,,the ,,expositor',s ,,bible4 ,edited by ,rev4 ,w4 ,r4 ,,nicoll1 ,d4,d41 ,editor of ,london ,expositor4 #a,,st ,,series ,,in #f ,,vols4 ,,maclaren1 ,rev4 ,alex4--,,colossians--,,philemon4 ,,dods1 ,rev4 ,marcus4--,,genesis4 ,,chadwick1 ,rev4 ,dean4--,,st4 ,,mark4 ,,blaikie1 ,rev4 ,w4 ,g4--,,samuel1 #b ,,vols4 ,,edwards1 ,rev4 ,t4 ,c4--,,hebrews4 #b;,d ,,series ,,in #f ,,vols4 ,,smith1 ,rev4 ,g4 ,a4--,,isaiah1 ,,vol4 ,i4 ,,alexander1 ,bishop4--,,epistles ,,of ,,st4 ,,john4 ,,plummer1 ,rev4 ,a4--,,pastoral ,,epistles4 ,,findlay1 ,rev4 ,g4 ,g4--,,galatians4 ,,milligan1 ,rev4 ,w4--,,revelation4 ,,dods1 ,rev4 ,marcus4--#a,,st ,,corinthians4 #c;,d ,,series ,,in #f ,,vols4 ,,smith1 ,rev4 ,g4 ,a4--,,isaiah1 ,,vol4 ,,ii4 ,,gibson1 ,rev4 ,j4 ,m4--,,st4 ,,matthew4 ,,watson1 ,rev4 ,r4 ,a4--,,judges--,,ruth4 ,,ball1 ,rev4 ,c4 ,j4--,,jeremiah4 ,,chap4 ,i-,,xx4 ,,chadwick1 ,rev4 ,dean4--,,exodus4 ,,burton1 ,rev4 ,h4--,,st4 ,,luke4 #d,,th ,,series ,,in #f ,,vols4 ,,kellogg1 ,rev4 ,s4 ,h4--,,leviticus4 ,,stokes1 ,rev4 ,g4 ,t4--,,acts1 ,,vol4 ,i4 ,,horton1 ,rev4 ,r4 ,f4--,,proverbs4 ,,dods1 ,rev4 ,marcus4--,,gospel ,,st4 ,,john1 ,,vol4 ,i4 ,,plummer1 ,rev4 ,a4--,,james--,,jude4 ,,cox1 ,rev4 ,s4--,,ecclesiastes4 #e,,th ,,series ,,in #f ,,vols4 ,,denney1 ,rev4 ,j4--,,thessalonians4 ,,watson1 ,rev4 ,r4 ,a4--,,job4 ,,maclaren1 ,rev4 ,a4--,,psalms1 ,,vol4 ,i4 ,,stokes1 ,rev4 ,g4 ,t4--,,acts1 ,,vol4 ,,ii4 ,,dods1 ,rev4 ,marcus4--,,gospel ,,st4 ,,john1 ,,vol4 ,,ii4 ,,findlay1 ,rev4 ,c4 ,g4--,,ephesians4 #f,,th ,,series ,,in #f ,,vols4 ,,rainy1 ,rev4 ,r4--,,philippians4 ,,farrar1 ,archdeacon ,f4 ,w4--#a,,st ,,kings4 ,,blaikie1 ,rev4 ,w4 ,g4--,,joshua4 ,,maclaren1 ,rev4 ,a4--,,psalms1 ,,vol4 ,,ii4 ,,lumby1 ,rev1 ,j4 ,r4--,,epistles ,,of ,,st4 ,,peter4 ,,adeney1 ,rev4 ,w4 ,f4--,,ezra--,,nehemiah--,,esther4 #g,,th ,,series ,,in #f ,,vols4 ,,moule1 ,rev4 ,h4 ,c4 ,g4--,,romans4 ,,farrar1 ,archdeacon ,f4 ,w4--#b;,d ,,kings4 ,,bennett1 ,rev4 ,w4 ,h4--#a,,st ,,and #b;,d ,,chronicles4 ,,maclaren1 ,rev4 ,a4--,,psalms1 ,,vol4 ,,iii4 ,,denney1 ,rev4 ,james4--#b;,d ,,corinthians4 ,,watson ,rev4 ,r4 ,a4--,,numbers4 #h,,th ,,and ,,final ,,series ,,in #g ,,vols4 ,,farrar1 ,archdeacon ,f4 ,w4--,,daniel4 ,,skinner1 ,rev4 ,john4--,,ezekiel4 ,,bennett1 ,rev4 ,w4 ,h4--,,jeremiah4 ,,harper1 ,rev4 ,prof4--,,deuteronomy4 ,,adeney1 ,rev4 ,w4 ,f4--,,solomon ,,and ,,lamentations4 ,,smith1 ,rev4 ,g4 ,a4--,,the ,,minor ,,prophets1 #b ,,vols4 ,about #djj pages in each ,volume4 ,price for either series1 six volumes #f4jf4 7,orders for #b or more series at same rate will be sent by ,express4 prepaid47 7,separate vols4 #a4ej postpaid4 ,descriptive circular sent on application47 ,,the ,,book ,,of ,,the ,,twelve ,,prophets ,,commonly ,,called ,,the ,,minor ,,by ,,george ,,adam ,,smith1 ,d4,d41 ,,ll4,d4 ,,professor ,,of ,,hebrew ,,and ,,old ,,testament ,,exegesis ,,free ,,church ,,college1 ,,glasgow ,,in ,,two ,,volumes ,,vol4 ,i4--,,amos1 ,,hosea ,,and ,,micah ,,with ,,an ,,introduction ,,and ,a ,,sketch ,,of ,,prophecy ,,in ,,early ,,israel ,,new ,,york ,a4 ,c4 ,,armstrong ,,and ,,son #c and #e ,west ,eighteenth ,street ,london3 ,hodder and ,stoughton #aijf ,,to ,,henry ,,drummond ,,preface ,the ,prophets1 to whom this and a following volume are dedicated1 have1 to our loss1 been haunted for centuries by a peddling and an ambiguous title4 ,their ,twelve ,books are in size smaller than those of the great ,three which precede them1 and doubtless none of their chapters soar so high as the brilliant summits to which we are swept by ,isaiah and the ,prophet of the ,exile4 ,but in every other respect they are undeserving of the niggardly name of ,minor4 ,two of them1 ,amos and ,hosea1 were the first of all prophecy--rising cliff-like1 with a sheer and magnificent originality1 to a height and a mass sufficient to set after them the trend and slope of the whole prophetic range4 ,the ,twelve together cover the extent of that range1 and illustrate the development of prophecy at almost every stage from the eighth century to the fourth4 ,yet even more than in the case of ,isaiah or ,jeremiah1 the ,church has been content to use a passage here and a passage there1 leaving the rest of the books to absolute neglect or the almost equal oblivion of routine-reading4 ,among the causes of this disuse have been the more than usually corrupt state of the text2 the consequent disorder and in parts unintelligibleness of all the versions2 the ignorance of the various historical circumstances out of which the books arose2 the absence of successful efforts to determine the periods and strophes1 the dramatic dialogues 7with the names of the speakers71 the lyric effusions and the passages of argument1 of all of which the books are composed4 ,the following exposition is an attempt to assist the bettering of all this4 ,as the ,twelve ,prophets illustrate among them the whole history of written prophecy1 ,i have thought it useful to prefix a historical sketch of the ,prophet in early ,israel1 or as far as the appearance of ,amos4 ,the ,twelve are then taken in chronological order4 ,under each of them a chapter is given of historical and critical introduction to his book2 then some account of the prophet himself as a man and a seer2 then a complete translation of the various prophecies handed down under his name1 with textual footnotes1 and an exposition and application to the present day in harmony with the aim of the series to which these volumes belong2 finally1 a discussion of the main doctrines the prophet has taught1 if it has not been found possible to deal with these in the course of the exposition4 99 99 99 99 99 ,an exact critical study of the ,twelve ,prophets is rendered necessary by the state of the entire text4 ,the present volume is based on a thorough examination of this in the light of the ancient versions and of modern criticism4 ,the emendations which ,i have proposed are few and insignificant1 but ,i have examined and discussed in footnotes all that have been suggested1 and in many cases my translation will be found to differ widely from that of the ,revised ,version4 ,to questions of integrity and authenticity more space is devoted than may seem to many to be necessary4 ,but it is certain that the criticism of the prophetic books has now entered on a period of the same analysis and discrimination which is almost exhausted in the case of the ,pentateuch4 ,some hints were given of this in a previous volume on ,isaiah1 chapters xl4-lxvi41 which are evidently a composite work4 ,among the books now before us1 the same fact has long been clear in the case of ,obadiah and ,zechariah1 and also since ,ewald's time with regard to ,micah4 ,but ,duhm's ,theology of the ,prophets1 which appeared in #ahge1 suggested interpolations in ,amos4 ,wellhausen 7in #ahgc7 and ,stade 7from #ahhc onwards7 carried the discussion further both on those1 and others1 of the ,twelve2 while a recent work by ,andre on ,haggai proves that many similar questions may still be raised and have to be debated4 ,the general fact must be admitted that hardly one book has escaped later additions--additions of an entirely justifiable nature1 which supplement the point of view of a single prophet with the richer experience or the riper hopes of a later day1 and thus afford to ourselves a more catholic presentment of the doctrines of prophecy and the ,divine purposes for mankind4 ,this general fact1 ,i say1 must be admitted4 ,but the questions of detail are still in process of solution4 ,it is obvious that settled results can be reached 7as to some extent they have been already reached in the criticism of the ,pentateuch7 only after years of research and debate by all schools of critics4 ,meantime it is the duty of each of us to offer his own conclusions1 with regard to every separate passage1 on the understanding that1 however final they may at present seem to him1 the end is not yet4 ,in previous criticism the defects1 of which work in the same field has made me aware1 are four3 #a4 ,a too rigid belief in the exact parallelism and symmetry of the prophetic style1 which ,i feel has led1 for instance1 ,wellhausen1 to whom we otherwise owe so much on the ,twelve ,prophets1 into many unnecessary emendations of the text1 or1 where some amendment is necessary1 to absolutely unprovable changes4 #b4 ,in passages between which no connection exists1 the forgetfulness of the principle that this fact may often be explained as justly by the hypothesis of the omission of some words1 as by the favourite theory of the later intrusion of portions of the extant text4 #c4 ,forgetfulness of the possibility1 which in some cases amounts almost to certainty1 of the incorporation1 among the authentic words of a prophet1 of passages of earlier as well as of later date4 ,and1 #d4 depreciation of the spiritual insight and foresight of pre-exilic writers4 ,these1 ,i am persuaded1 are defects in previous criticism of the prophets4 ,probably my own criticism will reveal many more4 ,in the beginnings of such analysis as we are engaged on1 we must be prepared for not a little arbitrariness and want of proportion2 these are often necessary for insight and fresh points of view1 but they are as easily eliminated by the progress of discussion4 99 99 99 99 99 ,all criticism1 however1 is preliminary to the real work which the immortal prophets demand from scholars and preachers in our age4 ,in a review of a previous volume1 ,i was blamed for applying a prophecy of ,isaiah to a problem of our own day4 ,this was called prostituting prophecy4 ,the prostitution of the prophets is their confinement to academic uses4 ,one cannot conceive an ending1 at once more pathetic and more ridiculous1 to those great streams of living water1 than to allow them to run out in the sands of criticism and exegesis1 however golden these sands may be4 ,the prophets spoke for a practical purpose2 they aimed at the hearts of men2 and everything that scholarship can do for their writings has surely for its final aim the illustration of their witness to the ways of ,god with men1 and its application to living questions and duties and hopes4 ,besides1 therefore1 seeking to tell the story of that wonderful stage in the history of the human spirit--surely next in wonder to the story of ,christ ,himself--,i have not feared at every suitable point to apply its truths to our lives to-day4 ,the civilisation in which prophecy flourished was in its essentials marvellously like our own4 ,to mark only one point1 the rise of prophecy in ,israel came fast upon the passage of the nation from an agricultural to a commercial basis of society1 and upon the appearance of the very thing which gives its name to civilisation--city-life1 with its unchanging sins1 problems and ideals4 ,a recent ,dutch critic1 whose exact scholarship is known to all readers of ,stade's ,journal of ,old ,testament ,science1 has said of ,amos and ,hosea3 ,these prophecies have a word of ,god1 as for all times1 so also especially for our own4 ,before all it is relevant to 'the social question' of our day1 to the relation of religion and morality4444 ,often it has been hard for me to refrain from expressly pointing out the agreement between ,then and ,to-day4#a ,this feeling will be shared by all students of prophecy whose minds and consciences are quick2 and ,i welcome the liberal plan of the series in which this volume appears1 because1 while giving room for the adequate discussion of critical and historical questions1 its chief design is to show the eternal validity of the ,books of the ,bible as the ,word of ,god1 and their meaning for ourselves to-day4 99 99 99 99 99 ,previous works on the ,minor ,prophets are almost innumerable4 ,those to which ,i owe most will be found indicated in the footnotes4 ,the translation has been executed upon the purpose1 not to sacrifice the literal meaning or exact emphasis of the original to the frequent possibility of greater elegance4 ,it reproduces every word1 with the occasional exception of a copula4 ,with some hesitation ,i have retained the traditional spelling of the ,divine ,name1 ,jehovah1 instead of the more correct ,jahve or ,yahweh2 but where the rhythm of certain familiar passages was disturbed by it1 ,i have followed the ,english versions and written ,lord4 ,the reader will keep in mind that a line may be destroyed by substituting our pronunciation of proper names for the more musical accents of the original4 ,thus1 for instance1 we obliterate the music of ,isra'el by making it two syllables and putting the accent on the first3 it has three syllables with the accent on the last4 ,we crush ,yerushalay into ,jersalem2 we shred off ,asshr into ,assyria1 and dub ,mira ,egypt4 ,hebrew has too few of the combinations which sound most musical to our ears1 to afford the suppression of any one of them4 ,,footnote3 #a ,j4 ,j4 ,p4 ,valeton1 jun41 ,amos en ,hosea1 #ahid3 quoted by ,budde in the ,theologische ,literaturzeitung1 ,september1 #ahid4 ,,contents ,,of ,,vol4 ,i4 ,,page ,,preface vii ,,chronological ,,table #a ,,introduction ,,chap4 ,i4 ,,the ,,book ,,of ,,the ,,twelve #c ,,ii4 ,,the ,,prophet ,,in ,,early ,,israel #aa #a4 ,,from ,,the ,,earliest ,,times ,,till ,,samuel4 #b4 ,,from ,,samuel ,,to ,,elisha4 ,,iii4 ,,the ,,eighth ,,century ,,in ,,israel #ca ,,iv4 ,,the ,,influence ,,of ,,assyria ,,upon ,,prophecy #dd ,,amos ,v4 ,,the ,,book ,,of ,,amos #fa ,,vi4 ,,the ,,man ,,and ,,the ,,prophet #gc #a4 ,,the ,,man ,,and ,,his ,,discipline 7i4 #a2 iii4 #c-h2 vii4 #ad1 #ae74 #b4 ,,the ,,word ,,and ,,its ,,origins 7i4 #b2 iii4 #c-h2 and passim74 #c4 ,,the ,,prophet ,,and ,,his ,,ministry 7vii42 viii4 #a-d74 ,,vii4 ,,atrocities ,,and ,,atrocities #aba ,,amos i4 #c-;ii4 ,,viii4 ,,civilisation ,,and ,,judgment #ada ,,amos iii4-iv4 #c4 ,,ix4 ,,the ,,false ,,peace ,,of ,,ritual #aef ,,amos iv4 #d-vi4 #a4 ,,for ,,worship1 ,,chastisement 7iv4 #d-ac74 #b4 ,,for ,,worship1 ,,justice 7v474 #c4 ,,at ,,ease ,,in ,,zion 7vi474 #d4 ,a ,,fragment ,,from ,,the ,,plague 7vi4 #i1 #aj74 ,x4 ,,doom ,,or ,,discipline8 #aha ,,amos viii4 #d-;ix4 #a4 ,,earthquake1 ,,eclipse ,,and ,,famine 7viii4 #d-ad74 #b4 ,,nemesis 7ix4 #a-f74 #c4 ,,the ,,voices ,,of ,,another ,,dawn 7ix4 #g-ae74 ,,xi4 ,,common-,,sense ,,and ,,the ,,reign ,,of ,,law #aif ,,amos iii4 #c-h2 iv4 #f-ac2 v4 #h1 #i2 vi4 #ab2 viii4 #h2 ix4 #e1 #f4 ,,hosea ,,xii4 ,,the ,,book ,,of ,,hosea #baa ,,xiii4 ,,the ,,problem ,,that ,,amos ,,left #bbg ,,xiv4 ,,the ,,story ,,of ,,the ,,prodigal ,,wife #bcb ,,hosea i4-iii4 ,,xv4 ,,the ,,thick ,,night ,,of ,,israel #bec ,,hosea iv4-xiv4 ,,xvi4 ,a ,,people ,,in ,,decay3 ,i4 ,,morally #bee ,,hosea iv4-vii4 #g4 #a4 ,,the ,,lord',s ,,quarrel ,,with ,,israel 7iv474 #b4 ,,priests ,,and ,,princes ,,fail 7v4 #a-ad74 #c4 ,,repentance ,,fails 7v4 #ae-vii4 #b74 #d4 ,,wickedness ,,in ,,high ,,places 7vii4 #c-g74 ,,xvii4 ,a ,,people ,,in ,,decay3 ,,ii4 ,,politically #bfi ,,hosea vii4 #h-x4 #a4 ,,the ,,confusion ,,of ,,the ,,nation 7vii4 #h-viii4 #c74 #b4 ,,artificial ,,kings ,,and ,,artificial ,,gods 7viii4 #d-ac74 #c4 ,,the ,,effects ,,of ,,exile 7ix4 #a-i74 #d4 ,,the ,,corruption ,,that ,,is ,,through ,,lust 7ix4 #aj-ag74 #e4 ,,once ,,more3 ,,puppet-,,kings ,,and ,,puppet-,,gods 7x474 ,,xviii4 ,,the ,,fatherhood ,,and ,,humanity ,,of ,,god #bij ,,hosea xi4 ,,xix4 ,,the ,,final ,,argument #bii ,,hosea xii4-xiv4 #a4 #a4 ,,the ,,people ,,and ,,their ,,father ,,jacob 7xii474 #b4 ,,the ,,last ,,judgment 7xiii4-xiv4 #a74 ,,xx4 ,i ,,will ,,be ,,as ,,the ,,dew #cjh ,,hosea xiv4 #b-aj4 ,,xxi4 ,,the ,,knowledge ,,of ,,god #cah ,,hosea passim4 ,,xxii4 ,,repentance #ccc ,,hosea passim4 ,,xxiii4 ,,the ,,sin ,,against ,,love #cdf ,,hosea i4-iii42 iv4 #aa ff42 ix4 #aj ff42 xi4 #h f4 ,,micah ,,xxiv4 ,,the ,,book ,,of ,,micah #ceg ,,xxv4 ,,micah ,,the ,,morasthite #cge ,,micah i4 ,,xxvi4 ,,the ,,prophet ,,of ,,the ,,poor #chf ,,micah ii41 iii4 ,,xxvii4 ,,on ,,time',s ,,horizon #djj ,,micah iv4 #a-g4 ,,xxviii4 ,,the ,,king ,,to ,,come #djh ,,micah iv4 #h-v4 ,,xxix4 ,,the ,,reasonableness ,,of ,,true ,,religion #dai ,,micah vi4 #a-h4 ,,xxx4 ,,the ,,sin ,,of ,,the ,,scant ,,measure #dbf ,,micah vi4 #i-vii4 #f4 ,,xxxi4 ,,our ,,mother ,,of ,,sorrows #dce ,,micah vii4 #g-bj4 ,,index ,,of ,,passages ,,and ,,texts #dci ,,chronology ,,of ,,the ,,double ,,kingdom ,,of ,,israel1 c4 #idj-fci ,b4,c4 999999 c4 circa3 it refers only to the accession of the kings of ,judah and ,israel2 the years are exact so far as they concern the ,assyrian data4 ,a date opposite the mere name of a king signifies the year of his accession4 ---------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------- ------------------------ ,,judah4 ,,israel4 ,,the ,,syria1 ,,etc4 ,,assyria4 ,,prophets4 ---------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------- ------------------------ #idj;c4,disruption of the ,kingdom4 ,rehoboam4 ,jeroboam ,i4 ,establishment of calf images in ,n4 ,israel4 #ibc;c4,abijam4 #ibj;c4,asa4 #iah;c4 444 ,nadab4 #iae;c4 444 ,baasha4 #hia;c4 444 ,elah4 #hhh;c4 444 ,zimri4 ,omri4 #hgf;c4 444 ,ahab4 ,revolt of ,mesha of ,moab3 the #hgd;c4,jehoshaphat4 444 ,elijah4 ,moabite ,stone 7circa #hfj74 #hed 444 ,first contact of ,israel and ,syria with ,assyria at the ,battle #hed of arar4 #hec;c4 444 ,ahaziah4 #heb;c4 444 ,joram4 4444 444 ,invades ,moab w4 ,judah and ,edom4 #hej 444 444 444 ,campaigns in all these #c yrs by ,shalmaneser ,,ii4 of #hej #hdi;c4,jehoram4 444 444 ,assyria against ,dadidri or ,hadadezer of ,damascus4#hdi #hdf 444 444 444 ,revolt of ,edom from ,judah 444 #hdf #hdd;c4,ahaziah4 7#b ,kings viii4 #bj ff474 #hdb;c4,athaliah4 ,jehu4 ,elisha4 444 ,tribute from ,jehu4 #hdb 444 444 444 444 ,war of ,hazael with ,assyria4 444 #hci 444 444 444 ,war of ,hazael with ,assyria4 #hci #hcf;c4,joash4 444 444 ,hazael subdues ,gilead 7,amos 444 #hcf #had;c4 444 ,jehoahaz4 444 i4 #c72 attacks ,gath1 but is 444 #had 444 444 444 bought off from ,jerusalem4 #hab 444 444 444 444 ,ac4 of ,ramman-,nirari4 #hab #hjf 444 444 444 ,arpad1 campaign against1 by ,assyria4 #hjf #hjc 444 444 444 ,damascus1 under ,meri1 besieged and taken by ,assyria4 #hjc 444 444 444 444 ,a year of pestilence4 444 444 #gih;c4 444 ,joash4 #gig;c4,amaziah4 #ghc;c4 444 ,jeroboam ,,ii4 444 444 ,shalmaneser ,,iii4 #ghc #ggh;c4,uzziah 7,azariah74 #gge 444 ,jeroboam 444 444 ,expedition to re-conquers ,cedar ,country4 #gge #ggc 444 ,moab1 ,gilead1 444 ,damascus1 campaign against1 by ,assyria4 #ggc #ggb 444 and part of 444 ,hadrach1 campaign against1 by ,assyria4 #ggb #gfe 444 ,aram4 444 ,a pestilence4 ,ac4 of ,assur-dan-il4 #gfe ,hadrach1 campaign against1 by ,assyria4 #gfc ,total eclipse of the sun on ,june #aeth visible in ,syria and at ,nineveh4 #gfc #gei 444 444 444 ,a pestilence in ,western ,asia4 444 #gei #gee 444 444 444 ,hadrach suffers attack from ,assyria4 #gee #ged 444 444 ,amos4 ,arpad suffers attack from ,assyria4 #ged #gec 444 444 444 444 ,ac4 of ,assur-,nirari4 #gec #gde 444 444 444 444 ,accession of ,tiglath-,pileser ,,iii4 #gde #gdc 444 ,zechariah1 son of 444 #gdc ,jeroboam 7#f mo474 444 444 ,shallum 7#a mo474 444 ,arpad besieged1 and after two or three years ,menahem4 ,hosea4 taken by ,assyria4 #gdb 444 444 444 #gdb #gda 444 444 444 #gda #gdj ,the yr ,king 444 #gcf8 ,uzziah died4 ,jotham sole ruler4 #gch 444 ,menahem is mentioned as tributary to ,assyria4 #gch #gcg;c4 ,pekahiah4 #gcf;c4,ahaz4 ,pekah1 the ,gileadite4 7,isa4 vii474 #gce ,ahaz is attacked both by ,pekah and by ,rezin of ,damascus 444 #gce #gcd 444 ,captivity of ,gil- etc41 by ,assyria ead1 ,galilee1 7,isa4 viii41 ix474 #gcd #gcc 444 444 444 ,damascus besieged and taken by ,assyria4 #gcc #gcb ,ahaz pays homage at ,damascus to the ,king of ,assyria4 #gcb #gca 444 444 444 444 ,tiglath-,pileser becomes #gca #gcj;c4 444 ,hoshea4 ,king of ,babylon under the name of ,pul4 #gbg;c4,hezekiah4 444 ,isaiah4 444 ,shalmaneser ,,iv4 #gbg #gbe 444 ,siege of ,samaria begins4 #gbb 444 ,fall of ,samaria4 444 444 ,sargon takes ,samaria4 #gbb or #a or #a #gbj 444 444 444 ,gaza overthrown by ,sargon as he marches past ,judah #gbj or #ai and defeats ,egypt at ,raphia4 or #ai #gae 444 ,samaria peopled by subjugated tribes #gae deported from ,assyria4 #gaa 444 444 444 ,ashdod taken by ,sargon4 #gaa #gji 444 444 444 444 ,sargon takes ,babylon #gji from ,merodach-,baladan4 #gje 444 444 444 ,death of ,sargon4 #gje ,ac4 of ,sennacherib4 #gjd 444 444 444 444 ,war with ,merodach-,baladan4 #gjd #gja ,invasion of ,judah and of all ,syria by ,sennacherib4 #gja ,deliverance of ,jerusalem4 ,siege of ,ekron4 ,battle of ,micah4 ,eltekeh4 #fie ,manasseh4 444 c4#b #fha 444 444 444 444 ,sennacherib murdered4 #fha ,asarhaddon succeeds4 #fgh 444 444 444 ,phnicia subdued by ,asarhaddon4 #fgh #fgf ,manasseh tributary to ,assyria4 #fgf #fga 444 444 444 ,tyre taken by ,asarhaddon on his #fga march to ,egypt1 and conquest of ,memphis4 #ffh 444 444 444 444 ,assurbanipal4 #ffh #fff ,manasseh and the other ,syrian kings tributary to ,assyria4 #fff #fda;c4,amon4 444 444 ,tyre assists ,assurbanipal against #fda the ,phnician ,arvad4 #fci;c4,josiah4 ---------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------- ------------------------ ,,footnote3 #b ,this date is very uncertain4 ,it may have been #fij1 or according to some #fhe4 ,,introduction ' 1 4 ,and of the ,twelve ,prophets may the bones ,flourish again from their place1 ,for they comforted ,jacob ,and redeemed them by the assurance of hope4 ,,ecclesiasticus xlix4 #aj4 ,,chapter ,i ,,the ,,book ,,of ,,the ,,twelve ,in the order of our ,english ,bible the ,minor ,prophets1 as they are usually called1 form the last twelve books of the ,old ,testament4 ,they are immediately preceded by ,daniel1 and before him by the three ,major ,prophets1 ,isaiah1 ,jeremiah 7with ,lamentations7 and ,ezekiel4 ,why all sixteen were thus gathered at the end of the other sacred books1 we do not know4 ,perhaps1 because it was held fitting that prophecy should occupy the last outposts of the ,old ,testament towards the ,new4 ,in the ,hebrew ,bible1 however1 the order differs1 and is much more significant4 ,the ,prophets#c form the second division of the threefold ,canon3 ,law1 ,prophets and ,writings2 and ,daniel is not among them4 ,the ,minor follow immediately after ,ezekiel4 ,moreover1 they are not twelve books1 but one4 ,they are gathered under the common title ,book of the ,twelve2#d and although each of them has the usual colophon detailing the number of its own verses1 there is also one colophon for all the twelve1 placed at the end of ,malachi and reckoning the sum of their verses from the first of ,hosea onwards4 ,this unity1 which there is reason to suppose was given to them before their reception into the ,canon1#e they have never since lost4 ,however much their place has changed in the order of the books of the ,old ,testament1 however much their own internal arrangement has differed1 the ,twelve have always stood together4 ,there has been every temptation to scatter them because of their various dates4 ,yet they never have been scattered2 and in spite of the fact that they have not preserved their common title in any ,bible outside the ,hebrew1 that title has lived on in literature and common talk4 ,thus the ,greek canon omits it2 but ,greek ,jews and ,christians always counted the books as one volume1#f calling them ,the ,twelve ,prophets1 or ,the ,twelve-,prophet ,book4#g4 ,it was the ,latins who designated them ,the ,minor ,prophets3 on account of their brevity as compared with those who are called the ,major because of their ampler volumes4#h ,and this name has passed into most modern languages1#i including our own4 ,but surely it is better to revert to the original1 canonical and unambiguous title of ,the ,twelve4 ,the collection and arrangement of ,the ,twelve are matters of obscurity1 from which1 however1 three or four facts emerge that are tolerably certain4 ,the inseparableness of the books is a proof of the ancient date of their union4 ,they must have been put together before they were received into the ,canon4 ,the ,canon of the ,prophets--,joshua to ,second ,kings and ,isaiah to ,malachi--was closed by #bjj ,b4,c4 at the latest1 and perhaps as early as #bej2 but if we have 7as seems probable7 portions of ,the ,twelve1#aj which must be assigned to a little later than #cjj1 this may be held to prove that the whole collection cannot have long preceded the fixing of the ,canon of the ,prophets4 ,on the other hand1 the fact that these latest pieces have not been placed under a title of their own1 but are attached to the ,book of ,zechariah1 is pretty sufficient evidence that they were added after the collection and fixture of twelve books--a round number which there would be every disposition not to disturb4 ,that would give us for the date of the first edition 7so to speak7 of our ,twelve some year before #cjj2 and for the date of the second edition some year towards #bej4 ,this is a question1 however1 which may be reserved for final decision after we have examined the date of the separate books1 and especially of ,joel and the second half of ,zechariah4 ,that there was a previous collection1 as early as the ,exile1 of the books written before then1 may be regarded as more than probable4 ,but we have no means of fixing its exact limits4 ,why the ,twelve were all ultimately put together is reasonably suggested by ,jewish writers4 ,they are small1 and1 as separate rolls1 might have been lost4#aa ,it is possible that the desire of the round number twelve is responsible for the admission of ,jonah1 a book very different in form from all the others2 just as we have hinted that the fact of there being already twelve may account for the attachment of the late fragments to the ,book of ,zechariah4 ,but all this is only to guess1 where we have no means of certain knowledge4 ,the ,book of the ,twelve has not always held the place which it now occupies in the ,hebrew ,canon1 at the end of the ,prophets4 ,the rabbis taught that ,hosea1 but for the comparative smallness of his prophecy1 should have stood first of all the writing prophets1 of whom they regarded him as the oldest4#ab ,and doubtless it was for the same chronological reasons1 that early ,christian catalogues of the ,scriptures1 and various editions of the ,septuagint1 placed the whole of ,the ,twelve in front of ,isaiah4#ac ,the internal arrangement of ,the ,twelve in our ,english ,bible is the same as that of the ,hebrew ,canon1 and was probably determined by what the compilers thought to be the respective ages of the books4 ,thus1 first we have six1 all supposed to be of the earlier ,assyrian period1 before #gjj--;,hosea1 ,joel1 ,amos1 ,obadiah1 ,jonah and ,micah2 then three from the late ,assyrian and the ,babylonian periods--,nahum1 ,habbakuk and ,zephaniah2 and then three from the ,persian period after the ,exile--,haggai1 ,zechariah and ,malachi4 ,the ,septuagint have altered the order of the first six1 arranging ,hosea1 ,amos1 ,micah1 ,joel and ,obadiah according to their size1 and setting ,jonah after them1 probably because of his different form4 ,the remaining six are left as in the ,hebrew4 ,recent criticism1 however1 has made it clear that the ,biblical order of ,the ,twelve ,prophets is no more than a very rough approximation to the order of their real dates2 and1 as it is obviously best for us to follow in their historical succession prophecies1 which illustrate the whole history of prophecy from its rise with ,amos to its fall with ,malachi and his successors1 ,i propose to do this4 ,detailed proofs of the separate dates must be left to each book4 ,all that is needful here is a general statement of the order4 ,of the first six prophets the dates of ,amos1 ,hosea1 and ,micah 7but of the latter's book in part only7 are certain4 ,the ,jews have been able to defend ,hosea's priority only on fanciful grounds4#ad ,whether or not he quotes from ,amos1 his historical allusions are more recent4 ,with the exception of a few fragments incorporated by later authors1 the ,book of ,amos is thus the earliest example of prophetic literature1 and we take it first4 ,the date we shall see is about #gee4 ,hosea begins five or ten years later1 and ,micah just before #gbb4 ,the three are in every respect--originality1 comprehensiveness1 influence upon other prophets--the greatest of our ,twelve1 and will therefore be treated with most detail1 occupying the whole of the first volume4 ,the rest of the first six are ,obadiah1 ,joel and ,jonah4 ,but the ,book of ,obadiah1 although it opens with an early oracle against ,edom1 is in its present form from after the ,exile4 ,the ,book of ,joel is of uncertain date1 but1 as we shall see1 the great probability is that it is late2 and the ,book of ,jonah belongs to a form of literature so different from the others that we may1 most conveniently1 treat of it last4 ,this leaves us to follow ,micah1 at the end of the eighth century1 with the group ,zephaniah1 ,nahum and ,habakkuk from the second half of the seventh century2 and finally to take in their order the post-exilic ,haggai1 ,zechariah i4-ix41 ,malachi1 and the other writings which we feel obliged to place about or even after that date4 ,one other word is needful4 ,this assignment of the various books to different dates is not to be held as implying that the whole of a book belongs to such a date or to the author whose name it bears4 ,we shall find that hands have been busy with the texts of the books long after the authors of these must have passed away2 that besides early fragments incorporated by later writers1 prophets of ,israel's new dawn mitigated the judgments and lightened the gloom of the watchmen of her night2 that here and there are passages which are evidently intrusions1 both because they interrupt the argument and because they reflect a much later historical environment than their context4 ,this1 of course1 will require discussion in each case1 and such discussion will be given4 ,the text will be subjected to an independent examination4 ,some passages hitherto questioned we may find to be unjustly so2 others not hitherto questioned we may see reason to suspect4 ,but in any case we shall keep in mind1 that the results of an independent inquiry are uncertain2 and that in this new criticism of the prophets1 which is comparatively recent1 we cannot hope to arrive for some time at so general a consensus1 as is being rapidly reached in the far older and more elaborated criticism of the ,pentateuch4#ae 99 99 99 99 99 ,such is the extent and order of the journey which lies before us4 ,if it is not to the very summits of ,israel's outlook that we climb--,isaiah1 ,jeremiah and the great ,prophet of the ,exile--we are yet to traverse the range of prophecy from beginning to end4 ,we start with its first abrupt elevations in ,amos4 ,we are carried by the side of ,isaiah and ,jeremiah1 yet at a lower altitude1 on to the ,exile4 ,with the returned ,israel we pursue an almost immediate rise to vision1 and then by ,malachi and others are conveyed down dwindling slopes to the very end4 ,beyond the land is flat4 ,though ,psalms are sung and brave deeds done1 and faith is strong and bright1 there is no height of outlook2 there is no more any prophet#af in ,israel4 ,but our ,twelve do more than thus carry us from beginning to end of the ,prophetic ,period4 ,of second rank as are most of the heights of this mountain range1 they yet bring forth and speed on their way not a few of the streams of living water which have nourished later ages1 and are flowing to-day4 ,impetuous cataracts of righteousness--let it roll on like water1 and justice as an everlasting stream2 the irrepressible love of ,god to sinful men2 the perseverance and pursuits of ,his grace2 ,his mercies that follow the exile and the outcast2 ,his truth that goes forth richly upon the heathen2 the hope of the ,saviour of mankind2 the outpouring of the ,spirit2 counsels of patience2 impulses of tenderness and of healing2 melodies innumerable1--all sprang from these lower hills of prophecy1 and sprang so strongly that the world hears and feels them still4 ,and from the heights of our present pilgrimage there are also clear those great visions of the ,stars and the ,dawn1 of the ,sea and the ,storm1 concerning which it is true1 that as long as men live they shall seek out the places whence they can be seen1 and thank ,god for ,his prophets4 ,,footnotes3 #c ,including1 of course1 the historical books1 ,joshua to #b ,kings1 which were known as the ,former ,prophets2 while what we call the prophets ,isaiah to ,malachi were known as the ,latter4 #d 1 the ,aramaic form of the ,hebrew 1 which appears with the other in the colophon to the book4 ,a later contraction is 4 ,this is the form transliterated in ,epiphanius3 4 #e ,see ,ryle1 ,canon of the ,o4,t41 p4 #aje4 #f ,so ,josephus1 ,contra ,apion1 i4 #h 7circa #ij ,a4,d471 reckons the prophetical books as thirteen1 of which the ,minor ,prophets could only have been counted as one--whatever the other twelve may have been4 ,melito of ,sardis 7c4 #agj71 quoted by ,eusebius 7,hist4 ,eccl41 iv4 #bf71 speaks of 4 ,to ,origen 7c4 #bej3 apud ,ibid41 vi4 #be7 they could only have been one out of the twenty-two he gives for the ,o4,t4 ,cf4 ,jerome 7,prolog4 ,galeatus71 ,liber duodecim ,prophetarum4 #g 3 ,jesus son of ,sirach xlix4 #aj2 -4 #h ,augustine1 ,de ,civ4 ,dei1 xviii4 #bi3 cf4 ,jerome1 ,proem4 in ,esaiam4 #i ,the ,german usage generally preserves the numeral1 ,die zwlf kleinen ,propheten4 #aj ,see ,vol4 ,,ii4 on ,zech4 ix4 ff4 #aa ,talmud3 ,baba ,bathra1 #ad;a3 cf4 ,rashi's ,commentary4 #ab ,talmud1 ibid4 #ac ,so the ,codices ,vaticanus and ,alexandrinus1 but not ,cod4 ,sin4 ,so also ,cyril of ,jerusalem 7 #chf71 ,athanasius 7#cfe71 ,gregory ,naz4 7 #cij71 and the spurious ,canon of the ,council of ,laodicea 7c4 #djj7 and ,epiphanius 7#djc74 ,see ,ryle1 ,canon of the ,o4,t41 #bae ff4 #ad ,by a forced interpretation of the phrase in chap4 i4 #b1 ,when the ,lord spake at the first by ,hosea 7,r4,v471 ,talmud3 ,baba ,bathra1 #ad;a4 #ae ,for further considerations on this point see pp4 #adb1 #aid1 #bjb ff41 #bbc ff41 #cjh1 etc4 #af ,psalm lxxiv4 #i4 ,,chapter ,,ii ,,the ,,prophet ,,in ,,early ,,israel ,our ,twelve ,prophets will carry us1 as we have seen1 across the whole extent of the ,prophetical period--the period when prophecy became literature1 assuming the form and rising to the intensity of an imperishable influence on the world4 ,the earliest of the ,twelve1 ,amos and ,hosea1 were the inaugurators of this period4 ,they were not only the first 7so far as we know7 to commit prophecy to writing1 but we find in them the germs of all its subsequent development4 ,yet ,amos and ,hosea were not unfathered4 ,behind them lay an older dispensation1 and their own was partly a product of this1 and partly a revolt against it4 ,amos says of himself3 ,the ,lord hath spoken1 who can but prophesy8--but again3 ,no prophet ,i1 nor prophet's son6 ,who were those earlier prophets1 whose office ,amos assumed while repudiating their spirit--whose name he abjured1 yet could not escape from it8 ,and1 while we are about the matter1 what do we mean by prophet in general8 ,in vulgar use the name prophet has degenerated to the meaning of one who foretells the future4 ,of this meaning it is1 perhaps1 the first duty of every student of prophecy earnestly and stubbornly to rid himself4 ,in its native ,greek tongue prophet meant not one who speaks before1 but one who speaks for1 or on behalf of1 another4 ,at the ,delphic oracle ,the ,prophts was the title of the official1 who received the utterances of the frenzied ,pythoness and expounded them to the people2#ag but ,plato says that this is a misuse of the word1 and that the true prophet is the inspired person himself1 he who is in communication with the ,deity and who speaks directly for the ,deity4#ah ,so ,tiresias1 the seer1 is called by ,pindar the prophet or interpreter of ,zeus1#ai and ,plato even styles poets the prophets of the ,muses4#bj ,it is in this sense that we must think of the prophet of the ,old ,testament4 ,he is a speaker for ,god4 ,the sharer of ,god's counsels1 as ,amos calls him1 he becomes the bearer and preacher of ,god's ,word4 ,prediction of the future is only a part1 and often a subordinate and accidental part1 of an office whose full function is to declare the character and the will of ,god4 ,but the prophet does this in no systematic or abstract form4 ,he brings his revelation point by point1 and in connection with some occasion in the history of his people1 or some phase of their character4 ,he is not a philosopher nor a theologian with a system of doctrine 7at least before ,ezekiel71 but the messenger and herald of ,god at some crisis in the life or conduct of ,his people4 ,his message is never out of touch with events4 ,these form either the subject-matter or the proof or the execution of every oracle he utters4 ,it is1 therefore1 ,god not merely as ,truth1 but far more as ,providence1 whom the prophet reveals4 ,and although that ,providence includes the full destiny of ,israel and mankind1 the prophet brings the news of it1 for the most part1 piece by piece1 with reference to some present sin or duty1 or some impending crisis or calamity4 ,yet he does all this1 not merely because the word needed for the day has been committed to him by itself1 and as if he were only its mechanical vehicle2 but because he has come under the overwhelming conviction of ,god's presence and of ,his character1 a conviction often so strong that ,god's word breaks through him and ,god speaks in the first person to the people4 #a4 ,,from ,,the ,,earliest ,,times ,,till ,,samuel4 ,there was no ancient people but believed in the power of certain personages to consult the ,deity and to reveal ,his will4 ,every man could sacrifice2 but not every man could render in return the oracle of ,god4 ,this pertained to select individuals or orders4 ,so the prophet seems to have been an older specialist than the priest1 though in every tribe he frequently combined the latter's functions with his own4#ba ,the matters on which ancient man consulted ,god were as wide as life4 ,but naturally at first1 in a rude state of society and at a low stage of mental development1 it was in regard to the material defence and necessities of life1 the bare law and order1 that men almost exclusively sought the ,divine will4 ,and the whole history of prophecy is just the effort to substitute for these elementary provisions a more personal standard of the moral law1 and more spiritual ideals of the ,divine ,grace4 ,by the ,semitic race--to which we may now confine ourselves1 since ,israel belonged to it--,deity was worshipped1 in the main1 as the god of a tribe4 ,every ,semitic tribe had its own god2 it would appear that there was no god without a tribe3#bb the traces of belief in a supreme and abstract ,deity are few and ineffectual4 ,the tribe was the medium by which the god made himself known1 and became an effective power on earth3 the god was the patron of the tribe1 the supreme magistrate and the leader in war4 ,the piety he demanded was little more than loyalty to ritual2 the morality he enforced was only a matter of police4 ,he took no cognisance of the character or inner thoughts of the individual4 ,but the tribe believed him to stand in very close connection with all the practical interests of their common life4 ,they asked of him the detection of criminals1 the discovery of lost property1 the settlement of civil suits1 sometimes when the crops should be sown1 and always when war should be waged and by what tactics4 ,the means by which the prophet consulted the ,deity on these subjects were for the most part primitive and rude4 ,they may be summed up under two kinds3 ,visions either through falling into ecstasy or by dreaming in sleep1 and ,signs or ,omens4 ,both kinds are instanced in ,balaam4#bc ,of the signs some were natural1 like the whisper of trees1 the flight of birds1 the passage of clouds1 the movements of stars4 ,others were artificial1 like the casting or drawing of lots4 ,others were between these1 like the shape assumed by the entrails of the sacrificed animals when thrown on the ground4 ,again1 the prophet was often obliged to do something wonderful in the people's sight1 in order to convince them of his authority4 ,in ,biblical language he had to work a miracle or give a sign4 ,one instance throws a flood of light on this habitual expectancy of the ,semitic mind4 ,there was once an ,arab chief1 who wished to consult a distant soothsayer as to the guilt of a daughter4 ,but before he would trust the seer to give him the right answer to such a question1 he made him discover a grain of corn which he had concealed about his horse4#bd ,he required the physical sign before he would accept the moral judgment4 ,now1 to us the crudeness of the means employed1 the opportunities of fraud1 the inadequacy of the tests for spiritual ends1 are very obvious4 ,but do not let us1 therefore1 miss the numerous moral opportunities which lay before the prophet even at that early stage of his evolution4 ,he was trusted to speak in the name of ,deity4 ,through him men believed in ,god and in the possibility of a revelation4 ,they sought from him the discrimination of evil from good4 ,the highest possibilities of social ministry lay open to him3 the tribal existence often hung on his word for peace or war2 he was the mouth of justice1 the rebuke of evil1 the champion of the wronged4 ,where such opportunities were present1 can we imagine the ,spirit of ,god to have been absent--the ,spirit ,who seeks men more than they seek ,him1 and as ,he condescends to use their poor language for religion must also have stooped to the picture language1 to the rude instruments1 symbols and sacraments1 of their early faith8 ,in an office of such mingled possibilities everything depended--as we shall find it depend to the very end of prophecy--on the moral insight and character of the prophet himself1 on his conception of ,god and whether he was so true to this as to overcome his professional temptations to fraud and avarice1 malice towards individuals1 subservience to the powerful1 or1 worst snares of all1 the slothfulness and insincerity of routine4 ,we see this moral issue put very clearly in such a story as that of ,balaam1 or in such a career as that of ,mohammed4 ,so much for the ,semitic soothsayer in general4 ,now let us turn to ,israel4 ,among the ,hebrews the man of ,god1#be to use his widest designation1 is at first called ,seer1#bf or ,gazer1#bg the word which ,balaam uses of himself4 ,in consulting the ,divine will he employs the same external means1 he offers the people for their evidence the same signs1 as do the seers or soothsayers of other ,semitic tribes4 ,he gains influence by the miracles1 the wonderful things1 which he does4#bh ,moses himself is represented after this fashion4 ,he meets the magicians of ,egypt on their own level4 ,his use of rods2 the holding up of his hands that ,israel may prevail against ,amaleq2 ,joshua's casting of lots to discover a criminal2 ,samuel's dream in the sanctuary2 his discovery for a fee of the lost asses of ,saul2 ,david and the images in his house1 the ephod he consulted2 the sign to go to battle what time thou hearest the sound of a going in the tops of the mulberry trees2 ,solomon's inducement of dreams by sleeping in the sanctuary at ,gibeah1--these are a few of the many proofs1 that early prophecy in ,israel employed not only the methods but even much of the furniture of the kindred ,semitic religions4 ,but then those tools and methods were at the same time accompanied by the noble opportunities of the prophetic office to which ,i have just alluded--opportunities of religious and social ministry--and1 still more1 these opportunities were at the disposal of moral influences which1 it is a matter of history1 were not found in any other ,semitic religion than ,israel's4 ,however you will explain it1 that ,divine ,spirit1 which we have felt unable to conceive as absent from any ,semitic prophet who truly sought after ,god1 that ,light which lighteth every man who cometh into the world1 was present to an unparalleled degree with the early prophets of ,israel4 ,he came to individuals1 and to the nation as a whole1 in events and in influences which may be summed up as the impression of the character of their national ,god1 ,jehovah3 to use ,biblical language1 as ,jehovah's spirit and power4 ,it is true that in many ways the ,jehovah of early ,israel reminds us of other ,semitic deities4 ,like some of them ,he appears with thunder and lightning2 like all of them ,he is the ,god of one tribe who are ,his peculiar people4 ,he bears the same titles--,melek1 ,adon1 ,baal 7,king1 ,lord1 ,possessor74 ,he is propitiated by the same offerings4 ,to choose one striking instance1 captives and spoil of war are sacrificed to ,him with the same relentlessness1 and by a process which has even the same names given to it1 as in the votive inscriptions of ,israel's heathen neighbours4#bi ,yet1 notwithstanding all these elements1 the religion of ,jehovah from the very first evinced1 by the confession of all critics1 an ethical force shared by no other ,semitic creed4 ,from the first there was in it the promise and the potency of that sublime monotheism1 which in the period of our ,twelve it afterwards reached4#cj ,its earliest effects of course were chiefly political3 it welded the twelve tribes into the unity of a nation2 it preserved them as one amid the many temptations to scatter along those divergent lines of culture and of faith1 which the geography of their country placed so attractively before them4#ca ,it taught them to prefer religious loyalty to material advantage1 and so inspired them with high motives for self-sacrifice and every other duty of patriotism4 ,but it did even better than thus teach them to bear one another's burdens4 ,it inspired them to care for one another's sins4 ,the last chapters of the ,book of ,judges prove how strong a national conscience there was in early ,israel4 ,even then ,israel was a moral1 as well as a political1 unity4 ,gradually there grew up1 but still unwritten1 a body of ,torah1 or revealed law1 which1 though its framework was the common custom of the ,semitic race1 was inspired by ideals of humanity and justice not elsewhere in that race discernible by us4 ,when we analyse this ethical distinction of early ,israel1 this indubitable progress which the nation were making while the rest of their world was morally stagnant1 we find it to be due to their impressions of the character of their ,god4 ,this character did not affect them as ,righteousness only4 ,at first it was even a more wonderful ,grace4 ,jehovah had chosen them when they were no people1 had redeemed them from servitude1 had brought them to their land2 had borne with their stubbornness1 and had forgiven their infidelities4 ,such a ,character was partly manifest in the great events of their history1 and partly communicated itself to their finest personalities--as the ,spirit of ,god does communicate with the spirit of man made in ,his image4 ,those personalities were the early prophets from ,moses to ,samuel4 ,they inspired the nation to believe in ,god's purposes for itself2 they rallied it to war for the common faith1 and war was then the pitch of self-sacrifice2 they gave justice to it in ,god's name1 and rebuked its sinfulness without sparing4 ,criticism has proved that we do not know nearly so much about those first prophets1 as perhaps we thought we did4 ,but under their ,god they made ,israel4 ,out of their work grew the monotheism of their successors1 whom we are now to study1 and later the ,christianity of the ,new ,testament4 ,for myself ,i cannot but believe1 that in the influence of ,jehovah which ,israel owned in those early times1 there was the authentic revelation of a real ,being4 #b4 ,,from ,,samuel ,,to ,,elisha4 ,of the oldest order of ,hebrew prophecy1 ,samuel was the last representative4 ,till his time1 we are told1 the prophet in ,israel was known as the ,seer1#cb but now1 with other tempers and other habits1 a new order appears1 whose name--and that means to a certain extent their spirit--is to displace the older name and the older spirit4 ,when ,samuel anointed ,saul he bade him1 for a sign that he was chosen of the ,lord1 go forth to meet a company of prophets--,nebi'm1 the singular is ,nabi'--coming down from the high place or sanctuary with viols1 drums and pipes1 and prophesying4 ,there1 he added1 the spirit of ,jehovah shall come upon thee1 and thou shalt prophesy with them1 and shalt be turned into another man4 ,so it happened2 and the people said one to another1 ,what is this that is come to the son of ,kish8 ,is ,saul also among the prophets8#cc ,another story1 probably from another source1 tells us that later1 when ,saul sent troops of messengers to the sanctuary at ,ramah to take ,david1 they saw the company of prophets prophesying and ,samuel standing appointed over them1 and the spirit of ,god fell upon one after another of the troops2 as upon ,saul himself when he followed them up4 ,and he stripped off his clothes also1 and prophesied before ,samuel in like manner1 and lay down naked all that day and all