and they shall grasp every man the -hand of his neighbour, and his hand shall be lifted against the hand -of his neighbour.[1449] And even Judah shall fight against Jerusalem, -and the wealth of all the nations round about shall be swept up, gold -and silver and garments, in a very great mass._ These two verses, 13 -and 14, obviously disturb the connection, which ver. 15 as obviously -resumes with ver. 12. They are, therefore, generally regarded as an -intrusion.[1450] But why they have been inserted is not clear. Ver. 14 -is a curious echo of the strife between Judah and Jerusalem described -in chap. xii. They may be not a mere intrusion, but simply out of their -proper place: yet, if so, where this proper place lies in these oracles -is impossible to determine.] - -_And even so shall be the plague upon the horses, mules, camels and -asses, and all the beasts which are in those camps—just like this -plague. And it shall come to pass that all that survive of all the -nations who have come up against Jerusalem, shall come up from year to -year to do obeisance to King Jehovah of Hosts, and to keep the Feast of -Booths. And it shall come to pass that whosoever of all the races of -the earth will not come up to Jerusalem to do obeisance to King Jehovah -of Hosts, upon them there shall be no rain. And if the race of Egypt go -not up nor come in, upon them also shall[1451] come the plague, with -which Jehovah shall strike the nations that go not up to keep the Feast -of Booths. Such shall be the punishment[1] of Egypt, and the -punishment[1452] of all nations who do not come up to keep the Feast of -Booths._ - -The Feast of Booths was specially one of thanksgiving for the harvest; -that is why the neglect of it is punished by the withholding of the -rain which brings the harvest. But such a punishment for such a neglect -shows how completely prophecy has become subject to the Law. One is -tempted to think what Amos or Jeremiah or even “Malachi” would have -thought of this. Verily all the writers of the prophetical books do -not stand upon the same level of religion. The writer remembers that -the curse of no rain cannot affect the Egyptians, the fertility of -whose rainless land is secured by the annual floods of her river. So he -has to insert a special verse for Egypt. She also will be plagued by -Jehovah, yet he does not tell us in what fashion her plague will come. - -The book closes with a little oracle of the most ceremonial -description, connected not only in temper but even by subject with what -has gone before. The very horses, which hitherto have been regarded as -too foreign,[1453] or—as even in this group of oracles[1454]—as too -warlike, to exist in Jerusalem, shall be consecrated to Jehovah. And so -vast shall be the multitudes who throng from all the earth to the -annual feasts and sacrifices at the Temple, that the pots of the latter -shall be as large as the great altar-bowls,[1455] and every pot in -Jerusalem and Judah shall be consecrated for use in the ritual. This -hallowing of the horses raises the question, whether the passage can be -from the same hand as wrote the prediction of the disappearance of all -horses from Jerusalem.[1456] - -_In that day there shall be upon the bells of the horses, Holiness unto -Jehovah. And the_ very _pots in the House of Jehovah shall be as the -bowls before the altar. Yea, every pot in Jerusalem and in Judah shall -be holy to Jehovah of Hosts, and all who sacrifice shall come and take -of them and cook in them. And there shall be no more any pedlar[1457] -in the House of Jehovah of Hosts in that day._ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1324] So Staerk, who thinks Amos I. made use of vv. 1-5. - -[1325] ix. 1, אדם, _mankind_, in contrast to the tribes of Israel; 3, -חרוץ, _gold_; 5, ישב as passive, cf. xii. 6; הוביש, Hi. of בּוּשׁ, in -passive sense only after Jeremiah (cf. above, p. 412, on Joel); in 2 -Sam. xix. 6, Hosea ii. 7, it is active. - -[1326] See p. 442. - -[1327] ix. 1. - -[1328] Heb. _resting-place_: cf. Zech. vi. 8, _bring Mine anger to -rest_. This meets the objection of Bredenkamp and others, that מנוחה is -otherwise used of Jehovah alone, in consequence of which they refer the -suffix to Him. - -[1329] The expression _hath an eye_ is so unusual that Klostermann, -_Theo. Litt. Zeit._, 1879, 566 (quoted by Nowack), proposes to read for -עין ערי, _Jehovah’s are the cities of the heathen_. For אדם, _mankind_, -as = _heathen_ cf. Jer. xxxii. 20. - -[1330] So LXX.: Heb. _also_. - -[1331] So LXX.: Heb. has verb in sing. - -[1332] Cf. Nahum iii. 8; Isa. xxvi. 1. - -[1333] Read מִבְטָחָה. - -[1334] Deut. xxiii. 3 (Heb., 2 Eng.). - -[1335] The prepositions refer to the half-breeds. Ezekiel uses the term -_to eat upon the blood_, _i.e._ meat eaten without being ritually slain -and consecrated, for illegal sacrifices (xxxiii. 35: cf. 1 Sam. xiv. 32 -f.; Lev. xix. 26, xvii. 11-14). - -[1336] מִצַָּּבָה for מִן־צָבָא; but to be amended to מַצָּבָה, 1 Sam. xiv. 12, -_a military post_. Ewald reads מֻצָּבָה, _rampart_. LXX. ἀνάστημα = מַצֵּבָה. - -[1337] ix. 10, מֹשֶׁל, cf. Dan. xi. 4; אפסי ארץ only in late writings -(unless Deut. xxxiii. 17 be early)—see Eckardt, p. 80; 12, בצּרון is -ἅπαξ λεγόμενον; the last clause of 12 is based on Isa. lxi. 7. If our -interpretation of צדיק and נושע be right, they are also symptoms of a -late date. - -[1338] נושׁע (ver. 9): the passive participle. - -[1339] Cf. _Isaiah xl.—lxvi._ (Expositor’s Bible), p. 219. - -[1340] Why _chariot from Ephraim_ and _horse from Jerusalem_ is -explained in _Hist. Geog._, pp. 329-331. - -[1341] See above. - -[1342] Symbol of peace as the horse was of war. - -[1343] Son of she-asses. - -[1344] Mass.: LXX. _He_. - -[1345] Heb. _blood of thy covenant_, but the suffix refers to the whole -phrase (Duhm, _Theol. der Proph._, p. 143). The covenant is Jehovah’s; -the blood, that which the people shed in sacrifice to ratify the -covenant. - -[1346] Heb. adds _there is no water in it_, but this is either a gloss, -or perhaps an attempt to make sense out of a dittography of מבור, or a -corruption of _none shall be ashamed_. - -[1347] Isa. lxi. 7. - -[1348] _Doctrine of the Prophets_, Note A, p. 472. - -[1349] 14, on תימן see Eckardt; 15, זויות, Aramaism; כבשׁ is late; 17, -התנוסס, only here and Psalm lx. 6; נוב, probably late. - -[1350] So LXX.: Heb. reads, _thy sons, O Javan_. - -[1351] LXX. ἐν σάλῳ τῆς ἀπειλῆς αὐτοῦ, _in the tossing of His threat_, -בשער גערו (?) or בשער העדו. It is natural to see here a reference to -the Theophanies of Hab. iii. 3, Deut. xxxiii. (see above, pp. 150 f.). - -[1352] Perhaps וְיָכְלוּ, _overcome them_. LXX. καταναλώσουσιν. - -[1353] Heb. _stones of a sling_, אבני קלע. Wellhausen and Nowack read -_sons_, בני, but what then is קלע? - -[1354] Reading דמם for Heb. והמו, _and roar_. - -[1355] Heb. _like a flock of sheep His people_, (but how is one to -construe this with the context?) _for (? like) stones of a diadem -lifting themselves up (? shimmering) over His land_. Wellhausen and -Nowack delete _for stones ... shimmering_ as a gloss. This would leave -_like a flock of sheep His people in His land_, to which it is proposed -to add _He will feed_. This gives good sense. - -[1356] Wellhausen, reading טובה, fem. suffix for neuter. Ewald and -others _He_. Hitzig and others _they_, the people. - -[1357] Of these cf. “Mal.” iii. 5; the late Jer. xliv. 8 ff.; Isa. lxv. -3-5; and, in the Priestly Law, Lev. xix. 31, xx. 6. - -[1358] _Z.A.T.W._, I. 60. He compares this verse with 1 Sam. xv. 23. In -Ezek. xxi. 26 they give oracles. - -[1359] חזיז, _lightning-flash_, only here and in Job xxviii. 26, -xxxviii. 25. - -[1360] LXX. read: _in season early rain and latter rain_. - -[1361] נסעו, used of a nomadic life in Jer. xxxi. 24 (23), and so -it is possible that in a later stage of the language it had come to -mean to wander or stray. But this is doubtful, and there may be a false -reading, as appears from LXX. ἐξηράνθησαν. - -[1362] For יענו read וינעו. The LXX. ἐκακώθησαν read וירעו. - -[1363] There can therefore be none of that connection between the two -pieces which Kirkpatrick assumes (p. 454 and note 2). - -[1364] פקד על - -[1365] פקד את - -[1366] See above, p. 444. - -[1367] x. 5, בוס, Eckardt, p. 82; 6, 12, גִּבֵּר, Pi., cf. Eccles. x. -10, where it alone occurs besides here; 5, 11, הבישו in passive sense. - -[1368] As we should say, _bell-wethers_: cf. Isa. xiv. 9, also a late -meaning. - -[1369] So LXX., reading כי־יפקד for כי־פקד. - -[1370] _Corner-stone_ as name for a chief: cf. Judg. xx. 2; 1 Sam. xiv. -38; Isa. xix. 13. _Stay_ or _tent-pin_, Isa. xxii. 23. _From Him_, -others _from them_. - -[1371] Read בַּגִּבֹּרִים and כְּטִיט (Wellhausen). - -[1372] Read וַהֲשִׁבוֹתִים for the Mass. וְהוֹשְׁבוֹתִים, _and I will -make them to dwell_. - -[1373] רחמתים and אלהיהם ,זנחתים and אענם, keywords of Hosea i.—iii. - -[1374] LXX.; sing. Heb. - -[1375] Changing the Heb. points which make the verb future. See -Nowack’s note. - -[1376] With LXX. read וְחִיּוּ for Mass. וְחָיוּ. - -[1377] See above, pp. 451, 471. - -[1378] So LXX.; Mass. sing. - -[1379] Heb. צרה, _narrow sea_: so LXX., but Wellhausen suggests מצרים, -which Nowack adopts. - -[1380] גברתם for גברתים. - -[1381] For יתהלכו read יתהללו, with LXX. and Syr. - -[1382] Heb. adds here a difficult clause, _for nobles are wasted_. -Probably a gloss. - -[1383] After the Ḳerî. - -[1384] I.e. _rankness_; applied to the thick vegetation in the larger -bed of the stream: see _Hist. Geog._, p. 484. - -[1385] xi. 5, וַאעְשִׁר, Hiph., but intransitive, _grow rich_; 6, ממציא; 7, -10, נעם (?); 8, בחל, Aram.; 13, יְקָר, Aram., Jer. xx. 5, Ezek. xxii. 25, -Job xxviii. 10; in Esther ten, in Daniel four times (Eckardt); xiii. 7, -עמית, one of the marks of the affinity of the language of “Zech.” -ix.—xiv. to that of the Priestly Code (cf. Lev. v. 21, xviii. 20, -etc.), but in P it is concrete, here abstract; צערים; 8, גוע, see -Eckardt, p. 85. - -[1386] Jer. xxiii. 1-8; Ezek. xxxiv., xxxvii. 24 ff.: cf. Kirkpatrick -P. 462. - -[1387] Exod. xxi. 32. - -[1388] LXX. _God of Hosts_. - -[1389] Read plural with LXX. - -[1390] That is the late Hebrew name for the heathen: cf. ix. 1. - -[1391] Heb. רֵעֵהוּ, _neighbour_; read רֹעֵהוּ. - -[1392] Many take this verse as an intrusion. It certainly seems to add -nothing to the sense and to interrupt the connection, which is clear -when it is removed. - -[1393] Heb. לָכֵן עֲנִיֵּי הַצֹּאן, _wherefore the miserable of the flock_, -which makes no sense. But LXX. read εἰς τήν Χαναάνιτην, and this -suggests the Heb. לכנעני, _to the Canaanites_, i.e. _merchants_, _of -the sheep_: so in ver. 11. - -[1394] Lit. _Bands_. - -[1395] The sense is here obscure. Is the text sound? In harmony with -the context עמים ought to mean _tribes of Israel_. But every passage in -the O.T. in which עמים might mean _tribes_ has been shown to have a -doubtful text: Deut. xxxii. 8, xxxiii. 3; Hosea x. 14; Micah i. 2. - -[1396] See above, note 1393, on the same mis-read phrase in ver. 7. - -[1397] Heb. הַיּוֹצֵר, _the potter_. LXX. χωνευτήριον _smelting -furnace_. Read הָאוֹצָר by change of א for י: the two are often -confounded; see n. 1399. - -[1398] Wellhausen and Nowack read _thou hast been valued of them_. But -there is no need of this. The clause is a sarcastic parenthesis spoken -by the prophet himself. - -[1399] Again Heb. _the potter_, LXX. _the smelting furnace_, as above -in ver. 13. The additional clause _House of God_ proves how right it is -to read _the treasury_, and disposes of the idea that _to throw to the -potter_ was a proverb for throwing away. - -[1400] Two codd. read _Jerusalem_, which Wellhausen and Nowack adopt. - -[1401] Heb. הַנַּעַר, _the scattered_. LXX. τὸν ἐσκορπίσμενον. - -[1402] הַנִּצָּבָה, obscure: some translate _the sound_ or _stable_. - -[1403] Heb. _and their hoofs he will tear_ (?). - -[1404] For Heb. האליל read as in ver. 15 האוילי. - -[1405] עמית: only in Lev. and here. - -[1406] הך. Perhaps we should read אַכֶּה, _I smite_, with Matt. xxvi. 31. - -[1407] Some take this as a promise: _turn My hand towards the little -ones_. - -[1408] LXX. Heb. אמרתי, but the ו has fallen from the front of it. - -[1409] See above, p. 462. - -[1410] xii. 2, רַעַל, a noun not found elsewhere in O. T. We found the -verb in Nahum ii. 4 (see above, p. 106), and probably in Hab. ii. 16 -for והערל (see above, p. 147, n. 412): it is common in Aramean; other -forms belong to later Hebrew (cf. Eckardt, p. 85). 3, שׂרט is used in -classic Heb. only of intentional cutting and tattooing of oneself; in -the sense of _wounding_ which it has here it is frequent in Aramean. -3 has besides אבן מעמסה, not found elsewhere. 4 has three nouns -terminating in ־ון, two of them—תמהון, _panic_, and עורון, judicial -_blindness_—in O. T. only found here and in Deut. xxviii. 28, the -former also in Aramean. 