that night4 ,wherefore they say1 ,is ,saul also among the prophets8#cd ,all this is very different from the habits of the ,seer1 who had hitherto represented prophecy4 ,he was solitary1 but these went about in bands4 ,they were filled with an infectious enthusiasm1 by which they excited each other and all sensitive persons whom they touched4 ,they stirred up this enthusiasm by singing1 playing upon instruments1 and dancing3 its results were frenzy1 the tearing of their clothes1 and prostration4 ,the same phenomena have appeared in every religion--in ,paganism often1 and several times within ,christianity4 ,they may be watched to-day among the dervishes of ,islam1 who by singing 7as one has seen them in ,cairo71 by swaying of their bodies1 by repeating the ,divine ,name1 and dwelling on the love and ineffable power of ,god1 work themselves into an excitement which ends in prostration and often in insensibility4#ce ,the whole process is due to an overpowering sense of the ,deity--crude and unintelligent if you will1 but sincere and authentic--which seems to haunt the early stages of all religions1 and to linger to the end with the stagnant and unprogressive4 ,the appearance of this prophecy in ,israel has given rise to a controversy as to whether it was purely a native product1 or was induced by infection from the ,canaanite tribes around4 ,such questions are of little interest in face of these facts3 that the ecstasy sprang up in ,israel at a time when the spirit of the people was stirred against the ,philistines1 and patriotism and religion were equally excited2 that it is represented as due to the ,spirit of ,jehovah2 and that the last of the old order of ,jehovah's prophets recognised its harmony with his own dispensation1 presided over it1 and gave ,israel's first king as one of his signs1 that he should come under its power4 ,these things being so1 it is surprising that a recent critic#cf should have seen in the dancing prophets nothing but eccentrics into whose company it was shame for so good a man as ,saul to fall4 ,he reaches this conclusion only by supposing that the reflexive verb used for their prophesying--hithnabb'--had at this time that equivalence to mere madness to which it was reduced by the excesses of later generations of prophets4 ,with ,samuel we feel that the word had no reproach3 the ,nebi'm were recognised by him as standing in the prophetical succession4 ,they sprang up in sympathy with a national movement4 ,the king who joined himself to them was the same who sternly banished from ,israel all the baser forms of soothsaying and traffic with the dead4 ,but1 indeed1 we need no other proof than this3 the name ,nebi'm so establishes itself in the popular regard that it displaces the older names of ,seer and ,gazer1 and becomes the classical term for the whole body of prophets from ,moses to ,malachi4 ,there was one very remarkable change effected by this new order of prophets1 probably the very greatest relief which prophecy experienced in the course of its evolution4 ,this was separation from the ritual and from the implements of soothsaying4 ,samuel had been both priest and prophet4 ,but after him the names and the duties were specialised1 though the specialising was incomplete4 ,while the new ,nebi'm remained in connection with the ancient centres of religion1 they do not appear to have exercised any part of the ritual4 ,the priests1 on the other hand1 did not confine themselves to sacrifice and other forms of public worship1 but exercised many of the so-called prophetic functions4 ,they also1 as ,hosea tells us1 were expected to give ,trth--revelations of the ,divine will on points of conduct and order4 ,there remained with them the ancient forms of oracle--the ,ephod1 or plated image1 the ,teraphim1 the lot1 and the ,urim and ,thummim1#cg all of these apparently still regarded as indispensable elements of religion4#ch ,from such rude forms of ascertaining the ,divine ,will1 prophecy in its new order was absolutely free4 ,and it was free of the ritual of the sanctuaries4 ,as has been justly remarked1 the ritual of ,israel always remained a peril to the people1 the peril of relapsing into ,paganism4 ,not only did it materialise faith and engross affections in the worshipper which were meant for moral objects1 but very many of its forms were actually the same as those of the other ,semitic religions1 and it tempted its devotees to the confusion of their ,god with the gods of the heathen4 ,prophecy was now wholly independent of it1 and we may see in such independence the possibility of all the subsequent career of prophecy along moral and spiritual lines4 ,amos absolutely condemns the ritual1 and ,hosea brings the message from ,god1 ,i will have mercy and not sacrifice4 ,this is the distinctive glory of prophecy in that era in which we are to study it4 ,but do not let us forget that it became possible through the ecstatic ,nebi'm of ,samuel's time1 and through their separation from the national ritual and the material forms of soothsaying4 ,it is the way of ,providence to prepare for the revelation of great moral truths1 by the enfranchisement1 sometimes centuries before1 of an order or a nation of men from political or professional interests which would have rendered it impossible for their descendants to appreciate those truths without prejudice or compromise4 ,we may conceive then of these ,nebi'm1 these prophets1 as enthusiasts for ,jehovah and for ,israel4 ,for ,jehovah--if to-day we see men cast by the adoration of the despot-deity of ,islam into transports so excessive that they lose all consciousness of earthly things and fall into a trance1 can we not imagine a like effect produced on the same sensitive natures of the ,east by the contemplation of such a ,god as ,jehovah1 so mighty in earth and heaven1 so faithful to ,his people1 so full of grace8 ,was not such an ecstasy of worship most likely to be born of the individual's ardent devotion in the hour of the nation's despair8#ci ,of course there would be swept up by such a movement all the more volatile and unbalanced minds of the day--as these always have been swept up by any powerful religious excitement--but that is not to discredit the sincerity of the main volume of the feeling nor its authenticity as a work of the ,spirit of ,god1 as the impression of the character and power of ,jehovah4 ,but these ecstatics were also enthusiasts for ,israel2 and this saved the movement from morbidness4 ,they worshipped ,god neither out of sheer physical sympathy with nature1 like the ,phnician devotees of ,adonis or the ,greek ,bacchantes2 nor out of terror at the approaching end of all things1 like some of the ecstatic sects of the ,middle ,ages2 nor out of a selfish passion for their own salvation1 like so many a modern ,christian fanatic2 but in sympathy with their nation's aspirations for freedom and her whole political life4 ,they were enthusiasts for their people4 ,the ecstatic prophet was not confined to his body nor to nature for the impulses of ,deity4 ,israel was his body1 his atmosphere1 his universe4 ,through it all he felt the thrill of ,deity4 ,confine religion to the personal1 it grows rancid1 morbid4 ,wed it to patriotism1 it lives in the open air and its blood is pure4 ,so in days of national danger the ,nebi'm would be inspired like ,saul to battle for their country's freedom2 in more settled times they would be lifted to the responsibilities of educating the people1 counselling the governors1 and preserving the national traditions4 ,this is what actually took place4 ,after the critical period of ,saul's time has passed1 the prophets still remain enthusiasts2 but they are enthusiasts for affairs4 ,they counsel and they rebuke ,david4#dj ,they warn ,rehoboam1 and they excite ,northern ,israel to revolt4#da ,they overthrow and they set up dynasties4#db ,they offer the king advice on campaigns4#dc ,like ,elijah1 they take up against the throne the cause of the oppressed2#dd like ,elisha1 they stand by the throne its most trusted counsellors in peace and war4#de ,that all this is no new order of prophecy in ,israel1 but the developed form of the ecstasy of ,samuel's day1 is plain from the continuance of the name ,nebi'm and from these two facts besides3 that the ecstasy survives and that the prophets still live in communities4 ,the greatest figures of the period1 ,elijah and ,elisha1 have upon them the hand of the ,lord1 as the influence is now called3 ,elijah when he runs before ,ahab's chariot across ,esdraelon1 ,elisha when by music he induces upon himself the prophetic mood4#df ,another ecstatic figure is the prophet who was sent to anoint ,jehu2 he swept in and he swept out again1 and the soldiers called him that mad fellow4#dg ,but the roving bands had settled down into more or less stationary communities1 who partly lived by agriculture and partly by the alms of the people or the endowments of the crown4#dh ,their centres were either the centres of national worship1 like ,bethel and ,gilgal1 or the centres of government1 like ,samaria1 where the dynasty of ,omri supported prophets both of ,baal and of ,jehovah4#di ,they were called prophets1 but also sons of the prophets1 the latter name not because their office was hereditary1 but by the ,oriental fashion of designating every member of a guild as the son of the guild4 ,in many cases the son may have succeeded his father2 but the ranks could be recruited from outside1 as we see in the case of the young farmer ,elisha1 whom ,elijah anointed at the plough4 ,they probably all wore the mantle which is distinctive of some of them1 the mantle of hair1 or skin of a beast4#ej ,the risks of degeneration1 to which this order of prophecy was liable1 arose both from its ecstatic temper and from its connection with public affairs4 ,religious ecstasy is always dangerous to the moral and intellectual interests of religion4 ,the largest prophetic figures of the period1 though they feel the ecstasy1 attain their greatness by rising superior to it4 ,elijah's raptures are impressive2 but nobler are his defence of ,naboth and his denunciation of ,ahab4 ,and so ,elisha's inducement of the prophetic mood by music is the least attractive element in his career3 his greatness lies in his combination of the care of souls with political insight and vigilance for the national interests4 ,doubtless there were many of the sons of the prophets who with smaller abilities cultivated a religion as rational and moral4 ,but for the herd ecstasy would be everything4 ,it was so easily induced or imitated that much of it cannot have been genuine4 ,even where the feeling was at first sincere we can understand how readily it became morbid2 how fatally it might fall into sympathy with that drunkenness from wine and that sexual passion which ,israel saw already cultivated as worship by the surrounding ,canaanites4 ,we must feel these dangers of ecstasy if we would understand why ,amos cut himself off from the ,nebi'm1 and why ,hosea laid such emphasis on the moral and intellectual sides of religion3 ,my people perish for lack of knowledge4 ,hosea indeed considered the degeneracy of ecstasy as a judgment3 the prophet is a fool1 the man of the spirit is mad--for the multitude of thine iniquity4#ea ,a later age derided the ecstatics1 and took one of the forms of the verb to prophesy as equivalent to the verb to be mad4#eb ,but temptations as gross beset the prophet from that which should have been the discipline of his ecstasy--his connection with public affairs4 ,only some prophets were brave rebukers of the king and the people4 ,the herd which fed at the royal table--four hundred under ,ahab--were flatterers1 who could not tell the truth1 who said ,peace1 peace1 when there was no peace4 ,these were false prophets4 ,yet it is curious that the very early narrative which describes them#ec does not impute their falsehood to any base motives of their own1 but to the direct inspiration of ,god1 who sent forth a lying spirit upon them4 ,so great was the reverence still for the man of the spirit6 ,rather than doubt his inspiration1 they held his very lies to be inspired4 ,one does not of course mean that these consenting prophets were conscious liars2 but that their dependence on the king1 their servile habits of speech1 disabled them from seeing the truth4 ,subserviency to the powerful was their great temptation4 ,in the story of ,balaam we see confessed the base instinct that he who paid the prophet should have the word of the prophet in his favour4 ,in ,israel prophecy went through exactly the same struggle between the claims of its ,god and the claims of its patrons4 ,nor were those patrons always the rich4 ,the bulk of the prophets were dependent on the charitable gifts of the common people1 and in this we may find reason for that subjection of so many of them to the vulgar ideals of the national destiny1 to signs of which we are pointed by ,amos4 ,the priest at ,bethel only reflects public opinion when he takes for granted that the prophet is a thoroughly mercenary character3 ,seer1 get thee gone to the land of ,judah2 eat there thy bread1 and play the prophet there6#ed ,no wonder ,amos separates himself from such hireling craftsmen6 99 99 99 99 99 ,such was the course of prophecy up to ,elisha1 and the borders of the eighth century4 ,we have seen how even for the ancient prophet1 mere soothsayer though we might regard him in respect of the rude instruments of his office1 there were present moral opportunities of the highest kind1 from which1 if he only proved true to them1 we cannot conceive the ,spirit of ,god to have been absent4 ,in early ,israel we are sure that the ,spirit did meet such strong and pure characters1 from ,moses to ,samuel1 creating by their means the nation of ,israel1 welding it to a unity1 which was not only political but moral--and moral to a degree not elsewhere realised in the ,semitic world4 ,we saw how a new race of prophets arose under ,samuel1 separate from the older forms of prophecy by lot and oracle1 separate1 too1 from the ritual as a whole2 and therefore free for a moral and spiritual advance of which the priesthood1 still bound to images and the ancient rites1 proved themselves incapable4 ,but this new order of prophecy1 besides its moral opportunities1 had also its moral perils3 its ecstasy was dangerous1 its connection with public affairs was dangerous too4 ,again1 the test was the personal character of the prophet himself4 ,and so once more we see raised above the herd great personalities1 who carry forward the work of their predecessors4 ,the results are1 besides the discipline of the monarchy and the defence of justice and the poor1 the firm establishment of ,jehovah as the one and only ,god of ,israel1 and the impression on ,israel both of ,his omnipotent guidance of them in the past1 and of a worldwide destiny1 still vague but brilliant1 which ,he had prepared for them in the future4 ,this brings us to ,elisha1 and from ,elisha there are but forty years to ,amos4 ,during those forty years1 however1 there arose within ,israel a new civilisation2 beyond her there opened up a new world2 and with ,assyria there entered the resources of ,providence1 a new power4 ,it was these three facts--the ,new ,civilisation1 the ,new ,world and the ,new ,power--which made the difference between ,elisha and ,amos1 and raised prophecy from a national to a universal religion4 ,,footnotes3 #ag ,herodotus1 viii4 #cf1 #cg4 #ah ,timus1 #ga1 #gb4 ,the whole passage is worth transcribing3-- ,no man1 when in his senses1 attains prophetic truth and inspiration2 but when he receives the inspired word either his intelligence is enthralled by sleep1 or he is demented by some distemper or possession4 ,and he who would understand what he remembers to have been said1 whether in dream or when he was awake1 by the prophetic and enthusiastic nature1 or what he has seen1 must recover his senses2 and then he will be able to explain rationally what all such words and apparitions mean1 and what indications they afford1 to this man or that1 of past1 present1 or future1 good and evil4 ,but1 while he continues demented1 he cannot judge of the visions which he sees or the words which he utters2 the ancient saying is very true that 'only a man in his senses can act or judge about himself and his own affairs4' ,and for this reason it is customary to appoint diviners or interpreters as discerners of the oracles of the gods4 ,some persons call them prophets2 they do not know that they are only repeaters of dark sayings and visions1 and are not to be called prophets at all1 but only interpreters of prophecy4--,jowett's ,translation4 #ai ,nik41 i4 #ia4 #bj ,phdrus1 #bfb ,d4 #ba ,it is still a controversy whether the original meaning of the ,semitic root ,,khn is prophet1 as in the ,arabic ,k,hi,n1 or priest1 as in the ,hebrew ,k,he,n4 #bb ,cf4 ,jer4 ii4 #aj3 ,for pass over to the isles of ,chittim1 and see2 and send unto ,kedar1 and consider diligently2 and see if there be such a thing4 ,hath a nation changed their gods8 ,from the isles of ,chittim unto ,kedar--the limits of the ,semitic world4 #bc ,numbers xxiv4 #d1 falling but having his eyes open4 ,ver4 #a1 enchantments ought to be omens4 #bd ,instanced by ,wellhausen1 ,skizzen u4 ,vorarb41 ,no4 v4 #be #bf #bg #bh ,deut4 xiii4 #a ff4 admits that heathen seers were able to work miracles and give signs1 as well as the prophets of ,jehovah4 #bi ,cf4 ,mesha's account of himself and ,chemosh on the ,moabite ,stone1 with the narrative of the taking of ,ai in the ,book of ,joshua4 #cj ,cf4 ,kuenen3 ,gesammelte ,alhandlungen 7trans4 by ,budde71 p4 #dfa4 #ca ,so in ,deborah's ,song4 #cb #a ,sam4 ix4 #i4 #cc #a ,sam4 x4 #a-af1 xi4 #a-aa1 #ae4 ,chap4 x4 #ag-bg1 xi4 #ab-ad1 belong to other and later documents4 ,cf4 ,robertson ,smith1 ,old ,testament in the ,jewish ,church1 #ace ff4 #cd #a ,sam4 xix4 #bj-bd4 #ce ,what seemed most to induce the frenzy of the dervishes whom ,i watched was the fixing of their attention upon1 the yearning of their minds after1 the love of ,god4 ,ya habeebi6--,o my beloved6--they cried4 #cf ,cornill1 in the first of his lectures on ,der ,israelitische ,prophetismus1 one of the very best popular studies of prophecy1 by a master on the subject4 ,see p4 #gc n4 #cg ,it is now past doubt that these were two sacred stones used for decision in the case of an alternative issue4 ,this is plain from the amended reading of ,saul's prayer in #a ,sam4 xiv4 #da1 #db 7after the ,,lxx473 ,o ,jehovah ,god of ,israel1 wherefore hast ,thou not answered ,thy servant this day8 ,if the iniquity be in me or in ,jonathan my son1 ,o ,jehovah ,god of ,israel1 give ,urim3 and if it be in ,thy people ,israel1 give1 ,i pray ,thee1 ,thummim4 #ch ,hosea iii4 #d4 ,see next chapter1 p4 #ch4 #ci ,cf4 ,deut4 xxviii4 #cd4 #dj #b ,sam4 xii4 #a ff4 #da #a ,kings xi4 #bi2 xii4 #bb4 #db #a ,kings xiv4 #b1 #g-aa2 xix4 #ae f42 #b ,kings ix4 #c ff4 #dc #a ,kings xxii4 #e ff42 #b ,kings iii4 #aa ff4 #dd #a ,kings xxi4 #a ff4 #de #b ,kings vi4-viii41 etc4 #df #a ,kings xviii4 #df2 #b ,kings iii4 #ae4 #dg #c ,kings ix4 #aa4 ,mad fellow1 not necessarily a term of reproach4 #dh #a ,kings xviii4 #d1 cf4 #ai2 #b ,kings ii4 #c1 #e2 iv4 #ch-dd2 v4 #bj ff42 vi4 #a ff42 viii4 #h f41 etc4 #di #a ,kings xviii4 #ai2 xxii4 #f4 #ej ,so ,elijah1 #b ,kings i4 #h3 cf4 ,john the ,baptist1 ,matt4 iii4 #d4 #ea ,hosea ix4 #g4 #eb ,jer4 xxix4 #bf3 ,every man that is mad1 and worketh himself into prophecy 71 the same form as is used without moral reproach in #a ,sam4 x4 #aj ff474 #ec #a ,kings xxii4 #ed ,amos vii4 #ab4 ,,chapter ,,iii ,,the ,,eighth ,,century ,,in ,,israel ,the long life of ,elisha fell to its rest on the margin of the eighth century4#ee ,he had seen much evil upon ,israel4 ,the people were smitten in all their coasts4 ,none of their territory across ,jordan was left to them2 and not only ,hazael and his ,syrians1 but bands of their own former subjects1 the ,moabites1 periodically raided ,western ,palestine1 up to the very gates of ,samaria4#ef ,such a state of affairs determined the activity of the last of the older prophets4 ,elisha spent his life in the duties of the national defence1 and in keeping alive the spirit of ,israel against her foes4 ,when he died they called him ,israel's chariot and the horsemen thereof1#eg so incessant had been both his military vigilance#eh and his political insight4#ei ,but ,elisha was able to leave behind him the promise of a new day of victory4#fj ,it was in the peace and liberty of this day that ,israel rose a step in civilisation2 that prophecy1 released from the defence1 became the criticism1 of the national life2 and that the people1 no longer absorbed in their own borders1 looked out1 and for the first time realised the great world1 of which they were only a part4 ,king ,joash1 whose arms the dying ,elisha had blessed1 won back in the sixteen years of his reign 7#gih-ghc7 the cities which the ,syrians had taken from his father4#fa ,his successor1 ,jeroboam ,,ii41 came in1 therefore1 with a flowing tide4 ,he was a strong man1 and he took advantage of it4 ,during his long reign of about forty years 7#ghc-gdc7 he restored the border of ,israel from the ,pass of ,hamath between the ,lebanons to the ,dead ,sea1 and occupied at least part of the territory of ,damascus4#fb ,this means that the constant raids to which ,israel had been subjected now ceased1 and that by the time of ,amos1 about #gee1 a generation was grown up who had not known defeat1 and the most of whom had perhaps no experience even of war4 ,along the same length of years ,uzziah 7circa #ggh-gdj7 had dealt similarly with ,judah4#fc ,he had pushed south to the ,red ,sea1 while ,jeroboam pushed north to ,hamath2 and while ,jeroboam had taken the ,syrian towns he had crushed the ,philistine4 ,he had reorganised the army1 and invented new engines of siege for casting stones4 ,on such of his frontiers as were opposed to the desert he had built towers3 there is no better means of keeping the nomads in subjection4 ,all this meant such security across broad ,israel as had not been known since the glorious days of ,solomon4 ,agriculture must everywhere have revived3 ,uzziah1 the ,chronicler tells us1 loved husbandry4 ,but we hear most of ,trade and ,building4 ,with quarters in ,damascus and a port on the ,red ,sea1 with allies in the ,phnician towns and tributaries in the ,philistine1 with command of all the main routes between ,egypt and the ,north as between the ,desert and the ,levant1 ,israel1 during those forty years of ,jeroboam and ,uzziah1 must have become a busy and a wealthy commercial power4 ,hosea calls the ,northern ,kingdom a very ,canaan#fd--;,canaanite being the ,hebrew term for trader--as we should say a very ,jew2 and ,amos exposes all the restlessness1 the greed1 and the indifference to the poor of a community making haste to be rich4 ,the first effect of this was a large increase of the towns and of town-life4 ,every document of the time--up to #gbj--speaks to us of its buildings4#fe ,in ordinary building houses of ashlar seem to be novel enough to be mentioned4 ,vast palaces--the name of them first heard of in ,israel under ,omri and his ,phnician alliance1 and then only as that of the king's citadel#ff--;are now built by wealthy grandees out of money extorted from the poor2 they can have risen only since the ,syrian wars4 ,there are summer houses in addition to winter houses2 and it is not only the king1 as in the days of ,ahab1 who furnishes his buildings with ivory4 ,when an earthquake comes and whole cities are overthrown1 the vigour and wealth of the people are such that they build more strongly and lavishly than before4#fg ,with all this we have the characteristic tempers and moods of city-life3 the fickleness and liability to panic which are possible only where men are gathered in crowds2 the luxury and false art which are engendered only by artificial conditions of life2 the deep poverty which in all cities1 from the beginning to the end of time1 lurks by the side of the most brilliant wealth1 its dark and inevitable shadow4 ,in short1 in the half-century between ,elisha and ,amos1 ,israel rose from one to another of the great stages of culture4 ,till the eighth century they had been but a kingdom of fighting husbandmen4 ,under ,jeroboam and ,uzziah city-life was developed1 and civilisation1 in the proper sense of the word1 appeared4 ,only once before had ,israel taken so large a step3 when they crossed ,jordan1 leaving the nomadic life for the agricultural2 and that had been momentous for their religion4 ,they came among new temptations3 the use of wine1 and the shrines of local gods who were believed to have more influence on the fertility of the land than ,jehovah who had conquered it for ,his people4 ,but now this further step1 from the agricultural stage to the mercantile and civil1 was equally fraught with danger4 ,there was the closer intercourse with foreign nations and their cults4 ,there were all the temptations of rapid wealth1 all the dangers of an equally increasing poverty4 ,the growth of comfort among the rulers meant the growth of thoughtlessness4 ,cruelty multiplied with refinement4 ,the upper classes were lifted away from feeling the real woes of the people4 ,there was a well-fed and sanguine patriotism1 but at the expense of indifference to social sin and want4 ,religious zeal and liberality increased1 but they were coupled with all the proud's misunderstanding of ,god3 an optimist faith without moral insight or sympathy4 ,it is all this which makes the prophets of the eighth century so modern1 while ,elisha's life is still so ancient4 ,with him we are back in the times of our own border wars--of ,wallace and ,bruce1 with their struggles for the freedom of the soil4 ,with ,amos we stand among the conditions of our own day4 ,the ,city has arisen4 ,for the development of the highest form of prophecy1 the universal and permanent form1 there was needed that marvellously unchanging mould of human life1 whose needs and sorrows1 whose sins and problems1 are to-day the same as they were all those thousands of years ago4 ,with ,civilisation came ,literature4 ,the long peace gave leisure for writing2 and the just pride of the people in boundaries broad as ,solomon's own1 determined that this writing should take the form of heroic history4 ,in the parallel reigns of ,jeroboam and ,uzziah many critics have placed the great epics of ,israel3 the earlier documents of our ,pentateuch which trace ,god's purposes to mankind by ,israel1 from the creation of the world to the settlement of the ,promised ,land2 the histories which make up our ,books of ,judges1 ,samuel and ,kings4 ,but whether all these were composed now or at an earlier date1 it is certain that the nation lived in the spirit of them1 proud of its past1 aware of its vocation1 and confident that its ,god1 who had created the world and so mightily led itself1 would bring it from victory by victory to a complete triumph over the heathen4 ,israel of the eighth century were devoted to ,jehovah2 and although passion or self-interest might lead individuals or even communities to worship other gods1 ,he had no possible rival upon the throne of the nation4 ,as they delighted to recount ,his deeds by their fathers1 so they thronged the scenes of these with sacrifice and festival4 ,bethel and ,beersheba1 ,dan and ,gilgal1 were the principal2#fh but ,mizpeh1 the top of ,tabor1#fi and ,carmel1#gj perhaps ,penuel1#ga were also conspicuous among the countless high places#gb of the land4 ,of those in ,northern ,israel ,bethel was the chief4 ,it enjoyed the proper site for an ancient shrine1 which was nearly always a market as well--near a frontier and where many roads converged2 where traders from the ,east could meet half-way with traders from the ,west1 the wool-growers of ,moab and the ,judan desert with the merchants of ,phnicia and the ,philistine coast4 ,here1 on the spot on which the father of the nation had seen heaven open1#gc a great temple was now built1 with a priesthood endowed and directed by the crown1#gd but lavishly supported also by the tithes and free-will offerings of the people4#ge ,it is a sanctuary of the king and a house of the kingdom4#gf ,jeroboam had ordained ,dan1 at the other end of the kingdom1 to be the fellow of ,bethel2#gg but ,dan was far away from the bulk of the people1 and in the eighth century ,bethel's real rival was ,gilgal4#gh ,whether this was the ,gilgal by ,jericho1 or the other ,gilgal on the ,samarian hills near ,shiloh1 is uncertain4 ,the latter had been a sanctuary in ,elijah's day1 with a settlement of the prophets2 but the former must have proved the greater attraction to a people so devoted to the sacred events of their past4 ,was it not the first resting-place of the ,ark after the passage of ,jordan1 the scene of the reinstitution of circumcision1 of the anointing of the first king1 of ,judah's second submission to ,david8#gi ,as there were many ,gilgals in the land--literally cromlechs1 ancient stone-circles sacred to the ,canaanites as well as to ,israel--so there were many ,mizpehs1 ,watchtowers1 ,seers' stations3 the one mentioned by ,hosea was probably in ,gilead4#hj ,to the southern ,beersheba1 to which ,elijah had fled from ,jezebel1 pilgrimages were made by northern ,israelites traversing ,judah4 ,the sanctuary on ,carmel was the ancient altar of ,jehovah which ,elijah had rebuilt2 but ,carmel seems at this time to have lain1 as it did so often1 in the power of the ,phnicians1 for it is imagined by the prophets only as a hiding-place from the face of ,jehovah4#ha ,at all these sanctuaries it was ,jehovah and no other who was sought3 thy ,god1 ,o ,israel1 which brought thee up out of the land of ,egypt4#hb ,at ,bethel and at ,dan ,he was adored in the form of a calf2 probably at ,gilgal also1 for there is a strong tradition to that effect2#hc and elsewhere men still consulted the other images which had been used by ,saul and by ,david1 the ,ephod and the ,teraphim4#hd ,with these there was the old ,semitic symbol of the ,maebah1 or upright stone on which oil was poured4#he ,all of them had been used in the worship of ,jehovah by the great examples and leaders of the past2 all of them had been spared by ,elijah and ,elisha3 it was no wonder that the common people of the eighth century felt them to be indispensable elements of religion1 the removal of which1 like the removal of the monarchy or of sacrifice itself1 would mean utter divorce from the nation's ,god4#hf ,one great exception must be made4 ,compared with the sanctuaries we have mentioned1 ,zion itself was very modern4 ,but it contained the main repository of ,israel's religion1 the ,ark1 and in connection with the ,ark the worship of ,jehovah was not a worship of images4 ,it is significant that from this1 the original sanctuary of ,israel1 with the pure worship1 the new prophecy derived its first inspiration4 ,but to that we shall return later with ,amos4#hg ,apart from the ,ark1 ,jerusalem was not free from images1 nor even from the altars of foreign deities4 ,where the externals of the ritual were thus so much the same as those of the ,canaanite cults1 which were still practised in and around the land1 it is not surprising that the worship of ,jehovah should be further invaded by many pagan practices1 nor that ,jehovah ,himself should be regarded with imaginations steeped in pagan ideas of the ,godhead4 ,that even the foulest tempers of the ,canaanite ritual1 those inspired by wine and the sexual passion1 were licensed in the sanctuaries of ,israel1 both ,amos and ,hosea testify4 ,but the worst of the evil was wrought in the popular conception of ,god4 ,let us remember again that ,jehovah had no real rival at this time in the devotion of ,his people1 and that their faith was expressed both by the legal forms of ,his religion and by a liberality which exceeded these4 ,the tithes were paid to ,him1 and paid1 it would appear1 with more than legal frequency4#hh ,sabbath and ,new ,moon1 as days of worship and rest from business1 were observed with a ,pharisaic scrupulousness for the letter if not for the spirit4#hi ,the prescribed festivals were held1 and thronged by zealous devotees who rivalled each other in the amount of their free-will offerings4#ij ,pilgrimages were made to ,bethel1 to ,gilgal1 to far ,beersheba1 and the very way to the latter appeared as sacred to the ,israelite as the way to ,mecca does to a pious ,moslem of to-day4#ia ,yet1 in spite of all this devotion to their ,god1 ,israel had no true ideas of ,him4 ,to quote ,amos1 they sought ,his sanctuaries1 but ,him they did not seek2 in the words of ,hosea's frequent plaint1 they did not know ,him4 ,to the mass of the people1 to their governors1 their priests1 and the most of their prophets1 ,jehovah was but the characteristic ,semitic deity--patron of ,his people1 and caring for them alone--who had helped them in the past1 and was bound to help them still--very jealous as to the correctness of ,his ritual and the amount of ,his sacrifices1 but indifferent about real morality4 ,nay1 there were still darker streaks in their views of ,him4 ,a god1 figured as an ox1 could not be adored by a cattle-breeding people without starting in their minds thoughts too much akin to the foul tempers of the ,canaanite faiths4 ,these things it is almost a shame to mention2 but without knowing that they fermented in the life of that generation1 we shall not appreciate the vehemence of ,amos or of ,hosea4 ,such a religion had no discipline for the busy1 mercenary life of the day4 ,injustice and fraud were rife in the very precincts of the sanctuary4 ,magistrates and priests alike were smitten with their generation's love of money1 and did everything for reward4 ,again and again do the prophets speak of bribery4 ,judges took gifts and perverted the cause of the poor2 priests drank the mulcted wine1 and slept on the pledged garments of religious offenders4 ,there was no disinterested service of ,god or of the commonweal4 ,mammon was supreme4 ,the influence of the commercial character of the age appears in another very remarkable result4 ,an agricultural community is always sensitive to the religion of nature4 ,they are awed by its chastisements--droughts1 famines and earthquakes4 ,they feel its majestic order in the course of the seasons1 the procession of day and night1 the march of the great stars all the host of the ,lord of hosts4 ,but ,amos seems to have had to break into passionate reminders of ,him that maketh ,orion and the ,pleiades1 and turneth the murk into morning4#ib ,several physical calamities visited the land4 ,the locusts are bad in ,palestine every sixth or seventh year3 one year before ,amos began they had been very bad4 ,there was a monstrous drought1 followed by a famine4 ,there was a long-remembered earthquake--the earthquake in the days of ,uzziah4 ,with ,egypt so near1 the home of the plague1 and with so much war afoot in ,northern ,syria1 there were probably more pestilences in ,western ,asia than those recorded in #hjc1 #gfe and #gei4 ,there was a total eclipse of the sun in #gfc4 ,but of all these1 except perhaps the pestilence1 a commercial people are independent as an agricultural are not4 ,israel speedily recovered from them1 without any moral improvement4 ,even when the earthquake came they said in pride and stoutness of heart1 ,the bricks are fallen down1 but we will build with hewn stones2 the sycamores are cut down1 but we will change to cedars4#ic ,it was a marvellous generation--so joyous1 so energetic1 so patriotic1 so devout6 ,but its strength was the strength of cruel wealth1 its peace the peace of an immoral religion4 ,i have said that the age is very modern1 and we shall indeed go to its prophets feeling that they speak to conditions of life extremely like our own4 ,but if we wish a still closer analogy from our history1 we must travel back to the fourteenth century in ,england--,langland's and ,wyclif's century1 which1 like this one in ,israel1 saw both the first real attempts towards a national literature1 and the first real attempts towards a moral and religious reform4 ,then as in ,israel a long and victorious reign was drawing to a close1 under the threat of disaster when it should have passed4 ,then as in ,israel there had been droughts1 earthquakes and pestilences with no moral results upon the nation4 ,then also there was a city life developing at the expense of country life4 ,then also the wealthy began to draw aloof from the people4 ,then also there was a national religion1 zealously cultivated and endowed by the liberality of the people1 but superstitious1 mercenary1 and corrupted by sexual disorder4 ,then too there were many pilgrimages to popular shrines1 and the land was strewn with mendicant priests and hireling preachers4 ,and then too prophecy raised its voice1 for the first time fearless in ,england4 ,as we study the verses of ,amos we shall find again and again the most exact parallels to them in the verses of ,langland's ,vision of ,piers the ,plowman1 which denounce the same vices in ,church and ,state1 and enforce the same principles of religion and morality4 99 99 99 99 99 ,it was when the reign of ,jeroboam was at its height of assured victory1 when the nation's prosperity seemed impregnable after the survival of those physical calamities1 when the worship and the commerce were in full course throughout the land1 that the first of the new prophets broke out against ,israel in the name of ,jehovah1 threatening judgment alike upon the new civilisation of which they were so proud and the old religion in which they were so confident4 ,these prophets were inspired by feelings of the purest morality1 by the passionate conviction that ,god could no longer bear such impurity and disorder4 ,but1 as we have seen1 no prophet in ,israel ever worked on the basis of principles only4 ,he came always in alliance with events4 ,these first appeared in the shape of the great physical disasters4 ,but a more powerful instrument of ,providence1 in the service of judgment1 was appearing on the horizon4 ,this was the ,assyrian ,empire4 ,so vast was its influence on prophecy that we must devote to it a separate chapter4 ,,footnotes3 #ee ,he died in #gih or #gig4 #ef #b ,kings x4 #cb1 xiii4 #bj1 #bb4 #eg #b ,kings xiii4 #ad4 #eh vi4 #ab ff41 etc4 #ei viii41 etc4 #fj xiii4 #ag ff4 #fa #b ,kings xiii4 #bb-be4 #fb xiv4 #bh1 if not ,damascus itself4 #fc #b ,kings xv43 cf4 #b ,chron4 xxvi4 #fd xii4 #g 7,heb4 ver4 #h74 ,trans41 ,as for ,canaan1 the balances1 etc4 #fe ,amos1 passim4 ,hosea viii4 #ad1 etc42 ,micah iii4 #ab2 ,isa4 ix4 #aj4 #ff 1 a word not found in the ,pentateuch1 ,joshua1 ,judges1 or ,samuel1 is used in #a ,kings xvi4 #ah1 #b ,kings xv4 #be1 for a citadel within the palace of the king4 ,similarly in ,isa4 xxv4 #b2 ,pro4 xviii4 #ai4 ,but in ,amos generally of any large or grand house4 ,that the name first appears in the time of ,omri's alliance with ,tyre1 points to a ,phnician origin4 ,probably from root 1 to be high4 #fg ,isa4 ix4 #aj4 #fh #a ,kings xii4 #be ff41 and ,amos and ,hosea passim4 #fi ,hosea v4 #a4 #gj #a ,kings xviii4 #cj ff4 #ga #a ,kings xii4 #be4 #gb ,originally so called from their elevation 7though oftener on the flank than on the summit of a hill72 but like the name ,high ,street or the ,scottish ,high ,kirk1 the term came to be dissociated from physical height and was applied to any sanctuary1 even in a hollow1 like so many of the sacred wells4 #gc ,the sanctuary itself was probably on the present site of the ,burj ,beitin 7with the ruins of an early ,christian ,church71 some few minutes to the south-east of the present village of ,beitin1 which probably represents the city of ,bethel that was called ,luz at the first4 #gd #a ,kings xii4 #be ff42 ,amos vii4 #ge ,amos iv4 #d4 #gf ,amos vii4 #ac4 #gg #a ,kings xii4 #be ff4 #gh ,curiously enough conceived by many of the early ,christian ,fathers as containing the second of the calves4 ,cyril1 ,comm4 in ,hoseam1 #e2 ,epiph41 ,de ,vitis ,proph41 #bcg2 ,chron4 ,pasc41 #afa4 #gi ,josh4 iv4 #bj ff41 v4 #b ff42 #a ,sam4 xi4 #ad1 #ae1 etc42 #b ,sam4 xix4 #ae1 #dj4 ,this ,gilgal by ,jericho fell to ,n4 ,israel after the ,disruption2 but there is nothing in ,amos or ,hosea to tell us1 whether it or the ,gilgal near ,shiloh1 which seems to have absorbed the sanctity of the latter1 is the shrine which they couple with ,bethel--except that they never talk of going up to it4 ,the passage from ,epiphanius in previous note speaks of the ,gilgal with the calf as the ,gilgal which is in ,shiloh4 #hj ,site uncertain4 ,see ,hist4 ,geog41 pp4 #egi1 #ehf4 #ha ,amos ix4 #c4 ,but cf4 i4 #b4 #hb #b ,kings xii4 #bh4 #hc ,see above1 p4 #cg1 n4 #a4 #hd ,the ,ephod1 the plated thing2 presumably a wooden image covered either with a skin of metal or a cloak of metal4 ,the ,teraphim were images in human shape4 #he ,the menhir of modern ,palestine--not a hewn pillar1 but oblong natural stone narrowing a little towards the top 7cf4 ,w4 ,r4 ,smith1 ,religion of the ,semites1 #ahc-ahh74 ,from ,hosea x4 #a1 #b1 it would appear that the maeboth of the eighth century were artificial4 ,they make good maeboth 7,a4,v4 wrongly images74 #hf ,so indeed ,hosea iii4 #d implies4 ,the ,asherah1 the pole or symbolic tree of ,canaanite worship1 does not appear to have been used as a part of the ritual of ,jehovah's worship4 ,but1 that there was constantly a temptation so to use it1 is clear from ,deut4 xvi4 #ba1 #bb4 ,see ,driver on that passage4 #hg ,see below1 p4 #ii4 #hh ,amos iv4 #d ff4 #hi ,amos vii4 #d3 cf4 #b ,kings v4 #bc4 #ij ,amos iv4 #d f4 #ia ,see below1 p4 #ahe4 #ib ,but whether these be by ,amos see ,chap4 ,,xi4 #ic ,isa ix4 #aj4 ,,chapter ,,iv ,,the ,,influence ,,of ,,assyria ,,upon ,,prophecy ,by far the greatest event in the eighth century before ,christ was the appearance of ,assyria in ,palestine4 ,to ,israel since the ,exodus and ,conquest1 nothing had happened capable of so enormous an influence at once upon their national fortunes and their religious development4 ,but while the ,exodus and ,conquest had advanced the political and spiritual progress of ,israel in equal proportion1 the effect of the ,assyrian invasion was to divorce these two interests1 and destroy the state while it refined and confirmed the religion4 ,after permitting the ,northern ,kingdom to reach an extent and splendour unrivalled since the days of ,solomon1 ,assyria overthrew it in #gba and left all ,israel scarcely a third of their former magnitude4 ,but while ,assyria proved so disastrous to the state1 her influence upon the prophecy of the period was little short of creative4 ,humanly speaking1 this highest stage of ,israel's religion could not have been achieved by the prophets except in alliance with the armies of that heathen empire4 ,before then we turn to their pages it may be well for us to make clear in what directions ,assyria performed this spiritual service for ,israel4 ,while pursuing this inquiry we may be able to find answers to the scarcely less important questions3 why the prophets were at first doubtful of the part ,assyria was destined to play in the providence of the ,almighty8 and why1 when the prophets were at last convinced of the certainty of ,israel's overthrow1 the statesmen of ,israel and the bulk of the people still remained so unconcerned about her coming1 or so sanguine of their power to resist her8 ,this requires1 to begin with1 a summary of the details of the ,assyrian advance upon ,palestine4 ,in the far past ,palestine had often been the hunting-ground of the ,assyrian kings4 ,but after #aajj ,b4,c41 and for nearly two centuries and a half1 her states were left to themselves4 ,then ,assyria resumed the task of breaking down that disbelief in her power with which her long withdrawal seems to have inspired their politics4 ,in #hgj ,assurnasirpal reached the ,levant1 and took tribute from ,tyre and ,sidon4 ,omri was reigning in ,samaria1 and must have come into close relations with the ,assyrians1 for during more than a century and a half after his death they still called the land of ,israel by his name4#id ,in #hed ,salmanassar ,,ii4 defeated at ,karkar the combined forces of ,ahab and ,benhadad4 ,in #hej1 #hdi and #hdf he conducted campaigns against ,damascus4 ,in #hdb he received tribute from ,jehu1#ie and in #hci again fought ,damascus under ,hazael4 ,after this there passed a whole generation during which ,assyria came no farther south than ,arpad1 some sixty miles north of ,damascus2 and ,hazael employed the respite in those campaigns which proved so disastrous for ,israel1 by robbing her of the provinces across ,jordan1 and ravaging the country about ,samaria4#if ,in #hjc ,assyria returned1 and accomplished the siege and capture of ,damascus4 ,the first consequence to ,israel was that restoration of her hopes under ,joash1 at which the aged ,elisha was still spared to assist1#ig and which reached its fulfilment in the recovery of all ,eastern ,palestine by ,jeroboam ,,ii4#ih ,jeroboam's own relations to ,assyria have not been recorded either by the ,bible or by the ,assyrian monuments4 ,it is hard to think that he paid no tribute to the king of kings4 ,at all events it is certain that1 while ,assyria again overthrew the ,arameans of ,damascus in #ggc and their neighbours of ,hadrach in #ggb and #gfe1 ,jeroboam was himself invading ,aramean land1 and the ,book of ,kings even attributes to him an extension of territory1 or at least of political influence1 up to the northern mouth of the great pass between the ,lebanons4#ii ,for the next twenty years ,assyria only once came as far as ,lebanon--to ,hadrach in #gei--;and it may have been this long quiescence which enabled the rulers and people of ,israel to forget1 if indeed their religion and sanguine patriotism had ever allowed them to realise1 how much the conquests and splendour of ,jeroboam's reign were due1 not to themselves1 but to the heathen power which had maimed their oppressors4 ,their dreams were brief4 ,before ,jeroboam himself was dead1 a new king had usurped the ,assyrian throne 7#gde ,b4,c47 and inaugurated a more vigorous policy4 ,borrowing the name of the ancient ,tiglath-,pileser1 he followed that conqueror's path across the ,euphrates4 ,at first it seemed as if he was to suffer check4 ,his forces were engrossed by the siege of ,arpad for three years 7c4 #gdc71 and this delay1 along with that of two years more1 during which he had to return to the conquest of ,babylon1 may well have given cause to the courts of ,damascus and ,samaria to believe that the ,assyrian power had not really revived4 ,combining1 they attacked ,judah under ,ahaz4 ,but ,ahaz appealed to ,tiglath-,pileser1 who within a year 7#gcd-gcc7 had overthrown ,damascus and carried captive the populations of ,gilead and ,galilee4 ,there could now be no doubt as to what the ,assyrian power meant for the political fortunes of ,israel4 ,before this resistless and inexorable empire1 the people of ,jehovah were as the most frail of their neighbours--sure of defeat1 and sure1 too1 of that terrible captivity in exile which formed the novel policy of the invaders against the tribes who withstood them4 ,israel dared to withstand4 ,the vassal ,hoshea1 whom the ,assyrians had placed on the throne of ,samaria in #gcj1 kept back his tribute4 ,the people rallied to him2 and for more than three years this little tribe of highlanders resisted in their capital the ,assyrian siege4 ,then came the end4 ,samaria fell in #gba1 and ,israel went into captivity beyond the ,euphrates4 ,in following the course of this long tragedy1 a man's heart cannot but feel that all the splendour and the glory did not lie with the prophets1 in spite of their being the only actors in the drama who perceived its moral issues and predicted its actual end4 ,for who can withhold admiration from those few tribesmen1 who accepted no defeat as final1 but so long as they were left to their fatherland rallied their ranks to its liberty and defied the huge empire4 ,nor was their courage always as blind1 as in the time of ,isaiah ,samaria's so fatally became4 ,for one cannot have failed to notice1 how fitful and irregular was ,assyria's advance1 at least up to the reign of ,tiglath-,pileser2 nor how prolonged and doubtful were her sieges of some of the towns4 ,the ,assyrians themselves do not always record spoil or tribute after what they are pleased to call their victories over the cities of ,palestine4 ,to the same campaign they had often to return for several years in succession4#ajj ,it took ,tiglath-,pileser himself three years to reduce ,arpad2 ,salmanassar ,,iv4 besieged ,samaria for three years1 and was slain before it yielded4 ,these facts enable us to understand that1 apart from the moral reasons which the prophets urged for the certainty of ,israel's overthrow by ,assyria1 it was always within the range of political possibility that ,assyria would not come back1 and that while she was engaged with revolts of other portions of her huge and disorganised empire1 a combined revolution on the part of her ,syrian vassals would be successful4 ,the prophets themselves felt the influence of these chances4 ,they were not always confident1 as we shall see1 that ,assyria was to be the means of ,israel's overthrow4 ,amos1 and in his earlier years ,isaiah1 describe her with a caution and a vagueness for which there is no other explanation than the political uncertainty that again and again hung over the future of her advance upon ,syria4 ,it1 then1 even in those high minds1 to whom the moral issue was so clear1 the political form that issue should assume was yet temporarily uncertain1 what good reasons must the mere statesmen of ,syria have often felt for the proud security which filled the intervals between the ,assyrian invasions1 or the sanguine hopes which inspired their resistance to the latter4 ,we must not cast over the whole ,assyrian advance the triumphant air of the annals of such kings as ,tiglath-,pileser or ,sennacherib4 ,campaigning in ,palestine was a dangerous business even to the ,romans2 and for the ,assyrian armies there was always possible besides some sudden recall by the rumour of a revolt in a distant province4 ,their own annals supply us with good reasons for the sanguine resistance offered to them by the tribes of ,palestine4 ,no defeat1 of course1 is recorded2 but the annals are full of delays and withdrawals4 ,then the ,plague would break out2 we know how in the last year of the century it turned ,sennacherib1 and saved ,jerusalem4#aja ,in short1 up almost to the end the ,syrian chiefs had some fair political reasons for resistance to a power which had so often defeated them2 while at the very end1 when no such reason remained and our political sympathy is exhausted1 we feel it replaced by an even warmer admiration for their desperate defence4 ,mere mountain-cats of tribes as some of them were1 they held their poorly furnished rocks against one1 two or three years of cruel siege4 ,in ,israel these political reasons for courage against ,assyria were enforced by the whole instincts of the popular religion4 ,the century had felt a new outburst of enthusiasm for ,jehovah4#ajb ,this was consequent1 not only upon the victories ,he had granted over ,aram1 but upon the literature of the peace which followed those victories3 the collection of the stories of the ancient miracles of ,jehovah in the beginning of ,his people's history1 and of the purpose ,he had even then announced of bringing ,israel to supreme rank in the world4 ,such a ,god1 so anciently manifested1 so recently proved1 could never surrender ,his own nation to a mere ,go#ajc--;a heathen and a barbarian people4 ,add this dogma of the popular religion of ,israel to those substantial hopes of ,assyria's withdrawal from ,palestine1 and you see cause1 intelligible and adequate1 for the complacency of ,jeroboam and his people to the fact that ,assyria had at last1 by the fall of ,damascus1 reached their own borders1 as well as for the courage with which ,hoshea in #gbe threw off the ,assyrian yoke1 and1 with a willing people1 for three years defended ,samaria against the great king4 ,let us not think that the opponents of the prophets were utter fools or mere puppets of fate4 ,they had reasons for their optimism2 they fought for their hearths and altars with a valour and a patience which proves that the nation as a whole was not so corrupt1 as we are sometimes1 by the language of the prophets1 tempted to suppose4 ,but all this--the reasonableness of the hope of resisting ,assyria1 the valour which so stubbornly fought her1 the religious faith which sanctioned both valour and hope--only the more vividly illustrates the singular independence of the prophets1 who took an opposite view1 who so consistently affirmed that ,israel must fall1 and so early foretold that she should fall to ,assyria4 ,the reason of this conviction of the prophets was1 of course1 their fundamental faith in the righteousness of ,jehovah4 ,that was a belief quite independent of the course of events4 ,as a matter of history1 the ethical reasons for ,israel's doom were manifest to the prophets within ,israel's own life1 before the signs grew clear on the horizon that the doomster was to be ,assyria4#ajd ,nay1 we may go further1 and say that it could not possibly have been otherwise4 ,for except the prophets had been previously furnished with the ethical reasons for ,assyria's resistless advance on ,israel1 to their sensitive minds that advance must have been a hopeless and a paralysing problem4 ,but they nowhere treat it as a problem4 ,by them ,assyria is always either welcomed as a proof or summoned as a means--the proof of their conviction that ,israel requires humbling1 the means of carrying that humbling into effect4 ,the faith of the prophets is ready for ,assyria from the moment that she becomes ominous for ,israel1 and every footfall of her armies on ,jehovah's soil becomes the corroboration of the purpose ,he has already declared to ,his servants in the terms of their moral consciousness4 ,the spiritual service which ,assyria rendered to ,israel was therefore secondary to the prophets' native convictions of the righteousness of ,god1 and could not have been performed without these4 ,this will become even more clear if we look for a little at the exact nature of that service4 ,in its broadest effects1 the ,assyrian invasion meant for ,israel a very considerable change in the intellectual outlook4 ,hitherto ,israel's world had virtually lain between the borders promised of old to their ambition--the river of ,egypt1#aje and the great river1 the ,river ,euphrates4 ,these had marked not merely the sphere of ,israel's politics1 but the horizon within which ,israel had been accustomed to observe the action of their ,god and to prove ,his character1 to feel the problems of their religion rise and to grapple with them4 ,but now there burst from the outside of this little world that awful power1 sovereign and inexorable1 which effaced all distinctions and treated ,israel in the same manner as her heathen neighbours4 ,this was more than a widening of the world3 it was a change of the very poles4 ,at first sight it appeared merely to have increased the scale on which history was conducted2 it was really an alteration of the whole character of history4 ,religion itself shrivelled up1 before a force so much vaster than anything it had yet encountered1 and so contemptuous of its claims4 ,what is ,jehovah1 said the ,assyrian in his laughter1 more than the gods of ,damascus1 or of ,hamath1 or of the ,philistines8 ,in fact1 for the mind of ,israel1 the crisis1 though less in degree1 was in quality not unlike that produced in the religion of ,europe by the revelation of the ,copernican astronomy4 ,as the earth1 previously believed to be the centre of the universe1 the stage on which the ,son of ,god had achieved ,god's eternal purposes to mankind1 was discovered to be but a satellite of one of innumerable suns1 a mere ball swung beside millions of others by a force which betrayed no sign of sympathy with the great transactions which took place on it1 and so faith in the ,divine worth of these was rudely shaken--so ,israel1 who had believed themselves to be the peculiar people of the ,creator1 the solitary agents of the ,god of ,righteousness to all mankind1#ajf and who now felt themselves brought to an equality with other tribes by this sheer force1 which1 brutally indifferent to spiritual distinctions1 swayed the fortunes of all alike1 must have been tempted to unbelief in the spiritual facts of their history1 in the power of their ,god and the destiny ,he had promised them4 ,nothing could have saved ,israel1 as nothing could have saved ,europe1 but a conception of ,god which rose to this new demand upon its powers--a faith which said1 ,our ,god is sufficient for this greater world and its forces that so dwarf our own2 the discovery of these only excites in us a more awful wonder of ,his power4 ,the prophets had such a conception of ,god4 ,to them ,he was absolute righteousness--righteousness wide as the widest world1 stronger than the strongest force4 ,to the prophets1 therefore1 the rise of ,assyria only increased the possibilities of ,providence4 ,but it could not have done this had ,providence not already been invested in a ,god capable by ,his character of rising to such possibilities4 ,assyria1 however1 was not only ,force3 she was also the symbol of a great ,idea--the ,idea of ,unity4 ,we have just ventured on one historical analogy4 ,we may try another and a more exact one4 ,the ,empire of ,rome1 grasping the whole world in its power and reducing all races of men to much the same level of political rights1 powerfully assisted ,christian theology in the task of imposing upon the human mind a clearer imagination of unity in the government of the world and of spiritual equality among men of all nations4 ,a not dissimilar service to the faith of ,israel was performed by the ,empire of ,assyria4 ,history1 that hitherto had been but a series of angry pools1 became as the ocean swaying in tides to one almighty impulse4 ,it was far easier to imagine a sovereign ,providence when ,assyria reduced history to a unity by overthrowing all the rulers and all their gods1 than when history was broken up into the independent fortunes of many states1 each with its own religion divinely valid in its own territory4 ,by shattering the tribes ,assyria shattered the tribal theory of religion1 which we have seen to be the characteristic ,semitic theory--a god for every tribe1 a tribe for every god4 ,the field was cleared of the many3 there was room for the ,one4 ,that ,he appeared1 not as the ,god of the conquering race1 but as the ,deity of one of their many victims1 was due to ,jehovah's righteousness4 ,at this juncture1 when the world was suggested to have one throne and that throne was empty1 there was a great chance1 if we may so put it1 for a god with a character4 ,and the only ,god in all the ,semitic world who had a character was ,jehovah4 ,it is true that the ,assyrian ,empire was not constructive1 like the ,roman1 and1 therefore1 could not assist the prophets to the idea of a ,catholic ,church4 ,but there can be no doubt that it did assist them to a feeling of the moral unity of mankind4 ,a great historian has made the just remark that1 whatsoever widens the imagination1 enabling it to realise the actual experience of other men1 is a powerful agent of ethical advance4#ajg ,now ,assyria widened the imagination and the sympathy of ,israel in precisely this way4 ,consider the universal ,pity of the ,assyrian conquest3 how state after state went down before it1 how all things mortal yielded and were swept away4 ,the mutual hatreds and ferocities of men could not persist before a common ,fate1 so sublime1 so tragic4 ,and thus we understand how in ,israel the old envies and rancours of that border warfare with her foes which had filled the last four centuries of her history is replaced by a new tenderness and compassion towards the national efforts1 the achievements and all the busy life of the ,gentile peoples4 ,isaiah is especially distinguished by this in his treatment of ,egypt and of ,tyre2 and even where he and others do not1 as in these cases1 appreciate the sadness of the destruction of so much brave beauty and serviceable wealth1 their tone in speaking of the fall of the ,assyrian on their neighbours is one of compassion and not of exultation4#ajh ,as the rivalries and hatreds of individual lives are stilled in the presence of a common death1 so even that factious1 ferocious world of the ,semites ceased to fret its anger and watch it for ever 7to quote ,amos' phrase7 in face of the universal ,assyrian ,fate4 ,but in that ,fate there was more than ,pity4 ,on the data of the prophets ,assyria was afflicting ,israel for moral reasons3 it could not be for other reasons that she was afflicting their neighbours4 ,israel and the heathen were suffering for the same righteousness' sake4 ,what could have better illustrated the moral equality of all mankind6 ,no doubt the prophets were already theoretically convinced#aji of this--for the righteousness they believed in was nothing if not universal4 ,but it is one thing to hold a belief on principle and another to have practical experience of it in history4 ,to a theory of the moral equality of mankind ,assyria enabled the prophets to add sympathy and conscience4 ,we shall see all this illustrated in the opening prophecies of ,amos against the foreign nations4 ,but ,assyria did not help to develop monotheism in ,israel only by contributing to the doctrines of a moral ,providence and of the equality of all men beneath it4 ,the influence must have extended to ,israel's conception of ,god in ,nature4 ,here1 of course1 ,israel was already possessed of great beliefs4 ,jehovah had created man2 ,he had divided the ,red ,sea and ,jordan4 ,the desert1 the storm1 and the seasons were all subject to ,him4 ,but at a time when the superstitious mind of the people was still feeling after other ,divine powers in the earth1 the waters and the air of ,canaan1 it was a very valuable antidote to such dissipation of their faith to find one ,god swaying1 through ,assyria1 all families of mankind4 ,the ,divine unity to which history was reduced must have reacted on ,israel's views of ,nature1 and made it easier to feel one ,god also there4 ,now1 as a matter of fact1 the imagination of the unity of ,nature1 the belief in a reason and method pervading all things1 was very powerfully advanced in ,israel throughout the ,assyrian period4 ,we may find an illustration of this in the greater1 deeper meaning in which the prophets use the old national name of ,israel's ,god--,jehovah eba'oth1 ,jehovah of ,hosts4 ,this title1 which came into frequent use under the early kings1 when ,israel's vocation was to win freedom by war1 meant then 7as far as we can gather7 only ,jehovah of the armies of ,israel--the ,god of battles1 the people's leader in war1#aaj whose home was ,jerusalem1 the people's capital1 and ,his sanctuary their battle emblem1 the ,ark4 ,now the prophets hear ,jehovah go forth 7as ,amos does7 from the same place1 but to them the ,name has a far deeper significance4 ,they never define it1 but they use it in associations where hosts must mean something different from the armies of ,israel4 ,to ,amos the hosts of ,jehovah are not the armies of ,israel1 but those of ,assyria3 they are also the nations whom ,he marshals and marches across the earth1 ,philistines from ,caphtor1 ,aram from ,qir1 as well as ,israel from ,egypt4 ,nay1 more2 according to those ,doxologies which either ,amos or a kindred spirit has added to his lofty argument1#aaa ,jehovah sways and orders the powers of the heavens3 ,orion and ,pleiades1 the clouds from the sea to the mountain peaks where they break1 day and night in constant procession4 ,it is in associations like these that the ,name is used1 either in its old form or slightly changed as ,jehovah ,god of hosts1 or the hosts2 and we cannot but feel that the hosts of ,jehovah are now looked upon as all the influences of earth and heaven--human armies1 stars and powers of nature1 which obey ,his word and work ,his will4 ,,footnotes3 #id ,the house of ,omri3 so even in ,sargon's time1 #gbb-gje4 #ie ,the ,black ,obelisk of ,salmanassar in the ,british ,museum1 on which the messengers of ,jehu are portrayed4 #if #b ,kings x4 #cb f42 xiii4 #c4 #ig #b ,kings xiii4 #ad ff4 #ih ,the phrase in #b ,kings xiii4 #e1 ,jehovah gave ,israel a saviour1 is interpreted by certain scholars as if the saviour were ,assyria4 ,in xiv4 #bg he is plainly said to be ,jeroboam4 #ii ,the entering in of ,hamath 7#b ,kings xiv4 #be74 #ajj ,salmanassar ,,ii4 in #hej1 #hdi1 #hdf to war against ,dad'idri of ,damascus1 and in #hdb and #hci against ,hazael1 his successor4 #aja ,see in this series ,isaiah1 ,vol4 ,i41 pp4 #cei ff4 #ajb ,see above1 pp4 #ce ff4 #ajc ,to use the term which ,amos adopts with such ironical force3 vi4 #ad4 #ajd ,when we get down among the details we shall see clear evidence for this fact1 for instance1 that ,amos prophesied against ,israel at a time when he thought that the ,lord's anger was to be exhausted in purely natural chastisements of ,his people1 and before it was revealed to him that ,assyria was required to follow up these chastisements with a heavier blow4 ,see ,chap4 ,,vi41 ,section #b4 #aje ,that is1 of course1 not the ,nile1 but the great ,wady1 at present known as the ,wady el ',arish1 which divides ,palestine from ,egypt4 #ajf ,so already in the ,,je narratives of the ,pentateuch4 #ajg ,lecky3 ,history of ,european ,morals1 ,i4 #ajh ,the present writer has already pointed out this with regard to ,egypt and ,phnicia in ,isaiah 7,expositor's ,bible ,series71 ,i41 ,chaps4 ,,xxii4 and ,,xxiii41 and with regard to ,philistia in ,hist4 ,geog41 p4 #agh4 #aji ,i put it this way only for the sake of making the logic clear2 for it is a mistake to say that the prophets at any time held merely theoretic convictions4 ,all their conviction was really experimental--never held apart from some illustration or proof of principle in actual history4 #aaj 3 #a ,sam4 i4 #c2 iv4 #d2 xvii4 #de1 where it is explained by the parallel phrase ,god of the armies of ,israel2 #b ,sam4 vi4 #b1 where it is connected with ,israel's battle emblem1 the ,ark 7cf4 ,jer4 xxii4 #ah72 and so throughout ,samuel and ,kings1 and also ,chronicles1 the ,psalms1 and most prophets4 ,the plural is never used in the ,old ,testament except of human hosts1 and generally of the armies or hosts of ,israel4 ,the theory therefore which sees the same meaning in the ,divine title is probably the correct one4 ,it was first put forward by ,herder 7,geist der ,eb4 ,poesie1 ii4 #hd1 #he71 and after some neglect it has been revived by ,kautzsch 7,z4 ,a4 ,t4 ,w41 vi4 ff47 and ,stade 7,gesch41 i4 #dcg1 n4 #c74 ,the alternatives are that the hosts originally meant those of heaven1 either the angels 7so1 among others1 ,ewald1 ,hist41 ,eng4 ,ed41 iii4 #fb7 or the stars 7so ,delitzsch1 ,kuenen1 ,baudissin1 ,cheyne1 ,prophecies of ,isaiah1 i4 #aa74 ,in the former of these two there is some force2 but the reason given for the latter1 that the name came to the front in ,israel when the people were being drawn into connection with star-worshipping nations1 especially ,aram1 seems to me baseless4 ,israel had not been long in touch with ,aram in ,saul's time1 yet even then the name is accepted as if one of much earlier origin4 ,a clear account of the argument on the other side to that taken in this note will be found in ,smend1 ,altiestamentliche ,religionsgeschichte1 pp4 #ahe ff4 #aaa ,see below1 ,chap4 ,,xi4 ,,amos ,towers in the distance1 like an earth-born ,atlas 444 such a man in such a historical position1 standing on the confines of light and darkness1 like day on the misty mountain-tops4 ,,chapter ,v ,,the ,,book ,,of ,,amos ,the genuineness of the bulk of the ,book of ,amos is not doubted by any critic4 ,the only passages suspected as interpolations are the three references to ,judah1 the three famous outbreaks in praise of the might of ,jehovah the ,creator1 the final prospect of a hope that does not gleam in any other part of the book1 with a few clauses alleged to reflect a stage of history later than that in which ,amos worked4#aab ,in all1 these verses amount to only twenty-six or twenty-seven out of one hundred and forty-six4 ,each of them can be discussed separately as we reach it1 and we may now pass to consider the general course of the prophecy which is independent of them4 ,the ,book of ,amos consists of ,three ,groups of ,oracles1 under one title1 which is evidently meant to cover them all4 ,the title runs as follows3-- ,words of ',amo--who was of the herdsmen of ,tea'--which he saw concerning ,israel in the days of ',uzziah king of ,judah1 and in the days of ,jarab'am son of ,joash1#aac king of ,israel3 two years before the earthquake4 ,the ,three ,sections1 with their contents1 are as follows3-- ,,first ,,section3 ,,chaps4 ,i41 ,,ii4 ,,the ,,heathen',s ,,crimes ,,and ,,israel',s4 ,a series of short oracles of the same form1 directed impartially against the political crimes of all the states of ,palestine1 and culminating in a more detailed denunciation of the social evils of ,israel1 whose doom is foretold1 beneath the same flood of war as shall overwhelm all her neighbours4 ,,second ,,section3 ,,chaps4 ,,iii4-,,vi4 ,,israel',s ,,crimes ,,and ,,doom4 ,a series of various oracles of denunciation1 which have no further logical connection than is supplied by a general sameness of subject1 and a perceptible increase of detail and articulateness from beginning to end of the section4 ,they are usually grouped according to the recurrence of the formula ,hear this word1 which stands at the head of our present chaps4 iii41 iv4 and v42 and by the two cries of ,woe at v4 #ah and vi4 #a4 ,but even more obvious than these commencements are the various climaxes to which they lead up4 ,these are all threats of judgment1 and each is more strenuous or explicit than the one that has preceded it4 ,they close with iii4 #ae1 iv4 #c1 iv4 #ab1 v4 #ag1 v4 #bg and vi4 #ad2 and according to them the oracles may be conveniently divided into six groups4 #a4 ,,iii4 #a-ae4 ,after the main theme of judgment is stated in #a1 #b1 we have in #c-h a parenthesis on the prophet's right to threaten doom2 after which #i-ae1 following directly on #b1 emphasise the social disorder1 threaten the land with invasion1 the people with extinction and the overthrow of their civilisation4 #b4 ,,iv4 #a-c1 beginning with the formula ,hear this word1 is directed against women and describes the siege of the capital and their captivity4 #c4 ,,iv4 #d-ab1 with no opening formula1 contrasts the people's vain propitiation of ,god by ritual with ,his treatment of them by various physical chastisements--drought1 blight and locusts1 pestilence1 earthquake--and summons them to prepare for another1 unnamed1 visitation4 ,jehovah ,god of ,hosts is ,his ,name4 #d4 ,v4 #a-ag1 beginning with the formula ,hear this word1 and a dirge over a vision of the nation's defeat1 attacks1 like the previous group1 the lavish ritual1 sets in contrast to it ,jehovah's demands for justice and civic purity2 and1 offering a reprieve if ,israel will repent1 closes with the prospect of an universal mourning 7vv4 #af1 #ag71 which1 though introduced by a therefore1 has no logical connection with what precedes it4 #e4 ,v4 #ah-bf is the first of the two groups that open with ,woe4 ,affirming that the eagerly expected ,day of ,jehovah will be darkness and disaster on disaster inevitable 7#ah-bj71 it again emphasises ,jehovah's desire for righteousness rather than worship 7#ba-bf71 and closes with the threat of captivity beyond ,damascus4 ,jehovah ,god of ,hosts is ,his ,name1 as at the close of #c4 #f4 ,,vi4 #a-ad4 ,the second ,woe1 on them that are at ease in ,zion 7#a1 #b73 a satire on the luxuries of the rich and their indifference to the national suffering 7#c-f73 captivity must come1 with the desolation of the land 7#i1 #aj72 and in a peroration the prophet reiterates a general downfall of the nation because of its perversity4 ,a ,nation--needless to name it6--will oppress ,israel from ,hamath to the ,river of the ,arabah4 ,,third ,,section3 ,,chaps4 ,,vii4-,,ix4 ,,visions ,,with ,,interludes4 ,the ,visions betray traces of development2 but they are interrupted by a piece of narrative and addresses on the same themes as chaps4 iii4-vi4 ,the ,,first ,,two ,,visions 7vii4 #a-f7 are of disasters--locusts and drought--in the realm of nature2 they are averted by prayer from ,amos4 ,the ,,third 7#g-i7 is in the sphere1 not of nature1 but history3 ,jehovah standing with a plumbline1 as if to show the nation's fabric to be utterly twisted1 announces that it shall be overthrown1 and that the dynasty of ,jeroboam must be put to the sword4 ,upon this mention of the king1 the first in the book1 there starts the narrative 7#aj-ag7 of how ,amaziah1 priest at ,bethel--obviously upon hearing the prophet's threat--sent word to ,jeroboam2 and then 7whether before or after getting a reply7 proceeded to silence ,amos1 who1 however1 reiterates his prediction of doom1 again described as captivity in a foreign land1 and adds a ,,fourth ,,vision 7viii4 #a-c71 of the aits or ,summer ,fruit1 which suggests ts1 or ,end of the ,nation4 ,here it would seem ,amos' discourses at ,bethel take end4 ,then comes viii4 #d-f1 another exposure of the sins of the rich2 followed by a triple pronouncement of doom 7#g71 again in the terms of physical calamities--earthquake 7#h71 eclipse 7#i1 #aj71 and famine 7#aa-ad71 in the last of which the public worship is again attacked4 ,a ,,fifth ,,vision1 of the ,lord by the ,altar commanding to smite 7ix4 #a71 is followed by a powerful threat of the hopelessness of escape from ,god's punishment 7ix4 #a;b-#d72 the third of the great apostrophes to the might of ,jehovah 7#e1 #f72 another statement of the equality in judgment of ,israel with other peoples1 and of their utter destruction 7#g-h;a74 ,then 7#h;b7 we meet the first qualification of the hitherto unrelieved sentence of death4 ,captivity is described1 not as doom1 but as discipline 7#i73 the sinners of the people1 scoffers at doom1 shall die 7#aj74 ,and this seems to leave room for two final oracles of restoration and glory1 the only two in the book1 which are couched in the exact terms of the promises of later prophecy 7#aa-ae7 and are by many denied to ,amos4 ,such is the course of the prophesying of ,amos4 ,to have traced it must have made clear to us the unity of his book1#aad as well as the character of the period to which he belonged4 ,but it also furnishes us with a good deal of evidence towards the answer of such necessary questions as these--whether we can fix an exact date for the whole or any part1 and whether we can trace any logical or historical development through the chapters1 either as these now stand1 or in some such re-arrangement as we saw to be necessary for the authentic prophecies of ,isaiah4 ,let us take first the simplest of these tasks--to ascertain the general period of the book4 ,twice--by the title and by the portion of narrative#aae--we are pointed to the reign of ,jeroboam ,,ii41 circa #ghc-gdc2 other historical allusions suit the same years4 ,the principalities of ,palestine are all standing1 except ,gath2#aaf but the great northern cloud which carries their doom has risen and is ready to burst4 ,now ,assyria1 we have seen1 had become fatal to ,palestine as early as #hed4 ,infrequent invasions of ,syria had followed1 in one of which1 in #hjc1 ,rimmon ,nirari ,,iii4 had subjected ,tyre and ,sidon1 besieged ,damascus1 and received tribute from ,israel4 ,so far then as the ,assyrian data are concerned1 the ,book of ,amos might have been written early in the reign of ,jeroboam4 ,even then was the storm lowering as he describes it4 ,even then had the lightning broken over ,damascus4 ,there are other symptoms1 however1 which demand a later date4 ,they seem to imply1 not only ,uzziah's overthrow of ,gath1#aag and ,jeroboam's conquest of ,moab#aah and of ,aram1#aai but that establishment of ,israel's political influence from ,lebanon to the ,dead ,sea1 which must have taken ,jeroboam several years to accomplish4 ,with this agree other features of the prophecy--the sense of political security in ,israel1 the large increase of wealth1 the ample and luxurious buildings1 the gorgeous ritual1 the easy ability to recover from physical calamities1 the consequent carelessness and pride of the upper classes4 ,all these things imply that the last ,syrian invasions of ,israel in the beginning of the century were at least a generation behind the men into whose careless faces the prophet hurled his words of doom4 ,during this interval ,assyria had again advanced--in #gge1 in #ggc and in #ggb4abj ,none of these expeditions1 however1 had come south of ,damascus1 and this1 their invariable arrest at some distance from the proper territory of ,israel1 may have further flattered the people's sense of security1 though probably the truth was that ,jeroboam1 like some of his predecessors1 bought his peace by tribute to the emperor4 ,in #gfe1 when the ,assyrians for the second time invaded ,hadrach1 in the neighbourhood of ,damascus1 their records mention a pestilence1 which1 both because their armies were then in ,syria1 and because the plague generally spreads over the whole of ,western ,asia1 may well have been the pestilence mentioned by ,amos4 ,in #gfc a total eclipse of the sun took place1 and is perhaps implied by the ninth verse of his eighth chapter4 ,if this double allusion to pestilence and eclipse be correct1 it brings the book down to the middle of the century and the latter half of ,jeroboam's long reign4 ,in #gee the ,assyrians came back to ,hadrach2 in #ged to ,arpad3 with these exceptions ,syria was untroubled by them till after #gde4 ,it was probably these quiet years in which ,amos found ,israel at ease in ,zion4#aba ,if we went down further1 within the more forward policy of ,tiglath-,pileser1 who ascended the throne in #gde and besieged ,arpad from #gdc to #gdj1 we should find an occasion for the urgency with which ,amos warns ,israel that the invasion of her land and the overthrow of the dynasty of ,jeroboam will be immediate4#abb ,but ,amos might have spoken as urgently even before ,tiglath-,pileser's accession2 and the probability that ,hosea1 who prophesied within ,jeroboam's reign1 quotes from ,amos seems to imply that the prophecies of the latter had been current for some time4 ,towards the middle of the eighth century--is1 therefore1 the most definite date to which we are able to assign the ,book of ,amos4 ,at so great a distance the difference of a few unmarked years is invisible4 ,it is enough that we know the moral dates--the state of national feeling1 the personages alive1 the great events which are behind the prophet1 and the still greater which are imminent4 ,we can see that ,amos wrote in the political pride of the latter years of ,jeroboam's reign1 after the pestilence and eclipse of the sixties1 and before the advance of ,tiglath-,pileser in the last forties1 of the eighth century4 ,a particular year is indeed offered by the title of the book1 which1 if not by ,amos himself1 must be from only a few years later3#abc ,words of ,amos1 which he saw in the days of ,uzziah and of ,jeroboam1 two years before the earthquake4 ,this was the great earthquake of which other prophets speak as having happened in the days of ,uzziah4#abd ,but we do not know where to place the year of the earthquake1 and are as far as ever from a definite date4 ,the mention of the earthquake1 however1 introduces us to the answer of another of our questions--whether1 with all its unity1 the ,book of ,amos reveals any lines of progress1 either of event or of idea1 either historical or logical4 ,granting the truth of the title1 that ,amos had his prophetic eyes opened two years before the earthquake1 it will be a sign of historical progress if we find in the book itself any allusions to the earthquake4 ,now these are present4 ,in the first division we find none1 unless the threat of ,god's visitation in the form of a shaking of the land be considered as a tremor communicated to the prophet's mind from the recent upheaval4 ,but in the second division there is an obvious reference3 the last of the unavailing chastisements1 with which ,jehovah has chastised ,his people1 is described as a great overturning4#abe ,and in the third division1 in two passages1 the judgment1 which ,amos has already stated will fall in the form of an invasion1 is also figured in the terms of an earthquake4 ,nor does this exhaust the tremors which that awful convulsion had started2 but throughout the second and third divisions there is a constant sense of instability1 of the liftableness and breakableness of the very ground of life4 ,of course1 as we shall see1 this was due to the prophet's knowledge of the moral explosiveness of society in ,israel2 but he could hardly have described the results of that in the terms he has used1 unless himself and his hearers had recently felt the ground quake under them1 and seen whole cities topple over4 ,if1 then1 ,amos began to prophesy two years before the earthquake1 the bulk of his book was spoken1 or at least written down1 after the earthquake had left all ,israel trembling4#abf ,this proof of progress in the book is confirmed by another feature4 ,in the abstract given above it is easy to see that the judgments of the ,lord upon ,israel were of a twofold character4 ,some were physical--famine1 drought1 blight1 locusts1 earthquake2 and some were political--battle1 defeat1 invasion1 captivity4 ,now it is significant--and ,i do not think the point has been previously remarked--that not only are the physical represented as happening first1 but that at one time the prophet seems to have understood that no others would be needed1 that indeed ,god did not reveal to him the imminence of political disaster till ,he had exhausted the discipline of physical calamities4 ,for this we have double evidence4 ,in chapter iv4 ,amos reports that the ,lord has sought to rouse ,israel out of the moral lethargy into which their religious services have soothed them1 by withholding bread and water2 by blighting their orchards2 by a pestilence1 a thoroughly ,egyptian one2 and by an earthquake4 ,but these having failed to produce repentance1 ,god must visit the people once more3 how1 the prophet does not say1 leaving the imminent terror unnamed1 but we know that the ,assyrian overthrow is meant4 ,now precisely parallel to this is the course of the ,visions in chapter vii4 ,the ,lord caused ,amos to see 7whether in fancy or in fact we need not now stop to consider7 the plague of locusts4 ,it was so bad as to threaten ,israel with destruction4 ,but ,amos interceded1 and ,god answered1 ,it shall not be4 ,similarly with a plague of drought4 ,but then the ,vision shifts from the realm of nature to that of politics4 ,the ,lord sets the plumbline to the fabric of ,israel's life3 this is found hopelessly bent and unstable4 ,it must be pulled down1 and the pulling down shall be political3 the family of ,jeroboam is to be slain1 the people are to go into captivity4 ,the next ,vision1 therefore1 is of the ,end--the ,final ,judgment of war and defeat1 which is followed only by ,silence4 ,thus1 by a double proof1 we see not only that the ,divine method in that age was to act first by physical chastisement1 and only then by an inevitable1 ultimate doom of war and captivity2 but that the experience of ,amos himself1 his own intercourse with the ,lord1 passed through these two stages4 ,the significance of this for the picture of the prophet's life we shall see in our next chapter4 ,here we are concerned to ask whether it gives us any clue as to the extant arrangement of his prophecies1 or any justification for re-arranging them1 as the prophecies of ,isaiah have to be re-arranged1 according to the various stages of historical development at which they were uttered4 ,we have just seen that the progress from the physical chastisements to the political doom is reflected in both the last two sections of the book4 ,but the same gradual1 cumulative method is attributed to the ,divine ,providence by the ,first ,section3 for three transgressions1 yea1 for four1 ,i will not turn it back2 and then follow the same disasters of war and captivity as are threatened in ,sections ,,ii4 and ,,iii4 ,but each section does not only thus end similarly2 each also begins with the record of an immediate impression made on the prophet by ,jehovah 7chaps4 i4 #b2 iii4 #c-h2 vii4 #a-i74 ,to sum up3--,the ,book of ,amos consists of three sections1#abg which seem to have received their present form towards the end of ,jeroboam's reign2 and which1 after emphasising their origin as due to the immediate influence of ,jehovah ,himself on the prophet1 follow pretty much the same course of the ,divine dealings with that generation of ,israel--a course which began with physical chastisements1 that failed to produce repentance1 and ended with the irrevocable threat of the ,assyrian invasion4 ,each section1 that is to say1 starts from the same point1 follows much the same direction1 and arrives at exactly the same conclusion4 ,chronologically you cannot put one of them before the other2 but from each it is possible to learn the stages of experience through which ,amos himself passed--to discover how ,god taught the prophet1 not only by the original intuitions from which all prophecy starts1 but by the gradual events of his day both at home and abroad4 ,this decides our plan for us4 ,we shall first trace the life and experience of ,amos1 as his book enables us to do2 and then we shall examine1 in the order in which they lie1 the three parallel forms in which1 when he was silenced at ,bethel1 he collected the fruits of that experience1 and gave them their final expression4 99 99 99 99 99 ,the style of the book is simple and terse4 ,the fixity of the prophet's aim--upon a few moral principles and the doom they demand--keeps his sentences firm and sharp1 and sends his paragraphs rapidly to their climax4 ,that he sees nature only under moral light renders his poetry austere and occasionally savage4 ,his language is very pure4 ,there is no ground for ,jerome's charge that he was imperitus sermone3 we shall have to notice only a few irregularities in spelling1 due perhaps to the dialect of the deserts in which he passed his life4#abh ,the text of the book is for the most part well-preserved2 but there are a number of evident corruptions4 ,of the ,greek ,version the same holds good as we have said in more detail of the ,greek of ,hosea4#abi ,it is sometimes correct where the ,hebrew text is not1 sometimes suggestive of the emendations required1 and sometimes hopelessly astray4 ,,footnotes3 #aab ,the full list of suspected passages is this3 7#a7 ,references to ,judah--ii4 #d1 #e2 vi4 #a1 in ,zion2 ix4 #aa1 #ab4 7#b7 ,the three ,outbreaks of ,praise--iv4 #ac2 v4 #h1 #i2 ix4 #e1 #f4 7#c7 ,the ,final ,hope--ix4 #h-ae1 including vv4 #aa1 #ab1 already mentioned4 7#d7 ,clauses alleged to reflect a later stage of history--i4 #i-ab2 v4 #a1 #b1 #ae2 vi4 #b1 #ad4 7#e7 ,suspected for incompatibility--viii4 #aa-ac4 #aac ,so designated to distinguish him from the first ,jeroboam1 the son of ,nebat4 #aad ,apart from the suspected parentheses already mentioned4 #aae ,chap4 vii4 #aaf ,and1 if vi4 #b be genuine1 ,hamath4 #aag #b ,chron4 xxvi4 #f4 ,in the list of the ,philistine cities1 ,amos i4 #f-h1 ,gath does not occur1 and in harmony with this in vi4 #b it is said to be overthrown2 see pp4 #agc f4 #aah #b ,kings4 ,in ,amos ii4 #c the ruler of ,moab is called1 not king1 but 1 or regent1 such as ,jeroboam substituted for the king of ,moab4 #aai ,according to ,grtz's emendation of vi4 #ac3 we have taken ,lo-,debar and ,karnaim4 ,perhaps too in iii4 #ab1 though the verse is very obscure1 some settlement of ,israelites in ,damascus is implied4 ,for ,jeroboam's conquest of ,aram 7#b ,kings xiv4 #bh71 see p4 #agg4 #abj ,in #gge to ,erini1 the country of the cedars--that is1 ,mount ,amanus1 near the ,gulf of ,antioch2 in #ggc to ,damascus2 in #ggb to ,hadrach4 #aba vi4 #a4 #abb vii4 #i4 #abc ,even ,knig denies that the title is from ,amos 7,einleitung1 #cjg72 yet the ground on which he does so1 the awkwardness of the double relative1 does not appear sufficient4 ,one does not write a title in the same style as an ordinary sentence4 #abd ,zech4 xiv4 #e1 and probably ,isa4 ix4 #i1 #aj 7,eng474 #abe iv4 #aa4 #abf ,of course it is always possible to suspect--and let us by all means exhaust the possibilities of suspicion--that the title has been added by a scribe1 who interpreted the forebodings of judgment which ,amos expresses in the terms of earthquake as if they were the predictions of a real earthquake1 and was anxious to show1 by inserting the title1 how they were fulfilled in the great convulsion of ,uzziah's days4 ,but to such a suspicion we have a complete answer4 ,no later scribe1 who understood the book he was dealing with1 would have prefixed to it a title1 with the motive just suspected1 when in chap4 iv4 he read that an earthquake had just taken place4 ,the very fact that such a title appears over a book1 which speaks of the earthquake as past1 surely attests the bona fides of the title4 ,with that mention in chap4 iv4 of the earthquake as past1 none would have ventured to say that ,amos began to prophesy before the earthquake unless they had known this to be the case4 #abg ,except for the later additions1 not by ,amos1 to be afterwards noted4 #abh ,cf4 ii4 #ac2 v4 #aa42 vi4 #h1 #aj2 vii4 #i1 #af2 viii4 #h 7874 #abi ,see below1 p4 #bba4 ,,chapter ,,vi ,,the ,,man ,,and ,,the ,,prophet ,the ,book of ,amos opens one of the greatest stages in the religious development of mankind4 ,its originality is due to a few simple ideas1 which it propels into religion with an almost unrelieved abruptness4 ,but1 like all ideas which ever broke upon the world1 these also have flesh and blood behind them4 ,like every other ,reformation1 this one in ,israel began with the conscience and the protest of an individual4 ,our review of the book has made this plain4 ,we have found in it1 not only a personal adventure of a heroic kind1 but a progressive series of visions1 with some other proofs of a development both of facts and ideas4 ,in short1 behind the book there beats a life1 and our first duty is to attempt to trace its spiritual history4 ,the attempt is worth the greatest care4 ,amos1 says a very critical writer1#acj is one of the most wonderful appearances in the history of the human spirit4 #a4 ,,the ,,man ,,and ,,his ,,discipline4 ,,amos i4 #a2 iii4 #c-h2 vii4 #ad1 #ae4 ,when charged at the crisis of his career with being but a hireling-prophet1 ,amos disclaimed the official name and took his stand upon his work as a man3 ,no prophet ,i1 nor prophet's son1 but a herdsman and a dresser of sycomores4 ,jehovah took me from behind the flock4#aca ,we shall enhance our appreciation of this manhood1 and of the new order of prophecy which it asserted1 if we look for a little at the soil on which it was so bravely nourished4 ,six miles south from ,bethlehem1 as ,bethlehem is six from ,jerusalem1 there rises on the edge of the ,judan plateau1 towards the desert1 a commanding hill1 the ruins on which are still known by the name of ,tea'4#acb ,in the time of ,amos ,tekoa was a place without sanctity and almost without tradition4 ,the name suggests that the site may at first have been that of a camp4 ,its fortification by ,rehoboam1 and the mission of its wise woman to ,david1 are its only previous appearances in history4 ,nor had nature been less grudging to it than fame4 ,the men of ,tekoa looked out upon a desolate and haggard world4 ,south1 west and north the view is barred by a range of limestone hills1 on one of which directly north the grey towers of ,jerusalem are hardly to be discerned from the grey mountain lines4 ,eastward the prospect is still more desolate1 but it is open2 the land slopes away for nearly eighteen miles to a depth of four thousand feet4 ,of this long descent1 the first step1 lying immediately below the hill of ,tekoa1 is a shelf of stony moorland with the ruins of vineyards4 ,it is the lowest ledge of the settled life of ,juda4 ,the eastern edge drops suddenly by broken rocks to slopes spotted with bushes of retem1 the broom of the desert1 and with patches of poor wheat4 ,from the foot of the slopes the land rolls away in a maze of low hills and shallow dales1 that flush green in spring1 but for the rest of the year are brown with withered grass and scrub4 ,this is the ,wilderness or ,pastureland of ,tekoa1#acc across which by night the wild beasts howl1 and by day the blackened sites of deserted camps1 with the loose cairns that mark the nomads' graves1 reveal a human life almost as vagabond and nameless as that of the beasts4 ,beyond the rolling land is ,jeshimon1 or ,devastation--a chaos of hills1 none of whose ragged crests are tossed as high as the shelf of ,tekoa1 while their flanks shudder down some further thousands of feet1 by crumbling precipices and corries choked with debris1 to the coast of the ,dead ,sea4 ,the northern half of this is visible1 bright blue against the red wall of ,moab1 and the level top of the wall1 broken only by the valley of the ,arnon1 constitutes the horizon4 ,except for the blue water--which shines in its gap between the torn hills like a bit of sky through rifted clouds--it is a very dreary world4 ,yet the sun breaks over it1 perhaps all the more gloriously2 mists1 rising from the sea simmering in its great vat1 drape the nakedness of the desert noon2 and through the dry desert night the planets ride with a majesty they cannot assume in our more troubled atmospheres4 ,it is also a very empty and a very silent world1 yet every stir of life upon it excites1 therefore1 the greater vigilance1 and man's faculties1 relieved from the rush and confusion of events1 form the instinct of marking1 and reflecting upon1 every single phenomenon4 ,and it is a very savage world4 ,across it all1 the towers of ,jerusalem give the only signal of the spirit1 the one token that man has a history4 ,upon this unmitigated wilderness1 where life is reduced to poverty and danger2 where nature starves the imagination1 but excites the faculties of perception and curiosity2 with the mountain tops and the sunrise in his face1 but above all with ,jerusalem so near1--,amos did the work which made him a man1 heard the voice of ,god calling him to be a prophet1 and gathered those symbols and figures in which his prophet's message still reaches us with so fresh and so austere an air4 ,amos was among the shepherds of ,tekoa4 ,the word for shepherd is unusual1 and means the herdsman of a peculiar breed of desert sheep1 still under the same name prized in ,arabia for the excellence of their wool4#acd ,and he was a dresser of sycomores4 ,the tree1 which is not our sycamore1 is very easily grown in sandy soil with a little water4 ,it reaches a great height and mass of foliage4 ,the fruit is like a small fig1 with a sweet but watery taste1 and is eaten only by the poor4 ,born not of the fresh twigs1 but of the trunk and older branches1 the sluggish lumps are provoked to ripen by pinching or bruising1 which seems to be the literal meaning of the term that ,amos uses of himself--a pincher of sycomores4#ace ,the sycomore does not grow at so high a level as ,tekoa2#acf and this fact1 taken along with the limitation of the ministry of ,amos to the ,northern ,kingdom1 has been held to prove that he was originally an ,ephraimite1 a sycomore-dresser1 who had migrated and settled down1 as the peculiar phrase of the title says1 among the shepherds of ,tekoa4#acg ,we shall presently see1 however1 that his familiarity with life in ,northern ,israel may easily have been won in other ways than through citizenship in that kingdom2 while the very general nature of the definition1 among the shepherds of ,tekoa1 does not oblige us to place either him or his sycomores so high as the village itself4 ,the most easterly township of ,juda1 ,tekoa commanded the whole of the wilderness beyond1 to which indeed it gave its name1 the wilderness of ,tekoa4 ,the shepherds of ,tekoa were therefore1 in all probability1 scattered across the whole region down to the oases on the coast of the ,dead ,sea1 which have generally been owned by one or other of the settled communities in the hill-country above1 and may at that time have belonged to ,tekoa1 just as in ,crusading times they belonged to the monks of ,hebron1 or are to-day cultivated by the ,rushaideh ,arabs1 who pitch their camps not far from ,tekoa itself4 ,as you will still find everywhere on the borders of the ,syrian desert shepherds nourishing a few fruit-trees round the chief well of their pasture1 in order to vary their milk diet1 so in some low oasis in the wilderness of ,juda ,amos cultivated the poorest1 but the most easily grown of fruits1 the sycomore4#ach ,all this pushes ,amos and his dwarf sheep deeper into the desert1 and emphasises what has been said above1 and still remains to be illustrated1 of the desert's influence on his discipline as a man and on his speech as a prophet4 ,we ought to remember that in the same desert another prophet was bred1 who was also the pioneer of a new dispensation1 and whose ministry1 both in its strength and its limitations1 is much recalled by the ministry of ,amos4 ,john the son of ,zacharias grew and waxed strong in spirit1 and was in the deserts till the day of his showing unto ,israel4#aci ,here1 too1 our ,lord was with the wild beasts4#adj ,how much ,amos had been with them may be seen from many of his metaphors4 ,the lion roareth1 who shall not fear8444 ,as when the shepherd rescueth from the mouth of the lion two shin-bones or a bit of an ear4444 ,it shall be as when one is fleeing from a lion1 and a bear cometh upon him2 and he entereth a house1 and leaneth his hand on the wall1 and a serpent biteth him4 ,as a wool-grower1 however1 ,amos must have had his yearly journeys among the markets of