7 למען לא is also cited by Eckardt as used only -in Ezek. xix. 6, xxvi. 20, and four times in Psalms. - -[1411] xii. 6, תחתיה. - -[1412] The text reads _against_ Judah, as if it with Jerusalem suffered -the siege of the heathen. But (1) this makes an unconstruable clause, -and (2) the context shows that Judah was _against_ Jerusalem. Therefore -Geiger (_Urschrift_, p. 58) is right in deleting על, and restoring to -the clause both sense in itself and harmony with the context. It is -easy to see why על was afterwards introduced. LXX. καὶ ἐν τῇ Ἰουδαίᾳ. - -[1413] Since Jerome, commentators have thought of a stone by throwing -or lifting which men try their strength, what we call a “putting -stone.” But is not the idea rather of one of the large stones -half-buried in the earth which it is the effort of the husbandman to -tear from its bed and carry out of his field before he ploughs it? Keil -and Wright think of a heavy stone for building. This is not so likely. - -[1414] שׂרט, elsewhere only in Lev. xxi. 5, is there used of -intentional cutting of oneself as a sign of mourning. Nowack takes the -clause as a later intrusion; but there is no real reason for this. - -[1415] Heb. _upon Judah will I keep My eyes open_ to protect him, and -this has analogies, Job xiv. 3, Jer. xxxii. 19. But the reading _its -eyes_, which is made by inserting a ו that might easily have dropped -out through confusion with the initial ו of the next word, has also -analogies (Isa. xlii. 7, etc.), and stands in better parallel to the -next clause, as well as to the clauses describing the panic of the -heathen. - -[1416] Others read אַלְפֵי, _thousands_, i.e. _districts_. - -[1417] Heb. _I will find me_; LXX. εὑρήσομεν ἑαυτοῖς. - -[1418] Hebrew adds a gloss: _in Jerusalem_. - -[1419] The population in time of war. - -[1420] xii. 10, שׁפך רוח, not earlier than Ezek. xxxix. 29, Joel -iii. 1, 2 (Heb.); תחנונים, only in Job, Proverbs, Psalms and Daniel; -המר, an intrans. Hiph.; xiii. 1, מקור, _fountain_, before Jeremiah -only in Hosea xiii. 15 (perhaps a late intrusion), but several times -in post-exilic writings instead of pre-exilic באר (Eckardt); נִדָּה -only after Ezekiel; 3, cf. xii. 10, דקר, chiefly, but not only, in -post-exilic writings. - -[1421] See especially xii. 12 ff., which is very suggestive of the -Priestly Code. - -[1422] _Hist. Geog._, Chap. XIX. On the name _plain of Megiddo_ see -especially notes, p. 386. - -[1423] 2 Chron. xxxv. 22 ff. - -[1424] Another explanation offered by the Targum is the mourning for -“Ahab son of Omri, slain by Hadad-Rimmon son of Tab-Rimmon.” - -[1425] LXX. gives for Hadad-Rimmon only the second part, ῥοῶν. - -[1426] Ezek. viii. 14. - -[1427] Baudissin, _Studien z. Sem. Rel. Gesch._, I. 295 ff. - -[1428] Heb. _Me_; several codd. _him_: some read אֱלֵי _to_ (him) _whom -they have pierced_; but this would require the elision of the sign of -the acc. before _who_. Wellhausen and others think something has fallen -from the text. - -[1429] See above, p. 482. - -[1430] LXX. Συμεών. - -[1431] Cf. Ezek. xxxvi. 25, xlvii. 1. - -[1432] Read אֲדָמָה קִנְיָנִי for the Mass. אדם הקנני: so Wellhausen. - -[1433] Heb. _between_. - -[1434] But see below, p. 490. - -[1435] ליהוה: or _belonging to Jehovah_; or like the _Lamed -auctoris_ or Lamed when construed with passive verbs (see Oxford -_Heb.-Eng. Dictionary_, pp. 513 and 514, col. 1), _from, by means of, -Jehovah_. - -[1436] Heb.: _and ye shall flee, the ravine of My mountains_. The text -is obviously corrupt, but it is difficult to see how it should be -repaired. LXX., Targ. Symmachus and the Babylonian codd. (Baer, p. 84) -read וְנִסְתַּם, _shall be closed_, for וְנַסְתֶּם, _ye shall flee_, and this is -adopted by a number of critics (Bredenkamp, Wellhausen, Nowack). But it -is hardly possible before the next clause, which says the valley -extends to ’Aṣal. - -[1437] Wellhausen suggests the ravine (גיא) of Hinnom. - -[1438] אָצַל, place-name: cf. אָצֵל, name of a family of Benjamin, -viii. 37 f., ix. 43 f.; and בֵית הָאֵצֶל, Micah i. 11. Some would read אֵצֶלּ, -the adverb _near by_. - -[1439] Amos i. 1. - -[1440] LXX. - -[1441] LXX.; Heb. _thee_. - -[1442] Heb. Kethibh, יְקָרוֹת יִקְפָּאוּן, _jewels_ (? hardly stars -as some have sought to prove from Job xxxi. 26) _grow dead_ or -_congealed_. Heb. Ḳerê, _jewels and frost_, וְקִפָּאוֹן. LXX. καὶ ψύχη -καὶ πάγος, וְקָרוּת וְקִפָּאוֹן, _and cold and frost_. Founding on this -Wellhausen proposes to read חוֹם for אוֹר, and renders, _there shall be -neither heat nor cold nor frost_. So Nowack. But it is not easy to see -how חוֹם ever got changed to אוֹר. - -[1443] _Unique_ or _the same_? - -[1444] Taken as a gloss by Wellhausen and Nowack. - -[1445] עֲרָבָה, the name for the Jordan Valley, the Ghôr (_Hist. -Geog._, pp. 482-484). It is employed, not because of its fertility, but -because of its level character. Cf. Josephus’ name for it, “the Great -Plain” (IV. _Wars_ viii. 2; IV. _Antt._ vi. 1): also 1 Macc. v. 52, -xvi. 11. - -[1446] Geba “long the limit of Judah to the north, 2 Kings xxiii. 8” -(_Hist. Geog._, pp. 252, 291). Rimmon was on the southern border of -Palestine (Josh. xv. 32, xix. 7), the present Umm er Rummamin N. of -Beersheba (Rob., _B. R._). - -[1447] Or _be inhabited as it stands_. - -[1448] Cf. “Mal.” iii. 24 (Heb.). - -[1449] Ezek. xxxviii. 21. - -[1450] So Wellhausen and Nowack. - -[1451] So LXX. and Syr. The Heb. text inserts a _not_. - -[1452] חטאת, in classic Heb. _sin_; but as in Num. xxxii. 23 and -Isa. v. 18, _the punishment that sin brings down_. - -[1453] Hosea xiv. 3. - -[1454] ix. 10. - -[1455] So Wellhausen. - -[1456] ix. 10. - -[1457] Heb. _Canaanite_. Cf. Christ’s action in cleansing the Temple of -all dealers (Matt. xxi. 12-14). - - - - - _JONAH_ - - - - - “And this is the tragedy of the Book of Jonah, that a Book which is - made the means of one of the most sublime revelations of truth in the - Old Testament should be known to most only for its connection with a - whale.” - - - - - CHAPTER XXXIV - - _THE BOOK OF JONAH_ - - -The book of Jonah is cast throughout in the form of narrative—the -only one of our Twelve which is so. This fact, combined with the -extraordinary events which the narrative relates, starts questions not -raised by any of the rest. Besides treating, therefore, of the book’s -origin, unity, division and other commonplaces of introduction, we -must further seek in this chapter reasons for the appearance of such a -narrative among a collection of prophetic discourses. We have to ask -whether the narrative be intended as one of fact; and if not, why the -author was directed to the choice of such a form to enforce the truth -committed to him. - -The appearance of a narrative among the Twelve Prophets is not, in -itself, so exceptional as it seems to be. Parts of the Books of Amos -and Hosea treat of the personal experience of their authors. The same -is true of the Books of Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel, in which the -prophet’s call and his attitude to it are regarded as elements of -his message to men. No: the peculiarity of the Book of Jonah is not -the presence of narrative, but the apparent absence of all prophetic -discourse.[1458] - -Yet even this might be explained by reference to the first part of the -prophetic canon—Joshua to Second Kings.[1459] These Former Prophets, as -they are called, are wholly narrative—narrative in the prophetic spirit -and written to enforce a moral. Many of them begin as the Book of Jonah -does:[1460] they contain stories, for instance, of Elijah and Elisha, -who flourished immediately before Jonah and like him were sent with -commissions to foreign lands. It might therefore be argued that the -Book of Jonah, though narrative, is as much a prophetic book as they -are, and that the only reason why it has found a place, not with these -histories, but among the Later Prophets, is the exceedingly late date -of its composition.[1461] - -This is a plausible, but not the real, answer to our question. Suppose -we were to find the latter by discovering that the Book of Jonah, -though in narrative form, is not real history at all, nor pretends to -be; but, from beginning to end, is as much a prophetic sermon as any of -the other Twelve Books, yet cast in the form of parable or allegory? -This would certainly explain the adoption of the book among the Twelve; -nor would its allegorical character appear without precedent to those -(and they are among the most conservative of critics) who maintain (as -the present writer does not) the allegorical character of the story of -Hosea’s wife.[1462] - -It is, however, when we pass from the form to the substance of the book -that we perceive the full justification of its reception among the -prophets. The truth which we find in the Book of Jonah is as full and -fresh a revelation of God’s will as prophecy anywhere achieves. That -God has _granted to the Gentiles also repentance unto life_[1463] is -nowhere else in the Old Testament so vividly illustrated. It lifts the -teaching of the Book of Jonah to equal rank with the second part of -Isaiah, and nearest of all our Twelve to the New Testament. The very -form in which this truth is insinuated into the prophet’s reluctant -mind, by contrasting God’s pity for the dim population of Niniveh with -Jonah’s own pity for his perished gourd, suggests the methods of our -Lord’s teaching, and invests the book with the morning air of that high -day which shines upon the most evangelic of His parables. - -One other remark is necessary. In our effort to appreciate this lofty -gospel we labour under a disadvantage. That is our sense of humour—our -modern sense of humour. Some of the figures in which our author conveys -his truth cannot but appear to us grotesque. How many have missed the -sublime spirit of the book in amusement or offence at its curious -details! Even in circles in which the acceptance of its literal -interpretation has been demanded as a condition of belief in its -inspiration, the story has too often served as a subject for humorous -remarks. This is almost inevitable if we take it as history. But we -shall find that one advantage of the theory, which treats the book as -parable, is that the features, which appear so grotesque to many, are -traced to the popular poetry of the writer’s own time and shown to be -natural. When we prove this, we shall be able to treat the scenery of -the book as we do that of some early Christian fresco, in which, -however rude it be or untrue to nature, we discover an earnestness and -a success in expressing the moral essence of a situation that are not -always present in works of art more skilful or more correct. - - - 1. THE DATE OF THE BOOK. - -Jonah ben-Amittai, from Gath-hepher[1464] in Galilee, came forward in -the beginning of the reign of Jeroboam II. to announce that the king -would regain the lost territories of Israel from the Pass of Hamath -to the Dead Sea.[1465] He flourished, therefore, about 780, and had -this book been by himself we should have had to place it first of all -the Twelve, and nearly a generation before that of Amos. But the book -neither claims to be by Jonah, nor gives any proof of coming from an -eye-witness of the adventures which it describes,[1466] nor even from -a contemporary of the prophet. On the contrary, one verse implies that -when it was written Niniveh had ceased to be a great city.[1467] Now -Niniveh fell, and was practically destroyed, in 606 B.C.[1468] In all -ancient history there was no collapse of an imperial city more sudden -or so complete.[1469] We must therefore date the Book of Jonah some -time after 606, when Niniveh’s greatness had become what it was to the -Greek writers, a matter of tradition. - -A late date is also proved by the language of the book. This not only -contains Aramaic elements which have been cited to support the argument -for a northern origin in the time of Jonah himself,[1470] but a number -of words and grammatical constructions which we find in the Old -Testament, some of them in the later and some only in the very latest -writings.[1471] Scarcely less decisive are a number of apparent -quotations and echoes of passages in the Old Testament, mostly later -than the date of the historical Jonah, and some of them even later than -the Exile.[1472] If it could be proved that the Book of Jonah quotes -from Joel, that would indeed set it down to a very late date—probably -about 300 B.C., the period of the composition of Ezra-Nehemiah, with -the language of which its own shows most affinity.[1473] This would -leave time for its reception into the Canon of the Prophets, which was -closed by 200 B.C.[1474] Had the book been later it would undoubtedly -have fallen, like Daniel, within the Hagiographa. - - - 2. THE CHARACTER OF THE BOOK. - -Nor does this book, written so many centuries after Jonah had passed -away, claim to be real history. On the contrary, it offers to us all -the marks of the parable or allegory. We have, first of all, the -residence of Jonah for the conventional period of three days and three -nights in the belly of the great fish, a story not only very -extraordinary in itself and sufficient to provoke the suspicion of -allegory (we need not stop to argue this), but apparently woven, as we -shall see,[1475] from the materials of a myth well known to the -Hebrews. We have also the very general account of Niniveh’s conversion, -in which there is not even the attempt to describe any precise event. -The absence of precise data is indeed conspicuous throughout the book. -“The author neglects a multitude of things, which he would have been -obliged to mention had history been his principal aim. He says nothing -of the sins of which Niniveh was guilty,[1476] nor of the journey of -the prophet to Niniveh, nor does he mention the place where he was cast -out upon the land, nor the name of the Assyrian king. In any case, if -the narrative were intended to be historical, it would be incomplete by -the frequent fact, that circumstances which are necessary for the -connection of events are mentioned later than they happened, and only -where attention has to be directed to them as having already -happened.”[1477] We find, too, a number of trifling discrepancies, from -which some critics[1478] have attempted to prove the presence of more -than one story in the composition of the book, but which are simply due -to the license a writer allows himself when he is telling a tale and -not writing a history. Above all, there is the abrupt close to the -story at the very moment at which its moral is obvious.[1479] All these -things are symptoms of the parable—so obvious and so natural, that we -really sin against the intention of the author, and the purpose of the -Spirit which inspired him, when we wilfully interpret the book as real -history.[1480] - - - 3. THE PURPOSE OF THE BOOK. - -The general purpose of this parable is very clear. It is not, as some -have maintained,[1481] to explain why the judgments of God and the -predictions of His prophets were not always fulfilled—though this also -becomes clear by the way. The purpose of the parable, and it is patent -from first to last, is to illustrate the mission of prophecy to the -Gentiles, God’s care for them, and their susceptibility to His word. -More correctly, it is to enforce all this truth upon a prejudiced and -thrice-reluctant mind.[1482] - -Whose was this reluctant mind? In Israel after the Exile there were -many different feelings with regard to the future and the great -obstacle which heathendom interposed between Israel and the future. -There was the feeling of outraged justice, with the intense conviction -that Jehovah’s kingdom could not be established save by the overthrow -of the cruel kingdoms of this world. We have seen that conviction -expressed in the Book of Obadiah. But the nation, which read and -cherished the visions of the Great Seer of the Exile,[1483] could not -help producing among her sons men with hopes about the heathen of a -very different kind—men who felt that Israel’s mission to the world was -not one of war, but of service in those high truths of God and of His -Grace which had been committed to herself. Between the two parties it -is certain there was much polemic, and we find this still bitter in the -time of our Lord. And some critics think that while Esther, Obadiah and -other writings of the centuries after the Return represent the one side -of this polemic, which demanded the overthrow of the heathen, the Book -of Jonah represents the other side, and in the vexed and reluctant -prophet pictures such Jews as were willing to proclaim the destruction -of the enemies of Israel, and yet like Jonah were not without the -lurking fear that God would disappoint their predictions and in His -patience leave the heathen room for repentance.[1484] Their dogmatism -could not resist the impression of how long God had actually spared the -oppressors of His people, and the author of the Book of Jonah cunningly -sought these joints in their armour to insinuate the points of his -doctrine of God’s real will for nations beyond the covenant. This is -ingenious and plausible. But in spite of the cleverness with which it -has been argued that the details of the story of Jonah are adapted to -the temper of the Jewish party who desired only vengeance on the -heathen, it is not at all necessary to suppose that the book was the -produce of mere polemic. The book is too simple and too grand for that. -And therefore those appear more right who conceive that the writer had -in view, not a Jewish party, but Israel as a whole in their national -reluctance to fulfil their Divine mission to the world.[1485] Of them -God had already said: _Who is blind but My servant, or deaf as My -messenger whom I have sent?... Who gave Jacob for a spoil and Israel to -the robbers? Did not Jehovah, He against whom we have sinned?—for they -would not walk in His ways, neither were they obedient to His -law._[1486] Of such a people Jonah is the type. Like them he flees from -the duty God has laid upon him. Like them he is, beyond his own land, -cast for a set period into a living death, and like them rescued again -only to exhibit once more upon his return an ill-will to believe that -God had any fate for the heathen except destruction. According to this -theory, then, Jonah’s disappearance in the sea and the great fish, and -his subsequent ejection upon dry land, symbolise the Exile of Israel -and their restoration to Palestine. - -In proof of this view it has been pointed out that, while the prophets -frequently represent the heathen tyrants of Israel as the sea or the -sea-monster, one of them has actually described the nation’s exile as -its swallowing by a monster, whom God forces at last to disgorge his -living prey.[1487] The full illustration of this will be given in -Chapter XXXVI. on “The Great Fish and What it Means.” Here it is only -necessary to mention that the metaphor was borrowed, not, as has been -alleged by many, from some Greek, or other foreign, myth, which, like -that of Perseus and Andromeda, had its scene in the neighbourhood of -Joppa, but from a Semitic mythology which was well known to the -Hebrews, and the materials of which were employed very frequently by -other prophets and poets of the Old Testament.[1488] - -Why, of all prophets, Jonah should have been selected as the type of -Israel, is a question hard but perhaps not impossible to answer. In -history Jonah appears only as concerned with Israel’s reconquest of her -lands from the heathen. Did the author of the book say: I will take -such a man, one to whom tradition attributes no outlook beyond Israel’s -own territories, for none could be so typical of Israel, narrow, -selfish and with no love for the world beyond herself? Or did the -author know some story about a journey of Jonah to Niniveh, or at least -some discourse by Jonah against the great city? Elijah went to Sarepta, -Elisha took God’s word to Damascus: may there not have been, though we -are ignorant of it, some connection between Niniveh and the labours of -Elisha’s successor? Thirty years after Jonah appeared, Amos proclaimed -the judgment of Jehovah upon foreign nations, with the destruction of -their capitals; about the year 755 he clearly enforced, as equal with -Israel’s own, the moral responsibility of the heathen to the God of -righteousness. May not Jonah, almost the contemporary of Amos, have -denounced Niniveh in the same way? Would not some tradition of this -serve as the nucleus of history, round which our author built his -allegory? It is possible that Jonah proclaimed doom upon Niniveh; yet -those who are familiar with the prophesying of Amos, Hosea, and, in his -younger days, Isaiah, will deem it hardly probable. For why do all -these prophets exhibit such reserve in even naming Assyria, if Israel -had already through Jonah entered into such articulate relations with -Niniveh? We must, therefore, admit our ignorance of the reasons which -led our author to choose Jonah as a type of Israel. We can only -conjecture that it may have been because Jonah was a prophet, whom -history identified only with Israel’s narrower interests. If, during -subsequent centuries, a tradition had risen of Jonah’s journey to -Niniveh or of his discourse against her, such a tradition has -probability against it. - - * * * * * - -A more definite origin for the book than any yet given has been -suggested by Professor Budde.[1489] The Second Book of Chronicles -refers to a _Midrash of the Book of the Kings_[1490] for further -particulars concerning King Joash. A _Midrash_[1491] was the expansion, -for doctrinal or homiletic purposes, of a passage of Scripture, and -very frequently took the form, so dear to Orientals, of parable or -invented story about the subject of the text. We have examples of -Midrashim among the Apocrypha, in the Books of Tobit and Susannah and -in the Prayer of Manasseh, the same as is probably referred to by the -Chronicler.[1492] That the Chronicler himself used the _Midrash of the -Book of the Kings_ as material for his own book is obvious from the -form of the latter and its adaptation of the historical narratives of -the Book of Kings.[1493] The Book of Daniel may also be reckoned among -the Midrashim, and Budde now proposes to add to their number the Book -of Jonah. It may be doubted whether this distinguished critic is right -in supposing that the book formed the Midrash to 2 Kings xiv. 25 ff. -(the author being desirous to add to the expression there of Jehovah’s -pity upon Israel some expression of His pity upon the heathen), or that -it was extracted just as it stands, in proof of which Budde points to -its abrupt beginning and end. We have seen another reason for the -latter;[1494] and it is very improbable that the Midrashim, so largely -the basis of the Books of Chronicles, shared that spirit of -universalism which inspires the Book of Jonah.[1495] But we may well -believe that it was in some Midrash of the Book of Kings that the -author of the Book of Jonah found the basis of the latter part of his -immortal work, which too clearly reflects the fortunes and conduct of -all Israel to have been wholly drawn from a Midrash upon the story of -the individual prophet Jonah. - - - 4. OUR LORD’S USE OF THE BOOK. - -We have seen, then, that the Book of Jonah is not actual history, but -the enforcement of a profound religious truth nearer to the level of -the New Testament than anything else in the Old, and cast in the form -of Christ’s own parables. The full proof of this can be made clear -only by the detailed exposition of the book. There is, however, one -other question, which is relevant to the argument. Christ Himself has -employed the story of Jonah. Does His use of it involve His authority -for the opinion that it is a story of real facts? - -Two passages of the Gospels contain the words of our Lord upon Jonah: -Matt. xii. 39, 41, and Luke xi. 29, 30.[1496] _A generation, wicked and -adulterous, seeketh a sign, and sign shall not be given it, save the -sign of the prophet Jonah.... The men of Niniveh shall stand up in the -Judgment with this generation, and condemn it, for they repented at the -preaching of Jonah, and behold, a greater than Jonah is here. This -generation is an evil generation: it seeketh a sign; and sign shall not -be given it, except the sign of Jonah. For as Jonah was a sign to the -Ninivites, so also shall the Son of Man be to this generation._ - -These words, of course, are compatible with the opinion that the Book -of Jonah is a record of real fact. The only question is, are they also -compatible with the opinion that the Book of Jonah is a parable? Many -say No; and they allege that those of us who hold this opinion are -denying, or at least ignoring, the testimony of our Lord; or that we -are taking away the whole force of the parallel which He drew. This is -a question of interpretation, not of faith. We do not believe that our -Lord had any thought of confirming or not confirming the historic -character of the story. His purpose was purely one of exhortation, and -we feel the grounds of that exhortation to be just as strong, when we -have proven the Book of Jonah to be a parable. Christ is using an -illustration: it surely matters not whether that illustration be drawn -from the realms of fact or of poetry. Again and again in their -discourses to the people do men use illustrations and enforcements -drawn from traditions of the past. Do we, even when the historical -value of these traditions is _very_ ambiguous, give a single thought to -the question of their historical character? We never think of it. It is -enough for us that the tradition is popularly accepted and familiar. -And we cannot deny to our Lord that which we claim for ourselves.[1497] -Even conservative writers admit this. In his recent Introduction to -Jonah Orelli says expressly: “It is not, indeed, proved with conclusive -necessity that, if the resurrection of Jesus was a physical fact, -Jonah’s abode in the fish’s belly must also be just as historical.”[1498] - -Upon the general question of our Lord’s authority in matters of -criticism, His own words with regard to personal questions may be -appositely quoted: _Man, who made Me a judge or divider over you? I -am come not to judge ... but to save._ Such matters our Lord surely -leaves to ourselves, and we have to decide them by our reason, our -common-sense and our loyalty to truth—of all of which He Himself is -the creator, and of which we shall have to render to Him an account -at the last. Let us remember this, and we shall use them with equal -liberty and reverence. _Bringing every thought into subjection to -Christ_ is surely just using our knowledge, our reason, and every other -intellectual gift which He has given us, with the accuracy and the -courage of His own Spirit. - - - 5. THE UNITY OF THE BOOK. - -The next question is that of the Unity of the Book. Several attempts -have been made to prove from discrepancies, some real and some alleged, -that the book is a compilation of stories from several different hands. -But these essays are too artificial to have obtained any adherence from -critics; and the few real discrepancies of narrative from which they -start are due, as we have seen, rather to the license of a writer of -parable than to any difference of authorship.