the land2 and to such were probably due his opportunities of familiarity with ,northern ,israel1 the originals of his vivid pictures of her town-life1 her commerce and the worship at her great sanctuaries4 ,one hour westward from ,tekoa would bring him to the high-road between ,hebron and the ,north1 with its troops of pilgrims passing to ,beersheba4#ada ,it was but half-an-hour more to the watershed and an open view of the ,philistine plain4 ,bethlehem was only six1 ,jerusalem twelve miles from ,tekoa4 ,ten miles farther1 across the border of ,israel1 lay ,bethel with its temple1 seven miles farther ,gilgal1 and twenty miles farther still ,samaria the capital1 in all but two days' journey from ,tekoa4 ,these had markets as well as shrines2#adb their annual festivals would be also great fairs4 ,it is certain that ,amos visited them2 it is even possible that he went to ,damascus1 in which the ,israelites had at the time their own quarters for trading4 ,by road and market he would meet with men of other lands4 ,phnician pedlars1 or ,canaanites as they were called1 came up to buy the homespun for which the housewives of ,israel were famed#adc--;hard-faced men who were also willing to purchase slaves1 and haunted even the battle-fields of their neighbours for this sinister purpose4 ,men of ,moab1 at the time subject to ,israel2 ,aramean hostages2 ,philistines who held the export trade to ,egypt1--these ,amos must have met and may have talked with2 their dialects scarcely differed from his own4 ,it is no distant1 desert echo of life which we hear in his pages1 but the thick and noisy rumour of caravan and market-place3 how the plague was marching up from ,egypt2#add ugly stories of the ,phnician slave-trade2#ade rumours of the advance of the awful ,power1 which men were hardly yet accustomed to name1 but which had already twice broken from the ,north upon ,damascus4 ,or it was the progress of some national mourning--how lamentation sprang up in the capital1 rolled along the highways1 and was re-echoed from the husbandmen and vinedressers on the hillsides4#adf ,or1 at closer quarters1 we see and hear the bustle of the great festivals and fairs--the solemn assemblies1 the reeking holocausts1 the noise of songs and viols2#adg the brutish religious zeal kindling into drunkenness and lust on the very steps of the altar2#adh the embezzlement of pledges by the priests1 the covetous restlessness of the traders1 their false measures1 their entanglement of the poor in debt2#adi the careless luxury of the rich1 their banquets1 buckets of wine1 ivory couches1 pretentious1 preposterous music4#aej ,these things are described as by an eyewitness4 ,amos was not a citizen of the ,northern ,kingdom1 to which he almost exclusively refers2 but it was because he went up and down in it1 using those eyes which the desert air had sharpened1 that he so thoroughly learned the wickedness of its people1 the corruption of ,israel's life in every rank and class of society4#aea ,but the convictions which he applied to this life ,amos learned at home4 ,they came to him over the desert1 and without further material signal than was flashed to ,tekoa from the towers of ,jerusalem4 ,this is placed beyond doubt by the figures in which he describes his call from ,jehovah4 ,contrast his story1 so far as he reveals it1 with that of another4 ,some twenty years later1 ,isaiah of ,jerusalem saw the ,lord in the ,temple1 high and lifted up1 and all the inaugural vision of this greatest of the prophets was conceived in the figures of the ,temple--the altar1 the smoke1 the burning coals4 ,but to his predecessor among the shepherds of ,tekoa1 although revelation also starts from ,jerusalem1 it reaches him1 not in the sacraments of her sanctuary1 but across the bare pastures1 and as it were in the roar of a lion4 ,jehovah from ,zion roareth1 and uttereth ,his voice from ,jerusalem4#aeb ,we read of no formal process of consecration for this first of the prophets4 ,through his clear desert air1 the word of ,god breaks upon him without medium or sacrament4 ,and the native vigilance of the man is startled1 is convinced by it1 beyond all argument or question4 ,the lion hath roared1 who shall not fear8 ,jehovah hath spoken1 who can but prophesy8 ,these words are taken from a passage in which ,amos illustrates prophecy from other instances of his shepherd life4 ,we have seen what a school of vigilance the desert is4 ,upon the bare surface all that stirs is ominous4 ,every shadow1 every noise--the shepherd must know what is behind and be warned4 ,such a vigilance ,amos would have ,israel apply to his own message1 and to the events of their history4 ,both of these he compares to certain facts of desert life1 behind which his shepherdly instincts have taught him to feel an ominous cause4 ,do two men walk together except they have trysted8--except they have made an appointment4 ,hardly in the desert1 for there men meet and take the same road by chance as seldom as ships at sea4 ,doth a lion roar in the jungle and have no prey1 or a young lion let out his voice in his den except he be taking something8 ,the hunting lion is silent till his quarry be in sight2 when the lonely shepherd hears the roar across the desert1 he knows the lion leaps upon his prey1 and he shudders as ,israel ought to do when they hear ,god's voice by the prophet1 for this also is never loosened but for some grim fact1 some leap of doom4 ,or doth a little bird fall on the snare earthwards and there be no noose upon her8 ,the reading may be doubtful1 but the meaning is obvious3 no one ever saw a bird pulled roughly down to earth when it tried to fly away without knowing there was the loop of a snare about her4 ,or does the snare itself rise up from the ground1 except indeed it be capturing something8--except there be in the trap or net something to flutter1 struggle and so lift it up4 ,traps do not move without life in them4 ,or is the alarum trumpet#aec blown in a city--for instance1 in high ,tekoa up there1 when some ,arab raid sweeps from the desert on to the fields--and do the people not tremble8 ,or shall calamity happen in a city and ,jehovah not have done it8 ,yea1 the ,lord ,jehovah doeth nothing but ,he has revealed ,his purpose to ,his servants the prophets4 ,my voice of warning and these events of evil in your midst have the same cause--,jehovah--behind them4 ,the lion hath roared1 who shall not fear8 ,jehovah hath spoken1 who can but prophesy8#aed ,we cannot miss the personal note which rings through this triumph in the reality of things unseen4 ,not only does it proclaim a man of sincerity and conviction3 it is resonant with the discipline by which that conviction was won--were won1 too1 the freedom from illusion and the power of looking at facts in the face1 which ,amos alone of his contemporaries possessed4 ,st4 ,bernard has described the first stage of the ,vision of ,god as the ,vision ,distributive1 in which the eager mind distributes her attention upon common things and common duties in themselves4 ,it was in this elementary school that the earliest of the new prophets passed his apprenticeship and received his gifts4 ,others excel ,amos in the powers of the imagination and the intellect4 ,but by the incorrupt habits of his shepherd's life1 by daily wakefulness to its alarms and daily faithfulness to its opportunities1 he was trained in that simple power of appreciating facts and causes1 which1 applied to the great phenomena of the spirit and of history1 forms his distinction among his peers4 ,in this we find perhaps the reason why he records of himself no solemn hour of cleansing and initiation4 ,jehovah took me from following the flock1 and ,jehovah said unto me1 ,go1 prophesy unto ,my people ,israel4 ,amos was of them of whom it is written1 ,blessed are those servants whom the ,lord when ,he cometh shall find watching4 ,through all his hard life1 this shepherd had kept his mind open and his conscience quick1 so that when the word of ,god came to him he knew it1 as fast as he knew the roar of the lion across the moor4 ,certainly there is no habit1 which1 so much as this of watching facts with a single eye and a responsible mind1 is indispensable alike in the humblest duties and in the highest speculations of life4 ,when ,amos gives those nave illustrations of how real the voice of ,god is to him1 we receive them as the tokens of a man1 honest and awake4 ,little wonder that he refuses to be reckoned among the professional prophets of his day1 who found their inspiration in excitement and trance4 ,upon him the impulses of the ,deity come in no artificial and morbid ecstasy1 removed as far as possible from real life4 ,they come upon him1 as it were1 in the open air4 ,they appeal to the senses of his healthy and expert manhood4 ,they convince him of their reality with the same force as do the most startling events of his lonely shepherd watches4 ,the lion hath roared1 who shall not fear8 ,jehovah hath spoken1 who can but prophesy8 ,the influence of the same discipline is still visible when ,amos passes from the facts of his own consciousness to the facts of his people's life4 ,his day in ,israel sweltered with optimism4 ,the glare of wealth1 the fulsome love of country1 the rank incense of a religion that was without morality--these thickened all the air1 and neither the people nor their rulers had any vision4 ,but ,amos carried with him his clear desert atmosphere and his desert eyes4 ,he saw the raw facts3 the poverty1 the cruel negligence of the rich1 the injustice of the rulers1 the immorality of the priests4 ,the meaning of these things he questioned with as much persistence as he questioned every suspicious sound or sight upon those pastures of ,tekoa4 ,he had no illusions3 he knew a mirage when he saw one4 ,neither the military pride of the people1 fostered by recent successes over ,syria1 nor the dogmas of their religion1 which asserted ,jehovah's swift triumph upon the heathen1 could prevent him from knowing that the immorality of ,israel meant ,israel's political downfall4 ,he was one of those recruits from common life1 by whom religion and the state have at all times been reformed4 ,springing from the laity and very often from among the working classes1 their freedom from dogmas and routine1 as well as from the compromising interests of wealth1 rank and party1 renders them experts in life to a degree that almost no professional priest1 statesman or journalist1 however honest or sympathetic1 can hope to rival4 ,into politics they bring facts1 but into religion they bring vision4 ,it is of the utmost significance that this reformer1 this founder of the highest order of prophecy in ,israel1 should not only thus begin with facts1 but to the very end be occupied with almost nothing else1 than the vision and record of them4 ,in ,amos there is but one prospect of the ,ideal4 ,it does not break till the close of his book1 and then in such contrast to the plain and final indictments1 which constitute nearly all the rest of his prophesying1 that many have not unnaturally denied to him the verses which contain it4 ,throughout the other chapters we have but the exposure of present facts1 material and moral1 nor the sight of any future more distant than to-morrow and the immediate consequences of to-day's deeds4 ,let us mark this4 ,the new prophecy which ,amos started in ,israel reached ,divine heights of hope1 unfolded infinite powers of moral and political regeneration--dared to blot out all the past1 dared to believe all things possible in the future4 ,but it started from the truth about the moral situation of the present4 ,its first prophet not only denied every popular dogma and ideal1 but appears not to have substituted for them any others4 ,he spent his gifts of vision on the discovery and appreciation of facts4 ,now this is necessary1 not only in great reformations of religion1 but at almost every stage in her development4 ,we are constantly disposed to abuse even the most just and necessary of religious ideals as substitutes for experience or as escapes from duty1 and to boast about the future before we have understood or mastered the present4 ,hence the need of realists like ,amos4 ,though they are destitute of dogma1 of comfort1 of hope1 of the ideal1 let us not doubt that they also stand in the succession of the prophets of the ,lord4 ,nay1 this is a stage of prophecy on which may be fulfilled the prayer of ,moses3 ,would to ,god that all the ,lord's people were prophets6 ,to see the truth and tell it1 to be accurate and brave about the moral facts of our day--to this extent the ,vision and the ,voice are possible for every one of us4 ,never for us may the doors of heaven open1 as they did for him who stood on the threshold of the earthly temple1 and he saw the ,lord enthroned1 while the ,seraphim of the ,presence sang the glory4 ,never for us may the skies fill with that tempest of life which ,ezekiel beheld from ,shinar1 and above it the sapphire throne1 and on the throne the likeness of a man1 the likeness of the glory of the ,lord4 ,yet let us remember that to see facts as they are and to tell the truth about them--this also is prophecy4 ,we may inhabit a sphere which does not prompt the imagination1 but is as destitute of the historic and traditional as was the wilderness of ,tekoa4 ,all the more may our unglamoured eyes be true to the facts about us4 ,every common day leads forth her duties as shining as every night leads forth her stars4 ,the deeds and the fortunes of men are in our sight1 and spell1 to all who will honestly read1 the very ,word of the ,lord4 ,if only we be loyal1 then by him who made the rude sounds and sights of the desert his sacraments1 and whose vigilance of things seen and temporal became the vision of things unseen and eternal1 we also shall see ,god1 and be sure of ,his ways with men4 ,before we pass from the desert discipline of the prophet1 we must notice one of its effects1 which1 while it greatly enhanced the clearness of his vision1 undoubtedly disabled ,amos for the highest prophetic rank4 ,he who lives in the desert lives without patriotism--detached and aloof4 ,he may see the throng of men more clearly than those who move among it4 ,he cannot possibly so much feel for them4 ,unlike ,hosea1 ,isaiah and ,jeremiah1 ,amos was not a citizen of the kingdom against which he prophesied1 and indeed no proper citizen of any kingdom1 but a nomad herdsman1 hovering on the desert borders of ,juda4 ,he saw ,israel from the outside4 ,his message to her is achieved with scarcely one sob in his voice4 ,for the sake of the poor and the oppressed among the people he is indignant4 ,but with the erring1 staggering nation as a whole he has no real sympathy4 ,his pity for her is exhausted in one elegy and two brief intercessions2 hardly more than once does he even call her to repentance4 ,his sense of justice1 in fact1 had almost never to contend with his love4 ,this made ,amos the better witness1 but the worse prophet4 ,he did not rise so high as his great successors1 because he did not so feel himself one with the people whom he was forced to condemn1 because he did not bear their fate as his own nor travail for their new birth4 ,ihm fehlt die ,liebe4 ,love is the element lacking in his prophecy2 and therefore the words are true of him1 which were uttered of his great follower across this same wilderness of ,juda1 that mighty as were his voice and his message to prepare the way of the ,lord1 yet the least in the ,kingdom of ,heaven is greater than he4 #b4 ,,the ,,word ,,and ,,its ,,origins4 ,,amos i4 #b2 iii4 #c-h2 and passim4 ,we have seen the preparation of the ,man for the ,word4 ,we are now to ask1 ,whence came the ,word to the ,man8--the ,word that made him a prophet4 ,what were its sources and sanctions outside himself8 ,these involve other questions4 ,how much of his message did ,amos inherit from the previous religion of his people8 ,and how much did he teach for the first time in ,israel8 ,and again1 how much of this new element did he owe to the great events of his day8 ,and how much demands some other source of inspiration8 ,to all these inquiries1 outlines of the answers ought by this time to have become visible4 ,we have seen that the contents of the ,book of ,amos consist almost entirely of two kinds3 facts1 actual or imminent1 in the history of his people2 and certain moral principles of the most elementary order4 ,amos appeals to no dogma nor form of law1 nor to any religious or national institution4 ,still more remarkably1 he does not rely upon miracle nor any so-called supernatural sign4 ,to employ the terms of ,mazzini's famous formula1 ,amos draws his materials solely from conscience and history4 ,within himself he hears certain moral principles speak in the voice of ,god1 and certain events of his day he recognises as the judicial acts of ,god4 ,the principles condemn the living generation of ,israel as morally corrupt2 the events threaten the people with political extinction4 ,from this agreement between inward conviction and outward event ,amos draws his full confidence as a prophet1 and enforces on the people his message of doom as ,god's own word4 ,the passage in which ,amos most explicitly illustrates this harmony between event and conviction is one whose metaphors we have already quoted in proof of the desert's influence upon the prophet's life4 ,when ,amos asks1 ,can two walk together except they have made an appointment8 his figure is drawn1 as we have seen1 from the wilderness in which two men will hardly meet except they have arranged to do so2 but the truth1 he would illustrate by the figure1 is that two sets of phenomena which coincide must have sprung from a common purpose4 ,their conjunction forbids mere chance4 ,what kind of phenomena he means1 he lets us see in his next instance3 ,doth a lion roar in the jungle and have no prey8 ,doth a young lion let forth his voice from his den except he be catching something8 ,that is1 those ominous sounds never happen without some fell and terrible deed happening along with them4 ,amos thus plainly hints that the two phenomena on whose coincidence he insists are an utterance on one side1 and on the other side a deed fraught with destruction4 ,the reading of the next metaphor about the bird and the snare is uncertain2 at most what it means is that you never see signs of distress or a vain struggle to escape without there being1 though out of sight1 some real cause for them4#aee ,but from so general a principle he returns in his fourth metaphor to the special coincidence between utterance and deed4 ,is the alarum-trumpet blown in a city and do the people not tremble8 ,of course they do2 they know such sound is never made without the approach of calamity4 ,but who is the author of every calamity8 ,god ,himself3 ,shall there be evil in a city and ,jehovah not have done it8 ,very well then2 we have seen that common life has many instances in which1 when an ominous sound is heard1 it is because it is closely linked with a fatal deed4 ,these happen together1 not by mere chance1 but because the one is the expression1 the warning or the explanation of the other4 ,and we also know that fatal deeds which happen to any community in ,israel are from ,jehovah4 ,he is behind them4 ,but they1 too1 are accompanied by a warning voice from the same source as themselves4 ,this is the voice which the prophet hears in his heart--the moral conviction which he feels as the ,word of ,god4 ,the ,lord ,jehovah doeth nothing but ,he hath revealed ,his counsel to ,his servants the prophets4 ,mark the grammar3 the revelation comes first to the prophet's heart2 then he sees and recognises the event1 and is confident to give his message about it4 ,so ,amos1 repeating his metaphor1 sums up his argument4 ,the ,lion hath roared1 who shall not fear8--certain that there is more than sound to happen4 ,the ,lord ,jehovah hath spoken1 who can but prophesy8--certain that what ,jehovah has spoken to him inwardly is likewise no mere sound1 but that deeds of judgment are about to happen1 as the ominous voice requires they should4#aef ,the prophet then is made sure of his message by the agreement between the inward convictions of his soul and the outward events of the day4 ,when these walk together1 it proves that they have come of a common purpose4 ,he who causes the events--it is ,jehovah ,himself1 for shall there be evil in a city and ,jehovah not have done it8--must be author also of the inner voice or conviction which agrees with them4 ,who then can but prophesy8 ,observe again that no support is here derived from miracle2 nor is any claim made for the prophet on the ground of his ability to foretell the event4 ,it is the agreement of the idea with the fact1 their evident common origin in the purpose of ,jehovah1 which makes a man sure that he has in him the ,word of ,god4 ,both are necessary1 and together are enough4 ,are we then to leave the origin of the ,word in this coincidence of fact and thought--as it were an electric flash produced by the contact of conviction with event8 ,hardly3 there are questions behind this coincidence4 ,for instance1 as to how the two react on each other--the event provoking the conviction1 the conviction interpreting the event8 ,the argument of ,amos seems to imply that the ethical principles are experienced by the prophet prior to the events which justify them ,is this so1 or was the shock of the events required to awaken the principles8 ,and if the principles were prior1 whence did ,amos derive them8 ,these are some questions that will lead us to the very origins of revelation4 ,the greatest of the events with which ,amos and his contemporaries dealt was the ,assyrian invasion4 ,in a previous chapter we have tried to estimate the intellectual effects of ,assyria on prophecy4#aeg ,assyria widened the horizon of ,israel1 put the world to ,hebrew eyes into a new perspective1 vastly increased the possibilities of history and set to religion a novel order of problems4 ,we can trace the effects upon ,israel's conceptions of ,god1 of man and even of nature4#aeh ,now it might be plausibly argued that the new prophecy in ,israel was first stirred and quickened by all this mental shock and strain1 and that even the loftier ethics of the prophets were thus due to the advance of ,assyria4 ,for1 as the most vigilant watchmen of their day1 the prophets observed the rise of that empire1 and felt its fatality for ,israel4 ,turning then to inquire the ,divine reasons for such a destruction1 they found these in ,israel's sinfulness1 to the full extent of which their hearts were at last awakened4 ,according to such a theory the prophets were politicians first and moralists afterwards3 alarmists to begin with1 and preachers of repentance only second4 ,or--to recur to the language employed above--the prophets' experience of the historical event preceded their conviction of the moral principle which agreed with it4 ,in support of such a theory it is pointed out that after all the most original element in the prophecy of the eighth century was the announcement of ,israel's fall and exile4 ,the ,righteousness of ,jehovah had often previously been enforced in ,israel1 but never had any voice drawn from it this awful conclusion that the nation must perish4 ,the first in ,israel to dare this was ,amos1 and surely what enabled him to do so was the imminence of ,assyria upon his people4 ,again1 such a theory might plausibly point to the opening verse of the ,book of ,amos1 with its unprefaced1 unexplained pronouncement of doom upon ,israel3-- ,the ,lord roareth from ,zion1 ,and giveth voice from ,jerusalem2 ,and the pastures of the shepherds mourn1 ,and the summit of ,carmel is withered6 ,here1 it might be averred1 is the earliest prophet's earliest utterance4 ,is it not audibly the voice of a man in a panic--such a panic as1 ever on the eve of historic convulsions1 seizes the more sensitive minds of a doomed people8 ,the distant ,assyrian thunder has reached ,amos1 on his pastures1 unprepared--unable to articulate its exact meaning1 and with only faith enough to hear in it the voice of his ,god4 ,he needs reflection to unfold its contents2 and the process of this reflection we find through the rest of his book4 ,there he details for us1 with increasing clearness1 both the ethical reasons and the political results of that ,assyrian terror1 by which he was at first so wildly shocked into prophecy4 ,but the panic-born are always the still-born2 and it is simply impossible that prophecy1 in all her ethical and religious vigour1 can have been the daughter of so fatal a birth4 ,if we look again at the evidence which is quoted from ,amos in favour of such a theory1 we shall see how fully it is contradicted by other features of his book4 ,to begin with1 we are not certain that the terror of the opening verse of ,amos is the ,assyrian terror4 ,even if it were1 the opening of a book does not necessarily represent the writer's earliest feelings4 ,the rest of the chapters contain visions and oracles which obviously date from a time when ,amos was not yet startled by ,assyria1 but believed that the punishment which ,israel required might be accomplished through a series of physical calamities--locusts1 drought and pestilence4#aei ,nay1 it was not even these earlier judgments1 preceding the ,assyrian1 which stirred the word of ,god in the prophet4 ,he introduces them with a now and a therefore4 ,that is to say1 he treats them only as the consequence of certain facts1 the conclusion of certain premises4 ,these facts and premises are moral--they are exclusively moral4 ,they are the sins of ,israel's life1 regarded without illusion and without pity4 ,they are certain simple convictions1 which fill the prophet's heart1 about the impossibility of the survival of any state which is so perverse and so corrupt4 ,this origin of prophecy in moral facts and moral intuitions1 which are in their beginning independent of political events1 may be illustrated by several other points4 ,for instance1 the sins which ,amos marked in ,israel were such as required no red dawn of judgment to expose their flagrance and fatality4 ,the abuse of justice1 the cruelty of the rich1 the shameless immorality of the priests1 are not sins which we feel only in the cool of the day1 when ,god ,himself draws near to judgment4 ,they are such things as make men shiver in the sunshine4 ,and so the ,book of ,amos1 and not less that of ,hosea1 tremble with the feeling that ,israel's social corruption is great enough of itself1 without the aid of natural convulsions1 to shake the very basis of national life4 ,shall not the land tremble for this1 ,amos says after reciting some sins1 and every one that dwelleth therein8#afj ,not drought nor pestilence nor invasion is needed for ,israel's doom1 but the elemental force of ruin which lies in the people's own wickedness4 ,this is enough to create gloom long before the political skies be overcast--or1 as ,amos himself puts it1 this is enough ,to cause the sun to go down at noon1 ,and to darken the earth in the clear day4#afa ,and once more--in spite of ,assyria the ruin may be averted1 if only the people will repent3 ,seek good and not evil1 and ,jehovah of hosts will be with you1 as you say4#afb ,assyria1 however threatening1 becomes irrelevant to ,israel's future from the moment that ,israel repents4 ,such beliefs1 then1 are obviously not the results of experience1 nor of a keen observation of history4 ,they are the primal convictions of the heart1 which are deeper than all experience1 and themselves contain the sources of historical foresight4 ,with ,amos it was not the outward event which inspired the inward conviction1 but the conviction which anticipated and interpreted the event1 though when the event came there can be no doubt that it confirmed1 deepened1 and articulated the conviction4#afc ,but when we have thus tracked the stream of prophecy as far back as these elementary convictions we have not reached the fountain-head4 ,whence did ,amos derive his simple and absolute ethics8 ,were they original to him8 ,were they new in ,israel8 ,such questions start an argument which touches the very origins of revelation4 ,it is obvious that ,amos not only takes for granted the laws of righteousness which he enforces3 he takes for granted also the people's conscience of them4 ,new1 indeed1 is the doom which sinful ,israel deserves1 and original to himself is the proclamation of it2 but ,amos appeals to the moral principles which justify the doom1 as if they were not new1 and as if ,israel ought always to have known them4 ,this attitude of the prophet to his principles has1 in our time1 suffered a curious judgment4 ,it has been called an anachronism4 ,so absolute a morality1 some say1 had never before been taught in ,israel2 nor had righteousness been so exclusively emphasised as the purpose of ,jehovah4 ,amos and the other prophets of his century were the virtual creators of ethical monotheism3 it could only be by a prophetic licence or prophetic fiction that he appealed to his people's conscience of the standards he promulgated1 or condemned his generation to death for not having lived up to them4 ,let us see how far this criticism is supported by the facts4 ,to no sane observer can the religious history of ,israel appear as anything but a course of gradual development4 ,even in the moral standards1 in respect to which it is confessedly often most difficult to prove growth1 the signs of the nation's progress are very manifest4 ,practices come to be forbidden in ,israel and tempers to be mitigated1 which in earlier ages were sanctioned to their extreme by the explicit decrees of religion4 ,in the nation's attitude to the outer world sympathies arise1 along with ideals of spiritual service1 where previously only war and extermination had been enforced in the name of the ,deity4 ,now in such an evolution it is equally indubitable that the longest and most rapid stage was the prophecy of the eighth century4 ,the prophets of that time condemn acts which had been inspired by their immediate predecessors2#afd they abjure1 as impeding morality1 a ceremonial which the spiritual leaders of earlier generations had felt to be indispensable to religion2 and they unfold ideals of the nation's moral destiny1 of which older writings give us only the faintest hints4 ,yet1 while the fact of a religious evolution in ,israel is thus certain1 we must not fall into the vulgar error which interprets evolution as if it were mere addition1 nor forget that even in the most creative periods of religion nothing is brought forth which has not already been promised1 and1 at some earlier stage1 placed1 so to speak1 within reach of the human mind4 ,after all it is the mind which grows2 the moral ideals which become visible to its more matured vision are so ,divine that1 when they present themselves1 the mind cannot but think they were always real and always imperative4 ,if we remember these commonplaces we shall do justice both to ,amos and to his critics4 ,in the first place it is clear that most of the morality which ,amos enforced is of that fundamental order which can never have been recognised as the discovery or invention of any prophet4 ,whatever be their origin1 the conscience of justice1 the duty of kindness to the poor1 the horror of wanton cruelty towards one's enemies1 which form the chief principles of ,amos1 are discernible in man as far back as history allows us to search for them4 ,should a generation have lost them1 they can be brought back to it1 never with the thrill of a new lesson1 but only with the shame of an old and an abused memory4 ,to neither man nor people can the righteousness which ,amos preached appear as a discovery1 but always as a recollection and a remorse4 ,and this is most emphatically true of the people of ,moses and of ,samuel1 of ,nathan1 of ,elijah and of the ,book of the ,covenant4 ,ethical elements had been characteristic of ,israel's religion from the very first4 ,they were not due to a body of written law1 but rather to the character of ,israel's ,god1 appreciated by the nation in all the great crises of their history4#afe ,jehovah had won for ,israel freedom and unity4 ,he had been a spirit of justice to their lawgivers and magistrates4#aff ,he had raised up a succession of consecrated personalities1#afg who by life and word had purified the ideals of the whole people4 ,the results had appeared in the creation of a strong national conscience1 which avenged with horror1 as folly in ,israel1 the wanton crimes of any person or section of the commonwealth2 in the gradual formation of a legal code1 founded indeed in the common custom of the ,semites1 but greatly more moral than that2 and even in the attainment of certain profoundly ethical beliefs about ,god and ,his relations1 beyond ,israel1 to all mankind4 ,now1 let us understand once for all1 that in the ethics of ,amos there is nothing which is not rooted in one or other of these achievements of the previous religion of his people4 ,to this religion ,amos felt himself attached in the closest possible way4 ,the word of ,god comes to him across the desert1 as we have seen1 yet not out of the air4 ,from the first he hears it rise from that one monument of his people's past which we have found visible on his physical horizon#afh--;from ,zion1 from ,jerusalem1#afi from the city of ,david1 from the ,ark1 whose ministers were ,moses and ,samuel1 from the repository of the main tradition of ,israel's religion4#agj ,amos felt himself in the sacred succession2 and his feeling is confirmed by the contents of his book4 ,the details of that civic justice which he demands from his generation are found in the ,book of the ,covenant--the only one of ,israel's great codes which appears by this time to have been in existence2#aga or in those popular proverbs which almost as certainly were found in early ,israel4#agb ,nor does ,amos go elsewhere for the religious sanctions of his ethics4 ,it is by the ancient mercies of ,god towards ,israel that he shames and convicts his generation--by the deeds of grace which made them a nation1 by the organs of doctrine and reproof which have inspired them1 unfailing from age to age4 ,i destroyed the ,amorite before them4444 ,yea1 ,i brought you up out of the land of ,egypt1 and ,i led you forty years in the wilderness1 to possess the land of the ,amorites4 ,and ,i raised up of your sons for prophets1 and of your young men for ,nazirites4 ,was it not even thus1 ,o ye children of ,israel8 saith ,jehovah4#agc ,we cannot even say that the belief which ,amos expresses in ,jehovah as the supreme ,providence of the world#agd was a new thing in ,israel1 for a belief as universal inspires those portions of the ,book of ,genesis which1 like the ,book of the ,covenant1 were already extant4 ,we see1 therefore1 what right ,amos had to present his ethical truths to ,israel1 as if they were not new1 but had been within reach of his people from of old4 ,we could not1 however1 commit a greater mistake1 than to confine the inspiration of our prophet to the past1 and interpret his doctrines as mere inferences from the earlier religious ideas of ,israel--inferences forced by his own passionate logic1 or more naturally ripened for him by the progress of events4 ,a recent writer has thus summarised the work of the prophets of the eighth century3 ,in fact they laid hold upon that bias towards the ethical1 which dwelt in ,jahwism from ,moses onwards1 and they allowed it alone to have value as corresponding to the true religion of ,jehovah4#age ,but this is too abstract to be an adequate statement of the prophets' own consciousness4 ,what overcame ,amos was a ,personal ,influence--the ,impression of a ,character2 and it was this not only as it was revealed in the past of his people4 ,the ,god who stands behind ,amos is indeed the ancient ,deity of ,israel1 and the facts which prove ,him ,god are those which made the nation--the ,exodus1 the guidance through the wilderness1 the overthrow of the ,amorites1 the gift of the land4 ,was it not even thus1 ,o ye children of ,israel8 ,but what beats and burns through the pages of ,amos is not the memory of those wonderful works1 so much as a fresh vision and understanding of the ,living ,god who worked them4 ,amos has himself met with ,jehovah on the conditions of his own time--on the moral situation provided by the living generation of ,israel4 ,by an intercourse conducted1 not through the distant signals of the past1 but here and now1 through the events of the prophet's own day1 ,amos has received an original and overpowering conviction of his people's ,god as absolute righteousness4 ,what prophecy had hitherto felt in part1 and applied to one or other of the departments of ,israel's life1 ,amos is the first to feel in its fulness1 and to every extreme of its consequences upon the worship1 the conduct and the fortunes of the nation4 ,to him ,jehovah not only commands this and that righteous law1 but ,jehovah and righteousness are absolutely identical4 ,seek ,jehovah and ye shall live 444 seek good and ye shall live4#agf ,the absoluteness with which ,amos conceived this principle1 the courage with which he applied it1 carry him along those two great lines upon which we most clearly trace his originality as a prophet4 ,in the strength of this principle he does what is really new in ,israel3 he discards the two elements which had hitherto existed alongside the ethical1 and had fettered and warped it4 ,up till now the ethical spirit of the religion of ,jehovah#agg had to struggle with two beliefs which we can trace back to the ,semitic origins of the religion--the belief1 namely1 that1 as the national ,god1 ,jehovah would always defend their political interests1 irrespective of morality2 and the belief that a ceremonial of rites and sacrifices was indispensable to religion4 ,these principles were mutual3 as the deity was bound to succour the people1 so were the people bound to supply the deity with gifts1 and the more of these they brought the more they made sure of his favours4 ,such views were not absolutely devoid of moral benefit4 ,in the formative period of the nation they had contributed both discipline and hope4 ,but of late they had between them engrossed men's hearts1 and crushed out of religion both conscience and common-sense4 ,by the first of them1 the belief in ,jehovah's predestined protection of ,israel1 the people's eyes were so holden they could not see how threatening were the times2 by the other1 the confidence in ceremonial1 conscience was dulled1 and that immorality permitted which they mingled so shamelessly with their religious zeal4 ,now the conscience of ,amos did not merely protest against the predominance of the two1 but was so exclusive1 so spiritual1 that it boldly banished both from religion4 ,amos denied that ,jehovah was bound to save ,his people2 he affirmed that ritual and sacrifice were no part of the service ,he demands from men4 ,this is the measure of originality in our prophet4 ,the two religious principles which were inherent in the very fibre of ,semitic religion1 and which till now had gone unchallenged in ,israel1 ,amos cast forth from religion in the name of a pure and absolute righteousness4 ,on the one hand1 ,jehovah's peculiar connection with ,israel meant no more than jealousy for their holiness3 ,you only have ,i known of all the families of the earth1 therefore will ,i visit upon you all your iniquities4#agh ,and1 on the other hand1 all their ceremonial was abhorrent to ,him3 ,i hate1 ,i despise your festivals4444 ,though ye offer ,me burnt offerings and your meal offerings1 ,i will not accept them4444 ,take thou away from ,me the noise of thy songs2 ,i will not hear the music of thy viols4 ,but let justice run down as waters1 and righteousness as a perennial stream4#agi ,it has just been said that emphasis upon morality as the sum of religion1 to the exclusion of sacrifice1 is the most original element in the prophecies of ,amos4 ,he himself1 however1 does not regard this as proclaimed for the first time in ,israel1 and the precedent he quotes is so illustrative of the sources of his inspiration that we do well to look at it for a little4 ,in the verse next to the one last quoted he reports these words of ,god3 ,did ye offer unto ,me sacrifices and gifts in the wilderness1 for forty years1 ,o house of ,israel8 ,an extraordinary challenge6 ,from the present blind routine of sacrifice ,jehovah appeals to the beginning of ,his relations with the nation3 did they then perform such services to ,him8 ,of course1 a negative answer is expected4 ,no other agrees with the main contention of the passage4 ,in the wilderness ,israel had not offered sacrifices and gifts to ,jehovah4 ,jeremiah quotes a still more explicit word of ,jehovah3 ,i spake not unto your fathers in the day that ,i brought them out of the land of ,egypt concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices3 but this thing ,i commanded them1 saying1 ,obey ,my voice1 and ,i will be your ,god1 and ye shall be ,my people4#ahj ,to these ,divine statements we shall not be able to do justice if we hold by the traditional view that the ,levitical legislation was proclaimed in the wilderness4 ,discount that legislation1 and the statements become clear4 ,it is true1 of course1 that ,israel must have had a ritual of some kind from the first2 and that both in the wilderness and in ,canaan their spiritual leaders must have performed sacrifices as if these were acceptable to ,jehovah4 ,but even so the ,divine words which ,amos and ,jeremiah quote are historically correct2 for while the ethical contents of the religion of ,jehovah were its original and essential contents--,i commanded them1 saying1 ,obey ,my voice--the ritual was but a modification of the ritual common to all ,semites2 and ever since the occupation of the land1 it had1 through the infection of the ,canaanite rites on the high places1 grown more and more ,pagan1 both in its functions and in the ideas which these were supposed to express4#aha ,amos was right4 ,sacrifice had never been the ,divine1 the revealed element in the religion of ,jehovah4 ,nevertheless1 before ,amos no prophet in ,israel appears to have said so4 ,and what enabled this man in the eighth century to offer testimony1 so novel but so true1 about the far-away beginnings of his people's religion in the fourteenth1 was plainly neither tradition nor historical research1 but an overwhelming conviction of the spiritual and moral character of ,god--of ,him who had been ,israel's ,god both then and now1 and whose righteousness had been1 just as much then as now1 exalted above all purely national interests and all susceptibility to ritual4 ,when we thus see the prophet's knowledge of the ,living ,god enabling him1 not only to proclaim an ideal of religion more spiritual than ,israel had yet dreamed1 but to perceive that such an ideal had been the essence of the religion of ,jehovah from the first1 we understand how thoroughly ,amos was mastered by that knowledge4 ,if we need any further proof of his possession by the character of ,god1 we find it in those phrases in which his own consciousness disappears1 and we have no longer the herald's report of the ,lord's words1 but the very accents of the ,lord ,himself1 fraught with personal feeling of the most intense quality4 ,i ,jehovah hate1 ,i despise your feast days4444 ,take thou away from ,me the noise of thy songs2 ,i will not hear the music of thy viols4#ahb444 ,i abhor the arrogance of ,jacob1 and hate his palaces4#ahc444 ,the eyes of the ,lord ,jehovah are upon the sinful kingdom4#ahd444 ,jehovah sweareth1 ,i will never forget any of their works4#ahe ,such sentences reveal a ,deity who is not only manifest ,character1 but surgent and importunate ,feeling4 ,we have traced the prophet's word to its ultimate source4 ,it springs from the righteousness1 the vigilance1 the urgency of the ,eternal4 ,the intellect1 imagination and heart of ,amos--the convictions he has inherited from his people's past1 his conscience of their evil life to-day1 his impressions of current and coming history--are all enforced and illuminated1 all made impetuous and radiant1 by the ,spirit1 that is to say the ,purpose and the ,energy1 of the ,living ,god4 ,therefore1 as he says in the title of his book1 or as some one says for him1 ,amos saw his words4 ,they stood out objective to himself4 ,and they were not mere sound4 ,they glowed and burned with ,god4 ,when we realise this1 we feel how inadequate it is to express prophecy in the terms of evolution4 ,no doubt1 as we have seen1 the ethics and religion of ,amos represent a large and measurable advance upon those of earlier ,israel4 ,and yet with ,amos we do not seem so much to have arrived at a new stage in a ,process1 as to have penetrated to the ,idea which has been behind the ,process from the beginning4 ,the change and growth of ,israel's religion are realities--their fruits can be seen1 defined1 catalogued--but a greater reality is the unseen ,purpose which impels them4 ,they have been expressed only now4 ,he has been unchanging from old and for ever--from the first absolute righteousness in ,himself1 and absolute righteousness in ,his demands from men4 #c4 ,,the ,,prophet ,,and ,,his ,,ministry4 ,,amos vii41 viii4 #a-d4 ,we have seen the preparation of the ,man for the ,word2 we have sought to trace to its source the ,word which came to the ,man4 ,it now remains for us to follow the ,prophet1 ,man and ,word combined1 upon his ,ministry to the people4 ,for reasons given in a previous chapter1#ahf there must always be some doubt as to the actual course of the ministry of ,amos before his appearance at ,bethel4 ,most authorities1 however1 agree that the visions recounted in the beginning of the seventh chapter form the substance of his address at ,bethel1 which was interrupted by the priest ,amaziah4 ,these visions furnish a probable summary of the prophet's experience up to that point4 ,while they follow the same course1 which we trace in the two series of oracles that now precede them in the book1 the ideas in them are less elaborate4 ,at the same time it is evident that ,amos must have already spoken upon other points than those which he puts into the first three visions4 ,for instance1 ,amaziah reports to the king that ,amos had explicitly predicted the exile of the whole people#ahg--;a conviction which1 as we have seen1 the prophet reached only after some length of experience4 ,it is equally certain that ,amos must have already exposed the sins of the people in the light of the ,divine righteousness4 ,some of the sections of the book which deal with this subject appear to have been originally spoken2 and it is unnatural to suppose that the prophet announced the chastisements of ,god without having previously justified these to the consciences of men4 ,if this view be correct1 ,amos1 having preached for some time to ,israel concerning the evil state of society1 appeared at a great religious festival in ,bethel1 determined to bring matters to a crisis1 and to announce the doom which his preaching threatened and the people's continued impenitence made inevitable4 ,mark his choice of place and of audience4 ,it was no mere king he aimed at4 ,nathan had dealt with ,david1 ,gad with ,solomon1 ,elijah with ,ahab and ,jezebel4 ,but ,amos sought the people1 them with whom resided the real forces and responsibilities of life3 the wealth1 the social fashions1 the treatment of the poor1 the spirit of worship1 the ideals of religion4#ahh ,and ,amos sought the people upon what was not only a great popular occasion1 but one on which was arrayed1 in all pomp and lavishness1 the very system he essayed to overthrow4 ,the religion of his time--religion as mere ritual and sacrifice--was what ,god had sent him to beat down1 and he faced it at its headquarters1 and upon one of its high days1 in the royal and popular sanctuary where it enjoyed at once the patronage of the crown1 the lavish gifts of the rich and the thronged devotion of the multitude4 ,as ,savonarola at the ,duomo in ,florence1 as ,luther at the ,diet of ,worms1 as our ,lord ,himself at the feast in ,jerusalem1 so was ,amos at the feast in ,bethel4 ,perhaps he was still more lonely4 ,he speaks nowhere of having made a disciple1 and in the sea of faces which turned on him when he spoke1 it is probable that he could not welcome a single ally4 ,they were officials1 or interested traders1 or devotees2 he was a foreigner and a wild man1 with a word that spared the popular dogma as little as the royal prerogative4 ,well for him was it that over all those serried ranks of authority1 those fanatic crowds1 that lavish splendour1 another vision commanded his eyes4 ,i saw the ,lord standing over the altar1 and ,he said1 ,smite4 ,amos told the pilgrims at ,bethel that the first events of his time in which he felt a purpose of ,god in harmony with his convictions about ,israel's need of punishment were certain calamities of a physical kind4 ,of these1 which in chapter iv4 he describes as successively drought1 blasting1 locusts1 pestilence and earthquake1 he selected at ,bethel only