[1499] - -In the question of the Unity of the Book, the Prayer or Psalm in chap. -ii. offers a problem of its own, consisting as it does almost entirely -of passages parallel to others in the Psalter. Besides a number of -religious phrases, which are too general for us to say that one prayer -has borrowed them from another,[1500] there are several unmistakeable -repetitions of the Psalms.[1501] - -And yet the Psalm of Jonah has strong features, which, so far as we -know, are original to it. The horror of the great deep has nowhere in -the Old Testament been described with such power or with such -conciseness. So far, then, the Psalm is not a mere string of -quotations, but a living unity. Did the author of the book himself -insert it where it stands? Against this it has been urged that the -Psalm is not the prayer of a man inside a fish, but of one who on dry -land celebrates a deliverance from drowning, and that if the author of -the narrative himself had inserted it, he would rather have done so -after ver. 11, which records the prophet’s escape from the fish.[1502] -And a usual theory of the origin of the Psalm is that a later editor, -having found the Psalm ready-made and in a collection where it was -perhaps attributed to Jonah,[1503] inserted it after ver. 2, which -records that Jonah did pray from the belly of the fish, and inserted it -there the more readily, because it seemed right for a book which had -found its place among the Twelve Prophets to contribute, as all the -others did, some actual discourse of the prophet whose name it -bore.[1504] This, however, is not probable. Whether the original author -found the Psalm ready to his hand or made it, there is a great deal to -be said for the opinion of the earlier critics,[1505] that he himself -inserted it, and just where it now stands. For, from the standpoint of -the writer, Jonah was already saved, when he was taken up by the -fish—saved from the deep into which he had been cast by the sailors, -and the dangers of which the Psalm so vividly describes. However -impossible it be for us to conceive of the compilation of a Psalm (even -though full of quotations) by a man in Jonah’s position,[1506] it was -consistent with the standpoint of a writer who had just affirmed that -the fish was expressly _appointed by Jehovah_, in order to save his -penitent servant from the sea. To argue that the Psalm is an intrusion -is therefore not only unnecessary, but it betrays failure to appreciate -the standpoint of the writer. Given the fish and the Divine purpose of -the fish, the Psalm is intelligible and appears at its proper place. It -were more reasonable indeed to argue that the fish itself is an -insertion. Besides, as we shall see, the spirit of the Psalm is -national; in conformity with the truth underlying the book, it is a -Psalm of Israel as a whole. - -If this be correct, we have the Book of Jonah as it came from the hands -of its author. The text is in wonderfully good condition, due to the -ease of the narrative and its late date. The Greek version exhibits the -usual proportion of clerical errors and mistranslations,[1507] -omissions[1508] and amplifications,[1509] with some variant -readings[1510] and other changes that will be noted in the verses -themselves. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1458] Unless the Psalm were counted as such. See below, p. 511. - -[1459] _Minus_ Ruth of course. - -[1460] Cf. with Jonah i. 1, וַיְהִי, Josh. i. 1, 1 Sam. i. 1, 2 Sam. i. -1. The corrupt state of the text of Ezek. i. 1 does not permit us to -adduce it also as a parallel. - -[1461] See below, p. 496. - -[1462] See above, Vol. I., p. 236. - -[1463] Acts xi. 8. - -[1464] Cf. Gittah-hepher, Josh. xix. 13, by some held to be El Meshhed, -three miles north-east of Nazareth. The tomb of Jonah is pointed out -there. - -[1465] 2 Kings xiv. 25. - -[1466] Cf. Kuenen, _Einl._, II. 417, 418. - -[1467] iii. 3: היתה, _was_. - -[1468] See above, pp. 21 ff., 96 ff. - -[1469] Cf. George Smith, _Assyrian Discoveries_, p. 94; Sayce, _Ancient -Empires of the East_, p. 141. Cf. previous note. - -[1470] As, _e.g._, by Volck, article “Jona” in Herzog’s _Real. -Encycl._²: the use of שֶׁל for אֲשֶׁר, as, _e.g._, in the very early -Song of Deborah. But the same occurs in many late passages: Eccles. i. -7, 11, ii. 21, 22, etc.; Psalms cxxii., cxxiv., cxxxv. 2, 8, cxxxvii. -8, cxlvi. 3. - -[1471] A. Grammatical constructions:—i. 7, בְּשֶׁלְּמִי; 12, בְּשֶׁלִּי: that בשל -has not altogether displaced באשרל König (_Einl._, 378) thinks a proof -of the date of Jonah in the early Aramaic period. iv. 6, the use of לוֹ -for the accusative, cf. Jer. xl. 2, Ezra viii. 24: seldom in earlier -Hebrew, 1 Sam. xxiii. 10, 2 Sam. iii. 30, especially when the object -stands before the verb, Isa. xi. 9 (this may be late), 1 Sam. xxii. 7, -Job v. 2; but continually in Aramaic, Dan. ii. 10, 12, 14, 24, etc. The -first personal pronoun אני (five times) occurs oftener than אנכי -(twice), just as in all exilic and post-exilic writings. The numerals -ii. 1, iii. 3, precede the noun, as in earlier Hebrew. - -B. Words:—מנה in Pi. is a favourite term of our author, ii. 1, iv. -6, 8; is elsewhere in O.T. Hebrew found only in Dan. i. 5, 10, 18, 1 -Chron. ix. 29, Psalm lxi. 8; but in O.T. Aramaic מנא Pi. מנּי occurs -in Ezra vii. 25, Dan. ii. 24, 49, iii. 12, etc. ספינה, i. 5, is not -elsewhere found in O.T., but is common in later Hebrew and in Aramaic. -התעשת, i. 6, _to think_, for the Heb. חשב, cf. Psalm cxlvi. 4, but -Aram. cf. Dan. vi. 4 and Targums. טעם in the sense _to order or -command_, iii. 7, is found elsewhere in the O.T. only in the Aramaic -passages Dan. iii. 10, Ezra vi. 1, etc. רבּו, iv. 11, for the earlier -רבבה occurs only in later Hebrew, Ezra ii. 64, Neh. vii. 66, 72, 1 -Chron. xxix. 7 (Hosea viii. 12, Kethibh is suspected). שתק, i. 11, 12, -occurs only in Psalm cvii. 30, Prov. xxvi. 20. עמל, iv. 10, instead of -the usual יגע. The expression _God of Heaven_, i. 9, occurs only in 2 -Chron. xxxvi. 23, Psalm cxxxvi. 26, Dan. ii. 18, 19, 44, and frequently -in Ezra and Nehemiah. - -[1472] In chap. iv. there are undoubted echoes of the story of Elijah’s -depression in 1 Kings xix., though the alleged parallel between Jonah’s -tree (iv. 8) and Elijah’s broom-bush seems to me forced, iv. 9 has been -thought, though not conclusively, to depend on Gen. iv. 6, and the -appearance of יהוה אלהים has been referred to its frequent use in Gen. -ii. f. More important are the parallels with Joel: iii. 9 with Joel ii. -14_a_, and the attributes of God in iv. 2 with Joel ii. 13. But which -of the two is the original? - -[1473] Kleinert assigns the book to the Exile; Ewald to the fifth or -sixth century; Driver to the fifth century (_Introd._^6, 301); Orelli -to the last Chaldean or first Persian age; Vatke to the third century. -These assign generally to after the Exile: Cheyne (_Theol. Rev._, XIV., -p. 218: cf. art. “Jonah” in the _Encycl. Brit._), König (_Einl._), Rob. -Smith, Kuenen, Wildeboer, Budde, Cornill, Farrar, etc. Hitzig brings it -down as far as the Maccabean age, which is impossible if the prophetic -canon closed in 200 B.C., and seeks for its origin in Egypt, “that land -of wonders,” on account of its fabulous character, and because of the -description of the east wind as חרישׁית (iv. 8), and the name of the -gourd, קיקיון, Egyptian _kiki_. But such a wind and such a plant were -found outside Egypt as well. Nowack dates the book after Joel. - -[1474] See above, Vol. I., p. 5. - -[1475] Below, pp. 523 ff. - -[1476] Contrast the treatment of foreign states by Elisha, Amos and -Isaiah, etc. - -[1477] Abridged from pp. 3 and 4 of Kleinert’s Introduction to the Book -of Jonah in Lange’s Series of Commentaries. Eng. ed., Vol. XVI. - -[1478] Köhler, _Theol. Rev._, Vol. XVI.; Böhme, _Z.A.T.W._, 1887, pp. -224 ff. - -[1479] Indeed throughout the book the truths it enforces are always -more pushed to the front than the facts. - -[1480] Nearly all the critics who accept the late date of the book -interpret it as parabolic. See also a powerful article by the late Dr. -Dale in the _Expositor_, Fourth Series, Vol. VI., July 1892, pp. 1 ff. -Cf., too, C. H. H. Wright, _Biblical Essays_ (1886), pp. 34-98. - -[1481] Marck (quoted by Kleinert) said: “Scriptum est magna parte -historicum sed ita ut in historia ipsa lateat maximi vaticinii -mysterium, atque ipse fatis suis, non minus quam effatis vatem se verum -demonstret.” Hitzig curiously thinks that this is the reason why it -has been placed in the Canon of the Prophets next to the unfulfilled -prophecy of God against Edom. But by the date which Hitzig assigns -to the book the prophecy against Edom was at least in a fair way to -fulfilment. Riehm (_Theol. Stud. u. Krit._, 1862, pp. 413 f.): “The -practical intention of the book is to afford instruction concerning -the proper attitude to prophetic warnings”; these, though genuine -words of God, may be averted by repentance. Volck (art. “Jona” in -Herzog’s _Real. Encycl._²) gives the following. Jonah’s experience is -characteristic of the whole prophetic profession. “We learn from it (1) -that the prophet must perform what God commands him, however unusual -it appears; (2) that even death cannot nullify his calling; (3) that -the prophet has no right to the fulfilment of his prediction, but must -place it in God’s hand.” Vatke (_Einl._, 688) maintains that the book -was written in an apologetic interest, when Jews expounded the prophets -and found this difficulty, that all their predictions had not been -fulfilled. “The author obviously teaches: (1) since the prophet cannot -withdraw from the Divine commission, he is also not responsible for the -contents of his predictions; (2) the prophet often announces Divine -purposes, which are not fulfilled, because God in His mercy takes back -the threat, when repentance follows; (3) the honour of a prophet is -not hurt when a threat is not fulfilled, and the inspiration remains -unquestioned, although many predictions are not carried out.” - -To all of which there is a conclusive answer, in the fact that, had the -book been meant to explain or justify unfulfilled prophecy, the author -would certainly not have chosen as an instance a judgment against -Niniveh, because, by the time he wrote, all the early predictions of -Niniveh’s fall had been fulfilled, we might say, to the very letter. - -[1482] So even Kimchi; and in modern times De Wette, Delitzsch, Bleek, -Reuss, Cheyne, Wright, König, Farrar, Orelli, etc. So virtually -also Nowack. Ewald’s view is a little different. He thinks that the -fundamental truth of the book is that “true fear and repentance bring -salvation from Jehovah.” - -[1483] Isa. xl. ff. - -[1484] So virtually Kuenen, _Einl._, II., p. 423; Smend, _Lehrbuch der -A. T. Religionsgeschichte_, pp. 408 f., and Nowack. - -[1485] That the book is a historical allegory is a very old theory. -Hermann v. d. Hardt (_Ænigmata Prisci Orbis_, 1723: cf. _Jonas in_ -_Carcharia, Israel in Carcathio_, 1718, quoted by Vatke, _Einl._, p. -686) found in the book a political allegory of the history of Manasseh -led into exile, and converted, while the last two chapters represent -the history of Josiah. That the book was symbolic in some way of the -conduct and fortunes of Israel was a view familiar in Great Britain -during the first half of this century: see the Preface to the English -translation of Calvin on Jonah (1847). Kleinert (in his commentary -on Jonah in Lange’s Series, Vol. XVI. English translation, 1874) was -one of the first to expound with details the symbolising of Israel in -the prophet Jonah. Then came the article in the _Theol. Review_ (XIV. -1877, pp. 214 ff.) by Cheyne, following Bloch’s _Studien z. Gesch. der -Sammlung der althebräischen Litteratur_ (Breslau, 1876); but adding the -explanation of _the great fish_ from Hebrew mythology (see below). Von -Orelli quotes Kleinert with approval in the main. - -[1486] Isa. xlii. 19-24. - -[1487] Jer. li. 34, 44 f. - -[1488] That the Book of Jonah employs mythical elements is an opinion -that has prevailed since the beginning of this century. But before -Semitic mythology was so well known as it is now, these mythical -elements were thought to have been derived from the Greek mythology. -So Gesenius, De Wette, and even Knobel, but see especially F. C. Baur -in Ilgen’s _Zeitschrift_ for 1837, p. 201. Kuenen (_Einl._, 424) and -Cheyne (_Theol. Rev._, XIV.) rightly deny traces of any Greek influence -on Jonah, and their denial is generally agreed in. - -Kleinert (_op. cit._, p. 10) points to the proper source in the native -mythology of the Hebrews: “The sea-monster is by no means an unusual -phenomenon in prophetic typology. It is the secular power appointed by -God for the scourge of Israel and of the earth (Isa. xxvii. 