two--locusts and drought--and he began with the locusts4 ,it may have been either the same visitation as he specifies in chapter iv41 or a previous one2 for of all the plagues of ,palestine locusts have been the most frequent1 occurring every six or seven years4 ,thus the ,lord ,jehovah caused me to see3 and1 behold1 a brood#ahi of locusts at the beginning of the coming up of the spring crops4 ,in the ,syrian year there are practically two tides of verdure3 one which starts after the early rains of ,october and continues through the winter1 checked by the cold2 and one which comes away with greater force under the influence of the latter rains and more genial airs of spring4#aij ,of these it was the later and richer which the locusts had attacked4 ,and1 behold1 it was after the king's mowings4 ,these seem to have been a tribute which the kings of ,israel levied on the spring herbage1 and which the ,roman governors of ,syria used annually to impose in the month ,nisan4#aia ,after the king's mowings would be a phrase to mark the time when everybody else might turn to reap their green stuff4 ,it was thus the very crisis of the year when the locusts appeared2 the ,april crops devoured1 there was no hope of further fodder till ,december4 ,still1 the calamity had happened before1 and had been survived2 a nation so vigorous and wealthy as ,israel was under ,jeroboam ,,ii4 need not have been frightened to death4 ,but ,amos felt it with a conscience4 ,to him it was the beginning of that destruction of his people which the spirit within him knew that their sin had earned4 ,so it came to pass1 when the locusts had made an end of devouring the verdure of the earth1 that ,i said1 ,remit1 ,i pray ,thee1 or pardon--a proof that there already weighed on the prophet's spirit something more awful than loss of grass--how shall ,jacob rise again8 for he is little4#aib ,the prayer was heard4 ,jehovah repented for this3 ,it shall not be1 said ,jehovah4 ,the unnameable it must be the same as in the frequent phrase of the first chapter3 ,i will not turn ,it back--namely1 the final execution of doom on the people's sin4 ,the reserve with which this is mentioned1 both while there is still chance for the people to repent and after it has become irrevocable1 is very impressive4 ,the next example which ,amos gave at ,bethel of his permitted insight into ,god's purpose was a great drought4 ,thus the ,lord ,jehovah made me to see3 and1 behold1 the ,lord ,jehovah was calling fire into the quarrel4#aic ,there was1 then1 already a quarrel between ,jehovah and ,his people--another sign that the prophet's moral conviction of ,israel's sin preceded the rise of the events in which he recognised its punishment4 ,and the fire devoured the ,great ,deep1 yea1 it was about to devour the land4#aid ,severe drought in ,palestine might well be described as fire1 even when it was not accompanied by the flame and smoke of those forest and prairie fires which ,joel describes as its consequences4#aie ,but to have the full fear of such a drought1 we should need to feel beneath us the curious world which the men of those days felt4 ,to them the earth rested in a great deep1 from whose stores all her springs and fountains burst4 ,when these failed it meant that the unfathomed floods below were burnt up4 ,but how fierce the flame that could effect this6 ,and how certainly able to devour next the solid land which rested above the deep--the very ,portion#aif assigned by ,god to ,his people4 ,again ,amos interceded3 ,lord ,jehovah1 ,i pray ,thee forbear3 how shall ,jacob rise8 for he is little4 ,and for the second time ,jacob was reprieved4 ,jehovah repented for this3 ,it also shall not come to pass1 said the ,lord ,jehovah4 ,we have treated these visions1 not as the imagination or prospect of possible disasters1#aig but as insight into the meaning of actual plagues4 ,such a treatment is justified1 not only by the invariable habit of ,amos to deal with real facts1 but also by the occurrence of these same plagues among the series by which1 as we are told1 ,god had already sought to move the people to repentance4#aih ,the general question of sympathy between such purely physical disasters and the moral evil of a people we may postpone to another chapter1 confining ourselves here to the part played in the events by the prophet himself4 ,surely there is something wonderful in the attitude of this shepherd to the fires and plagues that ,nature sweeps upon his land4 ,he is ready for them4 ,and he is ready not only by the general feeling of his time that such things happen of the wrath of ,god4 ,his sovereign and predictive conscience recognises them as her ministers4 ,they are sent to punish a people whom she has already condemned4 ,yet1 unlike ,elijah1 ,amos does not summon the drought1 nor even welcome its arrival4 ,how far has prophecy travelled since the violent ,tishbite6 ,with all his conscience of ,israel's sin1 ,amos yet prays that their doom may be turned4 ,we have here some evidence of the struggle through which these later prophets passed1 before they accepted their awful messages to men4 ,even ,amos1 desert-bred and living aloof from ,israel1 shrank from the judgment which it was his call to publish4 ,for two moments--they would appear to be the only two in his ministry--his heart contended with his conscience1 and twice he entreated ,god to forgive4 ,at ,bethel he told the people all this1 in order to show how unwillingly he took up his duty against them1 and how inevitable he found that duty to be4 ,but still more shall we learn from his tale1 if we feel in his words about the smallness of ,jacob1 not pity only1 but sympathy4 ,we shall learn that prophets are never made solely by the bare word of ,god1 but that even the most objective and judicial of them has to earn his title to proclaim judgment by suffering with men the agony of the judgment he proclaims4 ,never to a people came there a true prophet who had not first prayed for them4 ,to have entreated for men1 to have represented them in the highest courts of ,being1 is to have deserved also supreme judicial rights upon them4 ,and thus it is that our ,judge at the ,last ,day shall be none other than our great ,advocate who continually maketh intercession for us4 ,it is prayer1 let us repeat1 which1 while it gives us all power with ,god1 endows us at the same time with moral rights over men4 ,upon his mission of judgment we shall follow ,amos with the greater sympathy that he thus comes forth to it from the mercy-seat and the ministry of intercession4 ,the first two visions which ,amos told at ,bethel were of disasters in the sphere of nature1 but his third lay in the sphere of politics4 ,the two former were1 in their completeness at least1 averted2 and the language ,amos used of them seems to imply that he had not even then faced the possibility of a final overthrow4 ,he took for granted ,jacob was to rise again3 he only feared as to how this should be4 ,but the third vision is so final that the prophet does not even try to intercede4 ,israel is measured1 found wanting and doomed4 ,assyria is not named1 but is obviously intended2 and the fact that the prophet arrives at certainty with regard to the doom of ,israel1 just when he thus comes within sight of ,assyria1 is instructive as to the influence exerted on prophecy by the rise of that empire4#aii ,thus ,he gave me to see3 and1 behold1 the ,lord had taken ,his station--'tis a more solemn word than the stood of our versions--upon a city wall built to the plummet1#bjj and in ,his hand a plummet4 ,and ,jehovah said unto me1 ,what art thou seeing1 ,amos8 ,the question surely betrays some astonishment shown by the prophet at the vision or some difficulty he felt in making it out4 ,he evidently does not feel it at once1 as the natural result of his own thinking3 it is objective and strange to him2 he needs time to see into it4 ,and ,i said1 ,a plummet4 ,and the ,lord said1 ,behold1 ,i am setting a plummet in the midst of ,my people ,israel4 ,i will not again pass them over4 ,to set a measuring line or a line with weights attached to any building means to devote it to destruction2#bja but here it is uncertain whether the plummet threatens destruction1 or means that ,jehovah will at last clearly prove to the prophet the insufferable obliquity of the fabric of the nation's life1 originally set straight by ,himself--originally a wall of a plummet4 ,for ,god's judgments are never arbitrary3 by a standard we men can read ,he shows us their necessity4 ,conscience itself is no mere voice of authority3 it is a convincing plummet1 and plainly lets us see why we should be punished4 ,but whichever interpretation we choose1 the result is the same4 ,the high places of ,israel shall be desolate1 and the sanctuaries of ,isaac laid waste2 and ,i will rise against the house of ,jeroboam with the sword4 ,a declaration of war6 ,israel is to be invaded1 her dynasty overthrown4 ,every one who heard the prophet would know1 though he named them not1 that the ,assyrians were meant4 ,it was apparently at this point that ,amos was interrupted by ,amaziah4 ,the priest1 who was conscious of no spiritual power with which to oppose the prophet1 gladly grasped the opportunity afforded him by the mention of the king1 and fell back on the invariable resource of a barren and envious sacerdotalism3 ,he speaketh against ,csar4#bjb ,there follows one of the great scenes of history--the scene which1 however fast the ages and the languages1 the ideals and the deities may change1 repeats itself with the same two actors4 ,priest and ,man face each other--,priest with ,king behind1 ,man with ,god--and wage that debate in which the whole warfare and progress of religion consist4 ,but the story is only typical by being real4 ,many subtle traits of human nature prove that we have here an exact narrative of fact4 ,take ,amaziah's report to ,jeroboam4 ,he gives to the words of the prophet just that exaggeration and innuendo which betray the wily courtier1 who knows how to accentuate a general denunciation till it feels like a personal attack4 ,and yet1 like every ,caiaphas of his tribe1 the priest in his exaggerations expresses a deeper meaning than he is conscious of4 ,amos--note how the mere mention of the name without description proves that the prophet was already known in ,israel1 perhaps was one on whom the authorities had long kept their eye--,amos hath conspired against thee--yet ,god was his only fellow-conspirator6--in the midst of the house of ,israel--this royal temple at ,bethel4 ,the land is not able to hold his words--it must burst2 yes1 but in another sense than thou meanest1 ,o ,caiaphas-,amaziah6 ,for thus hath ,amos said1 ,by the sword shall ,jeroboam die--,amos had spoken only of the dynasty1 but the twist which ,amaziah lends to the words is calculated--and ,israel going shall go into captivity from off his own land4 ,this was the one unvarnished spot in the report4 ,having fortified himself1 as little men will do1 by his duty to the powers that be1 ,amaziah dares to turn upon the prophet2 and he does so1 it is amusing to observe1 with that tone of intellectual and moral superiority which it is extraordinary to see some men derive from a merely official station or touch with royalty4 ,visionary1#bjc begone6 ,get thee off to the land of ,judah2 and earn#bjd thy bread there1 and there play the prophet4 ,but at ,bethel--mark the rising accent of the voice--thou shalt not again prophesy4 ,the ,king's ,sanctuary it is1 and the ,house of the ,kingdom4#bje ,with the official mind this is more conclusive than that it is the ,house of ,god6 ,in fact the speech of ,amaziah justifies the hardest terms which ,amos uses of the religion of his day4 ,in all this priest says there is no trace of the spiritual--only fear1 pride and privilege4 ,divine truth is challenged by human law1 and the ,word of ,god silenced in the name of the king4 ,we have here a conception of religion1 which is not merely due to the unspiritual character of the priest who utters it1 but has its roots in the far back origins of ,israel's religion4 ,the ,pagan ,semite identified absolutely ,state and ,church2 and on that identification was based the religious practice of early ,israel4 ,it had many healthy results3 it kept religion in touch with public life2 order1 justice1 patriotism1 self-sacrifice for the common weal1 were devoutly held to be matters of religion4 ,so long1 therefore1 as the system was inspired by truly spiritual ideals1 nothing for those times could be better4 ,but we see in it an almost inevitable tendency to harden to the sheerest officialism4 ,that it was more apt to do so in ,israel than in ,judah1 is intelligible from the political origin of the ,northern ,schism1 and the erection of the national sanctuaries from motives of mere statecraft4#bjf ,erastianism could hardly be more flagrant or more ludicrous in its opposition to true religion than at ,bethel4 ,and yet how often have the ludicrousness and the flagrancy been repeated1 with far less temptation6 ,ever since ,christianity became a state religion1 she that needed least to use the weapons of this world has done so again and again in a thoroughly ,pagan fashion4 ,the attempts of ,churches by law established1 to stamp out by law all religious dissent2 or where such attempts were no longer possible1 the charges now of fanaticism and now of sordidness and religious shopkeeping1 which have been so frequently made against dissent by little men who fancied their state connection1 or their higher social position1 to mean an intellectual and moral superiority2 the absurd claims which many a minister of religion makes upon the homes and the souls of a parish1 by virtue not of his calling in ,christ1 but of his position as official priest of the parish1--all these are the sins of ,amaziah1 priest of ,bethel4 ,but they are not confined to an established ,church4 ,the ,amaziahs of dissent are also very many4 ,wherever the official masters the spiritual2 wherever mere dogma or tradition is made the standard of preaching2 wherever new doctrine is silenced1 or programmes of reform condemned1 as of late years in ,free ,churches they have sometimes been1 not by spiritual argument1 but by the ipse dixit of the dogmatist1 or by ecclesiastical rule or expediency1--there you have the same spirit4 ,the dissenter who checks the ,word of ,god in the name of some denominational law or dogma is as ,erastian as the churchman who would crush it1 like ,amaziah1 by invoking the state4 ,these things in all the ,churches are the beggarly rudiments of ,paganism2 and religious reform is achieved1 as it was that day at ,bethel1 by the abjuring of officialism4 ,but ,amos answered and said unto ,amaziah1 ,no prophet ,i1 nor prophet's son4 ,but a herdsman#bjg ,i1 and a dresser of sycomores2 and ,jehovah took me from behind the flock1 and ,jehovah said unto me1 ,go1 prophesy unto ,my people ,israel4 ,on such words we do not comment2 we give them homage4 ,the answer of this shepherd to this priest is no mere claim of personal disinterestedness4 ,it is the protest of a new order of prophecy1#bjh the charter of a spiritual religion4 ,as we have seen1 the sons of the prophets were guilds of men who had taken to prophesying because of certain gifts of temper and natural disposition1 and they earned their bread by the exercise of these4 ,among such abstract craftsmen ,amos will not be reckoned4 ,he is a prophet1 but not of the kind with which his generation was familiar4 ,an ordinary member of society1 he has been suddenly called by ,jehovah from his civil occupation for a special purpose and by a call which has not necessarily to do with either gifts or a profession4 ,this was something new1 not only in itself1 but in its consequences upon the general relations of ,god to men4 ,what we see in this dialogue at ,bethel is1 therefore1 not merely the triumph of a character1 however heroic1 but rather a step forward--and that one of the greatest and most indispensable--in the history of religion4 ,there follows a denunciation of the man who sought to silence this fresh voice of ,god4 ,now therefore hearken to the word of ,jehovah thou that sayest1 ,prophesy not against ,israel1 nor let drop thy words against the house of ,israel2 therefore thus saith ,jehovah4444 ,thou hast presumed to say2 ,hear what ,god will say4 ,thou hast dared to set thine office and system against ,his word and purpose4 ,see how they must be swept away4 ,in defiance of its own rules the grammar flings forward to the beginnings of its clauses1 each detail of the priest's estate along with the scene of its desecration4 ,thy wife in the city--shall play the harlot2 and thy sons and thy daughters by the sword--shall fall2 and thy land by the measuring rope--shall be divided2 and thou in an unclean land--shalt die4 ,do not let us blame the prophet for a coarse cruelty in the first of these details4 ,he did not invent it4 ,with all the rest it formed an ordinary consequence of defeat in the warfare of the times--an inevitable item of that general overthrow which1 with bitter emphasis1 the prophet describes in ,amaziah's own words3 ,israel going shall go into captivity from off his own land4 ,there is added a vision in line with the three which preceded the priest's interruption4 ,we are therefore justified in supposing that ,amos spoke it also on this occasion1 and in taking it as the close of his address at ,bethel4 ,then the ,lord ,jehovah gave me to see3 and1 behold1 a basket of aits1 that is1 summer fruit4 ,and ,he said1 ,what art thou seeing1 ,amos8 ,and ,i said1 ,a basket of aits4 ,and ,jehovah said unto me1 ,the ets--the ,end--has come upon ,my people ,israel4 ,i will not again pass them over4 ,this does not carry the prospect beyond the third vision1 but it stamps its finality1 and there is therefore added a vivid realisation of the result4 ,by four disjointed lamentations1 howls the prophet calls them1 we are made to feel the last shocks of the final collapse1 and in the utter end an awful silence4 ,and the songs of the temple shall be changed into howls in that day1 saith the ,lord ,jehovah4 ,multitude of corpses6 ,in every place6 ,he hath cast out6 ,hush6 ,these then were probably the last words which ,amos spoke to ,israel4 ,if so1 they form a curious echo of what was enforced upon himself1 and he may have meant them as such4 ,he was cast out2 he was silenced4 ,they might almost be the verbal repetition of the priest's orders4 ,in any case the silence is appropriate4 ,but ,amaziah little knew what power he had given to prophecy the day he forbade it to speak4 ,the gagged prophet began to write2 and those accents which1 humanly speaking1 might have died out with the songs of the temple of ,bethel were clothed upon with the immortality of literature4 ,amos silenced wrote a book--first of prophets to do so--and this is the book we have now to study4 ,,footnotes3 #acj ,cornill3 ,der ,israelitische ,prophetismus4 ,five ,lectures for the ,educated ,laity4 #ahid4 #aca ,amos vii4 #ad4 ,see further pp4 #gf f4 #acb ,khurbet ,taa'1 ,hebrew ,tea'1 1 from 1 to blow a trumpet 7cf4 ,jer4 vi4 #a1 ,blow the trumpet in ,tekoa7 or to pitch a tent4 ,the latter seems the more probable derivation of the name1 and suggests a nomadic origin1 which agrees with the position of ,tekoa on the borders of the desert4 ,tekoa does not occur in the list of the towns taken by ,joshua4 ,there are really no reasons for supposing that some other ,tekoa is meant4 ,the two that have been alleged are 7#a7 that ,amos exclusively refers to the ,northern ,kingdom1 7#b7 that sycomores do not grow at such levels as ,tekoa4 ,these are dealt with on pp4 #gi and #gg respectively4 #acc #b ,chron4 xx4 #bj4 #acd 1 nd1 is doubtless the same as the ,arabic nad1 or keeper of the naad1 defined by ,freytag as a short-legged and deformed race of sheep in the ,bahrein province of ,arabia1 from which comes the proverb viler than a naad2 yet the wool is very fine4 ,the king of ,moab is called in #b ,kings iii4 #d 7,a4,v4 sheep-master74 ,in vii4 #ad ,amos calls himself 1 cattleman1 which there is no reason to alter1 as some do1 to 4 #ace 1 bls1 probably from a root 7found in thiopic7 balas1 a fig2 hence one who had to do with figs1 handled them1 ripened them4 #acf ,the ,egyptian sycomore1 ,ficus sycomorus1 is not found in ,syria above one thousand feet above the sea1 while ,tekoa is more than twice as high as that4 ,cf4 #a ,kings x4 #bg1 the sycomores that are in the vale or valley land1 2 #a ,chron4 xxvii4 #bh1 the sycomores that are in the low plains4 ,the sycamore grows in sand on the edge of the desert as vigorously as in the midst of a well-watered country4 ,its roots go deep in search of water1 which infiltrates as far as the gorges of the hills1 and they absorb it freely even where drought seems to reign supreme 7,maspero on the ,egyptian sycomore2 ,the ,dawn of ,civilization1 translated by ,mc,clure1 p4 #bf74 ,everywhere on the confines of cultivated ground1 and even at some distance from the valley1 are fine single sycamores flourishing as though by miracle amid the sand4444 ,they drink from water1 which has infiltrated from the ,nile1 and whose existence is nowise betrayed upon the surface of the soil 7ib41 #aba74 ,always and still reverenced by ,moslem and ,christian4 #acg ,so practically ,oort 7,th4 ,tjidsch41 #ahia1 #aba ff471 when compelled to abandon his previous conclusion 7ib41 #ahhj1 #abb ff47 that the ,tekoa of ,amos lay in ,northern ,israel4 #ach ,in #ahia we met the ,rushaideh1 who cultivate ,engedi1 encamped just below ,tekoa4 ,but at other parts of the borders between the hill-country of ,juda and the desert1 and between ,moab and the desert1 we found round most of the herdsmen's central wells a few fig-trees or pomegranates1 or even apricots occasionally4 #aci ,luke i4 #hj4 #adj ,mark i4 #ah4 #ada v4 #e2 viii4 #ad4 #adb ,see p4 #cf4 #adc ,prov4 xxxi4 #bd4 #add vi4 #aj4 #ade i4 #i4 #adf v4 #af4 #adg v4 #ba ff4 #adh li4 #g1 #h4 #adi viii4 #d ff4 #aej vi4 #a1 #d-g4 #aea ,see pp4 #acf f4 #aeb i4 #b4 #aec 1 as has been pointed out1 means in early ,israel always the trumpet blown as a summons to war2 only in later ,israel was the name given to the temple trumpet4 #aed ,see further on this important passage pp4 #hi ff4 #aee ,shall a little bird fall on the snare earthwards and there be no noose about her8 ,shall a snare rise from the ground and not be taking something8 ,on this see p4 #hb4 ,its meaning seems to be equivalent to the ,scottish proverb3 ,there's aye some water whan the stirkie droons4 #aef ,there is thus no reason to alter the words who shall not prophesy to who shall not tremble--as ,wellhausen does4 ,to do so is to blunt the point of the argument4 #aeg ,see ,chap4 ,,iv4 #aeh ,see pp4 #ec ff4 #aei ,see pp4 #fi f4 #afj viii4 #h4 #afa viii4 #i4 #afb v4 #ad4 #afc ,how far ,assyria assisted the development of prophecy we have already seen4 ,but we have been made aware1 at the same time1 that ,assyria's service to ,israel in this respect presupposed the possession by the prophets of certain beliefs in the character and will of their ,god1 ,jehovah4 ,the prophets' faith could never have risen to the magnitude of the new problems set to it by ,assyria if there had not been already inherent in it that belief in the sovereignty of a ,righteousness of which all things material were but the instruments4 #afd ,compare1 for instance1 ,hosea's condemnation of ,jehu's murder of ,joram1 with ,elisha's command to do it2 also #b ,kings iii4 #ai1 #be1 with ,deut4 xx4 #ai4 #afe ,see above1 p4 #aj4 #aff ,isa4 xxviii4 #afg ,amos ii4 #afh ,ante1 p4 #gd4 #afi i4 #b4 #agj ,therefore we see at a glance how utterly inadequate is ,renan's brilliant comparison of ,amos to a modern revolutionary journalist 7,histoire du ,peuple ,israel1 ,,ii474 ,journalist indeed6 ,how all this would-be cosmopolitan and impartial critic's judgments smack of the boulevards6 #aga ,exod4 xx42 incorporated in the ,,je book of history1 and1 according to nearly all critics1 complete by #gej2 the contents must have been familiar in ,israel long before that4 ,there is no trace in ,amos of any influence peculiar to either the ,deuteronomic or the ,levitical legislation4 #agb ,see especially ,schultz1 ,o4 ,t4 ,theol41 ,eng4 ,trans4 by ,paterson1 ,i4 #bad4 #agc ii4 #i-aa4 ,on this passage see further p4 #acg4 #agd ,if iv4 #ac1 v4 #h and ix4 #f be genuine1 this remark equally applies to belief in ,jehovah as ,creator4 #age ,kayser1 ,old ,testament ,theology4 #agf v4 #f1 #ad4 #agg ,see above1 p4 #ah4 #agh iii4 #b4 #agi v4 #ba ff4 #ahj ,jer4 vii4 #bb f4 #aha ,see above1 p4 #bc4 #ahb v4 #ba-bc4 #ahc vi4 #h4 #ahd ix4 #h #ahe viii4 #g4 #ahf ,chap4 ,v41 p4 #ga4 #ahg vii4 #aa4 #ahh ,on the ministry of eighth-century prophets to the people see the author's ,isaiah1 ,i41 p4 #aai4 #ahi ,so ,,lxx41 followed by ,hitzig and ,wellhausen1 by reading for 4 #aij ,cf4 ,hist4 ,geography of the ,holy ,land1 pp4 #fd ff4 ,the word translated spring crop above is 1 and from the same root as the name of the latter rain1 1 which falls in the end of ,march or beginning of ,april4 ,cf4 ,zeitschrift des deutschen ,palstina-,vereins1 ,,iv4 #hc2 ,,viii4 #fb4 #aia ,cf4 #a ,kings xviii4 #e with #a ,sam4 vii4 #ae1 #ag2 #a ,kings iv4 #g ff4 ,see ,robertson ,smith1 ,religion of the ,semites1 #bbh4 #aib ,,lxx43 ,who shall raise up ,jacob again8 #aic ,so ,professor ,a4 ,b4 ,davidson4 ,but the grammar might equally well afford the rendering one calling that the ,lord will punish with the fire1 the of marking the introduction of indirect speech 7cf4 ,ewald1 #cch;a74 ,but ,hitzig for reads 7,deut4 xxv4 #ah71 to occur1 happen4 ,so similarly ,wellhausen1 es nahte sich zu strafen mit ,feuer der ,herr ,jahve4 ,all these renderings yield practically the same meaning4 #aid ,a4 ,b4 ,davidson1 ,syntax1 #eg1 ,rem4 #a4 #aie i4 #ai f4 #aif ,cf4 ,micah ii4 #c4 is the word used1 and according to the motive given above stands well for the climax of the fire's destructive work4 ,this meets the objection of ,wellhausen1 who proposes to omit 1 because the heat does not dry up first the great deep and then the fields 7,ackerflur74 ,this is to mistake the obvious point of the sentence4 ,the drought was so great that1 after the fountains were exhausted1 it seemed as if the solid framework of the land1 described with very apt pathos as the ,portion1 would be the next to disappear4 ,some take as divided1 therefore cultivated1 ground4 #aig ,so for instance1 ,von ,orelli4 #aih ,chap4 iv4 #aii ,see ,chap4 ,,iv41 p4 #ea4 #bjj ,literally of the plummet1 an obscure expression4 ,it cannot mean plumb-straight1 for the wall is condemned4 #bja #b ,kings xxi4 #ac3 ,i will stretch over ,jerusalem the line of ,samaria and the plummet or weight 77 of the house of ,ahab4 ,isa4 xxxiv4 #aa3 ,he shall stretch over it the cord of confusion1 and the weights 7literally stones7 of emptiness4 #bjb ,john xix4 #ab4 #bjc ,the word seer is here used in a contemptuous sense1 and has therefore to be translated by some such word as visionary4 #bjd ,literally eat4 #bje --that is1 a central or capital sanctuary4 ,cf4 7#a ,sam4 xxvii4 #e71 city of the kingdom1 i4e4 chief or capital town4 #bjf #a ,kings xii4 #bf1 #bg4 #bjg ,prophet and prophet's son are equivalent terms1 the latter meaning one of the professional guilds of prophets4 ,there is no need to change herdsman1 1 as ,wellhausen does1 into 1 shepherd1 the word used in i4 #a4 #bjh ,cf4 ,wellhausen1 ,hist41 ,eng4 ,ed41 #f3 ,amos was the founder and the purest type of a new order of prophecy4 ,,chapter ,,vii ,,atrocities ,,and ,,atrocities ,,amos i4 #c-;ii4 ,like all the prophets of ,israel1 ,amos receives oracles for foreign nations4 ,unlike them1 however1 he arranges these oracles not after1 but before1 his indictment of his own people1 and so as to lead up to this4 ,his reason is obvious and characteristic4 ,if his aim be to enforce a religion independent of his people's interests and privileges1 how can he better do so than by exhibiting its principles at work outside his people1 and then1 with the impetus drained from many areas1 sweep in upon the vested iniquities of ,israel herself8 ,this is the course of the first section of his book--chapters i4 and ii4 ,one by one the neighbours of ,israel are cited and condemned in the name of ,jehovah2 one by one they are told they must fall before the still unnamed engine of the ,divine ,justice4 ,but when ,amos has stirred his people's conscience and imagination by his judgment of their neighbours' sins1 he turns with the same formula on themselves4 ,are they morally better8 ,are they more likely to resist ,assyria8 ,with greater detail he shows them worse and their doom the heavier for all their privileges4 ,thus is achieved an oratorical triumph1 by tactics in harmony with the principles of prophecy and remarkably suited to the tempers of that time4 ,but ,amos achieves another feat1 which extends far beyond his own day4 ,the sins he condemns in the heathen are at first sight very different from those which he exposes within ,israel4 ,not only are they sins of foreign relations1 of treaty and war1 while ,israel's are all civic and domestic2 but they are what we call the atrocities of ,barbarism--wanton war1 massacre and sacrilege--while ,israel's are rather the sins of ,civilisation--the pressure of the rich upon the poor1 the bribery of justice1 the seduction of the innocent1 personal impurity1 and other evils of luxury4 ,so great is this difference that a critic more gifted with ingenuity than with insight might plausibly distinguish in the section before us two prophets with two very different views of national sin--a ruder prophet1 and of course an earlier1 who judged nations only by the flagrant drunkenness of their war1 and a more subtle prophet1 and of course a later1 who exposed the masked corruptions of their religion and their peace4 ,such a theory would be as false as it would be plausible4 ,for not only is the diversity of the objects of the prophet's judgment explained by this1 that ,amos had no familiarity with the interior life of other nations1 and could only arraign their conduct at those points where it broke into light in their foreign relations1 while ,israel's civic life he knew to the very core4 ,but ,amos had besides a strong and a deliberate aim in placing the sins of civilisation as the climax of a list of the atrocities of barbarism4 ,he would recall what men are always forgetting1 that the former are really more cruel and criminal than the latter2 that luxury1 bribery and intolerance1 the oppression of the poor1 the corruption of the innocent and the silencing of the prophet--what ,christ calls offences against ,his little ones--are even more awful atrocities than the wanton horrors of barbarian warfare4 ,if we keep in mind this moral purpose1 we shall study with more interest than we could otherwise do the somewhat foreign details of this section4 ,horrible as the outrages are which ,amos describes1 they were repeated only yesterday by ,turkey3 many of the crimes with which he charges ,israel blacken the life of ,turkey's chief accuser1 ,great ,britain4 ,in his survey ,amos includes all the six states of ,palestine that bordered upon ,israel1 and lay in the way of the advance of ,assyria--,aram of ,damascus1 ,philistia1 ,tyre 7for ,phnicia71 ,edom1 ,ammon and ,moab4 ,they are not arranged in geographical order4 ,the prophet begins with ,aram in the north-east1 then leaps to ,philistia in the south-west1 comes north again to ,tyre1 crosses to the south-east and ,edom1 leaps ,moab to ,ammon1 and then comes back to ,moab4 ,nor is any other explanation of his order visible4 ,damascus heads the list1 no doubt1 because her cruelties had been most felt by ,israel1 and perhaps too because she lay most open to ,assyria4 ,it was also natural to take next to ,aram ,philistia1#bji as ,israel's other greatest foe2 and nearest to ,philistia lay ,tyre4 ,the three south-eastern principalities come together4 ,but there may have been a chronological reason now unknown to us4 ,the authenticity of the oracles on ,tyre1 ,edom and ,judah has been questioned3 it will be best to discuss each case as we come to it4 ,each of the oracles is introduced by the formula3 ,thus saith1 or hath said1 ,jehovah3 ,because of three crimes of 444 yea1 because of four1 ,i will not turn ,it back4 ,in harmony with the rest of the book1#baj ,jehovah is represented as moving to punishment1 not for a single sin1 but for repeated and cumulative guilt4 ,the unnamed ,it which ,god will not recall is not the word of judgment1 but the anger and the hand stretched forth to smite4#baa ,after the formula1 an instance of the nation's guilt is given1 and then in almost identical terms he decrees the destruction of all by war and captivity4 ,assyria is not mentioned1 but it is the ,assyrian fashion of dealing with conquered states which is described4 ,except in the case of ,tyre and ,edom1 the oracles conclude as they have begun1 by asserting themselves to be the word of ,jehovah1 or of ,jehovah the ,lord4 ,it is no abstract righteousness which condemns these foreign peoples1 but the ,god of ,israel1 and their evil deeds are described by the characteristic ,hebrew word for sin--crimes1 revolts or treasons against ,him4#bab 99 99 99 99 99 #a4 ,,aram ,,of ,,damascus4--,thus hath ,jehovah said3 ,because of three crimes of ,damascus1 yea1 because of four1 ,i will not turn ,it back2 for that they threshed ,gilead with iron--or basalt threshing-sledges4 ,the word is iron1 but the ,arabs of to-day call basalt iron2 and the threshing-sledges1 curved slabs#bac drawn rapidly by horses over the heaped corn1 are studded with sharp basalt teeth that not only thresh out the grain1 but chop the straw into little pieces4 ,so cruelly had ,gilead been chopped by ,hazael and his son ,ben-,hadad some fifty or forty years before ,amos prophesied4#bad ,strongholds were burned1 soldiers slain without quarter1 children dashed to pieces1 and women with child put to a most atrocious end4#bae ,but ,i shall send fire on the house of ,hazael1 and it shall devour the palaces of ,ben-,hadad--these names are chosen1 not because they were typical of the ,damascus dynasty1 but because they were the very names of the two heaviest oppressors of ,israel4#baf ,and ,i will break the bolt#bag of ,damascus1 and cut off the inhabitant from ,bi'ath-,aven--the ,valley of ,idolatry1 so called1 perhaps1 by a play upon ,bi'ath ,on1#bah presumably the valley between the ,lebanons1 still called the ,be'a1 in which lay ,heliopolis#bai--;and him that holdeth the sceptre from ,beth-,eden--some royal ,paradise in that region of ,damascus1 which is still the ,paradise of the ,arab world--and the people of ,aram shall go captive to ir--,kir in the unknown north1 from which they had come3#bbj ,jehovah hath said it4 #b4 ,,philistia4--,thus saith ,jehovah3 ,for three crimes of ,gaza and for four ,i will not turn ,it back1 because they led captive a whole captivity1 in order to deliver them up to ,edom4 ,it is difficult to see what this means if not the wholesale depopulation of a district in contrast to the enslavement of a few captives of war4 ,by all tribes of the ancient world1 the captives of their bow and spear were regarded as legitimate property3 it was no offence to the public conscience that they should be sold into slavery4 ,but the ,philistines seem1 without excuse of war1 to have descended upon certain districts and swept the whole of the population before them1 for purely commercial purposes4 ,it was professional slave-catching4 ,the ,philistines were exactly like the ,arabs of to-day in ,africa--not warriors who win their captives in honourable fight1 but slave-traders1 pure and simple4 ,in warfare in ,arabia itself it is still a matter of conscience with the wildest nomads not to extinguish a hostile tribe1 however bitter one be against them4#bba ,gaza is chiefly blamed by ,amos1 for she was the emporium of the trade on the border of the desert1 with roads and regular caravans to ,petra and ,elah on the ,gulf of ,akaba1 both of them places in ,edom and depots for the traffic with ,arabia4#bbb ,but ,i will cut off the inhabitant from ,ashdod1 and the holder of the sceptre from ,askalon1 and ,i will turn ,my hand upon ,ekron--four of the five great ,philistine towns1 ,gath being already destroyed1 and never again to be mentioned with the others#bbc--;and the last of the ,philistines shall perish3 ,jehovah hath said it4 #c4 ,,tyre4--,thus saith ,jehovah3 ,because of three crimes of ,tyre and because of four ,i will not turn ,it back2 for that they gave up a whole captivity to ,edom--the same market as in the previous charge--and did not remember the covenant of brethren4 ,we do not know to what this refers4 ,the alternatives are three3 that the captives were ,hebrews and the alliance one between ,israel and ,edom2 that the captives were ,hebrews and the alliance one between ,israel and ,tyre2#bbd that the captives were ,phnicians and the alliance the natural brotherhood of ,tyre and the other ,phnician towns4#bbe ,but of these three alternatives the first is scarcely possible1 for in such a case the blame would have been rather ,edom's in buying than ,tyre's in selling4 ,the second is possible1 for ,israel and ,tyre had lived in close alliance for more than two centuries2 but the phrase covenant of brethren is not so well suited to a league between two tribes who felt themselves to belong to fundamentally different races1#bbf as to the close kinship of the ,phnician communities4 ,and although1 in the scrappy records of ,phnician history before this time1 we find no instance of so gross an outrage by ,tyre on other ,phnicians1 it is quite possible that such may have occurred4 ,during next century ,tyre twice over basely took sides with ,assyria in suppressing the revolts of her sister cities4#bbg ,besides1 the other ,phnician towns are not included in the charge4 ,we have every reason1 therefore1 to believe that ,amos expresses here not resentment against a betrayal of ,israel1 but indignation at an outrage upon natural rights and feelings with which ,israel's own interests were not in any way concerned4 ,and this also suits the lofty spirit of the whole prophecy4 ,but ,i will send fire upon the wall of ,tyre1 and it shall devour her palaces4444 ,this oracle against ,tyre has been suspected by ,wellhausen1#bbh for the following reasons3 that it is of ,tyre alone1 and silence is kept regarding the other ,phnician cities1 while in the case of ,philistia other towns than ,gaza are condemned2 that the charge is the same as against ,gaza2 and that the usual close to the formula is wanting4 ,but it would have been strange if from a list of states threatened by the ,assyrian doom we had missed ,tyre1 ,tyre which lay in the avenger's very path4 ,again1 that so acute a critic as ,wellhausen should cite the absence of other ,phnician towns from the charge against ,tyre is really amazing1 when he has just allowed that it was probably against some or all of these cities that ,tyre's crime was committed4 ,how could they be included in the blame of an outrage done upon themselves8 ,the absence of the usual formula at the close may perhaps be explained by omission1 as indicated above4#bbi #d4 ,,edom4--,thus saith ,jehovah3 ,because of three crimes of ,edom and because of four ,i will not turn ,it back2 for that he pursued with the sword his brother1 who cannot be any other than ,israel1 corrupted his natural feelings--literally his bowels of mercies--and kept aye fretting#bcj his anger1 and his passion he watched--like a fire1 or paid heed to it--for ever4#bca ,but ,i will send fire upon ,teman--the ,south ,region belonging to ,edom--and it shall devour the palaces of ,borah--the ,edomite ,borah1 south-east of ,petra4#bcb ,the ,assyrians had already compelled ,edom to pay tribute4#bcc ,the objections to the authenticity of this oracle are more serious than those in the case of the oracle on ,tyre4 ,it has been remarked#bcd that before the ,jewish ,exile so severe a tone could not have been adopted by a ,jew against ,edom1 who had been mostly under the yoke of ,judah1 and not leniently treated4 ,what were the facts8 ,joab subdued ,edom for ,david with great cruelty4#bce ,jewish governors were set over the conquered people1 and this state of affairs seems to have lasted1 in spite of an ,edomite attempt against ,solomon1#bcf till #hej4 ,in ,jehoshaphat's reign1 #hgc-hej1 there was no king of ,edom1 a deputy was king1 who towards #hej joined the kings of ,judah and ,israel in an invasion of ,moab through his territory4#bcg ,but1 soon after this invasion and perhaps in consequence of its failure1 ,edom revolted from ,joram of ,judah 7#hdi-hdb71 who unsuccessfully attempted to put down the revolt4#bch ,the ,edomites appear to have remained independent for fifty years at least4 ,amaziah of ,judah 7#gig-ggi7 smote them1#bci but not it would seem into subjection1 for1 according to the ,chronicler1 ,uzziah had to win back ,elath for the ,jews after ,amaziah's death4#bdj ,the history1 therefore1 of the relations of ,judah and ,edom before the time of ,amos was of such a kind as to make credible the existence in ,judah at that time of the feeling about ,edom which inspires this oracle4 ,edom had shown just the vigilant1 implacable hatred here described4 ,but was the right to blame them for it ,judah's1 who herself had so persistently waged war1 with confessed cruelty1 against ,edom8 ,could a ,judan prophet be just in blaming ,edom and saying nothing of ,judah8 ,it is true that in the fifty years of ,edom's independence--the period1 we must remember1 from which ,amos seems to draw the materials of all his other charges--there may have been events to justify this oracle as spoken by him2 and our ignorance of that period is ample reason why we should pause before rejecting the oracle so dogmatically as ,wellhausen does4 ,but we have at least serious grounds for suspecting it4 ,to charge ,edom1 whom ,judah has conquered and treated cruelly1 with restless hate towards ,judah seems to fall below that high impartial tone which prevails in the other oracles of this section4 ,the charge was much more justifiable at the time of the ,exile1 when ,edom did behave shamefully towards ,israel4#bda ,wellhausen points out that ,teman and ,borah are names which do not occur in the ,old ,testament before the ,exile1 but this is uncertain and inconclusive4 ,the oracle wants the concluding formula of the rest4#bdb #e4 ,,ammon4--,thus saith ,jehovah3 ,because of three crimes of ,ammon and because of four ,i will not turn ,it back2 for that they ripped up ,gilead's women with child--in order to enlarge their borders6 ,for such an end they committed such an atrocity6 ,the crime is one that has been more or less frequent in ,semitic warfare4 ,wellhausen cites several instances in the feuds of ,arab tribes about their frontiers4 ,the ,turks have been guilty of it in our own day4#bdc ,it is the same charge which the historian of ,israel puts into the mouth of ,elisha against ,hazael of ,aram1#bdd and probably the war was the same2 when ,gilead was simultaneously attacked by ,arameans from the north and ,ammonites from the south4 ,but ,i will set fire to the wall of ,rabbah--,rabbath-,ammon1 literally chief or capital of ,ammon--and it shall devour her palaces1 with clamour in the day of battle1 with tempest in the day of storm4 ,as we speak of storming a city1 ,amos and ,isaiah#bde use the tempest to describe the overwhelming invasion of ,assyria4 ,there follows the characteristic ,assyrian conclusion3 ,and their king shall go into captivity1 he and his princes#bdf together1 saith ,jehovah4 #f4 ,,moab4--,thus saith ,jehovah3 ,because of three crimes of ,moab and because of four ,i will not turn ,it back2 for that he burned the bones of the king of ,edom to lime4#bdg ,in the great invasion of ,moab1 about #hej1 by ,israel1 ,judah and ,edom conjointly1 the rage of ,moab seems to have been directed chiefly against ,edom4#bdh ,whether opportunity to appease that rage occurred on the withdrawal of ,israel we cannot say4 ,but either then or afterwards1 balked of their attempt to secure the king of ,edom alive1 ,moab wreaked their vengeance on his corpse1 and burnt his bones to lime4 ,it was1 in the religious belief of all antiquity1 a sacrilege2 yet it does not seem to have been the desecration of the tomb--or he would have mentioned it--but the wanton meanness of the deed1 which ,amos felt4 ,and ,i will send fire on ,moab1 and it shall devour the palaces of ,the-,cities--eroth1#bdi perhaps the present ureiyat1#bej on the ,moab plateau where ,chemosh had his shrine#bea--;and in tumult shall ,moab die--to ,jeremiah#beb the ,moabites were the sons of tumult--with clamour and with the noise of the war-trumpet4 ,and ,i will cut off the ruler--literally judge1 probably the vassal king placed by ,jeroboam ,,ii4--from her#bec midst1 and all his#bed princes will ,i slay with him3 ,jehovah hath said it4 99 99 99 99 99 ,these1 then1 are the charges which ,amos brings against the heathen neighbours of ,israel4 ,if we look as a whole across the details through which we have been working1 what we see is a picture of the ,semitic world so summary and so vivid that we get the like of it nowhere else--the ,semitic world in its characteristic brokenness and turbulence2 its factions and ferocities1 its causeless raids and quarrels1 tribal disputes about boundaries flaring up into the most terrible massacres1 vengeance that wreaks itself alike on the embryo and the corpse--cutting up women with child in ,gilead1 and burning to lime the bones of the king of ,edom4 ,and the one commerce which binds these ferocious tribes together is the slave-trade in its wholesale and most odious form4 ,amos treats none of the atrocities subjectively4 ,it is not because they have been inflicted upon ,israel that he feels or condemns them4 ,the appeals of ,israel against the tyrant become many as the centuries go on2 the later parts of the ,old ,testament are full of the complaints of ,god's chosen people1 conscious of their mission to the world1 against the heathen1 who prevented them from it4 ,here we find none of these complaints1 but a strictly objective and judicial indictment of the characteristic crimes of heathen men against each other2 and though this is made in the name of ,jehovah1 it is not in the interests of ,his people or of any of ,his purposes through them1 but solely by the standard of an impartial righteousness which1 as we are soon to hear1 must descend in equal judgment on ,israel4 ,again1 for the moral principles which ,amos enforces no originality can be claimed4 ,he condemns neither war as a whole nor slavery as a whole1 but limits his curse to wanton and deliberate aggravations of them3 to the slave-trade in cold blood1 in violation of treaties and for purely commercial ends2#bee to war for trifling causes1 and that wreaks itself on pregnant women and dead men2 to national hatreds1 that never will be still4 ,now against such things there has always been in mankind a strong conscience1 of which the word humanity is in itself a sufficient proof4 ,we need not here inquire into the origin of such a common sense--whether it be some native impulse of tenderness which asserts itself as soon as the duties of self-defence are exhausted1 or some rational notion of the needlessness of excesses1 or whether1 in committing these1 men are visited by fear of retaliation from the wrath they have unnecessarily exasperated4 ,certain it is1 that warriors of all races have hesitated to be wanton in their war1 and have foreboded the special judgment of heaven upon every blind extravagance of hate or cruelty4 ,it is well known how fey the ,greeks felt the insolence of power and immoderate anger2 they are the fatal element in many a ,greek tragedy4#bef ,but the ,semites themselves1 whose racial ferocity is so notorious1 are not without the same feeling4 ,even the ,beduins' old cruel rancours are often less than the golden piety of the wilderness4 ,the danger past1 they can think of the defeated foemen with kindness1 444 putting only their trust in ,ullah to obtain the like at need for themselves4 ,it is contrary to the ,arabian conscience to extinguish a ,kabla4#beg ,similarly in ,israel some of the earliest ethical movements were revolts of the public conscience against horrible outrages1 like that1 for instance1 done by the ,benjamites of ,gibeah4#beh ,therefore in these oracles on his wild ,semitic neighbours ,amos discloses no new ideal for either tribe or individual4 ,our view is confirmed that he was intent only upon rousing the natural conscience of his ,hebrew hearers in order to engage this upon other vices to which it was less impressionable--that he was describing those deeds of war and slavery1 whose atrocity all men admitted1 only that he might proceed to bring under the same condemnation the civic and domestic sins of ,israel4 ,we turn with him1 then1 to ,israel4 ,but in his book as it now stands in our ,bibles1 ,israel is not immediately reached4 ,between her and the foreign nations two verses are bestowed upon ,judah3 ,thus saith ,jehovah3 ,because of three crimes of ,judah and because of four ,i will not turn ,it back2 for that they despised the ,torah of ,jehovah1 and ,his statutes they did not observe1 and their falsehoods--false gods--led them astray1 after which their fathers walked4 ,but ,i will send fire on ,judah1 and it shall devour the palaces of ,jerusalem4 ,these verses have been suspected as a later insertion1#bei on the ground that every reference to ,judah in the ,book of ,amos must be late1 that the language is very formal1 and that the phrases in which the sin of ,judah is described sound like echoes of ,deuteronomy4 ,the first of these reasons may be dismissed as absurd2 it would have been far more strange if ,amos had never at all referred to ,judah4#bfj ,the charges1 however1 are not like those which ,amos elsewhere makes1 and though the phrases may be quite as early as his time1#bfa the reader of the original1 and even the reader of the ,english version1 is aware of a certain tameness and vagueness of statement1 which contrasts remarkably with the usual pungency of the prophet's style4 ,we are forced to suspect the authenticity of these verses4 ,we ought to pass1 then1 straight from the third to the sixth verse of this chapter1 from the oracles on foreign nations to that on ,northern ,israel4 ,it is introduced with the same formula as they are3 ,thus saith ,jehovah3 ,because of three crimes of ,israel and because of four ,i will not turn ,it back4 ,but there follow a greater number of details1 for ,amos has come among his own people whom he knows to the heart1 and he applies to them a standard more exact and an obligation more heavy than any he could lay to the life of the heathen4 ,let us run quickly through the items of his charge4 ,for that they sell an honest man#bfb for silver1 and a needy man for a pair of shoes--proverbial1 as we should say for an old song--who trample to the dust of the earth the head of the poor--the least improbable rendering of a corrupt passage#bfc--;and pervert the way of humble men4 ,and a man and his father will go into the maid1 the same maid1#bfd to desecrate ,my ,holy ,name--without doubt some public form of unchastity introduced from the ,canaanite worship into the very sanctuary of ,jehovah1 the holy place where ,he reveals ,his ,name--and on garments given in pledge they stretch themselves by every altar1 and the wine of those who have been fined they drink in the house of their ,god4 ,a riot of sin3 the material of their revels is the miseries of the poor1 its stage the house of ,god6 ,such is religion to the ,israel of ,amos' day--indoors1 feverish1 sensual4 ,by one of the sudden contrasts he loves1 ,amos sweeps out of it into ,god's ideal of religion--a great historical movement1 told in the language of the open air3 national deliverance1 guidance on the highways of the world1 the inspiration of prophecy1 and the pure1 ascetic life4 ,but ,i1 ,i destroyed the ,amorite#bfe before you1 whose height was as the cedars1 and he was strong as oaks1 and ,i destroyed his fruit from above and his roots from below4 ,what a contrast to the previous picture of the temple filled with fumes of wine and hot with lust6 ,we are out on open history2 ,god's gales blow and the forests crash before them4 ,and ,i brought you up out of the land of ,egypt1 and led you through the wilderness forty years1 to inherit the land of the ,amorite4 ,religion is not chambering and wantonness2 it is not selfish comfort or profiting by the miseries of the poor and the sins of the fallen4 ,but religion is history--the freedom of the people and their education1 the winning of the land and the defeat of the heathen foe2 and then1 when the land is firm and the home secure1 it is the raising1 upon that stage and shelter1 of spiritual guides and examples4 ,and ,i raised up of your sons to be prophets1 and of your young men to be ,nazirites--consecrated and ascetic lives4 ,is it not so1 ,o children of ,israel8 7oracle of ,jehovah74 ,but ye made the ,nazirites drink wine1 and the prophets ye charged1 saying1 ,prophesy not6 ,luxury1 then1 and a very sensual conception of religion1 with all their vicious offspring in the abuse of justice1 the oppression of the poor1 the corrupting of the innocent1 and the intolerance of spiritual forces--these are the sins of an enlightened and civilised people1 which ,amos describes as worse than all the atrocities of barbarism1 and as certain of ,divine vengeance4 ,how far beyond his own day are his words still warm6 ,here in the nineteenth century is ,great ,britain1 destroyer of the slave-traffic1 and champion of oppressed nationalities--yet this great and ,christian people1 at the very time they are abolishing slavery1 suffer their own children to work in factories and clay-pits for sixteen hours a day1 and in mines set women to a labour for which horses are deemed too valuable4 ,things improve after #ahdh1 but how slowly and against what callousness of ,christians ,lord ,shaftesbury's long and often disappointed labours painfully testify4 ,even yet our religious public1 that curses the ,turk1 and in an indignation1 which can never be too warm1 cries out against the ,armenian atrocities1 is callous1 nay1 by the avarice of some1 the haste and passion for enjoyment of many more1 and the thoughtlessness of all1 itself contributes1 to conditions of life and fashions of society1 which bear with cruelty upon our poor1 taint our literature1 needlessly increase the temptations of our large towns1 and render pure childlife impossible among masses of our population4 ,along some of the highways of our ,christian civilisation we are just as cruel and just as lustful as ,kurd or ,turk4 99 99 99 99 99 ,amos closes this prophecy with a vision of immediate judgment4 ,behold1 ,i am about to crush or squeeze down upon you1 as a waggon crushes#bff that is full of sheaves4#bfg ,an alternative reading supplies the same general impression of a crushing judgment3 ,i will make the ground quake under you1 as a waggon makes it quake1 or as a waggon itself quakes under its load of sheaves4 ,this shock is to be ,war4 ,flight shall perish from the swift1 and the strong shall not prove his power1 nor the mighty man escape with his life4 ,and he that graspeth the bow shall not stand1 nor shall the swift of foot escape1 nor the horseman escape with his life4 ,and he that thinketh himself strong among the heroes shall flee away naked in that day--'tis the oracle of ,jehovah4 ,,footnotes3 #bji ,as is done in chap4 vi4 #b1 ix4 #g4 #baj ,so against ,israel in chap4 iv4 #baa ,so ,isa4 v4 #be3 ,cf4 ,ezek4 xx4 #bb3 #bab #bac ,called lh1 i4e4 slab4 #bad ,these ,syrian campaigns in ,gilead must have taken place between #hci and #hjf1 the long interval during which ,damascus enjoyed freedom from ,assyrian invasion4 #bae #b ,kings viii4 #ab2 xiii4 #g3 cf4 above1 p4 #ca4 #baf ,he delivered them into the hand of ,hazael king of ,aram1 and into the hand of ,ben-,hadad the son of ,hazael1 continually 7#b ,kings xiii4 #c74 #bag ,no need here to render prince1 as some do4 #bah ,so the ,,lxx4 #bai ,the present ,baalbek 7,baal of the ,be'a874 ,wellhausen throws doubt on the idea that ,heliopolis was at this time an ,aramean town4 #bbj ix4 #g4 #bba ,doughty3 ,arabia ,deserta1 ,i4 #cce4 #bbb ,on the close connection of ,edom and ,gaza see ,hist4 ,geog41 pp4 #ahb ff4 #bbc ,see ,hist4 ,geog41 pp4 #aid ff4 ,wellhausen thinks ,gath was not yet destroyed1 and quotes vi4 #b2 ,micah i4 #aj1 #ad4 ,but we know that ,hazael destroyed it1 and that fact1 taken in conjunction with its being the only omission here from the five ,philistine towns1 is evidence enough4 ,in the passages quoted by ,wellhausen there is nothing to the contrary3 vi4 #b implies that ,gath has fallen2 ,micah i4 #aj is the repetition of an old proverb4 #bbd ,farrar1 #ec2 ,pusey on ver4 #i2 ,pietschmann1 ,geschichte der ,phnizier1 #bih4 #bbe ,to which ,wellhausen inclines4 #bbf ,gen4 x4 #bbg ,under ,asarhaddon1 #fgh-fgf ,b4,c41 and later under ,assurbanipal 7,pietschmann1 ,gesch41 pp4 #cjb f474 #bbh ,and he omits it from his translation4 #bbi ,so far from such an omission proving that the oracle is an insertion1 is it not more probable that an insertor would have taken care to make his insertion formally correct8 #bcj ,there seems no occasion to amend with ,olshausen to the kept of ,psalm ciii4 #i4 #bca ,read with ,,lxx4 1 though throughout the verse the ,,lxx4 translation is very vile4 #bcb ,in other two passages1 ,borah1 the city1 is placed in parallel not to another city1 but just as here to a whole region3 ,isa4 xxxiv4 #f1 where the parallel is the land of ,edom1 and lxiii4 #a1 where it is ,edom4 ,there is therefore no need to take ,teman in our passage as a city1 as which it does not appear before ,eusebius4 #bcc ,under ,rimmn-nirari ,,iii4 7#hab-ghc74 ,see ,buhl's ,gesch4 der ,edomiter1 #fe3 this against ,wellhausen4 #bcd ,wellhausen1 in loco4 #bce #b ,sam4 viii4 #ac1 with #a ,kings xi4 #af4 #bcf #a ,kings xi4 #ad-be4 #bcg #b ,kings iii4 #bch #b ,kings viii4 #bj-bb4 #bci #b ,kings xiv4 #aj4 #bdj #b ,chron4 xxvi4 #b4 #bda ,see1 however1 ,buhl1 op4 cit41 #fg4 #bdb ,it is1 however1 no reason against the authenticity of the oracle to say that ,edom lay outside the path of ,assyria4 ,in answer to that see the ,assyrian inscriptions1 e4g4 ,asarhaddon's3 cf4 above1 p4 #abi1 n4 #d4 #bdc ,notably in the recent ,armenian massacres4 #bdd #b ,kings viii4 #ab4 #bde xxviii4 #b1 xxvii4 #g1 #h1 where the ,assyrian and another invasion are both described in terms of tempest4 #bdf ,the ,,lxx4 reading1 their priests and their princes1 must be due to taking ,malcam their king as ,milcom the ,ammonite god4 ,see ,jer4 xlix4 #c4 #bdg ,great ,csar dead and turned to clay ,might stop a hole to turn the wind away4 #bdh #b ,kings iii4 #bf4 ,so rightly ,pusey4 #bdi ,jer4 xlviii4 #bd without article1 but in #da with4 #bej ,though this is claimed by most for iriathaim4 #bea ,moabite ,stone1 l4 #ac4 #beb xlviii4 #de4 #bec ,the land's4 #bed ,the king's4 #bee ,see above1 p4 #abf4 #bef 7schylus1 ,eumen41 #ecd73 cf4 ,odyssey1 xiv4 #bfb2 xvii4 #dca4 #beg ,i4e4 a tribe2 ,doughty1 ,arabia ,deserta1 ,i4 #cce4 #beh ,judges xix41 xx4 #bei ,duhm was the first to publish reasons for rejecting the passage 7,theol4 der ,propheten1 #ahge1 p4 #aai71 but ,wellhausen had already reached the same conclusion 7,kleine ,propheten1 p4 #ga74 ,oort and ,stade adhere4 ,on the other side see ,robertson ,smith1 ,prophets of ,israel1 #cih1 and ,kuenen1 who adheres to ,smith's arguments 7,onderzoek74 #bfj ,it is plain that ,amos could not have excepted ,judah from the universal ruin which he saw to threaten the whole land2 or at all events such exception would have required to be expressly made on special grounds4--,robertson ,smith1 ,prophets1 #cih4 #bfa ,ibid4 #bfb 1 righteous3 hardly1 as most commentators take it1 the legally 7as distinguished from the morally7 righteous2 the rich cruelly used their legal rights to sell respectable and honest members of society into slavery4 #bfc ,by adapting the ,,lxx4 ,so far as we know ,wellhausen is right in saying that the ,massoretic text1 which our ,english version follows1 gives no sense4 ,,lxx4 reads1 also without much sense as a whole1 1 4 #bfd ,so rightly the ,,lxx4 ,or the definite article may be here used in conformity with the common ,hebrew way of employing it to designate1 not a definite individual1 but a member of a definite1 well-known genus4 #bfe ,on the use of ,amorite for all the inhabitants of ,canaan see ,driver's ,deut41 pp4 #aa f4 #bff ,the verb of the ,massoretic text is not found elsewhere1 and whether we retain it1 or take it as a variant of1 or mistake for1 1 or adopt some other reading1 the whole phrase is more or less uncertain1 and the exact shade of meaning has to be guessed1 though the general sense remains pretty much the same4 ,the following is a complete note on the subject1 with reasons for adopting the above conclusion4 7#a7 ,,lxx43 ,behold1 ,i roll 77 under you as a waggon full of straw is rolled4 ,a4,v43 ,i am pressed under you as a cart is pressed4 ,pusey3 ,i straiten myself under you1 etc4 ,these versions take in the sense of 1 to press1 and in its usual meaning of beneath2 and the result is conformable to the well-known figure of the ,old ,testament by which ,god is said to be laden and weary with the transgressions of ,his people4 ,but this does not mean an actual descent of judgment1 and yet vv4 #ad-af imply that such an intimation has been made in ver4 #ac2 and besides and are both in the ,hiphil1 the active1 to press1 or causative1 make to press4 7#b7 ,accordingly some1 adopting this sense of the verb1 take in an unusual sense of down upon4 ,ewald3 ,i press down upon you as a cart that is full of sheaves presseth4 ,guthe 7in ,kautzsch's ,bibel73 ,ich will euch quetschen4 ,rev4 ,eng4 ,ver43 ,i will press you in your place4--,but has been taken in other senses4 7#c7 ,hoffmann 7,z4,a4,t4,w41 ,,iii4 #ajj7 renders it groan in conformity with ,arab4 '4 7#d7 ,wetzstein 7ibid41 #bgh ff47 quotes ,arab4 '1 to stop1 hinder1 and suggests ,i will bring to a stop4 7#e7 ,buhl 7#abth ,ed4 of ,gesenius' ,handwrt1 sub 71 in view of possibility of being threshing-roller1 recalls ,arab4 'a1 to cut in pieces4 7#f7 ,hitzig 7,exeg4 ,handbuch7 proposed to read and 3 ,i will make it shake under you1 as the laden waggon shakes 7the ground74 ,so rather differently ,wellhausen3 ,i will make the ground quake under you1 as a waggon quakes under its load of sheaves4 ,i have only to add that1 in the ,alex4 ,cod4 of ,,lxx41 which reads for 1 we have an interesting analogy to ,wetzstein's proposal2 and that in support of the rendering of ,ewald1 and its unusual interpretation of which seems to me on the whole the most probable1 we may compare ,job xxxvi4 #af1 4 ,this1 it is true1 suggests rather the choking of a passage than the crushing of the ground2 but1 by the way1 that sense is even more applicable to a harvest waggon laden with sheaves4 #bfg ,waggon full of sheaves4--,wellhausen goes too far when he suggests that ,amos would have to go outside ,palestine to see such a waggon4 ,that a people who already knew the use of chariots for travelling 7cf4 ,gen4 xlvi4 #e1 ,,je7 and waggons for agricultural purposes 7#a ,sam4 vi4 #g ff47 did not use them at least in the lowlands of their country is extremely improbable4 ,cf4 ,hist4 ,geog41 ,appendix on ,roads and ,wheeled ,vehicles in ,syria4 ,,chapter ,,viii ,,civilisation ,,and ,,judgment ,,amos iii4-iv4 #c4 ,we now enter the ,second ,section of the ,book of ,amos3 chaps4 iii4-vi4 ,it is a collection of various oracles of denunciation1 grouped partly by the recurrence of the formula ,hear this word1 which stands at the head of our present chapters iii41 iv4 and v41 which are therefore probably due to it2 partly by two cries of ,woe at v4 #ah and vi4 #a2 and also by the fact that each of the groups thus started leads up to an emphatic1 though not at first detailed1 prediction of the nation's doom 7iii4 #ac-ae2 iv4 #c2 iv4 #ab2 v4 #af1 #ag2 v4 #bf1 #bg2 vi4 #ad74 ,within these divisions lie a number of short indictments1 sentences of judgment and the like1 which have no further logical connection than is supplied by their general sameness of subject1 and a perceptible increase of articulateness from beginning to end of the ,section4 ,the sins of ,israel are more detailed1 and the judgment of war1 coming from the ,north1 advances gradually till we discern the unmistakable ranks of ,assyria4 ,but there are various parentheses and interruptions1 which cause the student of the text no little difficulty4 ,some of these1 however1 may be only apparent3 it will always be a question whether their want of immediate connection with what precedes them is not due to the loss of several words from the text rather than to their own intrusion into it4 ,of others it is true that they are obviously out of place as they lie2 their removal brings together verses which evidently belong to each other4 ,even such parentheses1 however1 may be from ,amos himself4 ,it is only where a verse1 besides interrupting the argument1 seems to reflect a historical situation later than the prophet's day1 that we can be sure it is not his own4 ,and in all this textual criticism we must keep in mind1 that the obscurity of the present text of a verse1 so far from being an adequate proof of its subsequent insertion1 may be the very token of its antiquity1 scribes or translators of later date having been unable to understand it4 ,to reject a verse1 only because we do not see the connection1 would surely be as arbitrary1 as the opposite habit of those who1 missing a connection1 invent one1 and then exhibit their artificial joint as evidence of the integrity of the whole passage4 ,in fact we must avoid all headstrong surgery1 for to a great extent we work in the dark4 ,the general subject of the ,section may be indicated by the title3 ,religion and ,civilisation4 ,a vigorous community1 wealthy1 cultured and honestly religious1 are1 at a time of settled peace and growing power1 threatened1 in the name of the ,god of justice1 with their complete political overthrow4 ,their civilisation is counted for nothing2 their religion1 on which they base their confidence1 is denounced as false and unavailing4 ,these two subjects are not1 and could not have been1 separated by the prophet in any one of his oracles4 ,but in the first1 the briefest and most summary of these1 chaps4 iii4-iv4 #c1 it is mainly with the doom of the civil structure of ,israel's life that ,amos deals2 and it will be more convenient for us to take them first1 with all due reference to the echoes of them in later parts of the ,section4 ,from iv4 #d-vi4 it is the ,religion and its false peace which he assaults2 and we shall take that in the next chapter4 ,first1 then1 ,civilisation and ,judgment 7iii4-iv4 #c72 ,second1 ,the ,false ,peace of ,ritual 7iv4 #d-vi474 99 99 99 99 99 ,these few brief oracles open upon the same note as that in which the previous ,section closed--that the crimes of ,israel are greater than those of the heathen2 and that the people's peculiar relation to ,god means1 not their security1 but their greater judgment4 ,it is then affirmed that ,israel's wealth and social life are so sapped by luxury and injustice that the nation must perish4 ,and1 as in every luxurious community the women deserve especial blame1 the last of the group of oracles is reserved for them 7iv4 #a-c74 ,hear this word1 which ,jehovah hath spoken against you1 ,o children of ,israel1 against the whole family which ,i brought up from the land of ,egypt--,judah as well as ,north ,israel1 so that we see the vanity of a criticism which would cast out of the ,book of ,amos as unauthentic every reference to ,judah4 ,only you have ,i known of all the families of the ground--not world1 but ground1 purposely chosen to stamp the meanness and mortality of them all--therefore will ,i visit upon you all your iniquities4 ,this famous text has been called by various writers the keynote1 the licence and the charter of prophecy4 ,but the names are too petty for what is not less than the fulmination of an element4 ,it is a peal of thunder we hear4 ,it is1 in a moment1 the explosion and discharge of the full storm of prophecy4 ,as when from a burst cloud the streams immediately below rise suddenly and all their banks are overflowed1 so the prophecies that follow surge and rise clear of the old limits of ,israel's faith by the unconfined1 unmeasured flood of heaven's justice that breaks forth by this single verse4 ,now1 once for all1 are submerged the lines of custom and tradition within which the course of religion has hitherto flowed2 and1 as it were1 the surface of the world is altered4 ,it is a crisis which has happened more than once again in history3 when helpless man has felt the absolute relentlessness of the moral issues of life2 their renunciation of the past1 however much they have helped to form it2 their sacrifice of every development however costly1 and of every hope however pure2 their deafness to prayer1 their indifference to penitence2 when no faith saves a ,church1 no courage a people1 no culture or prestige even the most exalted order of men2 but at the bare hands of a judgment1 uncouth of voice and often unconscious of a ,divine mission1 the results of a great civilisation are for its sins swept remorselessly away4 ,before the storm bursts1 we learn by its lightnings some truths from the old life that is to be destroyed4 ,you only have ,i known of all the families of the ground3 therefore will ,i visit your iniquities upon you4 ,religion is no insurance against judgment1 no mere atonement and escape from consequences4 ,escape6 ,religion is only opportunity--the greatest moral opportunity which men have1 and which if they violate nothing remains for them but a certain fearful looking forward unto judgment4 ,you only have ,i known2 and because you did not take the moral advantage of ,my intercourse1 because you felt it only as privilege and pride1 pardon for the past and security for the future1 therefore doom the more inexorable awaits you4 ,then as if the people had interrupted him with the question1 ,what sign do you give us that this judgment is near8--,amos goes aside into that noble digression 7vv4 #c-h7 on the harmony between the prophet's word and the imminent events of the time1 which we have already studied4#bfh ,from this apologia1 verse #i returns to the note of verses #a and #b and develops it4 ,not only is ,israel's responsibility greater than that of other people's4 ,her crimes themselves are more heinous4 ,make proclamation over the palaces in ,ashdod--if we are not to read ,assyria here1#bfi then the name of ,ashdod has perhaps been selected from all other heathen names because of its similarity to the ,hebrew word for that violence#bgj with which ,amos is charging the people--and over the palaces of the land of ,egypt1 and say1 ,gather upon the ,mount#bga of ,samaria and see6 ,confusions manifold in the midst of her2 violence to her very core6 ,yea1 they know not how to do uprightness1 saith ,jehovah1 who store up wrong and violence in their palaces4 ,to their crimes1 said the satirist of the ,romans1 they owe their gardens1 palaces1 stables and fine old plate4#bgb ,and ,william ,langland declared of the rich ,english of his day3-- ,for toke thei on trewly they tymbred not so heigh1 ,ne boughte non burgages be ye full certayne4#bgc ,therefore thus saith the ,lord ,jehovah3 ,siege and ,blockade of the ,land6#bgd ,and they shall bring down from off thee thy fortresses1 and plundered shall be thy palaces4 ,yet this shall be no ordinary tide of ,eastern war1 to ebb like the ,syrian as it flowed1 and leave the nation to rally on their land again4 ,for ,assyria devours the peoples4 ,thus saith ,jehovah3 ,as the shepherd saveth from the mouth of the lion a pair of shin-bones or a bit of an ear1 so shall the children of ,israel be saved--they who sit in ,samaria in the corner of the diwan and 444 on a couch4#bge ,the description1 as will be seen from the note below1 is obscure4 ,some think it is intended to satirise a novel and affected fashion of sitting adopted by the rich4 ,much more probably it means that carnal security in the luxuries of civilisation which ,amos threatens more than once in similar phrases4#bgf ,the corner of the diwan is in ,eastern houses the seat of honour4#bgg ,to this desert shepherd1 with only the hard ground to rest on1 the couches and ivory-mounted diwans of the rich must have seemed the very symbols of extravagance4 ,but the pampered bodies that loll their lazy lengths upon them shall be left like the crumbs of a lion's meal--two shin-bones and the bit of an ear6 ,their whole civilisation shall perish with them4 ,hearken and testify against the house of ,israel--oracle of the ,lord ,jehovah1 ,god of ,hosts#bgh--those addressed are still the heathen summoned in ver4 #i4 ,for on the day when ,i visit the crimes of ,israel upon him1 ,i shall then make visitation upon the altars of ,bethel1 and the horns of the altar1 which men grasp in their last despair1 shall be smitten and fall to the earth4 ,and ,i will strike the winter-house upon the summer-house1 and the ivory houses shall perish1 yea1 swept away shall be houses many--oracle of ,jehovah4 ,but the luxury of no civilisation can be measured without its women1 and to the women of ,samaria ,amos now turns with the most scornful of all his words4 ,hear this word--this for you--kine of ,bashan that are in the mount of ,samaria1 that oppress the poor1 that crush the needy1 that say to their lords1 ,bring1 and let us drink4 ,sworn hath the ,lord ,jehovah by ,his holiness1 lo1 days are coming when there shall be a taking away of you with hooks1 and of the last of you with fish-hooks4 ,they put hooks#bgi in the nostrils of unruly cattle1 and the figure is often applied to human captives2#bhj but so many should these cattle of ,samaria be that for the last of them fish-hooks must be used4 ,yea1 by the breaches in the wall of the stormed city shall ye go out1 every one headlong1 and ye shall be cast 444#bha oracle of ,jehovah4 ,it is a cowherd's rough picture of women3 a troop of kine--heavy1 heedless animals1 trampling in their anxiety for food upon every frail and lowly object in the way4 ,but there is a prophet's insight into character4 ,not of ,jezebels1 or ,messalinas1 or ,lady-,macbeths is it spoken1 but of the ordinary matrons of ,samaria4 ,thoughtlessness and luxury are able to make brutes out of women of gentle nurture1 with homes and a religion4#bhb 99 99 99 99 99 ,such are these three or four short oracles of ,amos4 ,they are probably among his earliest--the first peremptory challenges of prophecy to that great stronghold which before forty years she is to see thrown down in obedience to her word4 ,as yet1 however1 there seems to be nothing to justify the menaces of ,amos4 ,fair and stable rises the structure of ,israel's life4 ,a nation1 who know themselves elect1 who in politics are prosperous and in religion proof to every doubt1 build high their palaces1 see the skies above them unclouded1 and bask in their pride1 heaven's favourites without a fear4 ,this man1 solitary and sudden from his desert1 springs upon them in the name of ,god and their poor4 ,straighter word never came from ,deity3 ,jehovah hath spoken1 who can but prophesy8 ,the insight of it1 the justice of it1 are alike convincing4 ,yet at first it appears as if it were sped on the personal and very human passion of its herald4 ,for ,amos not only uses the desert's cruelties--the lion's to the sheep--to figure ,god's impending judgment upon ,his people1 but he enforces the latter with all a desert-bred man's horror of cities and civilisation4 ,it is their costly furniture1 their lavish and complex building1 on which he sees the storm break4 ,we seem to hear again that frequent phrase of the previous section3 the fire shall devour the palaces thereof4 ,the palaces1 he says1 are simply storehouses of oppression2 the palaces will be plundered4 ,here1 as throughout his book1#bhc couches and diwans draw forth the scorn of a man accustomed to the simple furniture of the tent4 ,but observe his especial hatred of houses4 ,four times in one verse he smites them3 winter-house on summer-house and the ivory houses shall perish--yea1 houses manifold1 saith the ,lord4 ,so in another oracle of the same section3 ,houses of ashlar ye have built1 and ye shall not inhabit them2 vineyards of delight have ye planted1 and ye shall not drink of their wine4#bhd ,and in another3 ,i loathe the pride of ,jacob1 and his palaces ,i hate2 and ,i will give up a city and all that is in it4444 ,for1 lo1 the ,lord is about to command1 and ,he will smite the great house into ruins and the small house into splinters4#bhe ,no wonder that such a prophet found war with its breached walls insufficient1 and welcomed1 as the full ally of his word1 the earthquake itself4#bhf ,yet all this is no mere desert razzia in the name of the ,lord1 a nomad's hatred of cities and the culture of settled men4 ,it is not a temper2 it is a vision of history4 ,in the only argument which these early oracles contain1 ,amos claims to have events on the side of his word4 ,shall the lion roar and not be catching something8 ,neither does the prophet speak till he knows that ,god is ready to act4 ,history accepted this claim4 ,amos spoke about #gee4 ,in #gcd ,tiglath-,pileser swept ,gilead and ,galilee2 in #gbd ,shalmaneser overran the rest of ,northern ,israel3 siege and blockade of the whole land6 ,for three years the ,mount of ,samaria was invested1 and then taken2 the houses overthrown1 the rich and the delicate led away captive4 ,it happened as ,amos foretold2 for it was not the shepherd's rage within him that spoke4 ,he had seen the ,lord standing1 and ,he said1 ,smite4 ,but this assault of a desert nomad upon the structure of a nation's life raises many echoes in history and some questions in our own minds to-day4 ,again and again have civilisations far more powerful than ,israel's been threatened by the desert in the name of ,god1 and in good faith it has been proclaimed by the prophets of ,christianity and other religions that ,god's kingdom cannot come on earth till the wealth1 the culture1 the civil order1 which men have taken centuries to build1 have been swept away by some great political convulsion4 ,to-day ,christianity herself suffers the same assaults1 and is told by many1 the high life and honest intention of whom cannot be doubted1 that till the civilisation which she has so much helped to create is destroyed1 there is no hope for the purity or the progress of the race4 ,and ,christianity1 too1 has doubts within herself4 ,what is the world which our ,master refused in the ,mount of ,temptation1 and so often and so sternly told us that it must perish8--how much of our wealth1 of our culture1 of our politics1 of the whole fabric of our society8 ,no thoughtful and religious man1 when confronted with civilisation1 not in its ideal1 but in one of those forms which give it its very name1 the life of a large city1 can fail to ask1 ,how much of this deserves the judgment of ,god8 ,how much must be overthrown1 before ,his will is done on earth8 ,all these questions rise in the ears and the heart of a generation1 which more than any other has been brought face to face with the ruins of empires and civilisations1 which have endured longer1 and in their day seemed more stable1 than her own4 ,in face of the confused thinking and fanatic speech which have risen on all such topics1 it seems to me that the ,hebrew prophets supply us with four cardinal rules4 ,first1 of course1 they insist that it is the moral question upon which the fate of a civilisation is decided4 ,by what means has this system grown8 ,is justice observed in essence as well as form8 ,is there freedom1 or is the prophet silenced8 ,does luxury or self-denial prevail8 ,do the rich make life hard for the poor8 ,is childhood sheltered and is innocence respected8 ,by these1 claim the prophets1 a nation stands or falls2 and history has proved the claim on wider worlds than they dreamt of4 ,but by themselves moral reasons are never enough to justify a prediction of speedy doom upon any system or society4 ,none of the prophets began to foretell the fall of ,israel till they read1 with keener eyes than their contemporaries1 the signs of it in current history4 ,and this1 ,i take it1 was the point which made a notable difference between them1 and one who like them scourged the social wrongs of his civilisation1 yet never spoke a word of its fall4 ,juvenal nowhere calls down judgments1 except upon individuals4 ,in his time there were no signs of the decline of the empire1 even though1 as he marks1 there was a flight from the capital of the virtue which was to keep the empire alive4 ,but the prophets had political proof of the nearness of ,god's judgment1 and they spoke in the power of its coincidence with the moral corruption of their people4 ,again1 if conscience and history 7both of them1 to the prophets1 being witnesses of ,god7 thus combine to announce the early doom of a civilisation1 neither the religion that may have helped to build it1 nor any remanent virtue in it1 nor its ancient value to ,god1 can avail to save4 ,we are tempted to judge that the long and costly development of ages is cruelly thrown away by the convulsion and collapse of an empire2 it feels impious to think that the patience1 the providence1 the millennial discipline of the ,almighty are to be in a moment abandoned to some rude and savage force4 ,but we are wrong4 ,you only have ,i known of all the families of the ground1 yet ,i must visit upon you your iniquities4 ,nothing is too costly for justice4 ,and ,god finds some other way of conserving the real results of the past4 ,again1 it is a corollary of all this1 that the sentence upon civilisation must often seem to come by voices that are insane1 and its execution by means that are criminal4 ,of course1 when civilisation is arraigned as a whole1 and its overthrow demanded1 there may be nothing behind the attack but jealousy or greed1 the fanaticism of ignorant men or the madness of disordered lives4 ,but this is not necessarily the case4 ,for ,god has often in history chosen the outsider as the herald of doom1 and sent the barbarian as its instrument4 ,by the statesmen and patriots of ,israel1 ,amos must have been regarded as a mere savage1 with a savage's hate of civilisation4 ,but we know what he answered when ,amaziah called him rebel4 ,and it was not only for its suddenness that the apostles said the day of the ,lord should come as a thief1 but also because of its methods4 ,for over and over again has doom been pronounced1 and pronounced truly1 by men who in the eyes of civilisation were criminals and monsters4 ,now apply these four principles to the question of ourselves4 ,it will scarcely be denied that our civilisation tolerates1 and in part lives by1 the existence of vices which1 as we all admit1 ruined the ancient empires4 ,are the political possibilities of overthrow also present8 ,that there exist among us means of new historic convulsions is a thing hard for us to admit4 ,but the signs cannot be hid4 ,when we see the jealousies of the ,christian peoples1 and their enormous preparations for battle2 the arsenals of ,europe which a few sparks may blow up2 the millions of soldiers one man's word may mobilise2 when we imagine the opportunities which a general war would furnish to the discontented masses of the ,european proletariat1--we must surely acknowledge the existence of forces capable of inflicting calamities1 so severe as to affect not merely this nationality or that type of culture1 but the very vigour and progress of civilisation herself2 and all this without our looking beyond ,christendom1 or taking into account the rise of the yellow races to a consciousness of their approach to equality with ourselves4 ,if1 then1 in the eyes of the ,divine justice ,christendom merits judgment1--if life continue to be left so hard to the poor2 if innocence be still an impossibility for so much of the childhood of the ,christian nations2 if with so many of the leaders of civilisation prurience be lifted to the level of an art1 and licentiousness followed as a cult2 if we continue to pour the evils of our civilisation upon the barbarian1 and the vices of our young nobles1 to paraphrase ,juvenal1 are aped in ,hindustan1--then let us know that the means of a judgment more awful than any which has yet scourged a delinquent civilisation are extant and actual among us4 ,and if one should reply1 that our ,christianity makes all the difference1 that ,god cannot undo the development of nineteen centuries1 or cannot overthrow the peoples of ,his ,son1--let us remember that ,god does justice at whatever cost2 that as ,he did not spare ,israel at the hands of ,assyria1 so ,he did not spare ,christianity in the ,east when the barbarians of the desert found her careless and corrupt4 ,you only have ,i known of all the families of the ground1 therefore will ,i visit upon you all your iniquities4 ,,chapter ,,ix ,,the ,,false ,,peace ,,of ,,ritual ,,amos iv4 #d-vi4 ,the next four groups of oracles#bhg--;iv4 #d-ac1 v4 #a-ag1 v4 #ah-bg and vi4--treat of many different details1 and each of them has its own emphasis2 but all are alike in this1 that they vehemently attack the national worship and the sense of political security which it has engendered4 ,let us at once make clear that this worship is the worship of ,jehovah4 ,it is true that it is mixed with idolatry1 but1 except possibly in one obscure verse1#bhh ,amos does not concern himself with the idols4 ,what he strikes at1 what he would sweep away1 is his people's form of devotion to their own ,god4 ,the cult of the national ,god1 at the national sanctuaries1 in the national interest and by the whole body of the people1 who practise it with a zeal unparalleled by their forefathers--this is what ,amos condemns4 ,and he does so absolutely4 ,he has nothing but scorn for the temples and the feasts4 ,the assiduity of attendance1 the liberality of gifts1 the employment of wealth and art and patriotism in worship--he tells his generation that ,god loathes it all4 ,like ,jeremiah1 he even seems to imply that ,god never instituted in ,israel any sacrifice or offering4#bhi ,it is all this which gives these oracles their interest for us2 and that interest is not merely historical4 ,it is indeed historical to begin with4 ,when we find1 not idolatry1 but all religious ceremonial--temples1 public worship1 tithes1 sacrifice1 the praise of ,god by music1 in fact every material form in which man has ever been wont to express his devotion to ,god--scorned and condemned with the same uncompromising passion as idolatry itself1 we receive a needed lesson in the history of religion4 ,for when one is asked1 ,what is the distinguishing characteristic of heathenism8 one is always ready to say1 ,idolatry1 which is not true4 ,the distinguishing characteristic of heathenism is the stress which it lays upon ceremonial4 ,to the pagan religions1 both of the ancient and of the modern world1 rites were the indispensable element in religion4 ,the gifts of the gods1 the abundance of fruits1 the security of the state1 depended upon the full and accurate performance of ritual4 ,in ,greek literature we have innumerable illustrations of this3 the ,iliad itself starts from a god's anger1 roused by an insult to his priest1 whose prayers for vengeance he hears because sacrifices have been assiduously offered to him4 ,and so too with the systems of paganism from which the faith of ,israel1 though at first it had so much in common with them1 broke away to its supreme religious distinction4 ,the ,semites laid the stress of their obedience to the gods upon traditional ceremonies2 and no sin was held so heinous by them as the neglect or infringement of a religious rite4 ,by the side of it offences against one's fellow-men or one's own character were deemed mere misdemeanours4 ,in the day of ,amos this pagan superstition thoroughly penetrated the religion of ,jehovah1 and so absorbed the attention of men1 that without the indignant and complete repudiation of it prophecy could not have started on her task of identifying morality with religion1 and of teaching men more spiritual views of ,god4 ,but even when we are thus aware of ceremonialism as the characteristic quality of the pagan religions1 we have not measured the full reason of that uncompromising attack on it1 which is the chief feature of this part of the permanent canon of our religion4 ,for idolatries die everywhere2 but everywhere a superstitious ritualism survives4 ,it continues with philosophies that have ceased to believe in the gods who enforced it4 ,upon ethical movements which have gained their freedom by breaking away from it1 in the course of time it makes up1 and lays its paralysing weight4 ,with offers of help it flatters religions the most spiritual in theory and intention4 ,the ,pharisees1 than whom few parties had at first purer ideals of morality1 tithed mint1 anise and cummin1 to the neglect of the essence of the ,law2 and even sound ,christians1 who have assimilated the ,gospel of ,st4 ,john1 find it hard and sometimes impossible to believe in salvation apart from their own sacraments1 or outside their own denominational forms4 ,now this is because ritual is a thing which appeals both to the baser and to the nobler instincts of man4 ,to the baser it offers itself as a mechanical atonement for sin1 and a substitute for all moral and intellectual effort in connection with faith2 to the nobler it insists on a man's need in religion of order and routine1 of sacrament and picture4 ,plainly then the words of ,amos have significance for more than the immediate problems of his day4 ,and if it seem to some1 that ,amos goes too far with his cry to sweep away all ceremonial1 let them remember1 besides the crisis of his times1 that the temper he exposes and seeks to dissipate is a rank and obdurate error of the human heart4 ,our ,lord1 who recognised the place of ritual in worship1 who said1 ,thus it behoveth us to fulfil all righteousness1 which righteousness in the dialect of ,his day was not the moral law1 but man's due of rite1 sacrifice1 tithe and alms1#bij said also1 ,i will have mercy and not sacrifice4 ,there is an irreducible minimum of rite and routine in worship2 there is an invaluable loyalty to traditional habits2 there are holy and spiritual uses in symbol and sacrament4 ,but these are all dispensable2 and because they are all constantly abused1 the voice of the prophet is ever needed which tells us that ,god will have none of them2 but let justice roll on like water1 and righteousness like an unfailing stream4 ,for the superstition that ritual is the indispensable bond between ,god and man1 ,amos substitutes two other aspects of religion4 ,they are history as ,god's discipline of man2 and civic justice1 as man's duty to ,god4 ,the first of them he contrasts with religious ceremonialism in chap4 iv4 #d-ac1 and the second in chap4 v42 while in chap4 vi4 he assaults once more the false political peace which the ceremonialism engenders4 #a4 ,,for ,,worship1 ,,chastisement4 ,,amos iv4 #d-ac4 ,in chap4 ii4 ,amos contrasted the popular conception of religion as worship with ,god's conception of it as history4 ,he placed a picture of the sanctuary1 hot with religious zeal1 but hot too with passion and the fumes of wine1 side by side with a great prospect of the national history3 ,god's guidance of ,israel from ,egypt onwards4 ,that is1 as we said at the time1 he placed an indoors picture of religion side by side with an open-air one4 ,he repeats that arrangement here4 ,the religious services he sketches are more pure1 and the history he takes from his own day2 but the contrast is the same4 ,again we have on the one side the temple worship--artificial1 exaggerated1 indoors1 smoky2 but on the other a few movements of ,god in ,nature1 which1 though they all be calamities1 have a great moral majesty upon them4 ,the first opens with a scornful call to worship1 which the prophet1 letting out his whole heart at the beginning1 shows to be equivalent to sin4 ,note next the impossible caricature of their exaggerated zeal3 sacrifices every morning instead of once a year1 tithes every three days instead of every three years4#bia ,to offer leavened bread was a departure from the older fashion of unleavened4#bib ,to publish their liberality was like the later ,pharisees1 who were not dissimilarly mocked by our ,lord3 ,when thou doest alms1 cause not a trumpet to be sounded before thee1 as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets1 that they may have glory of men4#bic ,there is a certain rhythm in the taunt2 but the prose style seems to be resumed with fitness when the prophet describes the solemn approach of ,god in deeds of doom4 ,come away to ,bethel and transgress1 ,at ,gilgal exaggerate your transgression6 ,and bring every morning your sacrifices1 ,every three days your tithes6 ,and send up the savour of leavened bread as a thank-offering1 ,and call out your liberalities--make them to be heard6 ,for so ye love to do1 ,o children of ,israel3 ,oracle of ,jehovah4 ,but ,i on ,my side have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities1 and want of bread in all your places--yet ye did not return to ,me3 oracle of ,jehovah4 ,but ,i on ,my side withheld from you the winter rain1#bid while it was still three months to the harvest3 and ,i let it rain repeatedly on one city1 and upon one city ,i did not let it rain3 one lot was rained upon1 and the lot that was not rained upon withered2 and two or three cities kept straggling to one city to drink water1 and were not satisfied--yet ye did not return to ,me3 oracle of ,jehovah4 ,i smote you with blasting and with mildew3 many of your gardens and your vineyards and your figs and your olives the locust devoured--yet ye did not return to ,me3 oracle of ,jehovah4 ,i sent among you a pestilence by way of ,egypt3#bie ,i slew with the sword your youths--besides the capture of your horses--and ,i brought up the stench of your camps to your nostrils--yet ye did not return to ,me3 oracle of ,jehovah4 ,i overturned among you1 like ,god's own overturning of ,sodom and ,gomorrah1 till ye became as a brand plucked from the burning--yet ye did not return to ,me3 oracle of ,jehovah4 ,this recalls a passage in that ,english poem of which we are again and again reminded by the ,book of ,amos1 ,the ,vision of ,piers ,plowman4 ,it is the sermon of ,reason in ,passus ,v4 7,skeat's edition73-- ,he preved that thise pestilences were for pure synne1 ,and the southwest wynde in saterday et evene ,was pertliche#bif for pure pride and for no poynt elles4 ,piries and plomtrees were puffed to the erthe1 ,in ensample ze segges#big ze shulden do the bettere4 ,beches and brode okes were blowen to the grounde4 ,torned upward her tailles in tokenynge of drede1 ,that dedly synne at domesday shal fordon#bih hem alle4 ,in the ancient world it was a settled belief that natural calamities like these were the effects of the deity's wrath4 ,when ,israel suffers from them the prophets take for granted that they are for the people's punishment4 ,i have elsewhere shown how the climate of ,palestine lent itself to these convictions2 in this respect the ,book of ,deuteronomy contrasts it with the climate of ,egypt4#bii ,and although some1 perhaps rightly1 have scoffed at the exaggerated form of the belief1 that ,god is angry with the sons of men every time drought or floods happen1 yet the instinct is sound which in all ages has led religious people to feel that such things are inflicted for moral purposes4 ,in the economy of the universe there may be ends of a purely physical kind served by such disasters1 apart altogether from their meaning to man4 ,but man at least learns from them that nature does not exist solely for feeding1 clothing and keeping him wealthy2 nor is it anything else than his monotheism1 his faith in ,god as the ,lord both of his moral life and of nature1 which moves him to believe1 as ,hebrew prophets taught and as our early ,english seer heard ,reason herself preach4 ,amos had the more need to explain those disasters as the work of the ,god of righteousness1 because his contemporaries1 while willing to grant ,jehovah leadership in war1 were tempted to attribute to the ,canaanite gods of the land all power over the seasons4 ,what1 however1 more immediately concerns us in this passage is its very effective contrast between men's treatment of ,god and ,god's treatment of men4 ,they lavish upon ,him gifts and sacrifices4 ,he--on ,his side--sends them cleanness of teeth1 drought1 blasting of their fruits1 pestilence1 war and earthquake4 ,that is to say1 they regard ,him as a being only to be flattered and fed4 ,he regards them as creatures with characters to discipline1 even at the expense of their material welfare4 ,their views of ,him1 if religious1 are sensuous and gross2 ,his views of them1 if austere1 are moral and ennobling4 ,all this may be grim1 but it is exceeding grand2 and short as the efforts of ,amos are1 we begin to perceive in him something already of the greatness of an ,isaiah4 ,and have not those1 who have believed as ,amos believed1 ever been the strong spirits of our race1 making the very disasters which crushed them to the earth the tokens that ,god has great views about them8 ,laugh not at the simple peoples1 who have their days of humiliation1 and their fast-days after floods and stunted harvests4 ,for they take these1 not like other men1 as the signs of their frailty and helplessness2 but as measures of the greatness ,god sees in them1 ,his provocation of their souls to the infinite possibilities which ,he has prepared for them4 ,israel1 however1 did not turn even at the fifth call to penitence1 and so there remained nothing for her but a fearful looking forward to judgment1 all the more terrible that the prophet does not define what the judgment shall be4 ,therefore thus shall ,i do to thee1 ,o ,israel3 because ,i am going to do