1)”; and -Cheyne (_Theol. Rev._, XIV., “Jonah: a Study in Jewish Folk-lore and -Religion”) points out how Jer. li. 34, 44 f., forms the connecting link -between the story of Jonah and the popular mythology. - -[1489] _Z.A.T.W._, 1892, pp. 40 ff. - -[1490] 2 Chron. xxiv. 27. - -[1491] Cf. Driver, _Introduction_, I., p. 497. - -[1492] 2 Chron. xxxiii. 18. - -[1493] See Robertson Smith, Old Test. in the Jewish Church, pp. 140, -154. - -[1494] See above, pp. 499 f. - -[1495] Cf. Smend, _A. T. Religionsgeschichte_, p. 409, n. 1. - -[1496] Matt. xii. 40—_For as Jonah was in the belly of the whale three -days and three nights, so shall the Son of Man be in the heart of -the earth three days and three nights_—is not repeated in Luke xi. -29, 30, which confines the sign to the preaching of repentance, and -is suspected as an intrusion both for this and other reasons, e.g. -that ver. 40 is superfluous and does not fit in with ver. 41, which -gives the proper explanation of the sign; that Jonah, who came by his -burial in the fish through neglect of his duty and not by martyrdom, -could not therefore in this respect be a type of our Lord. On the -other hand, ver. 40 is not unlike another reference of our Lord to His -resurrection, John ii. 19 ff. Yet, even if ver. 40 be genuine, the -vagueness of the parallel drawn in it between Jonah and our Lord surely -makes for the opinion that in quoting Jonah our Lord was not concerned -about quoting facts, but simply gave an illustration from a well-known -tale. Matt. xvi. 4, where the sign of Jonah is again mentioned, does -not explain the sign. - -[1497] Take a case. Suppose we tell slothful people that theirs will be -the fate of the man who buried his talent, is this to commit us to the -belief that the personages of Christ’s parables actually existed? Or -take the homiletic use of Shakespeare’s dramas—“as Macbeth did,” or “as -Hamlet said.” Does it commit us to the historical reality of Macbeth -or Hamlet? Any preacher among us would resent being bound by such an -inference. And if we resent this for ourselves, how chary we should be -about seeking to bind our Lord by it. - -[1498] Eng. trans. of _The Twelve Minor Prophets_, p. 172. Consult also -Farrar’s judicious paragraphs on the subject: _Minor Prophets_, 234 f. - -[1499] The two attempts which have been made to divide the Book of -Jonah are those by Köhler in the _Theol. Rev._, XVI. 139 ff., and by -Böhme in the _Z.A.T.W._, VII. 224 ff. Köhler first insists on traits -of an earlier age (rude conception of God, no sharp boundary drawn -between heathens and the Hebrews, etc.), and then finds traces of a -late revision: lacuna in i. 2; hesitation in iii. 1, in the giving of -the prophet’s commission, which is not pure Hebrew; change of three -days to forty (cf. LXX.); mention of unnamed king and his edict, which -is superfluous after the popular movement; beasts sharing in mourning; -also in i. 5, 8, 9, 14, ii. 2, דָּגָה, iii. 9, iv. 1-4, as disturbing -context; also the building of a booth is superfluous, and only invented -to account for Jonah remaining forty days instead of the original -three; iv. 6, להיות צל על ראשׁו for an original לְהַּצִּל לוֹ = to -offer him shade; 7, _the worm_, תולעת, due to a copyist’s change of -the following בעלות. Withdrawing these, Köhler gets an account of the -sparing of Niniveh on repentance following a sentence of doom, which, -he says, reflects the position of the city of God in Jeremiah’s time, -and was due to Jeremiah’s opponents, who said in answer to his sentence -of doom: If Niniveh could avert her fate, why not Jerusalem? Böhme’s -conclusion, starting from the alleged contradictions in the story, is -that no fewer than four hands have had to deal with it. A sufficient -answer is given by Kuenen (_Einl._, 426 ff.), who, after analysing the -dissection, says that its “improbability is immediately evident.” With -regard to the inconsistencies which Böhme alleges to exist in chap. -iii. between ver. 5 and vv. 6-9, Kuenen remarks that “all that is -needed for their explanation is a little good-will”—a phrase applicable -to many other difficulties raised with regard to other Old Testament -books by critical attempts even more rational than those of Böhme. -Cornill characterises Böhme’s hypothesis as absurd. - -[1500] _To Thy holy temple_, vv. 5 and 8: cf. Psalm v. 8, etc. _The -waters have come round me to my very soul_, ver. 6: cf. Psalm lxix. 2. -_And Thou broughtest up my life_, ver. 7: cf. Psalm xxx. 4. _When my -soul fainted upon me_, ver. 8: cf. Psalm cxlii. 4, etc. _With the voice -of thanksgiving_, ver. 10: cf. Psalm xlii. 5. The reff. are to the Heb. -text. - -[1501] Cf. ver. 3 with Psalm xviii. 7; ver. 4 with Psalm xlii. 8; ver. -5 with Psalm xxxi. 23; ver. 9 with Psalm xxxi. 7, and ver. 10 with -Psalm l. 14. - -[1502] Budde, as above, p. 42. - -[1503] De Wette, Knobel, Kuenen. - -[1504] Budde. - -[1505] _E.g._ Hitzig. - -[1506] Luther says of Jonah’s prayer, that “he did not speak with these -exact words in the belly of the fish, nor placed them so orderly, but -he shows how he took courage, and what sort of thoughts his heart had, -when he stood in such a battle with death.” We recognise in this Psalm -“the recollection of the confidence with which Jonah hoped towards God, -that since he had been rescued in so wonderful a way from death in the -waves, He would also bring him out of the night of his grave into the -light of day.” - -[1507] ii. 5, B has λαόν for ναόν; i. 9, for עברי it reads עבדי, and -takes the י to be abbreviation for יהוה; ii. 7, for בעדי it reads -בעלי and translates κάτοχοι; iv. 11, for ישׁ־בהּ it reads ישׁבו, and -translates κατοικοῦσι. - -[1508] i. 4, גדולה, perhaps rightly omitted before following גדול; -i. 8, B omits the clause באשר to לנו, probably rightly, for it is -needless, though supplied by Codd. A, Q; iii. 9, one verb, μετανοήσει, -for ישוב ונחם, probably correctly, see below. - -[1509] i. 2, ἡ κραυγὴ τῆς κακίας for רעתם; ii. 3, τὸν θεόν μου after -יהוה; ii. 10, in obedience to another reading; iii. 2, τὸ ἔμπροσθεν -after קראיה; iii. 8, לאמר. - -[1510] iii. 4, 8. - - - - - CHAPTER XXXV - - _THE GREAT REFUSAL_ - - JONAH i - - -We have now laid clear the lines upon which the Book of Jonah was -composed. Its purpose is to illustrate God’s grace to the heathen in -face of His people’s refusal to fulfil their mission to them. The -author was led to achieve this purpose by a parable, through which the -prophet Jonah moves as the symbol of his recusant, exiled, redeemed -and still hardened people. It is the Drama of Israel’s career, as the -Servant of God, in the most pathetic moments of that career. A nation -is stumbling on the highest road nation was ever called to tread. - - _Who is blind but My servant, - Or deaf as My messenger whom I have sent?_ - -He that would read this Drama aright must remember what lies behind the -Great Refusal which forms its tragedy. The cause of Israel’s recusancy -was not only wilfulness or cowardly sloth, but the horror of a whole -world given over to idolatry, the paralysing sense of its irresistible -force, of its cruel persecutions endured for centuries, and of the long -famine of Heaven’s justice. These it was which had filled Israel’s -eyes too full of fever to see her duty. Only when we feel, as the -writer himself felt, all this tragic background to his story are we -able to appreciate the exquisite gleams which he flashes across it: -the generous magnanimity of the heathen sailors, the repentance of -the heathen city, and, lighting from above, God’s pity upon the dumb -heathen multitudes. - -The parable or drama divides itself into three parts: The Prophet’s -Flight and Turning (chap. i.); The Great Fish and What it Means (chap. -ii.); and The Repentance of the City (chaps. iii. and iv.). - - * * * * * - -The chief figure of the story is Jonah, son of Amittai, from -Gath-hepher in Galilee, a prophet identified with that turn in Israel’s -fortunes, by which she began to defeat her Syrian oppressors, and win -back from them her own territories—a prophet, therefore, of revenge, -and from the most bitter of the heathen wars. _And the word of Jehovah -came to Jonah, the son of Amittai, saying, Up, go to Niniveh, the Great -City, and cry out against her, for her evil is come up before Me._ But -_he arose to flee_. It was not the length of the road, nor the danger -of declaring Niniveh’s sin to her face, which turned him, but the -instinct that God intended by him something else than Niniveh’s -destruction; and this instinct sprang from his knowledge of God -Himself. _Ah now, Jehovah, was not my word, while I was yet upon mine -own soil, at the time I made ready to flee to Tarshish, this—that I -knew that Thou art a God gracious and tender and long-suffering, -plenteous in love and relenting of evil?_[1511] Jonah interpreted the -Word which came to him by the Character which he knew to be behind the -Word. This is a significant hint upon the method of revelation. - -It would be rash to say that, in imputing even to the historical Jonah -the fear of God’s grace upon the heathen, our author were guilty of an -anachronism.[1512] We have to do, however, with a greater than -Jonah—the nation herself. Though perhaps Israel little reflected upon -it, the instinct can never have been far away that some day the grace -of Jehovah might reach the heathen too. Such an instinct, of course, -must have been almost stifled by hatred born of heathen oppression, as -well as by the intellectual scorn which Israel came to feel for heathen -idolatries. But we may believe that it haunted even those dark periods -in which revenge upon the Gentiles seemed most just, and their -destruction the only means of establishing God’s kingdom in the world. -We know that it moved uneasily even beneath the rigour of Jewish -legalism. For its secret was that faith in the essential grace of God, -which Israel gained very early and never lost, and which was the spring -of every new conviction and every reform in her wonderful development. -With a subtle appreciation of all this, our author imputes the instinct -to Jonah from the outset. Jonah’s fear, that after all the heathen may -be spared, reflects the restless apprehension even of the most -exclusive of his people—an apprehension which by the time our book was -written seemed to be still more justified by God’s long delay of doom -upon the tyrants whom He had promised to overthrow. - -But to the natural man in Israel the possibility of the heathen’s -repentance was still so abhorrent, that he turned his back upon it. -_Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish from the face of Jehovah._ In spite of -recent arguments to the contrary, the most probable location of -Tarshish is the generally accepted one, that it was a Phœnician colony -at the other end of the Mediterranean. In any case it was far from the -Holy Land; and by going there the prophet would put the sea between -himself and his God. To the Hebrew imagination there could not be a -flight more remote. Israel was essentially an inland people. They had -come up out of the desert, and they had practically never yet touched -the Mediterranean. They lived within sight of it, but from ten to -twenty miles of foreign soil intervened between their mountains and its -stormy coast. The Jews had no traffic upon the sea, nor (but for one -sublime instance[1513] to the contrary) had their poets ever employed -it except as a symbol of arrogance and restless rebellion against the -will of God.[1514] It was all this popular feeling of the distance and -strangeness of the sea which made our author choose it as the scene of -the prophet’s flight from the face of Israel’s God. Jonah had to pass, -too, through a foreign land to get to the coast: upon the sea he would -only be among heathen. This was to be part of his conversion. _He went -down to Yapho, and found a ship going to Tarshish, and paid the fare -thereof, and embarked on her to get away with_ her crew[1515] _to -Tarshish—away from the face of Jehovah_. - -The scenes which follow are very vivid: the sudden wind sweeping down -from the very hills on which Jonah believed he had left his God; the -tempest; the behaviour of the ship, so alive with effort that the story -attributes to her the feelings of a living thing—_she thought she must -be broken_; the despair of the mariners, driven from the unity of their -common task to the hopeless diversity of their idolatry—_they cried -every man unto his own god_; the jettisoning of the tackle of the ship -to lighten her (as we should say, they let the masts go by the board); -the worn-out prophet in the hull of the ship, sleeping like a stowaway; -the group gathered on the heaving deck to cast the lot; the passenger’s -confession, and the new fear which fell upon the sailors from it; the -reverence with which these rude men ask the advice of him, in whose -guilt they feel not the offence to themselves, but the sacredness to -God; the awakening of the prophet’s better self by their generous -deference to him; how he counsels to them his own sacrifice; their -reluctance to yield to this, and their return to the oars with -increased perseverance for his sake. But neither their generosity nor -their efforts avail. The prophet again offers himself, and as their -sacrifice he is thrown into the sea. - -_And Jehovah cast a wind[1516] on the sea, and there was a great -tempest,[1517] and the ship threatened[1518] to break up. And the -sailors were afraid, and cried every man unto his own god; and they -cast the tackle of the ship into the sea, to lighten it from upon them. -But Jonah had gone down to the bottom of the ship and lay fast asleep. -And the captain of the ship[1519] came to him, and said to him, What -art thou doing asleep? Up, call on thy God; peradventure the God will -be gracious to us, that we perish not. And they said every man to his -neighbour, Come, and let us cast lots, that we may know for whose sake -is this evil_ come _upon us. So they cast lots, and the lot fell on -Jonah. And they said to him, Tell us now,[1520] what is thy business, -and whence comest thou? what is thy land, and from what people art -thou? And he said to them, A Hebrew am I, and a worshipper of the God -of Heaven,[1521] who made the sea and the dry land. And the men feared -greatly, and said to him, What is this thou hast done? (for they knew -he was fleeing from the face of Jehovah, because he had told them). And -they said to him, What are we to do to thee that the sea cease_ raging -_against us? For the sea was surging higher and higher. And he said, -Take me and throw me into the sea; so shall the sea cease_ raging -_against you: for I am sure that it is on my account that this great -tempest is_ risen _upon you. And the men laboured[1522] with the oars -to bring the ship to land, and they could not, for the sea grew more -and more stormy against them. So they called on Jehovah and said, -Jehovah, let us not perish, we pray Thee, for the life of this man, -neither bring innocent blood upon us: for Thou art Jehovah, Thou doest -as Thou pleasest. Then they took up Jonah and cast him into the sea, -and the sea stilled from its raging. But the men were in great awe of -Jehovah, and sacrificed to Him and vowed vows._ - -How very real it is and how very noble! We see the storm, and then we -forget the storm in the joy of that generous contest between heathen -and Hebrew. But the glory of the passage is the change in Jonah -himself. It has been called his punishment and the conversion of the -heathen. Rather it is his own conversion. He meets again not only God, -but the truth from which he fled. He not only meets that truth, but he -offers his life for it. - -The art is consummate. The writer will first reduce the prophet and the -heathen whom he abhors to the elements of their common humanity. As men -have sometimes seen upon a mass of wreckage or on an ice-floe a number -of wild animals, by nature foes to each other, reduced to peace through -their common danger, so we descry the prophet and his natural enemies -upon the strained and breaking ship. In the midst of the storm they are -equally helpless, and they cast for all the lot which has no respect -of persons. But from this the story passes quickly, to show how Jonah -feels not only the human kinship of these heathen with himself, but -their susceptibility to the knowledge of his God. They pray to Jehovah -as the God of the sea and the dry land; while we may be sure that the -prophet’s confession, and the story of his own relation to that God, -forms as powerful an exhortation to repentance as any he could have -preached in Niniveh. At least it produces the effects which he has -dreaded. In these sailors he sees heathen turned to the fear of the -Lord. All that he has fled to avoid happens there before his eyes and -through his own mediation. - -The climax is reached, however, neither when Jonah feels his common -humanity with the heathen nor when he discovers their awe of his God, -but when in order to secure for them God’s sparing mercies he offers -his own life instead. _Take me up and cast me into the sea; so shall -the sea cease from_ raging _against you._ After their pity for him -has wrestled for a time with his honest entreaties, he becomes their -sacrifice. - - * * * * * - -In all this story perhaps the most instructive passages are those which -lay bare to us the method of God’s revelation. When we were children -this was shown to us in pictures of angels bending from heaven to guide -Isaiah’s pen, or to cry Jonah’s commission to him through a trumpet. -And when we grew older, although we learned to dispense with that -machinery, yet its infection remained, and our conception of the whole -process was mechanical still. We thought of the prophets as of another -order of things; we released them from our own laws of life and -thought, and we paid the penalty by losing all interest in them. But -the prophets were human, and their inspiration came through experience. -The source of it, as this story shows, was God. Partly from His -guidance of their nation, partly through close communion with Himself, -they received new convictions of His character. Yet they did not -receive these mechanically. They spake neither at the bidding of -angels, nor like heathen prophets in trance or ecstasy, but as _they -were moved by the Holy Ghost_. And the Spirit worked upon them first as -the influence of God’s character,[1523] and second through the -experience of life. God and life—these are all the postulates for -revelation. - -At first Jonah fled from the truth, at last he laid down his life for -it. So God still forces us to the acceptance of new light and the -performance of strange duties. Men turn from these, because of sloth -or prejudice, but in the end they have to face them, and then at what -a cost! In youth they shirk a self-denial to which in some storm of -later life they have to bend with heavier, and often hopeless, hearts. -For their narrow prejudices and refusals, God punishes them by bringing -them into pain that stings, or into responsibility for others that -shames, these out of them. The drama of life is thus intensified in -interest and beauty; characters emerge heroic and sublime. - - “But, oh the labour, - O prince, the pain!” - -Sometimes the neglected duty is at last achieved only at the cost of -a man’s breath; and the truth, which might have been the bride of his -youth and his comrade through a long life, is recognised by him only in -the features of Death. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1511] iv. 2. - -[1512] For the grace of God had been the most formative influence in -the early religion of Israel (see Vol. I., p. 19), and Amos, only -thirty years after Jonah, emphasised the moral equality of Israel and -the Gentiles before the one God of righteousness. Given these two -premisses of God’s essential grace and the moral responsibility of the -heathen to Him, and the conclusion could never have been far away that -in the end His essential grace must reach the heathen too. Indeed in -sayings not later than the eighth century it is foretold that Israel -shall become a blessing to the whole world. Our author, then, may have -been guilty of no anachronism in imputing such a foreboding to Jonah. - -[1513] Second Isaiah. See chap. lx. - -[1514] See the author’s _Hist. Geog. of the Holy Land_, pp. 131-134. - -[1515] Heb. _them_. - -[1516] So LXX.: Heb. _a great wind_. - -[1517] Heb. _on the sea_. - -[1518] Lit. _reckoned_ or _thought_. - -[1519] Heb. _ropes_. - -[1520] The words _for whose sake is this evil_ come _upon us_ do not -occur in LXX. and are unnecessary. - -[1521] Wellhausen suspects this form of the Divine title. - -[1522] Heb. _dug_. - -[1523] _I knew how Thou art a God gracious._ - - - - - CHAPTER XXXVI - - _THE GREAT FISH AND WHAT IT MEANS—THE PSALM_ - - JONAH ii - - -At this point in the tale appears the Great Fish. _And Jehovah prepared -a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of the fish -three days and three nights._ - -After the very natural story which we have followed, this verse -obtrudes itself with a shock of unreality and grotesqueness. What an -anticlimax! say some; what a clumsy intrusion! So it is if Jonah be -taken as an individual. But if we keep in mind that he stands here, not -for himself, but for his nation, the difficulty and the grotesqueness -disappear. It is Israel’s ill-will to the heathen, Israel’s refusal -of her mission, Israel’s embarkation on the stormy sea of the world’s -politics, which we have had described as Jonah’s. Upon her flight -from God’s will there followed her Exile, and from her Exile, which -was for a set period, she came back to her own land, a people still, -and still God’s servant to the heathen. How was the author to express -this national death and resurrection? In conformity with the popular -language of his time, he had described Israel’s turning from God’s will -by her embarkation on a stormy sea, always the symbol of the prophets -for the tossing heathen world that was ready to engulf her; and now -to express her exile and return he sought metaphors in the same rich -poetry of the popular imagination. - -To the Israelite who watched from his hills that stormy coast on which -the waves hardly ever cease to break in their impotent restlessness, -the sea was a symbol of arrogance and futile defiance to the will of -God. The popular mythology of the Semites had filled it with turbulent -monsters, snakes and dragons who wallowed like its own waves, helpless -against the bounds set to them, or rose to wage war against the gods -in heaven and the great lights which they had created; but a god slays -them and casts their carcases for meat and drink to the thirsty people -of the desert.[1524] It is a symbol of the perpetual war between light -and darkness; the dragons are the clouds, the slayer the sun. A -variant form, which approaches closely to that of Jonah’s great fish, -is still found in Palestine. In May 1891 I witnessed at Hasbeya, on the -western skirts of Hermon, an eclipse of the moon. When the shadow began -to creep across her disc, there rose from the village a hideous din of -drums, metal pots and planks of wood beaten together; guns were fired, -and there was much shouting. I was told that this was done to terrify -the great fish which was swallowing the moon, and to make him disgorge -her. - -Now these purely natural myths were applied by the prophets and poets -of the Old Testament to the illustration, not only of Jehovah’s -sovereignty over the storm and the night, but of His conquest of the -heathen powers who had enslaved His people.[1525] Isaiah had heard -in the sea the confusion and rage of the peoples against the bulwark -which Jehovah set around Israel;[1526] but it is chiefly from the -time of the Exile onward that the myths themselves, with their cruel -monsters and the prey of these, are applied to the great heathen -powers and their captive, Israel. One prophet explicitly describes the -Exile of Israel as the swallowing of the nation by the monster, the -Babylonian tyrant, whom God forces at last to disgorge its prey. Israel -says:[1527] _Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon hath devoured me[1528] -and crushed me,[1528] ... he hath swallowed me up like the Dragon, -filling his belly, from my delights he hath cast me out_. But Jehovah -replies:[1529] _I will punish Bel in Babylon, and I will bring out of -his mouth that which he hath swallowed.... My people, go ye out of the -midst of her._ - -It has been justly remarked by Canon Cheyne that this passage may be -considered as the intervening link between the original form of the -myth and the application of it made in the story of Jonah.[1530] To -this the objection might be offered that in the story of Jonah the -_great fish_ is not actually represented as the means of the prophet’s -temporary destruction, like the monster in Jeremiah li., but rather as -the vessel of his deliverance.[1531] This is true, yet it only means -that our author has still further adapted the very plastic material -offered him by this much transformed myth. But we do not depend for our -proof upon the comparison of a single passage. Let the student of the -Book of Jonah read carefully the many passages of the Old Testament, in -which the sea or its monsters rage in vain against Jehovah, or are -harnessed and led about by Him; or still more those passages in which -His conquest of these monsters is made to figure His conquest of the -heathen powers,[1532]—and the conclusion will appear irresistible that -the story of the _great fish_ and of Jonah the type of Israel is drawn -from the same source. Such a solution of the problem has one great -advantage. It relieves us of the grotesqueness which attaches to the -literal conception of the story, and of the necessity of those painful -efforts for accounting for a miracle which have distorted the -common-sense and even the orthodoxy of so many commentators of the -book.[1533] We are dealing, let us remember, with poetry—a poetry -inspired by one of the most sublime truths of the Old Testament, but -whose figures are drawn from the legends and myths of the people to -whom it is addressed. To treat this as prose is not only to sin against -the common-sense which God has given us, but against the simple and -obvious intention of the author. It is blindness both to reason and to -Scripture. - -These views are confirmed by an examination of the Psalm or Prayer -which is put into Jonah’s mouth while he is yet in the fish. We have -already seen what grounds there are for believing that the Psalm -belongs to the author’s own plan, and from the beginning appeared just -where it does now.