this to thee1 prepare to meet thy ,god1 ,o ,israel4 ,for1 lo1 ,he that formeth the mountains1 and createth the wind1 and declareth to man what ,his thought is1 that maketh morning darkness1 and marcheth on the high places of earth1 ,jehovah1 ,god of ,hosts1 is ,his ,name4#cjj #b4 ,,for ,,worship1 ,,justice4 ,,amos v4 ,in the next of these groups of oracles ,amos continues his attack on the national ritual1 and now contrasts it with the service of ,god in public life--the relief of the poor1 the discharge of justice4 ,but he does not begin with this4 ,the group opens with an elegy1 which bewails the nation as already fallen4 ,it is always difficult to mark where the style of a prophet passes from rhythmical prose into what we may justly call a metrical form4 ,but in this short wail1 we catch the well-known measure of the ,hebrew dirge2 not so artistic as in later poems1 yet with at least the characteristic couplet of a long and a short line4 ,hear this word which ,i lift up against you--a ,dirge1 ,o house of ,israel3-- ,fallen1 no more shall she rise1 ,virgin of ,israel6 ,flung down on her own ground1 ,no one to raise her6 ,the ,virgin1 which with ,isaiah is a standing title for ,jerusalem and occasionally used of other cities1 is here probably the whole nation of ,northern ,israel4 ,the explanation follows4 ,it is ,war4 ,for thus saith the ,lord ,jehovah3 ,the city that goeth forth a thousand shall have an hundred left2 and she that goeth forth an hundred shall have left ten for the house of ,israel4 ,but judgment is not yet irrevocable4 ,there break forthwith the only two promises which lighten the lowering darkness of the book4 ,let the people turn to ,jehovah ,himself--and that means let them turn from the ritual1 and instead of it purge their civic life1 restore justice in their courts and help the poor4 ,for ,god and moral good are one4 ,it is seek ,me and ye shall live1 and seek good and ye shall live4 ,omitting for the present all argument as to whether the interruption of praise to the power of ,jehovah be from ,amos or another1 we read the whole oracle as follows4 ,thus saith ,jehovah to the house of ,israel3 ,seek ,me and live4 ,but seek not ,bethel1 and come not to ,gilgal1 and to ,beersheba pass not over--to come to ,beersheba one had to cross all ,judah4 ,for ,gilgal shall taste the gall of exile--it is not possible except in this clumsy way to echo the prophet's play upon words1 ,ha-,gilgal galoh yigleh--and ,bethel1 ,god's house1 shall become an idolatry4 ,this rendering1 however1 scarcely gives the rude force of the original2 for the word rendered idolatry1 ,aven1 means also falsehood and perdition1 so that we should not exaggerate the antithesis if we employed a phrase which once was not vulgar3 ,and ,bethel1 house of ,god1 shall go to the devil6#cja ,the epigram was the more natural that near ,bethel1 on a site now uncertain1 but close to the edge of the desert to which it gave its name1 there lay from ancient times a village actually called ,beth-,aven1 however the form may have risen4 ,and we shall find ,hosea stereotyping this epigram of ,amos1 and calling the sanctuary ,beth-,aven oftener than he calls it ,beth-,el4#cjb ,seek ye ,jehovah and live1 he begins again1 lest ,he break forth like fire1 ,o house of ,joseph1 and it consume and there be none to quench at ,bethel4#cjc 444#cjd ,he that made the ,seven ,stars and ,orion1#cje that turneth the murk#cjf into morning1 and day ,he darkeneth to night1 that calleth for the waters of the sea and poureth them out on the face of the earth--,jehovah ,his ,name4 ,he it is that flasheth out ruin#cjg on strength1 and bringeth down#cjh destruction on the fortified4 ,this rendering of the last verse is uncertain1 and rightly suspected1 but there is no alternative so probable1 and it returns to the keynote from which the passage started1 that ,god should break forth like fire4 ,ah1 they that turn justice to wormwood1 and abase#cji righteousness to the earth6 ,they hate him that reproveth in the gate--in an ,eastern city both the law-court and place of the popular council--and him that speaketh sincerely they abhor4 ,so in the ,english mystic's ,vision ,peace complains of ,wrong3-- ,i dar noughte for fere of hym fyghte ne chyde4#caj ,wherefore1 because ye trample on the weak and take from him a present of corn1#caa ye have built houses of ashlar1#cab but ye shall not dwell in them2 vineyards for pleasure have ye planted1 but ye shall not drink of their wine4 ,for ,i know how many are your crimes1 and how forceful#cac your sins--ye that browbeat the righteous1 take bribes1 and bring down the poor in the gate6 ,therefore the prudent in such a time is dumb1 for an evil time is it indeed4 ,seek good and not evil1 that ye may live1 and ,jehovah ,god of ,hosts be with you1 as ye say ,he is4 ,hate evil and love good2 and in the gate set justice on her feet again--peradventure ,jehovah ,god of ,hosts may have pity on the remnant of ,joseph4 ,if in the ,book of ,amos there be any passages1 which1 to say the least1 do not now lie in their proper places1 this is one of them4 ,for1 firstly1 while it regards the nation as still responsible for the duties of government1 it recognises them as reduced to a remnant4 ,to find such a state of affairs we have to come down to the years subsequent to #gcd1 when ,tiglath-,pileser swept into captivity all ,gilead and ,galilee--that is1 two-thirds1 in bulk1 of the territory of ,northern ,israel--but left ,ephraim untouched4 ,in answer to this1 it may1 of course1 be pointed out that in thus calling the people to repentance1 so that a remnant might be saved1 ,amos may have been contemplating a disaster still future1 from which1 though it was inevitable1 ,god might be moved to spare a remnant4#cad ,that is very true4 ,but it does not meet this further difficulty1 that the verses 7#ad1 #ae7 plainly make interruption between the end of ver4 #ac and the beginning of ver4 #af2 and that the initial therefore of the latter verse1 while it has no meaning in its present sequence1 becomes natural and appropriate when made to follow immediately on ver4 #ac4 ,for all these reasons1 then1 ,i take vv4 #ad and #ae as a parenthesis1 whether from ,amos himself or from a later writer who can tell8 ,but it ought to be kept in mind that in other prophetic writings where judgment is very severe1 we have some proof of the later insertion of calls to repentance1 by way of mitigation4 ,ver4 #ac had said the time was so evil that the prudent man kept silence4 ,all the more must the ,lord ,himself speak1 as ver4 #af now proclaims4 ,therefore thus saith ,jehovah1 ,god of ,hosts1#cae ,lord3 ,on all open ways lamentation1 and in all streets they shall be saying1 ,ah woe6 ,ah woe6 ,and in all vineyards lamentation1#caf and they shall call the ploughman to wailing and to lamentation them that are skilful in dirges--town and country1 rustic and artist alike--for ,i shall pass through thy midst1 saith ,jehovah4 ,it is the solemn formula of the ,great ,passover1 when ,egypt was filled with wailing and there were dead in every house4 ,the next verse starts another1 but a kindred1 theme4 ,as blind as was ,israel's confidence in ritual1 so blind was their confidence in dogma1 and the popular dogma was that of the ,day of ,jehovah4 ,all popular hopes expect their victory to come in a single sharp crisis--a day4 ,and again1 the day of any one means either the day he has appointed1 or the day of his display and triumph4 ,so ,jehovah's day meant to the people the day of ,his judgment1 or of ,his triumph3 ,his triumph in war over their enemies1 ,his judgment upon the heathen4 ,but ,amos1 whose keynote has been that judgment begins at home1 cries woe upon such hopes1 and tells his people that for them the day of ,jehovah is not victory1 but rather insidious1 importunate1 inevitable death4 ,and this he describes as a man who has lived1 alone with wild beasts1 from the jungles of the ,jordan1 where the lions lurk1 to the huts of the desert infested by snakes4 ,woe unto them that long for the day of ,jehovah6 ,what have you to do with the day of ,jehovah8 ,it is darkness1 and not light4 ,as when a man fleeth from the face of a lion1 and a bear falls upon him2 and he comes into his home1#cag and1 breathless1 leans his hand upon the wall1 and a serpent bites him4 ,and then1 as if appealing to ,heaven for confirmation3 ,is it not so8 ,is it not darkness1 the day of ,jehovah1 and not light8 storm darkness1 and not a ray of light upon it8 ,then ,amos returns to the worship1 that nurse of their vain hopes1 that false prophet of peace1 and he hears ,god speak more strongly than ever of its futility and hatefulness4 ,i hate1 ,i loathe your feasts1 and ,i will not smell the savour of your gatherings to sacrifice4 ,for with pagan folly they still believed that the smoke of their burnt-offerings went up to heaven and flattered the nostrils of ,deity4 ,how ingrained was this belief may be judged by us from the fact that the terms of it had to be adopted by the apostles of a spiritual religion1 if they would make themselves understood1 and are now the metaphors of the sacrifices of the ,christian heart4#cah ,though ye bring to ,me burnt-offerings and your meal-offerings ,i will not be pleased1 or your thank-offerings of fatted calves1 ,i will not look at them4 ,let cease from ,me the noise of thy songs2 to the playing of thy viols ,i will not listen4 ,but let justice roll on like water1 and righteousness like an unfailing stream4 ,then follows the remarkable appeal from the habits of this age to those of the times of ,israel's simplicity4 ,was it flesh- or meal-offerings that ye brought ,me in the wilderness1 forty years1 ,o house of ,israel8#cai ,that is to say1 at the very time when ,god made ,israel ,his people1 and led them safely to the promised land--the time when of all others ,he did most for them--,he was not moved to such love and deliverance by the propitiatory bribes1 which this generation imagine to be so availing and indispensable4 ,nay1 those still shall not avail1 for exile from the land shall now as surely come in spite of them1 as the possession of the land in old times came without them4 ,this at least seems to be the drift of the very obscure verse which follows1 and is the unmistakable statement of the close of the oracle4 ,but ye shall lift up 444 your king and 444 your god1 images which you have made for yourselves2#cbj and ,i will carry you away into exile far beyond ,damascus1 saith ,jehovah--,god of ,hosts is ,his ,name6#cba ,so this chapter closes like the previous1 with the marshalling of ,god's armies4 ,but as there ,his hosts were the movements of ,nature and the ,great ,stars1 so here they are the nations of the world4 ,by ,his rule of both ,he is the ,god of ,hosts4 #c4 ,,at ,,ease ,,in ,,zion4 ,,amos vi4 ,the evil of the national worship was the false political confidence which it engendered4 ,leaving the ritual alone1 ,amos now proceeds to assault this confidence4 ,we are taken from the public worship of the people to the private banquets of the rich1 but again only in order to have their security and extravagance contrasted with the pestilence1 the war and the captivity1 that are rapidly approaching4 ,woe unto them that are at ease in ,zion#cbb--;it is a proud and overweening ease which the word expresses--and that trust in the mount of ,samaria6 ,men of mark of the first of the peoples--ironically1 for that is ,israel's opinion of itself--and to them do the house of ,israel resort6444#cbc ,ye that put off the day of calamity#cbd and draw near the sessions of injustice#cbe--;an epigram and proverb1 for it is the universal way of men to wish and fancy far away the very crisis that their sins are hastening on4 ,isaiah described this same generation as drawing iniquity with cords of hypocrisy1 and sin as it were with a cart-rope6 ,that lie on ivory diwans and sprawl on their couches--another luxurious custom1 which filled this rude shepherd with contempt--and eat lambs from the flock and calves from the midst of the stall#cbf--that is1 only the most delicate of meats--who prate or purr or babble to the sound of the viol1 and as if they were ,david himself invent for them instruments of song2#cbg who drink wine by ewerfuls--waterpotfuls--and anoint with the finest of oil--yet never do they grieve at the havoc of ,joseph6 ,the havoc is the moral havoc1 for the social structure of ,israel is obviously still secure4#cbh ,the rich are indifferent to it2 they have wealth1 art1 patriotism1 religion1 but neither heart for the poverty nor conscience for the sin of their people4 ,we know their kind6 ,they are always with us1 who live well and imagine they are proportionally clever and refined4 ,they have their political zeal1 will rally to an election when the interests of their class or their trade is in danger4 ,they have a robust and exuberant patriotism1 talk grandly of commerce1 empire and the national destiny2 but for the real woes and sores of the people1 the poverty1 the overwork1 the drunkenness1 the dissoluteness1 which more affect a nation's life than anything else1 they have no pity and no care4 ,therefore now--the double initial of judgment--shall they go into exile at the head of the exiles1 and stilled shall be the revelry of the dissolute--literally the sprawlers1 as in ver4 #d1 but used here rather in the moral than in the physical sense4 ,sworn hath the ,lord ,jehovah by ,himself--'tis the oracle of ,jehovah ,god of ,hosts3 ,i am loathing#cbi the pride of ,jacob1 and his palaces do ,i hate1 and ,i will pack up a city and its fulness4#ccj444 ,for1 behold1 ,jehovah is commanding1 and ,he will smite the great house into ruins and the small house into splinters4 ,the collapse must come1 postpone it as their fancy will1 for it has been worked for and is inevitable4 ,how could it be otherwise8 ,shall horses run on a cliff1 or the sea be ploughed by oxen#cca--that ye should turn justice to poison and the fruit of righteousness to wormwood6 ,ye that exult in ,lo-,debar and say1 ,by our own strength have we taken to ourselves arnaim4 ,so ,grtz rightly reads the verse4 ,the ,hebrew text and all the versions take these names as if they were common nouns--,lo-,debar1 a thing of nought2 arnaim1 a pair of horns--and doubtless it was just because of this possible play upon their names1 that ,amos selected these two out of all the recent conquests of ,israel4 ,karnaim1 in full ,ashteroth ,karnaim1 ,astarte of ,horns1 was that immemorial fortress and sanctuary which lay out upon the great plateau of ,bashan towards ,damascus2 so obvious and cardinal a site that it appears in the sacred history both in the earliest recorded campaign in ,abraham's time and in one of the latest under the ,maccabees4#ccb ,lo-,debar was of ,gilead1 and probably lay on that last rampart of the province northward1 overlooking the ,yarmuk1 a strategical point which must have often been contested by ,israel and ,aram1 and with which no other ,old ,testament name has been identified4#ccc ,these two fortresses1 with many others1 ,israel had lately taken from ,aram2 but not1 as they boasted1 by their own strength4 ,it was only ,aram's pre-occupation with ,assyria now surgent on the northern flank1 which allowed ,israel these easy victories4 ,and this same northern foe would soon overwhelm themselves4 ,for1 behold1 ,i am to raise up against you1 ,o house of ,israel--'tis the oracle of ,jehovah ,god of the hosts#ccd--;a ,nation1 and they shall oppress you from the ,entrance of ,hamath to the ,torrent of the ',arabah4 ,every one knows the former1 the ,pass between the ,lebanons1 at whose mouth stands ,dan1 northern limit of ,israel2 but it is hard to identify the latter4 ,if ,amos means to include ,judah1 we should have expected the ,torrent of ,egypt1 the present ,wady el ',arish2 but the ,wady of the ',arabah may be a corresponding valley in the eastern watershed issuing in the ',arabah4 ,if ,amos threatens only the ,northern ,kingdom1 he intends some wady running down to that ,sea of the ',arabah1 the ,dead ,sea1 which is elsewhere given as the limit of ,israel4#cce ,the ,assyrian flood1 then1 was about to break1 and the oracles close with the hopeless prospect of the whole land submerged beneath it4 #d4 ,a ,,fragment ,,from ,,the ,,plague4 ,in the above exposition we have omitted two very curious verses1 #i and #aj1 which are held by some critics to interrupt the current of the chapter1 and to reflect an entirely different kind of calamity from that which it predicts4 ,i do not think these critics right1 for reasons ,i am about to give2 but the verses are so remarkable that it is most convenient to treat them by themselves apart from the rest of the chapter4 ,here they are1 with the verse immediately in front of them4 ,i am loathing the pride of ,jacob1 and his palaces ,i hate4 ,and ,i will give up a city and its fulness to 4447perhaps siege or pestilence874 ,and it shall come to pass1 if there be left ten men in one house1 and they die1#ccf 444 that his cousin#ccg and the man to burn him shall lift him to bring the body#cch out of the house1 and they shall say to one who is in the recesses of the house1#cci ,are there any more with thee8 ,and he shall say1 ,not one 444 and they shall say1 ,hush6 7for one must not make mention of the name of ,jehovah74 ,this grim fragment is obscure in its relation to the context4 ,but the death of even so large a household as ten--the funeral left to a distant relation--the disposal of the bodies by burning instead of the burial customary among the ,hebrews#cdj--sufficiently reflect the kind of calamity4 ,it is a weird little bit of memory1 the recollection of an eye-witness1 from one of those great pestilences which1 during the first half of the eighth century1 happened not seldom in ,western ,asia4#cda ,but what does it do here8 ,wellhausen says that there is nothing to lead up to the incident2 that before it the chapter speaks1 not of pestilence1 but only of political destruction by an enemy4 ,this is not accurate4 ,the phrase immediately preceding may mean either ,i will shut up a city and its fulness1 in which case a siege is meant1 and a siege was the possibility both of famine and pestilence2 or ,i will give up the city and its fulness4441 in which case a word or two may have been dropped1 as words have undoubtedly been dropped at the end of the next verse1 and one ought perhaps to add to the pestilence4#cdb ,the latter alternative is the more probable1 and this may be one of the passages1 already alluded to1#cdc in which the want of connection with the preceding verses is to be explained1 not upon the favourite theory that there has been a violent intrusion into the text1 but upon the too much neglected hypothesis that some words have been lost4 ,the uncertainty of the text1 however1 does not weaken the impression of its ghastly realism3 the unclean and haunted house2 the kinsman and the body-burner afraid to search through the infected rooms1 and calling in muffled voice to the single survivor crouching in some far corner of them1 ,are there any more with thee8 his reply1 ,none--himself the next6 ,yet these details are not the most weird4 ,over all hangs a terror darker than the pestilence4 ,shall there be evil in a city and ,jehovah not have done it8 ,such1 as we have heard from ,amos1 was the settled faith of the age4 ,but in times of woe it was held with an awful and a craven superstition4 ,the whole of life was believed to be overhung with loose accumulations of ,divine anger4 ,and as in some fatal hollow in the high ,alps1 where any noise may bring down the impending masses of snow1 and the fearful traveller hurries along in silence1 so the men of that superstitious age feared1 when an evil like the plague was imminent1 even to utter the ,deity's name1 lest it should loosen some avalanche of ,his wrath4 ,and he said1 ,hush6 for1 adds the comment1 one must not make mention of the name of ,jehovah4 ,this reveals another side of the popular religion which ,amos has been attacking4 ,we have seen it as the sheer superstition of routine2 but we now know that it was a routine broken by panic4 ,the ,god who in times of peace was propitiated by regular supplies of savoury sacrifice and flattery1 is conceived1 when ,his wrath is roused and imminent1 as kept quiet only by the silence of its miserable objects4 ,the false peace of ritual is tempered by panic4 ,,footnotes3 #bfh ,see above1 pp4 #hb ff4 and pp4 #hi ff4 #bfi ,with the ,,lxx4 for 4 #bgj 7ver4 #aj74 #bga ,singular as in ,,lxx41 and not plural as in the ,m4,t4 and ,english versions4 #bgb ,juvenal1 ,satires1 ,i4 #bgc ,vision of ,piers ,plowman4 ,burgagestenements4 #bgd ,or ,the ,enemy1 and that right round the ,land6 #bge ,in ,damascus on a couch3 on a ,damascus couch3 on a ,damascus-cloth couch3 or ,damascus-fashion on a couch--alternatives all equally probable and equally beyond proof4 ,the text is very difficult1 nor do the versions give help4 7#a7 ,the consonants of the word before a couch spell in ,damascus1 and so the ,,lxx4 take it4 ,this would be in exact parallel to the in ,samaria of the previous half of the clause4 ,but although ,jeroboam ,,ii4 is said to have recovered ,damascus 7#b ,kings xiv4 #bh71 this is not necessarily the town itself1 of whose occupation by ,israel we have no evidence1 while ,amos always assumes it to be ,aramean1 and here he is addressing ,israelites4 ,still retaining the name of the city1 we can take it with couch as parallel1 not to in ,samaria1 but to on the side of a diwan2 in that case the meaning may have been a ,damascus couch 7though as the two words stand it is impossible to parse them1 and ,gen4 xv4 #b cannot be quoted in support of this1 for it is too uncertain itself1 being possibly a gloss1 though it is curious that as the two passages run the name ,damascus should be in the same strange grammatical conjunction in each71 or possibly ,damascus-fashion on a couch1 which 7if the first half of the clause1 as some maintain1 refers to some delicate or affected posture then come into fashion7 is the most probable rendering4 7#b7 ,the ,massoretes have pointed1 not bedammeseq in ,damascus1 but bedemesheq1 a form not found elsewhere1 which some 7,ges41 ,hitz41 ,ew41 ,rev4 ,eng4 ,ver41 etc47 take to mean some ,damascene stuff 7as perhaps our ,damask and the ,arabic dimshaq originally meant1 though this is not certain71 e4g4 silk or velvet or cushions4 7#c7 ,others rearrange the text4 ,e4g4 ,hoffmann 7,z4 ,a4 ,t4 ,w41 ,,iii4 #ajb7 takes the whole clause away from ver4 #ab and attaches it to ver4 #ac1 reading ,o those who sit in ,samaria on the edge of the diwan1 and in ,damascus on a couch1 hearken and testify against the house of ,jacob4 ,but1 as ,wellhausen points out1 those addressed in ver4 #ac are the same as those addressed in ver4 #i4 ,wellhausen prefers to believe that after the words children of ,israel1 which end a sentence1 something has fallen out4 ,the ,,lxx4 translator1 who makes several blunders in the course of this chapter1 instead of translating couch1 the last word of the verse1 merely transliterates it into 66 #bgf ,cf4 vi4 #d3 that lie on ivory diwans and sprawl on their couches4 #bgg ,van ,lennep1 ,bible ,lands and ,customs1 p4 #dfj4 #bgh ,see p4 #bje1 n4 #d4 #bgi ,the words for hook in ,hebrew--the two used above1 and 2 and a third1 --all mean originally thorns1 doubtless the first hooks of primitive man2 but by this time they would signify metal hooks--a change analogous to the ,english word pen4 #bhj ,cf4 ,isa4 xxxvii4 #bi2 #b ,chron4 xxxiii4 #aa4 ,on the use fish-hooks1 ,job xl4 #bf 7,heb471 xli4 #b 7,eng472 ,ezek4 xxix4 #d4 #bha ,the verb1 which in the text is active1 must be taken in the passive4 ,the word not translated above is unto the ,harmn1 which name does not occur elsewhere4 ,,lxx4 read 1 which ,ewald renders ye shall cast the ,rimmon to the mountain 7cf4 ,isa4 ii4 #bj71 and he takes ,rimmon to be the ,syrian goddess of love4 ,steiner 7quoted by ,wellhausen7 renders ye shall be cast out to ,hadad ,rimmon1 that is1 violated as ,hitzig separates from 1 which he takes as contracted from 1 and renders ye shall fling yourselves out on the mountains as a refuge4 ,but none of these is satisfactory4 #bhb ,i have already treated this passage in connection with ,isaiah's prophecies on women in the volume on ,isaiah i4-xxxix4 7,expositor's ,bible71 ,chap4 ,,xvi4 #bhc ,cf4 chap4 vi4 #d4 #bhd v4 #aa4 #bhe vi4 #h1 #aa4 #bhf ,cf4 what was said on building above1 p4 #cc4 #bhg ,see p4 #ada4 #bhh v4 #bf4 #bhi v4 #be4 #bij ,another proof of how the spirit of ritualism tends to absorb morality4 #bia ,ver4 #d3 cf4 #a ,sam4 i42 ,deut4 xiv4 #bh4 ,wellhausen offers another exegesis3 ,amos is describing exactly what took place at ,bethel--sacrifice on the morning1 i4e4 next to the day of their arrival1 tithes on the third day thereafter4 #bib ,see ,wellhausen's note1 and compare ,lev4 vii4 #ac4 #bic ,matt4 vi4 #b4 #bid 3 ,hist4 ,geog41 p4 #fd4 ,it is interesting that this year 7#ahie7 the same thing was threatened1 according to a report in the ,mittheilungen u4 ,nachrichten des ,d4,p4,v41 p4 #dd3 ,nachdem es im ,december einigemal recht stark geregnet hatte besonders an der ,meereskste ist seit kurz vor ,weihnachten das ,wetter immer schn u4 mild geblieben1 u4 wenn nicht weiterer ,regen fllt1 so wird grosser ,wassermangel entstehen denn bis jetzt 7#af ,febr47 hat ,niemand ,cisterne voll4 ,the harvest is in ,april-,may4 #bie ,or in the fashion of ,egypt1 i4e4 a thoroughly ,egyptian plague2 so called1 not with reference to the plagues of ,egypt1 but because that country was always the nursery of the pestilence4 ,see ,hist4 ,geog41 p4 #aeg ff4 ,note how it comes with war4 #bif ,apertly1 openly4 #big ,men4 #bih ,undo4 #bii ,hist4 ,geog41 ,chap4 iii41 pp4 #gc f4 #cjj ,this and similar passages are dealt with by themselves in ,chap4 ,,xi4 #cja ,cf4 ,,lxx43 4 #cjb ,the name ,bethel is always printed as one word in our ,hebrew texts4 ,see ,baer on ,gen4 xii4 #h4 #cjc ,wellhausen thinks at ,bethel not genuine4 ,but ,bethel has been singled out as the place where the people put their false confidence1 and is naturally named here4 ,,lxx43 4 #cjd ,ver4 #g is plainly out of place here1 as the ,,lxx4 perceived1 and therefore tried to give it another rendering which would make it seem in place3 1 4 ,so ,ewald removed it to between vv4 #i and #aj4 ,there it begins well another oracle2 and it may be that we should insert before it 1 as in vv4 #ah1 vi4 #a4 #cje ,literally the ,group and the ,giant4 1 ,kimah1 signifies group1 or little heap4 ,here it is rendered by ,aq4 and at ,job ix4 #i by ,,lxx4 2 and here by ,theod4 and in ,job xxxviii4 #ca1 the chain1 or cluster1 of the group 4 ,the ,targ4 and ,pesh4 always give it as ,kima1 i4e4 ,pleiades4 ,and this is the rendering of most moderns4 ,but ,stern takes it for ,sirius with its constellation of the ,great ,dog1 for the reason that this is the brightest of all stars1 and therefore a more suitable fellow for ,orion than the dimmer ,pleiades can be4 1 the ,fool or ,giant1 is the ,hebrew name of 1 by which the ,,lxx4 render it4 ,targum 4 ,to the ancient world the constellation looked like the figure of a giant fettered in heaven1 a fool so far as he trusted in his bodily strength 7,dillmann74 ,in later times he was called ,nimrod4 ,his early setting came at the time of the early rains4 ,cf4 with the passage ,job ix4 #i and xxxviii4 #ca4 #cjf ,the abstract noun meaning deep shadow1 ,,lxx4 1 and rendered shadow of death by many modern versions4 #cjg ,so ,,lxx41 reading for 2 it improves the rhythm1 and escapes the awkward repetition of 4 #cjh ,so ,,lxx4 #cji ,possible alternative3 make stagnant4 #caj ,vision of ,piers ,plowman1 ,passus ,,iv41 l4 #eb4 ,cf4 the whole passage4 #caa ,uncertain2 ,hitzig takes it as the apodosis of the previous clause3 ,ye shall have to take from him a present of corn1 i4e4 as alms4 #cab ,see above1 p4 #cc4 #cac ,cf4 ,pecca fortiter4 #cad ,as1 for instance1 the prophet looks forward to in iii4 #ab4 #cae ,god of ,hosts1 perhaps an intrusion 787 between and 4 #caf ,i have ventured to rearrange the order of the clauses1 which in the original is evidently dislocated4 #cag ,lit4 the house4 #cah ,eph4 v4 #b2 etc4 #cai ,no one doubts that this verse is interrogative4 ,but the ,authorised ,eng4 ,ver4 puts it in a form--,have ye brought unto ,me8 etc4--which implies blame that they did not do so4 ,ewald was the first to see that1 as rendered above1 an appeal to the forty years was the real intention of the verse4 ,so after him nearly all critics1 also the ,revised ,eng4 ,ver43 ,did ye bring unto ,me8 ,on the whole question of the possibility of such an appeal see above1 pp4 #ajj ff41 and cf4 ,jer4 vii4 #bb1 which distinctly declares that in the wilderness ,god prescribed no ritual to ,israel4 #cbj ,ver4 #bf is very difficult1 for both the text and the rendering of all the possible alternatives of it are quite uncertain4 7#a7 ,as to the text1 the present division into words must be correct2 at least no other is possible4 ,but the present order of the words is obviously wrong4 ,for your images is evidently described by the relative clause which you have made1 and ought to stand next it4 ,what then is to be done with the two words that at present come between--star of your god8 ,are they both a mere gloss1 as ,robertson ,smith holds1 and therefore to be struck out8 or should they precede the pair of words1 1 which they now follow8 ,this is the order of the text which the ,,lxx4 translator had before him1 only for he misread or 3 1 ,q1 om4 ,,aq 4 ,this arrangement has the further evidence in its favour1 that it brings your god into proper parallel with your king4 ,the ,hebrew text would then run thus3-- 7#b7 ,the translation of this text is equally difficult3 not in the verb 1 for both the grammar and the argument oblige us to take it as future1 and ye shall lift up2 but in the two words and 4 ,are these common nouns1 or proper names of deities in apposition to your king and your god8 ,the ,,lxx4 takes as tabernacle1 and as a proper name 7,theodotion takes both as proper names74 ,the ,auth4 ,eng4 ,ver4 follows the ,,lxx4 7except that it takes king for the name ,moloch74 ,schrader 7,stud4 u4 ,krit41 #ahgd1 #cbd2 ,k4,a4,t41 #ddb f47 takes them as the consonants of ,sakkut1 a name of the ,assyrian god ,adar1 and of ,kewan1 the ,assyrian name for the planet ,saturn3 ,ye shall take up ,sakkut your king and ,kewan your star-god1 your images which444 ,baethgen goes further and takes both the of and the of as ,moloch and elam1 proper names1 in combination with ,sakkut and ,kewan 7,beitr4 z4 ,sem4 ,rel41 #bci74 ,now it is true that the ,second ,book of ,kings implies that the worship of the host of heaven existed in ,samaria before its fall 7#b ,kings xvii4 #af71 but the introduction into ,samaria of ,assyrian gods 7among them ,adar7 is placed by it after the fall 7#b ,kings xvii4 #ca71 and besides1 ,amos does not elsewhere speak of the worship of foreign gods1 nor is the mention of them in any way necessary to the argument here4 ,on the contrary1 even if ,amos were to mention the worship of idols by ,israel1 would he have selected at this point the ,assyrian ones8 7,see1 however1 ,tiele1 ,revue de l',histoire des ,religions1 ,,iii41 p4 #baa1 who makes ,koun and the planet ,keiwan purely ,phnician deities47 ,some critics take and as common nouns in the construct state4 ,so ,ewald1 and so most recently ,robertson ,smith 7,o4,t4,j4,c41 #b73 the shrine of your king and the stand of your images4 ,this is more in harmony with the absence from the rest of ,amos of any hint as to the worship of idols1 but an objection to it1 and a very strong one1 is that the alleged common nouns are not found elsewhere in ,hebrew4 ,in view of this conflicting evidence it is best therefore to leave the words untranslated1 as in the text above4 ,it is just possible that they may themselves be later insertions1 for the verse would read very well without them3 ,and ye shall lift up your king and your images which you have made to yourselves4 #cba ,the last clause is peculiar4 ,two clauses seem to have run into one--saith ,jehovah1 ,god of ,hosts1 and ,god of ,hosts is ,his ,name4 ,the word ,his ,name1 may have been added to give the oracle the same conclusion as the oracle at the end of the preceding chapter2 and it is not to be overlooked that at the end of a clause does not occur elsewhere in the book outside the three questioned ,doxologies iv4 #ac1 v4 #h1 ix4 #f4 ,further1 see below1 pp4 #bjd f4 #cbb ,in ,zion3 very suspicious1 ,cornill4 ,but see pp4 #ace f4 #cbc ,i remove ver4 #b to a note1 not that ,i am certain that it is not by ,amos--who can be dogmatic on such a point8--but because the text of it1 the place which it occupies1 and its relation to the facts of current history1 all raise doubts4 ,moreover it is easily detached from the context1 without disturbing the flow of the chapter1 which indeed runs more equably without it4 ,the ,massoretic text gives3 ,pass over to ,calneh1 and see2 and go thence to ,hamath ,rabbah1 and come down to ,gath of the ,philistines3 are they better than these kingdoms1 or is their territory larger than yours8 ,presumably these kingdoms are ,judah and ,israel4 ,but that can only mean that ,israel is the best of the peoples1 a statement out of harmony with the irony of ver4 #a1 and impossible in the mouth of ,amos4 ,geiger1 therefore1 proposes to read3 ,are you better than these kingdoms--i4e4 ,calneh1 ,hamath1 ,gath--or is your territory larger than theirs8 ,but this is also unlikely1 for ,israel's territory was much larger than ,gath's4 ,besides1 the question would have force only if ,calneh1 ,hamath and ,gath had already fallen4 ,gath had1 but it is at least very questionable whether ,hamath had4 ,therefore ,schrader 7,k4,a4,t41 #ddd7 rejects the whole verse2 and ,kuenen agrees that if we are to understand ,assyrian conquests1 it is hardly possible to retain the verses4 ,bickell's first argument against the verse1 that it does not fit into the metrical system of ,amos vi4 #a-g1 is precarious2 his second1 that it disturbs the grammar1 which it makes to jump suddenly from the third person in ver4 #a to the second in ver4 #b1 and back to the third in ver4 #c1 is not worth anything1 for such a jump occurs within ver4 #c itself4 #cbd ,davidson1 ,syntax1 #ajj1 ,r4 #e4 #cbe 2 ,,lxx4 1 on which hint ,hoffmann renders the verse3 you that daily demand the tribute of evil 7cf4 ,ezek4 xvi4 #cc71 and every ,sabbath extort by violence4 ,but this is both unnecessary and opposed to viii4 #e1 which tells us no trade was done on the ,sabbath4 is to be taken in the common sense of sitting in judgment 7rather than with ,wellhausen71 in the sense of the enthronement of wrong-doing4 #cbf ,to this day1 in some parts of ,palestine1 the general fold into which the cattle are shut contains a portion railed off for calves and lambs 7cf4 ,dr4 ,m4 ,blanckenhorn of ,erlangen in the ,mittheilungen u4 ,nachrichten of the ,d4,p4,v41 #ahie1 p4 #cg1 with a sketch74 ,it must be this to which ,amos refers4 #cbg ,or perhaps melodies1 airs4 #cbh ,of course1 it is possible that here again1 as in v4 #ae and #af1 we have prophecy later than the disaster of #gcd1 when ,tiglath-,pileser made a great breach or havoc in the body politic of ,israel by taking ,gilead and ,galilee captive4 ,but this is scarcely probable1 for ,amos almost everywhere lays stress upon the moral corruption of ,israel1 as her real and essential danger4 #cbi for 4 #ccj ,some words must have dropped out here4 ,for these and the following verses #i and #aj on the pestilence see pp4 #agh ff4 #cca ,so ,michaelis1 for 4 #ccb ,gen4 xiv4 #e2 #a ,macc4 v4 ,in the days of ,eusebius and ,jerome 7#dth century7 there were two places of the name3 one of them doubtless the present ,tell ,ashtara south of ,el-,merkez1 the other distant from that fourteen ,roman miles4 #ccc ,along this ridge ran1 and still runs1 one of the most important highways to the ,east1 that from ,beth-,shan by ,gadera to ,edrei4 ,about seven miles east from ,gadera lies a village1 ,ibdar1 with a good spring and some ancient remains 7,schumacher1 ,n4 ,ajlun1 #aja74 ,lo-,debar is mentioned in #b ,sam4 ix4 #de2 xvii4 #bg2 and doubtless the ,lidebir of ,josh4 xiii4 #bf on the north border of ,gilead is the same4 #ccd ,with the article1 an unusual form of the title4 ,,lxx4 here 4 #cce #b ,kings xiv4 #be4 ,the ,torrent of the ',arabah can scarcely be the ,torrent of the ',arabim of ,isa4 xv4 #g for the latter was outside ,israel's territory1 and the border between ,moab and ,edom4 ,the ,,lxx4 render ,torrent of the ,west1 4 #ccf ,here there is evidently a gap in the text4 ,the ,,lxx4 insert 2 perhaps therefore the text originally ran and the survivors die4 #ccg ,or uncle--that is1 a distant relative1 presumably because all the near ones are dead4 #cch ,literally bones4 #cci ,,lxx4 3 evidently in ignorance of the reading or the meaning4 #cdj ,the burning of a body was regarded1 as we have seen 7,amos ii4 #a71 as a great sacrilege2 and was practised1 outside times of pestilence only in cases of great criminals3 ,lev4 xx4 #ad2 xxi4 #i2 ,josh4 vii4 #be4 ,doughty 7,arabia ,deserta1 #fh7 mentions a case in which1 in ,medina1 a ,persian pilgrim was burned to death by an angry crowd for defiling ,mohammed's tomb4 #cda ,the ,assyrian inscriptions record at least three--in #hjc1 #gfe1 #gei4 #cdb ,as in ,psalm lxxviii4 #ej4 1 to give up1 is so seldom used absolutely 7,deut4 xxxii4 #cj is poetry and elliptic7 that we may well believe it was followed by words signifying to what the city was to be given up4 #cdc ,pp4 #ada f4 ,,chapter ,x ,,doom ,,or ,,discipline8 ,,amos viii4 #d-;ix4 ,we now enter the ,third ,section of the ,book of ,amos3 chaps4 vii4-ix4 ,as we have already treated the first part of it--the group of four visions1 which probably formed the prophet's discourse at ,bethel1 with the interlude of his adventure there 7vii4-viii4 #c7cdd--we may pass at once to what remains3 from viii4 #d to the end of the book4 ,this portion consists of groups of oracles more obscure in their relations to each other than any we have yet studied1 and probably containing a number of verses which are not from ,amos himself4 ,they open in a denunciation of the rich1 which echoes previous oracles1 and soon pass to judgments of a kind already threatened1 but now with greater relentlessness4 ,then1 just as all is at the darkest1 lights break2 exceptions are made2 the inevitable captivity is described no more as doom1 but as discipline2 and1 with only this preparation for a change1 we are swept out on a scene1 in which1 although the land is strewn with the ruins that have been threatened1 the sunshine of a new day floods them2 the promise of restoration is given2 ,nature herself will be regenerated1 and the whole life of ,israel planted on its own ground again4 ,whether it was given to ,amos himself to behold this day--whether these last verses of the book were his ,nunc ,dimittis1 or the hope of a later generation1 which found his book intolerably severe1 and mingled with its judgments their own new mercies--we shall try to discover further on4 ,meanwhile there is no doubt that we start with the authentic oracles of the prophet4 ,we know the ring of his voice4 ,to the tyranny of the rich1 which he has so often lashed1 he now adds the greed and fraud of the traders2 and he paints ,israel's doom in those shapes of earthquake1 eclipse and famine with which his own generation had recently become familiar4 ,note that in this first group ,amos employs only physical calamities1 and says nothing of war and captivity4 ,if the standard which we have already applied to the growth of his doctrine be correct1 these ought therefore to be counted among his earlier utterances4 ,war and captivity follow in chap4 ix4 ,that is to say1 this ,third ,section follows the same line of development as both the ,first and the ,second4 #a4 ,,earthquake1 ,,eclipse ,,and ,,famine4 ,,amos viii4 #d-ad4 ,hear this1 ye who trample the needy1 and would put an end to#cde the lowly of the land1 saying1 ,when will the ,new-,moon be over1 that we may sell grain1 and the ,sabbath1 that we may open corn 7by making small the measure1 but large the weight1 and falsifying the fraudulent balances2 buying the wretched for silver1 and the needy for a pair of shoes671 and that we may sell as grain the refuse of the corn6 ,the parenthesis puzzles1 but is not impossible3 in the speed of his scorn1 ,amos might well interrupt the speech of the merchants by these details of their fraud1#cdf flinging these in their teeth as they spoke4 ,the existence at this date of the ,new-,moon and ,sabbath as days of rest from business is interesting2 but even more interesting is the peril to which they lie open4 ,as in the case of the ,nazirites and the prophets1 we see how the religious institutions and opportunities of the people are threatened by worldliness and greed4 ,and1 as in every other relevant passage of the ,old ,testament1 we have the interests of the ,sabbath bound up in the same cause with the interests of the poor4 ,the ,fourth ,commandment enforces the day of rest on behalf of the servants and bondsmen4 ,when a later prophet substitutes for religious fasts the ideals of social service1 he weds with the latter the security of the ,sabbath from all business4#cdg ,so here ,amos emphasises that the ,sabbath is threatened by the same worldliness and love of money which tramples on the helpless4 ,the interests of the ,sabbath are the interests of the poor3 the enemies of the ,sabbath are the enemies of the poor4 ,and all this illustrates our ,saviour's saying1 that the ,sabbath was made for man4 ,but1 as in the rest of the book1 judgment again follows hard on sin4 ,sworn hath ,jehovah by the pride of ,jacob1 ,never shall ,i forget their deeds4 ,it is as before4 ,the chief spring of the prophet's inspiration is his burning sense of the personal indignation of ,god against crimes so abominable4 ,god is the ,god of the poor1 and ,his anger rises1 as we see the anger of ,christ arise1 heavy against their tyrants and oppressors4 ,such sins are intolerable to ,him4 ,but the feeling of their intolerableness is shared by the land itself1 the very fabric of nature2 the earthquake is the proof of it4 ,for all this shall not the land tremble and her every inhabitant mourn8 and she shall rise like the ,nile in mass1 and heave and sink like the ,nile of ,egypt4#cdh ,to the earthquake is added the eclipse3 one had happened in #hjc1 and another in #gfc1 the memory of which probably inspired the form of this passage4 ,and it shall be in that day--'tis the oracle of the ,lord ,jehovah--that ,i shall bring down the sun at noon1 and cast darkness on the earth in broad day4#cdi ,and ,i will turn your festivals into mourning1 and all your songs to a dirge4 ,and ,i will bring up upon all loins sackcloth and on every head baldness1 and ,i will make it like the mourning for an only son1 and the end of it as a bitter day4 ,but the terrors of earthquake and eclipse are not sufficient for doom1 and famine is drawn upon4 ,lo1 days are coming--'tis the oracle of the ,lord ,jehovah--that ,i will send famine on the land1 not a famine of bread nor a drouth of water1 but of hearing the words of ,jehovah4 ,and they shall wander from sea to sea1 and from the dark ,north to the ,sunrise shall they run to and fro1 to seek the word of ,jehovah1 and they shall not find it2 444 who swear by ,samaria's ,guilt--the golden calf in the house of the kingdom at ,bethel#cej--;and say1 ,as liveth thy ,god1 ,o ,dan6 and1 ,as liveth the way to ,beersheba6 and they shall fall and not rise any more4 ,i have omitted ver4 #ac3 in that day shall the fair maids faint and the youths for thirst2 and ,i append my reasons in a note4 ,some part of the received text must go1 for while vv4 #aa and #ab speak of a spiritual drought1 the drought of #ac is physical4 ,and ver4 #ad follows #ab better than it follows #ac4 ,the oaths mentioned by ,bethel1 ,dan1 ,beersheba1 are not specially those of young men and maidens1 but of the whole nation1 that run from one end of the land to the other1 ,dan to ,beersheba1 seeking for some word of ,jehovah4#cea ,one of the oaths1 ,as liveth the way to ,beersheba1#ceb is so curious that some have doubted if the text be correct4 ,but strange as it may appear to us to speak of the life of the lifeless1 this often happens among the ,semites4 ,to-day ,arabs swear wa hyt1 'by the life of1' even of things inanimate2 ',by the life of this fire1 or of this coffee4'#cec ,and as ,amos here tells us that the ,israelite pilgrims swore by the way to ,beersheba1 so do the ,moslems affirm their oaths by the sacred way to ,mecca4 ,thus ,amos returns to the chief target of his shafts--the senseless1 corrupt worship of the national sanctuaries4 ,and this time--perhaps in remembrance of how they had silenced the word of ,god when he brought it home to them at ,bethel--he tells ,israel that1 with all their running to and fro across the land1 to shrine after shrine in search of the word1 they shall suffer from a famine and drouth of it4 ,perhaps this is the most effective contrast in which ,amos has yet placed the stupid ritualism of his people4 ,with so many things to swear by2 with so many holy places that once were the homes of ,vision1 ,abraham's ,beersheba1 ,jacob's ,bethel1 ,joshua's ,gilgal--nay1 a whole land over which ,god's voice had broken in past ages1 lavish as the rain2 with1 too1 all their assiduity of sacrifice and prayer1 they should nevertheless starve and pant for that living word of the ,lord1 which they had silenced in ,his prophet4 ,thus1 men may be devoted to religion1 may be loyal to their sacred traditions and institutions1 may haunt the holy associations of the past and be very assiduous with their ritual--and yet1 because of their worldliness1 pride and disobedience1 never feel that moral inspiration1 that clear call to duty1 that comfort in pain1 that hope in adversity1 that good conscience at all times1 which spring up in the heart like living water4 ,where these be not experienced1 orthodoxy1 zeal1 lavish ritual1 are all in vain4 #b4 ,,nemesis4 ,,amos ix4 #a-f4 ,there follows a ,vision in ,bethel1 the opening of which1 ,i saw the ,lord1 immediately recalls the great inauguration of ,isaiah4 ,he also saw the ,lord2 but how different the ,attitude1 how other the ,word6 ,to the statesman-prophet the ,lord is enthroned1 surrounded by the court of heaven2 and though the temple rocks to the intolerable thunder of their praise1 they bring to the contrite man beneath the consciousness of a life-long mission4 ,but to ,amos the ,lord is standing and alone--to this lonely prophet ,god is always alone--and ,his message may be summed up in its initial word1 ,smite4 ,there--,government3 hierarchies of service1 embassies1 clemencies1 healings1 and though at first devastation1 thereafter the indestructible hope of a future4 ,here--,judgment3 that ,figure of ,fate which terror's fascinated eye ever sees alone2 one final blow and irreparable ruin4 ,and so1 as with ,isaiah we saw how constructive prophecy may be1 with ,amos we behold only the preparatory havoc1 the levelling and clearing of the ground of the future4 ,i have seen the ,lord standing over the ,altar1 and ,he said1 ,smite the capital--of the pillar--that the very thresholds#ced quake1 and break them on the head of all of them6 ,it is a shock that makes the temple reel from roof-tree to basement4 ,the vision seems subsequent to the prophet's visit to ,bethel2 and it gathers his whole attack on the national worship into one decisive and irreparable blow4 ,the last of them will ,i slay with the sword3 there shall not flee away of them one fugitive3 there shall not escape of them a single survivor6 ,neither hell nor heaven1 mountain-top nor sea-bottom1 shall harbour one of them4 ,if they break through to ,sheol1 thence shall ,my hand take them2 and if they climb to heaven1 thence shall ,i bring them down4 ,if they hide in ,carmel's top1 thence will ,i find them out and fetch them2 and if they conceal themselves from before ,mine eyes in the bottom of the sea1 thence shall ,i charge the ,serpent and he shall bite them2 and if they go into captivity before their foes--to ,israel as terrible a distance from ,god's face as ,sheol itself6--thence will ,i charge the sword and it shall slay them2 and ,i will set ,mine eye upon them for evil and not for good4 ,it is a ruder draft of the ,hundred and ,thirty-,ninth ,psalm2 but the ,divine ,pursuer is ,nemesis1 and not ,conscience4 ,and the ,lord1 ,jehovah of the ,hosts2 ,who toucheth the earth and it melteth1 and all its inhabitants mourn1 and it rises like the ,nile1 all of it together1 and sinks like the ,nile of ,egypt2 ,who buildeth ,his stories in the heavens1 and ,his vault on the earth ,he foundeth2 ,who calleth to the waters of the sea and poureth them forth on the face of the earth--,jehovah of ,hosts is ,his ,name4#cee #c4 ,,the ,,voices ,,of ,,another ,,dawn4 ,,amos ix4 #g-ae4 ,and now we are come to the part where1 as it seems1 voices of another day mingle with that of ,amos1 and silence his judgments in the chorus