[1534] But we may also point out how, in consistence -with its context, this is a Psalm, not of an individual Israelite, -but of the nation as a whole. It is largely drawn from the national -liturgy.[1535] It is full of cries which we know, though they are -expressed in the singular number, to have been used of the whole -people, or at least of that pious portion of them, who were Israel -indeed. True that in the original portion of the Psalm, and by far its -most beautiful verses, we seem to have the description of a drowning -man swept to the bottom of the sea. But even here, the colossal scenery -and the magnificent hyperbole of the language suit not the experience -of an individual, but the extremities of that vast gulf of exile into -which a whole nation was plunged. It is a nation’s carcase which rolls -upon those infernal tides that swirl among the roots of mountains and -behind the barred gates of earth. Finally, vv. 9 and 10 are obviously -a contrast, not between the individual prophet and the heathen, but -between the true Israel, who in exile preserve their loyalty to -Jehovah, and those Jews who, forsaking their _covenant-love_, lapse -to idolatry. We find many parallels to this in exilic and post-exilic -literature. - -_And Jonah prayed to Jehovah his God from the belly of the fish, and -said:—_ - - _I cried out of my anguish to Jehovah, and He answered me; - From the belly of Inferno I sought help—Thou heardest my voice. - For Thou hadst[1536] cast me into the depth, to the heart - of the seas, and the flood rolled around me; - All Thy breakers and billows went over me. - Then I said, I am hurled from Thy sight: - How[1537] shall I ever again look towards Thy holy temple? - Waters enwrapped me to the soul; the Deep rolled around me; - The tangle was bound about my head. - I was gone down to the roots of the hills; - Earth _and_ her bars were behind me for ever. - But Thou broughtest my life up from destruction, - Jehovah my God! - When my soul fainted upon me, I remembered Jehovah, - And my prayer came in unto Thee, to Thy holy temple. - They that observe the idols of vanity, - They forsake their covenant-love. - But to the sound of praise I will sacrifice to Thee; - What I have vowed I will perform. - Salvation is Jehovah’s._ - -_And Jehovah spake to the fish, and it threw up Jonah on the dry land._ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1524] For the Babylonian myths see Sayce’s Hibbert Lectures; George -Smith’s _Assyrian Discoveries_; and Gunkel, _Schöpfung u. Chaos_. - -[1525] Passages in which this class of myths are taken in a physical -sense are Job iii. 8, vii. 12, xxvi. 12, 13, etc., etc.; and passages -in which it is applied politically are Isa. xxvii. 1, li. 9; Jer. li. -34, 44; Psalm lxxiv., etc. See Gunkel, _Schöpfung u. Chaos_. - -[1526] Chap. xvii. 12-14. - -[1527] Jer. li. 34. - -[1528] Heb. margin, LXX. and Syr.; Heb. text _us_. - -[1529] Jer. li. 44, 45. - -[1530] Cheyne, _Theol. Rev._, XIV. See above, p. 503. - -[1531] See above, p. 511, on the Psalm of Jonah. - -[1532] Above, p. 525, n. 1525. - -[1533] It is very interesting to notice how many commentators (_e.g._ -Pusey, and the English edition of Lange) who take the story in its -individual meaning, and therefore as miraculous, immediately try to -minimise the miracle by quoting stories of great fishes who have -swallowed men, and even men in armour, whole, and in one case at least -have vomited them up alive! - -[1534] See above, pp. 511 f. - -[1535] See above, p. 511, nn. 1500, 1501. - -[1536] The grammar, which usually expresses result, more literally -runs, _And Thou didst cast me_; but after the preceding verse it must -be taken not as expressing consequence but cause. - -[1537] Read אֵיךְ for אַךְ, and with the LXX. take the sentence -interrogatively. - - - - - CHAPTER XXXVII - - _THE REPENTANCE OF THE CITY_ - - JONAH iii - - -Having learned, through suffering, his moral kinship with the heathen, -and having offered his life for some of them, Jonah receives a second -command to go to Niniveh. He obeys, but with his prejudice as strong -as though it had never been humbled, nor met by Gentile nobleness. -The first part of his story appears to have no consequences in the -second.[1538] But this is consistent with the writer’s purpose to treat -Jonah as if he were Israel. For, upon their return from Exile, and in -spite of all their new knowledge of themselves and the world, Israel -continued to cherish their old grudge against the Gentiles. - -_And the word of Jehovah came to Jonah the second time, saying, Up, go -to Niniveh, the great city, and call unto her with the call which I -shall tell thee. And Jonah arose and went to Niniveh, as Jehovah said. -Now Niniveh was a city great before God, three days’ journey_ through -and through.[1539] _And Jonah began by going through the city one day’s -journey, and he cried and said, Forty[1540] days more and Niniveh shall -be overturned_. - -Opposite to Mosul, the well-known emporium of trade on the right bank -of the Upper Tigris, two high artificial mounds now lift themselves -from the otherwise level plain. The more northerly takes the name of -Kujundschik, or “little lamb,” after the Turkish village which couches -pleasantly upon its north-eastern slope. The other is called in the -popular dialect Nebi Yunus, “Prophet Jonah,” after a mosque dedicated -to him, which used to be a Christian church; but the official name -is Niniveh. These two mounds are bound to each other on the west by -a broad brick wall, which extends beyond them both, and is connected -north and south by other walls, with a circumference in all of about -nine English miles. The interval, including the mounds, was covered -with buildings, whose ruins still enable us to form some idea of -what was for centuries the wonder of the world. Upon terraces and -substructions of enormous breadth rose storied palaces, arsenals, -barracks, libraries and temples. A lavish water system spread in all -directions from canals with massive embankments and sluices. Gardens -were lifted into mid-air, filled with rich plants and rare and -beautiful animals. Alabaster, silver, gold and precious stones relieved -the dull masses of brick and flashed sunlight from every frieze and -battlement. The surrounding walls were so broad that chariots could -roll abreast on them. The gates, and especially the river gates, were -very massive.[1541] - -All this was Niniveh proper, whose glory the Hebrews envied and over -whose fall more than one of their prophets exult. But this was not the -Niniveh to which our author saw Jonah come. Beyond the walls were great -suburbs,[1542] and beyond the suburbs other towns, league upon league -of dwellings, so closely set upon the plain as to form one vast complex -of population, which is known to Scripture as _The Great City_.[1543] -To judge from the ruins which still cover the ground,[1544] the -circumference must have been about sixty miles, or three days’ journey. -It is these nameless leagues of common dwellings which roll before -us in the story. None of those glories of Niniveh are mentioned, of -which other prophets speak, but the only proofs offered to us of the -city’s greatness are its extent and its population.[1545] Jonah is sent -to three days, not of mighty buildings, but of homes and families, to -the Niniveh, not of kings and their glories, but of men, women and -children, _besides much cattle_. The palaces and temples he may pass in -an hour or two, but from sunrise to sunset he treads the dim drab mazes -where the people dwell. - -When we open our hearts for heroic witness to the truth there rush upon -them glowing memories of Moses before Pharaoh, of Elijah before Ahab, -of Stephen before the Sanhedrim, of Paul upon Areopagus, of Galileo -before the Inquisition, of Luther at the Diet. But it takes a greater -heroism to face the people than a king, to convert a nation than to -persuade a senate. Princes and assemblies of the wise stimulate the -imagination; they drive to bay all the nobler passions of a solitary -man. But there is nothing to help the heart, and therefore its courage -is all the greater, which bears witness before those endless masses, in -monotone of life and colour, that now paralyse the imagination like -long stretches of sand when the sea is out, and again terrify it like -the resistless rush of the flood beneath a hopeless evening sky. - -It is, then, with an art most fitted to his high purpose that our -author—unlike all other prophets, whose aim was different—presents -to us, not the description of a great military power: king, nobles -and armed battalions: but the vision of those monotonous millions. He -strips his country’s foes of everything foreign, everything provocative -of envy and hatred, and unfolds them to Israel only in their teeming -humanity.[1546] - -His next step is still more grand. For this teeming humanity he claims -the universal human possibility of repentance—that and nothing more. - -Under every form and character of human life, beneath all needs and all -habits, deeper than despair and more native to man than sin itself, -lies the power of the heart to turn. It was this and not hope that -remained at the bottom of Pandora’s Box when every other gift had fled. -For this is the indispensable secret of hope. It lies in every heart, -needing indeed some dream of Divine mercy, however far and vague, to -rouse it; but when roused, neither ignorance of God, nor pride, nor -long obduracy of evil may withstand it. It takes command of the whole -nature of a man, and speeds from heart to heart with a violence, that -like pain and death spares neither age nor rank nor degree of culture. -This primal human right is all our author claims for the men of -Niniveh. He has been blamed for telling us an impossible thing, that a -whole city should be converted at the call of a single stranger; and -others have started up in his defence and quoted cases in which large -Oriental populations have actually been stirred by the preaching of an -alien in race and religion; and then it has been replied, “Granted the -possibility, granted the fact in other cases, yet where in history have -we any trace of this alleged conversion of all Niniveh?” and some -scoff, “How could a Hebrew have made himself articulate in one day to -those Assyrian multitudes?” - -How long, O Lord, must Thy poetry suffer from those who can only treat -it as prose? On whatever side they stand, sceptical or orthodox, they -are equally pedants, quenchers of the spiritual, creators of unbelief. - -Our author, let us once for all understand, makes no attempt to record -an historical conversion of this vast heathen city. For its men he -claims only the primary human possibility of repentance; expressing -himself not in this general abstract way, but as Orientals, to whom an -illustration is ever a proof, love to have it done—by story or parable. -With magnificent reserve he has not gone further; but only told -into the prejudiced faces of his people, that out there, beyond the -Covenant, in the great world lying in darkness, there live, not beings -created for ignorance and hostility to God, elect for destruction, but -men with consciences and hearts, able to turn at His Word and to hope -in His Mercy—that to the farthest ends of the world, and even on the -high places of unrighteousness, Word and Mercy work just as they do -within the Covenant. - -The fashion in which the repentance of Niniveh is described is natural -to the time of the writer. It is a national repentance, of course, and -though swelling upwards from the people, it is confirmed and organised -by the authorities: for we are still in the Old Dispensation, when -the picture of a complete and thorough repentance could hardly be -otherwise conceived. And the beasts are made to share its observance, -as in the Orient they always shared and still share in funeral pomp and -trappings.[1547] It may have been, in addition, a personal pleasure -to our writer to record the part of the animals in the movement. See -how, later on, he tells us that for their sake also God had pity upon -Niniveh. - -_And the men of Niniveh believed upon God, and cried a fast, and from -the greatest of them to the least of them they put on sackcloth. And -word came to the king of Niniveh, and he rose off his throne, and cast -his mantle from upon him, and dressed in sackcloth and sat in the dust. -And he sent criers to say in Niniveh:—_ - -_By Order of the King and his Nobles, thus:—Man and Beast, Oxen and -Sheep, shall not taste anything, neither eat nor drink water. But let -them clothe themselves[1548] in sackcloth, both man and beast, and call -upon God with power, and turn every man from his evil way and from -every wrong which they have in hand. Who knoweth but that God may[1549] -relent and turn from the fierceness of His wrath, that we perish -not?_[1550] - -_And God saw their doings, how they turned from their evil way; and God -relented of the evil which He said He would do to them, and did it -not._ - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1538] Only in iii. 1, _second time_, and in iv. 2 are there any -references from the second to the first part of the book. - -[1539] The diameter rather than the circumference seems intended by the -writer, if we can judge by his sending the prophet _one day’s journey -through the city_. Some, however, take the circumference as meant, and -this agrees with the computation of sixty English miles as the girth of -the greater Niniveh described below. - -[1540] LXX. Codd. B, etc., read _three days_; other Codd. have the -_forty_ of the Heb. text. - -[1541] For a more detailed description of Niniveh see above on the Book -of Nahum, pp. 98 ff. - -[1542] רחבות עיר, Gen. x. 11. - -[1543] Gen. x. 12, according to which the Great City included, besides -Niniveh, at least Resen and Kelach. - -[1544] And taking the present Kujundschik, Nimrud, Khorsabad and -Balawat as the four corners of the district. - -[1545] iii. 2, iv. 11. - -[1546] Compare the Book of Jonah, for instance, with the Book of Nahum. - -[1547] Cf. Herod. IX. 24; Joel i. 18; Virgil, _Eclogue_ V., _Æneid_ XI. -89 ff.; Plutarch, _Alex._ 72. - -[1548] LXX.: _and they did clothe themselves in sackcloth_, and so on. - -[1549] So LXX. Heb. text: _may turn and relent, and turn_. - -[1550] The alleged discrepancies in this account have been already -noticed. As the text stands the fast and mourning are proclaimed and -actually begun before word reaches the king and his proclamation of -fast and mourning goes forth. The discrepancies might be removed by -transferring the words in ver. 6, _and they cried a fast, and from the -greatest of them, to the least they clothed themselves in sackcloth_, -to the end of ver. 8, with a לאמר or ויאמרו to introduce ver. 9. But, -as said above (pp. 499, 510, n. 1499), it is more probable that the -text as it stands was original, and that the inconsistencies in the -order of the narrative are due to its being a tale or parable. - - - - - CHAPTER XXXVIII - - _ISRAEL’S JEALOUSY OF JEHOVAH_ - - JONAH iv - - -Having illustrated the truth, that the Gentiles are capable of -repentance unto life, the Book now describes the effect of their escape -upon Jonah, and closes by revealing God’s full heart upon the matter. - -Jonah is very angry that Niniveh has been spared. Is this (as some say) -because his own word has not been fulfilled? In Israel there was an -accepted rule that a prophet should be judged by the issue of his -predictions: _If thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word -which Jehovah hath not spoken?—when a prophet speaketh in the name of -Jehovah, if the thing follow not nor come to pass, that is the thing -which Jehovah hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken -presumptuously, thou shalt have no reverence for him_.[1551] Was it -this that stung Jonah? Did he ask for death because men would say of -him that when he predicted Niniveh’s overthrow he was false and had not -God’s word? Of such fears there is no trace in the story. Jonah never -doubts that his word came from Jehovah, nor dreads that other men will -doubt. There is absolutely no hint of anxiety as to his professional -reputation. But, on the contrary, Jonah says that from the first he had -the foreboding, grounded upon his knowledge of God’s character, that -Niniveh would be spared, and that it was from this issue he shrank and -fled to go to Tarshish. In short he could not, either then or now, -master his conviction that the heathen should be destroyed. His grief, -though foolish, is not selfish. He is angry, not at the baffling of his -word, but at God’s forbearance with the foes and tyrants of Israel. - -Now, as in all else, so in this, Jonah is the type of his people. If we -can judge from their literature after the Exile, they were not troubled -by the nonfulfilment of prophecy, except as one item of what was the -problem of their faith—the continued prosperity of the Gentiles. -And this was not, what it appears to be in some Psalms, only an -intellectual problem or an offence to their sense of justice. Nor could -they meet it always, as some of their prophets did, with a supreme -intellectual scorn of the heathen, and in the proud confidence that -they themselves were the favourites of God. For the knowledge that God -was infinitely gracious haunted their pride; and from the very heart of -their faith arose a jealous fear that He would show His grace to others -than themselves. To us it may be difficult to understand this temper. -We have not been trained to believe ourselves an elect people; nor -have we suffered at the hands of the heathen. Yet, at least, we have -contemporaries and fellow-Christians among whom we may find still alive -many of the feelings against which the Book of Jonah was written. Take -the Oriental Churches of to-day. Centuries of oppression have created -in them an awful hatred of the infidel, beneath whose power they are -hardly suffered to live. The barest justice calls for the overthrow of -their oppressors. That these share a common humanity with themselves is -a sense they have nearly lost. For centuries they have had no spiritual -intercourse with them; to try to convert a Mohammedan has been for -twelve hundred years a capital crime. It is not wonderful that Eastern -Christians should have long lost power to believe in the conversion of -infidels, and to feel that anything is due but their destruction. The -present writer once asked a cultured and devout layman of the Greek -Church, Why then did God create so many Mohammedans? The answer came -hot and fast: To fill up Hell! Analogous to this were the feelings of -the Jews towards the peoples who had conquered and oppressed them. But -the jealousy already alluded to aggravated these feelings to a rigour -no Christian can ever share. What right had God to extend to their -oppressors His love for a people who alone had witnessed and suffered -for Him, to whom He had bound Himself by so many exclusive promises, -whom He had called His Bride, His Darling, His Only One? And yet the -more Israel dwelt upon that Love the more they were afraid of it. God -had been so gracious and so long-suffering to themselves that they -could not trust Him not to show these mercies to others. In which case, -what was the use of their uniqueness and privilege? What worth was -their living any more? Israel might as well perish. - -It is this subtle story of Israel’s jealousy of Jehovah, and Jehovah’s -gentle treatment of it, which we follow in the last chapter of the -book. The chapter starts from Jonah’s confession of a fear of the -results of God’s lovingkindness and from his persuasion that, as this -spread to the heathen, the life of His servant spent in opposition to -the heathen was a worthless life; and the chapter closes with God’s own -vindication of His Love to His jealous prophet. - -_It was a great grief to Jonah, and he was angered; and he prayed -to Jehovah and said: Ah now, Jehovah, while I was still upon mine -own ground, at the time that I prepared to flee to Tarshish, was -not this my word, that I knew Thee to be a God gracious and tender, -long-suffering and plenteous in love, relenting of evil? And now, -Jehovah, take, I pray Thee, my life from me, for for me death is better -than life._ - -In this impatience of life as well as in some subsequent traits, the -story of Jonah reflects that of Elijah. But the difference between the -two prophets was this, that while Elijah was very jealous _for_ -Jehovah, Jonah was very jealous _of_ Him. Jonah could not bear to see -the love promised to Israel alone, and cherished by her, bestowed -equally upon her heathen oppressors. And he behaved after the manner of -jealousy and of the heart that thinks itself insulted. He withdrew, and -sulked in solitude, and would take no responsibility nor further -interest in his work. Such men are best treated by a caustic -gentleness, a little humour, a little rallying, a leaving to nature, -and a taking unawares in their own confessed prejudices. All these—I -dare to think even the humour—are present in God’s treatment of Jonah. -This is very natural and very beautiful. Twice the Divine Voice speaks -with a soft sarcasm: _Art thou very angry?_[1552] Then Jonah’s -affections, turned from man and God, are allowed their course with a -bit of nature, the fresh and green companion of his solitude; and then -when all his pity for this has been roused by its destruction, that -very pity is employed to awaken his sympathy with God’s compassion for -the great city, and he is shown how he has denied to God the same -natural affection which he confesses to be so strong in himself. But -why try further to expound so clear and obvious an argument? - -_But Jehovah said, Art thou_ so _very angry?_ Jonah would not -answer—how lifelike is his silence at this point!—_but went out from -the city and sat down before it,[1553] and made him there a booth and -dwelt beneath it in the shade, till he should see what happened in the -city. And Jehovah God prepared a gourd,[1554] and it grew up above -Jonah to be a shadow over his head....[1555] And Jonah rejoiced in the -gourd with a great joy. But as dawn came up the next day God prepared a -worm, and _this_[1556] wounded the gourd, that it perished. And it came -to pass, when the sun rose, that God prepared a dry east-wind,[1557] -and the sun smote on Jonah’s head, so that he was faint, and begged for -himself that he might die,[1558] saying, Better my dying than my -living! And God said unto Jonah, Art thou so very angry about the -gourd? And he said, I am very angry—even unto death! And Jehovah said: -Thou carest for a gourd for which thou hast not travailed, nor hast -thou brought it up, a thing that came in a night and in a night has -perished.[1559] And shall I not care for Niniveh, the Great City,[1560] -in which there are more than twelve times ten thousand human beings who -know not their right hand from their left, besides much cattle?_ - -God has vindicated His love to the jealousy of those who thought that -it was theirs alone. And we are left with this grand vague vision of -the immeasurable city, with its multitude of innocent children and -cattle, and God’s compassion brooding over all. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1551] Deut. xviii. 21, 22. - -[1552] The Hebrew may be translated either, first, _Doest thou well to -be angry?_ or second, _Art thou very angry?_ Our versions both prefer -the _first_, though they put the _second_ in the margin. The LXX. take -the _second_. That the second is the right one is not only proved by -its greater suitableness, but by Jonah’s answer to the question, _I am -very angry, yea, even unto death_. - -[1553] Heb. _the city_. - -[1554] קִיקָיון, the Egyptian kiki, the Ricinus or Palma Christi. See -above, p. 498, n. 1473. - -[1555] Heb. adds _to save him from his evil_, perhaps a gloss. - -[1556] Heb. _it_. - -[1557] חֲרִישִׁית. The Targum implies a _quiet_, i.e. _sweltering_, -_east wind_. Hitzig thinks that the name is derived from the season of -ploughing and some modern proverbs appear to bear this out: _an autumn -east wind_. LXX. συγκαίων Siegfried-Stade: _a cutting east wind_, as if -from חרשׁ. Steiner emends to חריסית, as if from חֶרֶס = _the piercing_, a -poetic name of the sun; and Böhme, _Z.A.T.W._, VII. 256, to חרירית, -from חרר, _to glow_. Köhler (_Theol. Rev._, XVI., p. 143) compares חֶרֶשׁ, -_dried clay_. - -[1558] Heb.: _begged his life, that he might die_. - -[1559] Heb.: _which was the son of a night, and son of a night has -perished_. - -[1560] Gen. x. 12. - - - - -INDEX OF PROPHETS - - - HABAKKUK, Introduction, 115; - Chaps. i.—ii. 4, 129; - ii. 5-20, 143; - iii., 149. - - HAGGAI, Introduction, 225; - Chap. i., 236; - ii. 1-9, 241; - ii. 10-19, 244; - ii. 20-23, 250. - - JOEL, Introduction, 375; - Chaps. i.—ii. 17, 398; - ii. 18-32, 418; - iii., 431. - - JONAH, Introduction, 493; - Chap. i., 514; - ii., 523; - iii., 529; - iv., 536. - - “MALACHI,” Introduction, 331; - Chap. i. 2-5, 349; - i. 6-14, 352; - ii. 1-9, 360; - ii. 10-16, 363; - ii. 17—iii. 5, 365; - iii. 6-12, 367; - iii. 13—iv. 2 (Eng.; iii. 13-21 Heb.), 369; - iv. 3-5 (Eng.; iii. 22-24 Heb.), 371. - - NAHUM, Introduction, 77; - Chap. i., 90; - ii., iii., 96. - - OBADIAH, Introduction, 163; - vv. 1-21, 173, 177. - - ZECHARIAH (i.—viii.), Introduction, 255; - Chap. i. 1-6, 267; - i. 7-17, 283; - i. 18-21 (Eng.; ii. 1-4 Heb.), 286; - ii. 1-5 (Eng.; ii. 5-9 Heb.), 287; - iii., 292; - iv., 297; - v. 1-4, 301; - v. 5-11, 303; - vi. 1-8, 305; - vi. 9-15, 307; - vii., 320; - viii., 323. - - “ZECHARIAH” (ix.—xiv.), Introduction, 449; - Chap. ix. 1-8, 463; - ix. 9-12, 466; - ix. 13-17, 467; - x. 1, 2, 469; - x. 3-12, 470; - xi. 1-3, 473; - xi. 4-17, 473; - xii. 1-7, 478; - xii. 8—xiii. 6, 481; - xiii. 7-9, 473, 477; - xiv., 485. - - ZEPHANIAH, Introduction, 35; - Chaps. i.—ii. 3, 46; - ii. 4-15, 61; - iii. 1-13, 67; - iii. 14-20, 67, 73. - - - - - PRINTED BY - HAZELL, WATSON, AND VINEY, LD., - LONDON AND AYLESBURY. - - - - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Expositor's Bible; The Book of the -Twelve Prophets, Vol. 2 (of 2), by George Adam Smith - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EXPOSITOR'S BIBLE; TWELVE PROPHETS, VOL. 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