of their unbroken hope4 ,at first1 however1 it is himself without doubt who speaks4 ,he takes up the now familiar truth1 that when it comes to judgment for sin1 ,israel is no dearer to ,jehovah than any other people of ,his equal ,providence4 ,are ye not unto ,me1 ,o children of ,israel--'tis the oracle of ,jehovah--just like the children of ,kushites8 mere black folk and far away6 ,did ,i not bring up ,israel from ,egypt1 and the ,philistines from ,caphtor1 and ,aram from ir8 ,mark again the universal ,providence which ,amos proclaims3 it is the due concomitant of his universal morality4 ,once for all the religion of ,israel breaks from the characteristic ,semitic belief that gave a god to every people1 and limited both his power and his interests to that people's territory and fortunes4 ,and if we remember how everything spiritual in the religion of ,israel1 everything in its significance for mankind1 was rendered possible only because at this date it broke from and abjured the particularism in which it had been born1 we shall feel some of the ,titanic force of the prophet1 in whom that break was achieved with an absoluteness which leaves nothing to be desired4 ,but let us also emphasise1 that it was by no mere method of the intellect or observation of history that ,amos was led to assert the unity of the ,divine ,providence4 ,the inspiration in this was a moral one3 ,jehovah was ruler and guide of all the families of mankind1 because ,he was exalted in righteousness2 and the field in which that righteousness was proved and made manifest was the life and the fate of ,israel4 ,therefore to this ,amos now turns4 ,lo1 the eyes of the ,lord ,jehovah are on the sinful kingdom1 and ,i will destroy it from the face of the ground4 ,in other words1 ,jehovah's sovereignty over the world was not proved by ,israel's conquest of the latter1 but by ,his unflinching application of the principles of righteousness1 at whatever cost1 to ,israel herself4 ,up to this point1 then1 the voice of ,amos is unmistakable1 uttering the doctrine1 so original to him1 that in the judgment of ,god ,israel shall not be specially favoured1 and the sentence1 we have heard so often from him1 of her removal from her land4 ,remember1 ,amos has not yet said a word in mitigation of the sentence3 up to this point of his book it has been presented as inexorable and final4 ,but now to a statement of it as absolute as any that has gone before1 there is suddenly added a qualification3 nevertheless ,i will not utterly destroy the house of ,jacob--'tis the oracle of ,jehovah4 ,and then there is added a new picture of exile changed from doom to discipline1 a process of sifting by which only the evil in ,israel1 all the sinners of ,my people1 shall perish1 but not a grain of the good4 ,for1 lo1 ,i am giving command1 and ,i will toss the house of ,israel among all the nations1 like something that is tossed in a sieve1 but not a pebble#cef shall fall to earth4 ,by the sword shall die all the sinners of ,my people1 they who say1 ,the calamity shall not reach nor anticipate us4#ceg ,now as to these qualifications of the hitherto unmitigated judgments of the book1 it is to be noted that there is nothing in their language to lead us to take them from ,amos himself4 ,on the contrary1 the last clause describes what he has always called a characteristic sin of his day4 ,our only difficulties are that hitherto ,amos has never qualified his sentences of doom1 and that the change now appears so suddenly that the two halves of the verse in which it does so absolutely contradict each other4 ,read them again1 ver4 #h3 ,lo1 the eyes of the ,lord ,jehovah are on the sinful nation1 and ,i will destroy it from off the face of the ground--nevertheless destroying ,i shall not destroy the house of ,jacob3 'tis the oracle of ,jehovah4 ,can we believe the same prophet to have uttered at the same time these two statements8 ,and is it possible to believe that prophet to be the hitherto unwavering1 unqualifying ,amos8 ,noting these things1 let us pass to the rest of the chapter4 ,we break from all shadows2 the verses are verses of pure hope4 ,the judgment on ,israel is not averted2 but having taken place her ruin is regarded as not irreparable4 ,in that day--the day ,amos has threatened of overthrow and ruin--,i will raise again the fallen hut of ,david and will close up its breaches1 and his ruins ,i will raise1 and ,i will build it up as in the days of old1#ceh that they may possess the remnant of ,edom and all the nations upon whom ,my ,name has been called--that is1 as once their ,possessor--'tis the oracle of ,jehovah1 ,he who is about to do this4 ,the fallen hut of ,david undoubtedly means the fall of the kingdom of ,judah4 ,it is not language ,amos uses1 or1 as it seems to me1 could have used1 of the fall of the ,northern ,kingdom only4#cei ,again1 it is undoubted that ,amos contemplated the fall of ,judah3 this is implicit in such a phrase as the whole family that ,i brought up from ,egypt4#cfj ,he saw then the day and the ruins of which ver4 #aa speaks4 ,the only question is1 can we attribute to him the prediction of a restoration of these ruins8 ,and this is a question which must be answered in face of the facts that the rest of his book is unrelieved by a single gleam of hope1 and that his threat of the nation's destruction is absolute and final4 ,now it is significant that in face of those facts ,cornill 7though he has changed his opinion7 once believed it was surely possible for ,amos to include restoration in his prospect of ruin1 as 7he might have added7 other prophets undoubtedly do4 ,i confess ,i cannot so readily get over the rest of the book and its gloom2 and am the less inclined to be sure about these verses being ,amos' own that it seems to have been not unusual for later generations1 for whom the daystar was beginning to rise1 to add their own inspired hopes to the unrelieved threats of their predecessors of the midnight4 ,the mention of ,edom does not help us much3 in the days of ,amos after the partial conquest by ,uzziah the promise of the rest of ,edom was singularly appropriate4 ,on the other hand1 what interest had so purely ethical a prophet in the mere addition of territory8 ,to this point we shall have to return for our final decision4 ,we have still the closing oracle--a very pleasant piece of music1 as if the birds had come out after the thunderstorm1 and the wet hills were glistening in the sunshine4 ,lo1 days are coming--'tis the oracle of ,jehovah--when the ploughman shall catch up the reaper1 and the grape-treader him that streweth the seed4 ,the seasons shall jostle each other1 harvest following hard upon seed-time1 vintage upon spring4 ,it is that happy contention of seasons which ,josephus describes as the perpetual blessing of ,galilee4#cfa ,and the mountains shall drip with new wine1 and all the hills shall flow down4 ,and ,i will bring back the captivity of ,my people ,israel1 and they shall build the waste cities and dwell in them1 and plant vineyards and drink the wine thereof1 and make gardens and eat their fruits4 ,and ,i will plant them on their own ground2 and they shall not be uprooted any more from their own ground which ,i have given to them1 saith ,jehovah thy ,god4#cfb ,again we meet the difficulty3 does the voice that speaks here speak with captivity already realised8 or is it the voice of one who projects himself forward to a day1 which1 by the oath of the ,lord ,himself1 is certain to come8 99 99 99 99 99 ,we have now surveyed the whole of this much-doubted1 much-defended passage4 ,i have stated fully the arguments on both sides4 ,on the one hand1 we have the fact that nothing in the language of the verses1 and nothing in their historical allusions1 precludes their being by ,amos2 we have also to admit that1 having threatened a day of ruin1 it was possible for ,amos to realise by his mind's eye its arrival1 and standing at that point to see the sunshine flooding the ruins and to prophesy a restoration4 ,in all this there is nothing impossible in itself or inconsistent with the rest of the book4 ,on the other hand1 we have the impressive and incommensurable facts3 first1 that this change to hope comes suddenly1 without preparation and without statement of reasons1 at the very end of a book whose characteristics are not only a final and absolute sentence of ruin upon the people1 and an outlook of unrelieved darkness1 but scornful discouragement of every popular vision of a prosperous future2 and1 second1 that the prophetic books contain numerous signs that later generations wove their own brighter hopes into the abrupt and hopeless conclusions of prophecies of judgment4 ,to this balance of evidence is there anything to add8 ,i think there is2 and that it decides the question4 ,all these prospects of the future restoration of ,israel are absolutely without a moral feature4 ,they speak of return from captivity1 of political restoration1 of supremacy over the ,gentiles1 and of a revived ,nature1 hanging with fruit1 dripping with must4 ,such hopes are natural and legitimate to a people who were long separated from their devastated and neglected land1 and whose punishment and penitence were accomplished4 ,but they are not natural to a prophet like ,amos4 ,imagine him predicting a future like this6 ,imagine him describing the consummation of his people's history1 without mentioning one of those moral triumphs to rally his people to which his whole passion and energy had been devoted4 ,to me it is impossible to hear the voice that cried1 ,let justice roll on like waters and righteousness like a perennial stream1 in a peroration which is content to tell of mountains dripping with must and of a people satisfied with vineyards and gardens4 ,these are legitimate hopes2 but they are the hopes of a generation of other conditions and of other deserts than the generation of ,amos4 ,if then the gloom of this great book is turned into light1 such a change is not due to ,amos4 ,,footnotes3 #cdd ,see ,chapter ,,vi41 ,section #c4 #cde ,the phrase is uncertain4 #cdf ,wellhausen thinks that the prophet could not have put the parenthesis in the mouth of the traders1 and therefore regards it as an intrusion or gloss4 ,but this is hypercriticism4 ,the last clause1 however1 may be a mere clerical repetition of ii4 #f4 #cdg ,isa4 lviii4 ,see the exposition of the passage in the writer's ,isaiah xl4-lxvi4 7,expositor's ,bible ,series71 pp4 #dag ff43 ,our prophet1 while exalting the practical service of man at the expense of certain religious forms1 equally exalts the observance of the ,sabbath2 444 he places the keeping of the ,sabbath on a level with the practice of love4 #cdh ,she shall rise1 etc4--,the clause is almost the same as in ix4 #e;b1 and the text differs from the ,,lxx41 which omits and heave4 ,is it an insertion8 #cdi ,literally in the day of light4 #cej ,that is1 ,samaria is used in the wider sense of the kingdom1 not the capital1 and there is no need for ,wellhausen's substitution of ,bethel for it4 #cea ,this in answer to ,gunning 7,de ,godspraken van ,amos1 #ahhe71 ,wellh4 in loco1 and ,knig 7,einleitung1 p4 #cjd1 d71 who reckon vv4 #aa and #ab to be the insertion3 the latter on the additional ground that the formula of ver4 #ac1 in that day1 points back to ver4 #i2 but not to the ,lo1 days are coming of ver4 #aa4 ,but thus to miss out vv4 #aa and #ab leaves us with greater difficulties than before4 ,for without them how are we to explain the thirst of ver4 #ac4 ,it is left unintroduced2 there is no hint of a drought in #i and #aj4 ,it seems to me then that1 since we must omit some verse1 it ought to be ver4 #ac2 and this the rather that if omitted it is not missed4 ,it is just the kind of general statement that would be added by an unthinking scribe2 and it does not readily connect with ver4 #ad1 while ver4 #ab does do so4 ,for why should youths and maids be specially singled out as swearing by ,samaria1 ,dan and ,beersheba8 ,these were the oaths of the whole people1 to whom vv4 #aa and #ab refer4 ,i see a very clear case1 therefore1 for omitting ver4 #ac4 #ceb ,,lxx4 here gives a mere repetition of the preceding oath4 #cec ,doughty3 ,arabia ,deserta ,i4 #bfi4 #ced ,since it is the capital that has been struck1 and the command is given to break the thresholds on the head of all of them1 many translate lintels or architraves instead of thresholds 7e4g4 ,hitzig1 and ,guthe in ,kautzsch's ,bibel74 ,but the word always means thresholds and the blow here is fundamental4 #cee ,,lxx4 adds of ,hosts3 on the whole passage see next chapter4 #cef ,we should have expected a grain1 but the word only means small stone3 cf4 #b ,sam4 xvii4 #ac4 ,the ,,lxx4 has here 1 fracture1 ruin4 ,cf4 ,z4,a4,t4,w41 ,,iii4 #abe4 #ceg ,the text has been disturbed here2 the verbs are in forms not possible to the sense4 ,for read either with ,hitzig or with ,wellhausen4 1 ,hiph41 is not impossible in an intransitive sense1 but probably ,wellhausen is right in reading ,pi1 4 ,the reading which the ,greek suggests and ,hoffmann and ,wellhausen adopt is not so appropriate to the preceding verb as of the text4 #ceh ,the text reads their breaches1 and some accordingly point hut1 as if it were the plural huts 7,hoffmann1 ,z4,a4,t4,w41 #ahhc1 #abe2 ,schwally1 id41 #ahij1 #bbf1 n4 #a2 ,guthe in ,kautzsch's ,bibel74 ,the ,,lxx4 has the sing41 and it is easy to see how the plur4 fem4 suffix may have risen from confusion with the following conjunction4 #cei ,this against ,cornill1 ,einleitung1 #agf4 #cfj iii4 #a4 #cfa ,,iii4 ,wars1 x4 #h4 ,with the above verses of the ,book of ,amos ,lev4 xxvi4 #e has been compared3 your threshing shall reach to the vintage and the vintage to the sowing time4 ,but there is no reason to suppose that either of two so natural passages depends on the other4 #cfb ,,lxx4 ,god of ,hosts4 ,,chapter ,,xi ,,common-,,sense ,,and ,,the ,,reign ,,of ,,law ,,amos iii4 #c-h2 iv4 #f-ac2 v4 #h1 #i2 vi4 #ab2 viii4 #h2 ix4 #e1 #f4 ,fools1 when they face facts1 which is seldom1 face them one by one1 and1 as a consequence1 either in ignorant contempt or in panic4 ,with this inordinate folly ,amos charged the religion of his day4 ,the superstitious people1 careful of every point of ritual and very greedy of omens1 would not ponder real facts nor set cause to effect4 ,amos recalled them to common life4 ,does a bird fall upon a snare1 except there be a loop on her8 ,does the trap itself rise front the ground1 except it be catching something--something alive in it that struggles1 and so lifts the trap8 ,shall the alarum be blown in a city1 and the people not tremble8 ,daily life is impossible without putting two and two together4 ,but this is just what ,israel will not do with the sacred events of their time4 ,to religion they will not add common-sense4 ,for ,amos himself1 all things which happen are in sequence and in sympathy4 ,he has seen this in the simple life of the desert2 he is sure of it throughout the tangle and hubbub of history4 ,one thing explains another2 one makes another inevitable4 ,when he has illustrated the truth in common life1 ,amos claims it for especially four of the great facts of the time4 ,the sins of society1 of which society is careless2 the physical calamities1 which they survive and forget2 the approach of ,assyria1 which they ignore2 the word of the prophet1 which they silence1--all these belong to each other4 ,drought1 ,pestilence1 ,earthquake1 ,invasion conspire--and the ,prophet holds their secret4 ,now it is true that for the most part ,amos describes this sequence of events as the personal action of ,jehovah4 ,shall evil befall1 and ,jehovah not have done it8444 ,i have smitten you4444 ,i will raise up against you a ,nation4444 ,prepare to meet thy ,god1 ,o ,israel6#cfc ,yet even where the personal impulse of the ,deity is thus emphasised1 we feel equal stress laid upon the order and the inevitable certainty of the process4 ,amos nowhere uses ,isaiah's great phrase3 a ,god of ,mishpat1 a ,god of ,order or ,law4 ,but he means almost the same thing3 ,god works by methods which irresistibly fulfil themselves4 ,nay more4 ,sometimes this sequence sweeps upon the prophet's mind with such force as to overwhelm all his sense of the ,personal within it4 ,the ,will and the ,word of the ,god who causes the thing are crushed out by the ,must ,be of the thing itself4 ,take even the descriptions of those historical crises1 which the prophet most explicitly proclaims as the visitations of the ,almighty4 ,in some of the verses all thought of ,god ,himself is lost in the roar and foam with which that tide of necessity bursts up through them4 ,the fountains of the great deep break loose1 and while the universe trembles to the shock1 it seems that even the voice of the ,deity is overwhelmed4 ,in one passage1 immediately after describing ,israel's ruin as due to ,jehovah's word1 ,amos asks how could it have happened otherwise3-- ,shall horses run up a cliff1 or oxen plough the sea8 that ye turn justice into poison1 and the fruit of righteousness into wormwood4#cfd ,a moral order exists1 which it is as impossible to break without disaster as it would be to break the natural order by driving horses upon a precipice4 ,there is an inherent necessity in the sinners' doom4 ,again1 he says of ,israel's sin3 ,shall not the ,land tremble for this8 ,yea1 it shall rise up together like the ,nile1 and heave and sink like the ,nile of ,egypt4#cfe ,the crimes of ,israel are so intolerable1 that in its own might the natural frame of things revolts against them4 ,in these great crises1 therefore1 as in the simple instances adduced from everyday life1 ,amos had a sense of what we call law1 distinct from1 and for moments even overwhelming1 that sense of the personal purpose of ,god1 admission to the secrets of which had marked his call to be a prophet4#cff ,these instincts we must not exaggerate into a system4 ,there is no philosophy in ,amos1 nor need we wish there were4 ,far more instructive is what we do find--a virgin sense of the sympathy of all things1 the thrill rather than the theory of a universe4 ,and this faith1 which is not a philosophy1 is especially instructive on these two points3 that it springs from the moral sense2 and that it embraces1 not history only1 but nature4 ,it springs from the moral sense4 ,other races have arrived at a conception of the universe along other lines3 some by the observation of physical laws valid to the recesses of space2 some by logic and the unity of ,reason4 ,but ,israel found the universe through the conscience4 ,it is a historical fact that the ,unity of ,god1 the ,unity of ,history and the ,unity of the ,world1 did1 in this order1 break upon ,israel1 through conviction and experience of the universal sovereignty of righteousness4 ,we see the beginnings of the process in ,amos4 ,to him the sequences which work themselves out through history and across nature are moral4 ,righteousness is the hinge on which the world hangs2 loosen it1 and history and nature feel the shock4 ,history punishes the sinful nation4 ,but nature1 too1 groans beneath the guilt of man2 and in the ,drought1 the ,pestilence and the ,earthquake provides his scourges4 ,it is a belief which has stamped itself upon the language of mankind4 ,what else is plague than blow or scourge8 ,this brings us to the second point--our prophet's treatment of ,nature4 ,apart from the disputed passages 7which we shall take afterwards by themselves7 we have in the ,book of ,amos few glimpses of nature1 and these always under a moral light4 ,there is not in any chapter a landscape visible in its own beauty4 ,like all desert-dwellers1 who when they would praise the works of ,god lift their eyes to the heavens1 ,amos gives us but the outlines of the earth--a mountain range1#cfg or the crest of a forest1#cfh or the bare back of the land1 bent from sea to sea4#cfi ,nearly all his figures are drawn from the desert--the torrent1 the wild beasts1 the wormwood4#cgj ,if he visits the meadows of the shepherds1 it is with the terror of the people's doom2#cga if the vineyards or orchards1 it is with the mildew and the locust2#cgb if the towns1 it is with drought1 eclipse and earthquake4#cgc ,to him1 unlike his fellows1 unlike especially ,hosea1 the whole land is one theatre of judgment2 but it is a theatre trembling to its foundations with the drama enacted upon it4 ,nay1 land and nature are themselves actors in the drama4 ,physical forces are inspired with moral purpose1 and become the ministers of righteousness4 ,this is the converse of ,elijah's vision4 ,to the older prophet the message came that ,god was not in the fire nor in the earthquake nor in the tempest1 but only in the still small voice4 ,but to ,amos the fire1 the earthquake and the tempest are all in alliance with the ,voice1 and execute the doom which it utters4 ,the difference will be appreciated by us1 if we remember the respective problems set to prophecy in those two periods4 ,to ,elijah1 prophet of the elements1 wild worker by fire and water1 by life and death1 the spiritual had to be asserted and enforced by itself4 ,ecstatic as he was1 ,elijah had to learn that the ,word is more ,divine than all physical violence and terror4 ,but ,amos understood that for his age the question was very different4 ,not only was the ,god of ,israel dissociated from the powers of nature1 which were assigned by the popular mind to the various ,ba'alim of the land1 so that there was a divorce between ,his government of the people and the influences that fed the people's life2 but morality itself was conceived as provincial4 ,it was narrowed to the national interests2 it was summed up in mere rules of police1 and these were looked upon as not so important as the observances of the ritual4 ,therefore ,amos was driven to show that nature and morality are one4 ,morality is not a set of conventions4 ,morality is the order of things4 ,righteousness is on the scale of the universe4 ,all things tremble to the shock of sin2 all things work together for good to them that fear ,god4 ,with this sense of law1 of moral necessity1 in ,amos we must not fail to connect that absence of all appeal to miracle1 which is also conspicuous in his book4 ,we come now to the three disputed passages3-- iv4 #ac3--;,for1 lo6 ,he ,who formed the hills1#cgd and createth the wind1#cge and declareth to man what ,his#cgf mind is2 ,who maketh the dawn into darkness1 and marcheth on the heights of the land--,jehovah1 ,god of ,hosts1 is ,his ,name4 v4 #h1 #i3--,maker of the ,pleiades and ,orion1#cgg turning to morning the murk1 and day into night ,he darkeneth2 ,who calleth for the waters of the sea1 and poureth them forth on the face of the earth--,jehovah ,his ,name2 ,who flasheth ruin on the strong1 and destruction cometh down on the fortress4#cgh ix4 #e1 #f3--;,and the ,lord ,jehovah of the ,hosts1 ,who toucheth the earth and it rocketh1 and all mourn that dwell on it1 and it riseth like the ,nile together1 and sinketh like the ,nile of ,egypt2 ,who hath builded in the heavens ,his ascents1 and founded ,his vault upon the earth2 ,who calleth to the waters of the sea1 and poureth them on the face of the earth--,jehovah#cgi ,his ,name4 ,these sublime passages it is natural to take as the triple climax of the doctrine we have traced through the ,book of ,amos4 ,are they not the natural leap of the soul to the stars8 ,the same shepherd's eye which has marked sequence and effect unfailing on the desert soil1 does it not now sweep the clear heavens above the desert1 and find there also all things ordered and arrayed8 ,the same mind which traced the ,divine processes down history1 which foresaw the hosts of ,assyria marshalled for ,israel's punishment1 which felt the overthrow of justice shock the nation to their ruin1 and read the disasters of the husbandman's year as the vindication of a law higher than the physical--does it not now naturally rise beyond such instances of the ,divine order1 round which the dust of history rolls1 to the lofty1 undimmed outlines of the ,universe as a whole1 and1 in consummation of its message1 declare that all is ,law1 and ,law intelligible to man8 ,but in the way of so attractive a conclusion the literary criticism of the book has interposed4 ,it is maintained#chj that1 while none of these sublime verses are indispensable to the argument of ,amos1 some of them actually interrupt it1 so that when they are removed it becomes consistent2 that such ejaculations in praise of ,jehovah's creative power are not elsewhere met with in ,hebrew prophecy before the time of the ,exile2 that they sound very like echoes of the ,book of ,job2 and that in the ,septuagint version of ,hosea we actually find a similar doxology1 wedged into the middle of an authentic verse of the prophet4#cha ,to these arguments against the genuineness of the three famous passages1 other critics1 not less able and not less free1 like ,robertson ,smith and ,kuenen1#chb have replied that such ejaculations at critical points of the prophet's discourse are not surprising under the general conditions of prophetic oratory2 and that1 while one of the doxologies does appear to break the argument#chc of the context1 they are all of them thoroughly in the spirit and the style of ,amos4 ,to this point the discussion has been carried2 it seems to need a closer examination4 44 ,we may at once dismiss the argument which has been drawn from that obvious intrusion into the ,greek of ,hosea xiii4 #d4 ,not only is this verse not so suited to the doctrine of ,hosea as the doxologies are to the doctrine of ,amos2 but while they are definite and sublime1 it is formal and flat--,who made firm the heavens and founded the earth1 ,whose hands founded all the host of heaven1 and ,he did not display them that thou shouldest walk after them4 ,the passages in ,amos are vision2 this is a piece of catechism crumbling into homily4 ,again--an argument in favour of the authenticity of these passages may be drawn from the character of their subjects4 ,we have seen the part which the desert played in shaping the temper and the style of ,amos4 ,but the works of the ,creator1 to which these passages lift their praise1 are just those most fondly dwelt upon by all the poetry of the desert4 ,the ,arabian nomad1 when he magnifies the power of ,god1 finds his subjects not on the bare earth about him1 but in the brilliant heavens and the heavenly processes4 ,again1 the critic who affirms that the passages in ,amos in every case sensibly disturb the connection1#chd exaggerates4 ,in the case of the first of them1 chap4 iv4 #ac1 the disturbance is not at all sensible2 though it must be admitted that the oracle closes impressively enough without it4 ,the last of them1 chap4 ix4 #e1 #f--which repeats a clause already found in the book#che--;is as much in sympathy with its context as most of the oracles in the somewhat scattered discourse of that last section of the book4 ,the real difficulty is the second doxology1 chap4 v4 #h1 #i1 which does break the connection1 and in a sudden and violent way4 ,remove it1 and the argument is consistent4 ,we cannot read chap4 v4 without feeling that1 whether ,amos wrote these verses or not1 they did not originally stand where they stand at present4 ,now1 taken with this dispensableness of two of the passages and this obvious intrusion of one of them1 the following additional fact becomes ominous4 ,jehovah is ,his ,name 7which occurs in two of the passages71#chf or ,jehovah of ,hosts is ,his ,name 7which occurs at least in one71#chg is a construction which does not happen elsewhere in the book1 except in a verse where it is awkward and where we have already seen reason to doubt its genuineness4#chh ,but still more1 the phrase does not occur in any other prophet1 till we come down to the oracles which compose ,isaiah xl4-lxvi4 ,here it happens thrice--twice in passages dating from the ,exile1#chi and once in a passage suspected by some to be of still later date4#cij ,in the ,book of ,jeremiah the phrase is found eight times2 but either in passages already on other grounds judged by many critics to be later than ,jeremiah1#cia or where by itself it is probably an intrusion into the text4#cib ,now is it a mere coincidence that a phrase1 which1 outside the ,book of ,amos1 occurs only in writing of the time of the ,exile and in passages considered for other reasons to be post-exilic insertions--is it a mere coincidence that within the ,book of ,amos it should again be found only in suspected verses8 ,there appears to be in this more than a coincidence2 and the present writer cannot but feel a very strong case against the traditional belief that these doxologies are original and integral portions of the ,book of ,amos4 ,at the same time a case which has failed to convince critics like ,robertson ,smith and ,kuenen cannot be considered conclusive1 and we are so ignorant of many of the conditions of prophetic oratory at this period that dogmatism is impossible4 ,for instance1 the use by ,amos of the ,divine titles is a matter over which uncertainty still lingers2 and any further argument on the subject must include a fuller discussion than space here allows of the remarkable distribution of those titles throughout the various sections of the book4#cic ,but if it be not given to us to prove this kind of authenticity--a question whose data are so obscure1 yet whose answer fortunately is of so little significance--let us gladly welcome that greater ,authenticity whose undeniable proofs these verses so splendidly exhibit4 ,no one questions their right to the place which some great spirit gave them in this book--their suitableness to its grand and ordered theme1 their pure vision and their eternal truth4 ,that common-sense1 and that conscience1 which1 moving among the events of earth and all the tangled processes of history1 find everywhere reason and righteousness at work1 in these verses claim the ,universe for the same powers1 and see in stars and clouds and the procession of day and night the ,one ,eternal ,god ,who declareth to man what ,his mind is4 ,,footnotes3 #cfc iii4 #f;b2 iv4 #i2 vi4 #ad2 iv4 #ab;b4 #cfd vi4 #ab4 #cfe viii4 #h4 #cff iii4 #g3 ,jehovah ,god doeth nothing1 but ,he hath revealed ,his secret to ,his servants the prophets4 #cfg i4 #b2 iii4 #i2 ix4 #c4 #cfh ii4 #i4 #cfi viii4 #ab4 #cgj v4 #bd2 #ai1 #bj1 etc42 #g2 vi4 #ab4 #cga i4 #b4 #cgb iv4 #i ff4 #cgc iv4 #f-aa2 vi4 #aa2 viii4 #h ff4 #cgd ,,lxx4 the thunder4 #cge ,or spirit4 #cgf ,i4e4 ,god's2 a more natural rendering than to take his 7as ,hitzig does7 as meaning man's4 #cgg ,see above1 pp4 #aff f4 n4 #cgh ,text of last clause uncertain2 see above1 p4 #afg4 #cgi ,,lxx4 ,jehovah of ,hosts4 #chj ,first in #ahge by ,duhm1 ,theol4 der ,proph41 p4 #aai2 and after him by ,oort1 ,theol4 ,tjidschrift1 #ahhj1 pp4 #aaf f42 ,wellhausen1 in locis2 ,stade1 ,gesch41 ,i4 #ega2 ,cornill1 ,einleitung1 #agf4 #cha ,hosea xiii4 #d #chb ,smith1 ,prophets of ,israel1 p4 #cii2 ,kuenen1 ,hist4 ,krit4 ,einl4 7,germ4 ,ed471 ,,ii4 #cdg4 #chc v4 #h1 #i4 #chd ,cornill1 ,einl41 #agf4 #che ,cf4 viii4 #h4 #chf v4 #h2 ix4 #f1 though here ,,lxx4 read ,jehovah of ,hosts is ,his ,name4 #chg iv4 #ac4 ,see previous note4 #chh v4 #bg4 ,see above1 pp4 #agb f4 n43 cf4 ,hosea xii4 #f4 #chi xlvii4 #d and liv4 #e4 #cij xlviii4 #b3 cf4 ,duhm1 in loco1 and ,cheyne1 ,introduction to the ,book of ,isaiah1 #cja4 #cia x4 #af2 xxxi4 #ce2 xxxii4 #ah2 l4 #cd 7perhaps a quotation from ,isa4 xlvii4 #d72 li4 #ai1 #eg4 #cib xlvi4 #ah1 where the words fail in ,,lxx42 xlviii4 #ae b1 where the clause in which it occurs is wanting in the ,,lxx4 #cic ,but ,i have room at least for a bare statement of these remarkable facts3-- ,the titles for the ,god of ,israel used in the ,book of ,amos are these3 7#a7 ,thy ,god1 ,o ,israel1 2 7#b7 ,jehovah1 2 7#c7 ,lord ,jehovah1 2 7#d7 ,lord ,jehovah of the ,hosts1 2 7#e7 ,jehovah ,god of ,hosts or of the ,hosts1 or 4 ,now in the ,first ,section1 chaps4 i41 ii41 it is interesting that we find none of the variations which are compounded with ,hosts1 4 ,by itself 7especially in the phrase ,thus saith ,jehovah1 7 is general2 and once only 7i4 #h7 is ,lord ,jehovah employed4 ,the phrase1 oracle of ,jehovah1 1 is also rare2 it occurs only twice 7ii4 #aa1 #af71 and then only in the passage dealing with ,israel1 and not at all in the oracles against foreign nations4 ,in ,sections ,,ii4 and ,,iii4 the simple is again most frequently used4 ,but we find also ,lord ,jehovah1 7iii4 #g1 #h2 iv4 #b1 #e2 v4 #c1 with alone in the parallel ver4 #d2 vi4 #h2 vii4 #a1 #b1 #d bis1 #e1 #f2 viii4 #a1 #c1 #i1 #aa71 used either indifferently with 2 or in verses where it seems more natural to emphasise the sovereignty of ,jehovah than ,his simple ,name 7as1 e4g41 where ,he swears1 iv4 #b1 vi4 #h1 yet when the same phrase occurs in viii4 #g alone is used72 or in the solemn ,visions of the ,third ,section 7but not in the ,narrative72 and sometimes we find in the ,visions ,lord1 1 alone without 7vii4 #g1 #h2 ix4 #a74 ,the titles containing or occur nine times4 ,of these five are in passages which we have seen other reasons to suppose are insertions3 two of the ,doxologies--iv4 #ac1 and ix4 #e1 7in addition the ,,lxx4 read in ix4 #f 71 and in v4 #ad1 #ae 7see p4 #afh7 and #bg 7see p4 #agb71 in all three 4 ,the four genuine passages are iii4 #ac1 where we find preceded by 2 v4 #af1 where we have followed by 2 vi4 #h1 1 and vi4 #ad1 4 ,throughout the last two sections of the book is used with all these forms of the ,divine title4 ,,hosea ,for leal love have ,i desired and not sacrifice ,and the knowledge of ,god rather than burnt-offerings4 ,,chapter ,,xii ,,the ,,book ,,of ,,hosea ,the ,book of ,hosea consists of two unequal sections1 chaps4 i4-iii4 and chaps4 iv4-xiv41 which differ in the dates of their standpoints1 to a large extent also in the details of their common subjects1 but still more largely in their form and style4 ,the ,first ,section is in the main narrative2 though the style rises to the pitch of passionate pleading and promise1 it is fluent and equable4 ,if one verse be omitted and three others transposed1#cid the argument is continuous4 ,in the ,second ,section1 on the contrary1 we have a stream of addresses and reflections1 appeals1 upbraidings1 sarcasms1 recollections of earlier history1 denunciations and promises1 which1 with little logical connection and almost no pauses or periods1 start impulsively from each other1 and for a large part are expressed in elliptic and ejaculatory phrases4 ,in the present restlessness of ,biblical ,criticism it would have been surprising if this difference of style had not prompted some minds to a difference of authorship4 ,grtz#cie has distinguished two ,hoseas1 separated by a period of fifty years4 ,but if1 as we shall see1 the ,first ,section reflects the end of the reign of ,jeroboam ,,ii41 who died about #gdc1 then the next few years1 with their revolutionary changes in ,israel1 are sufficient to account for the altered outlook of the ,second ,section2 while the altered style is fully explained by difference of occasion and motive4 ,in both sections not only are the religious principles identical1 and many of the characteristic expressions1#cif but there breathes throughout the same urgent and jealous temper1 which renders ,hosea's personality so distinctive among the prophets4 ,within this unity1 of course1 we must not be surprised to find1 as in the ,book of ,amos1 verses which cannot well be authentic4 ,,first ,,section3 ,,hosea',s ,,prophetic ,,life4 ,with the removal of some of the verses the argument becomes clear and consecutive4 ,after the story of the wife and children 7i4 #b-i71 who are symbols of the land and people of ,israel in their apostasy from ,god 7#b1 #d1 #f1 #i71 the ,divine voice calls on the living generation to plead with their mother lest destruction come 7ii4 #b-e1 ,eng42 ii4 #d-g1 ,heb4#cig71 but then passes definite sentence of desolation on the land and of exile on the people 7#f-ac1 ,eng42 #h-ae1 ,heb471 which however is not final doom1 but discipline1#cih with the ultimate promise of the return of the nation's youth1 their renewed betrothal to ,jehovah and the restoration of nature 7#ad-bc74 ,then follows the story of the prophet's restoration of his wife1 also with discipline 7chap4 iii474 ,notice that1 although the story of the wife's fall has preceded the declaration of ,israel's apostasy1 it is ,israel's restoration which precedes the wife's4 ,the ethical significance of this order we shall illustrate in the next chapter4 ,in this section the disturbing verses are i4 #g and the group of three--i4 #aj1 #aa1 ii4 #a 7,eng42 but ii4 #a-c ,heb474 ,chap4 i4 #g introduces ,judah as excepted from the curse passed upon ,israel2 it is so obviously intrusive in a prophecy dealing only with ,israel1 and it so clearly reflects the deliverance of ,judah from ,sennacherib in #gja1 that we cannot hold it for anything but an insertion of a date subsequent to that deliverance1 and introduced by a pious ,jew to signalise ,judah's fate in contrast with ,israel's4#cii ,the other three verses 7i4 #aj1 #aa1 ii4 #a1 ,eng42 ii4 #a-c1 ,heb47 introduce a promise of restoration before the sentence of judgment is detailed1 or any ethical conditions of restoration are stated4 ,that is1 they break and tangle an argument otherwise consistent and progressive from beginning to end of the ,section4 ,every careful reader must feel them out of place where they lie4 ,their awkwardness has been so much appreciated that1 while in the ,hebrew text they have been separated from chap4 i41 in the ,greek they have been separated from chap4 ii4 ,that is to say1 some have felt they have no connection with what precedes them1 others none with what follows them2 while our ,english version1 by distributing them between the two chapters1 only makes more sensible their superfluity4 ,if they really belong to the prophecy1 their proper place is after the last verse of chap4 ii4#djj ,this is actually the order in which part of it and part of them are quoted by ,st4 ,paul4#dja ,at the same time1 when so arranged1 they repeat somewhat awkwardly the language of ii4 #bc1 and scarcely form a climax to the chapter4 ,there is nothing in their language to lead us to doubt that they are ,hosea's own2 and ver4 #aa shows that they must have been written at least before the captivity of ,northern ,israel4#djb ,the only other suspected clause in this section is that in iii4 #e1 and ,david their king2#djc but if it be struck out the verse is rendered awkward1 if not impossible1 by the immediate repetition of the ,divine name1 which would not have been required in the absence of the suspected clause4#djd ,the text of the rest of the section is remarkably free from obscurities4 ,the ,greek version offers few variants1 and most of these are due to mistranslation4#dje ,in iii4 #a for loved of a husband it reads loving evil4 ,evidently this section was written before the death of ,jeroboam ,,ii4 ,the house of ,jehu still reigns2 and as ,hosea predicts its fall by war on the classic battleground of ,jezreel1 the prophecy must have been written before the actual fall1 which took the form of an internal revolt against ,zechariah1 the son of ,jeroboam4 ,with this agrees the tone of the section4 ,there are the same evils in ,israel which ,amos exposed in the prosperous years of the same reign2 but ,hosea appears to realise the threatened exile from a nearer standpoint4 ,it is probable also that part of the reason of his ability to see his way through the captivity to the people's restoration is due to a longer familiarity with the approach of captivity than ,amos experienced before he wrote4 ,but1 of course1 for ,hosea's promise of restoration there were1 as we shall see1 other and greater reasons of a religious kind4#djf ,,second ,,section3 ,,chaps4 iv4-xiv4 ,when we pass into these chapters we feel that the times are changed4 ,the dynasty of ,jehu has passed3 kings are falling rapidly3 ,israel devours its rulers3#djg there is no loyalty to the king2 he is suddenly cut off2#djh all the princes are revolters4#dji ,round so despised and so unstable a throne the nation tosses in disorder4 ,conspiracies are rife4 ,it is not only1 as in ,amos1 the the sins of the luxurious1 of them that are at ease in ,zion1 which are exposed2 but also literal bloodshed3 highway robbery with murder1 abetted by the priests2#daj the thief breaketh in and the robber-troop maketh a raid4#daa ,amos looked out on foreign nations across a quiet ,israel2 his views of the world are wide and clear2 but in the ,book of ,hosea the dust is up1 and into what is happening beyond the frontier we get only glimpses4 ,there is enough1 however1 to make visible another great change since the days of ,jeroboam4 ,israel's self-reliance is gone4 ,she is as fluttered as a startled bird3 ,they call unto ,egypt1 they go unto ,assyria4#dab ,their wealth is carried as a gift to ,king ,jareb1#dac and they evidently engage in intrigues with ,egypt4 ,but everything is hopeless3 kings cannot save1 for ,ephraim is seized by the pangs of a fatal crisis4#dad ,this broken description reflects--and all the more faithfully because of its brokenness--the ten years which followed on the death of ,jeroboam ,,ii4 about #gdc4dae ,his son ,zechariah1 who succeeded him1 was in six months assassinated by ,shallum ben ,jabesh1 who within a month more was himself cut down by ,menahem ben ,gadi4#daf ,menahem held the throne for six or seven years1 but only by sending to the ,king of ,assyria an enormous tribute which he exacted from the wealthy magnates of ,israel4#dag ,discontent must have followed these measures1 such discontent with their rulers as ,hosea describes4 ,pekahiah ben ,menahem kept the throne for little over a year after his father's death1 and was assassinated by his captain1#dah ,pekah ben ,remaliah1 with fifty ,gileadites1 and ,pekah took the throne about #gcf4 ,this second and bloody usurpation may be one of those on which ,hosea dwells2 but if so it is the last historical allusion in his book4 ,there is no reference to the war of ,pekah and ,rezin against ,ahaz of ,judah which ,isaiah describes1#dai and to which ,hosea must have alluded had he been still prophesying4#dbj ,there is no allusion to its consequence in ,tiglath-,pileser's conquest of ,gilead and ,galilee in #gcd-gcc4 ,on the contrary1 these provinces are still regarded as part of the body politic of ,israel4#dba ,nor is there any sign that ,israel have broken with ,assyria2 to the last the book represents them as fawning on the ,northern ,power4#dbb ,in all probability1 then1 the ,book of ,hosea was closed before #gcd ,b4,c4 ,the ,second ,section dates from the years behind that and back to the death of ,jeroboam ,,ii4 about #gdc1 while the ,first ,section1 as we saw1 reflects the period immediately before the latter4 ,we come now to the general style of chaps4 iv4-xiv4 ,the period1 as we have seen1 was one of the most broken of all the history of ,israel2 the political outlook1 the temper of the people1 were constantly changing4 ,hosea1 who watched these kaleidoscopes1 had himself an extraordinarily mobile and vibrant mind4 ,there could be no greater contrast to that fixture of conscience which renders the ,book of ,amos so simple in argument1 so firm in style4#dbc ,it was a leaden plummet which ,amos saw ,jehovah setting to the structure of ,israel's life4#dbd ,but ,hosea felt his own heart hanging at the end of the line2 and this was a heart that could never be still4 ,amos is the prophet of law2 he sees the ,divine processes work themselves out1 irrespective of the moods and intrigues of the people1 with which1 after all1 he was little familiar4 ,so each of his paragraphs moves steadily forward to a climax1 and every climax is ,doom--the captivity of the people to ,assyria4 ,you can divide his book by these things2 it has its periods1 strophes and refrains4 ,it marches like the hosts of the ,lord of hosts4 ,but ,hosea had no such unhampered vision of great laws4 ,he was too familiar with the rapid changes of his fickle people2 and his affection for them was too anxious4 ,his style has all the restlessness and irritableness of hunger about it--the hunger of love4 ,hosea's eyes are never at rest4 ,he seeks1 he welcomes1 for moments of extraordinary fondness he dwells upon every sign of his people's repentance4 ,but a ,divine jealousy succeeds1 and he questions the motives of the change4 ,you feel that his love has been overtaken and surprised by his knowledge2 and in fact his whole style might be described as a race between the two--a race varying and uncertain up to almost the end4 ,the transitions are very swift4 ,you come upon a passage of exquisite tenderness3 the prophet puts the people's penitence in his own words with a sympathy and poetry that are sublime and seem final4 ,but suddenly he remembers how false they are1 and there is another light in his eyes4 ,the lustre of their tears dies from his verses1 like the dews of a midsummer morning in ,ephraim2 and all is dry and hard again beneath the brazen sun of his amazement4 ,what shall ,i do unto thee1 ,ephraim8 ,what shall ,i do unto thee1 ,judah8 ,indeed1 this figure of his own is insufficient to express the suddenness with which ,hosea lights up some intrigue of the statesmen of the day1 or some evil habit of the priests1 or some hidden orgy of the common people4 ,rather than the sun it is the lightning--the lightning in pursuit of a serpent4 ,the elusiveness of the style is the greater that many passages do not seem to have been prepared for public delivery4 ,they are more the play of the prophet's mind than his set speech4 ,they are not formally addressed to an audience1 and there is no trace in them of oratorical art4 ,hence the language of this ,second ,section of the ,book of ,hosea is impulsive and abrupt beyond all comparison4 ,there is little rhythm in it1 and almost no argument4 ,few metaphors are elaborated4 ,even the brief parallelism of ,hebrew poetry seems too long for the quick spasms of the writer's heart4 ,osee1 said ,jerome1#dbe commaticus est1 et quasi per sententias loquitur4 ,he speaks in little clauses1 often broken off2 he is impatient even of copulas4 ,and withal he uses a vocabulary full of strange words1 which the paucity of parallelism makes much the more difficult4 ,to this original brokenness and obscurity of the language are due1 first1 the great corruption of the text2 second1 the difficulty of dividing it2 third1 the uncertainty of deciding its genuineness or authenticity4 #a4 ,the ,,text of ,hosea is one of the most dilapidated in the ,old ,testament1 and in parts beyond possibility of repair4 ,it is probable that glosses were found necessary at an earlier period and to a larger extent than in most other books3 there are evident traces of some2 yet it is not always possible to disentangle them4#dbf ,the value of the ,greek version is curiously mixed4 ,the authors had before them much the same difficulties as we have1 and they made many more for themselves4 ,some of their mistranslations are outrageous3 they occur not only in obscure passages1 where they may be pardoned2#dbg but even where there are parallel terms with which the translators show themselves familiar4#dbh ,sometimes they have translated word by word1 without any attempt to give the general sense2 and as a whole their version is devoid both of beauty and compactness4 ,yet not infrequently they supply us with a better reading than the ,massoretic text4 ,occasionally they divide words properly which the latter misdivides4#dbi ,they often give more correctly the easily confused pronominal suffixes2#dcj and the copula4#dca ,and they help us to the true readings of many other words4#dcb ,here and there an additional clause in the ,greek is plethoric1 perhaps copied by mistake from a similar verse in the context4#dcc ,all of these will be noticed separately as we reach them4 ,but1 even after these and other aids1 we shall find that the text not infrequently remains impracticable4 #b4 ,as great as the difficulty of reaching a true text in this ,second ,section of the book is the difficulty of ,,dividing it4 ,here and there1 it is true1 the ,greek helps us to improve upon the division into chapters and verses of the ,hebrew text1 which is that of our own ,english version4 ,chap4 vi4 #a-d ought to follow immediately on to the end of chap4 v41 with the connecting word saying4 ,the last few words of chap4 vi4 go with the first two of chap4 vii41 but perhaps both are gloss4 ,the openings of chaps4 xi4 and xii4 are better arranged in the ,hebrew than in the ,greek4 ,as regards verses we shall have to make several rearrangements4#dcd ,but beyond this more or less conventional division into chapters and verses our confidence ceases4 ,it is impossible to separate the section1 long as it is1 into subsections1 or into oracles1 strophes or periods4 ,the reason of this we have already seen1 in the turbulence of the period reflected1 in the divided interests and abrupt and emotional style of the author1 and in the probability that part at least of the book was not prepared for public speaking4 ,the periods and climaxes1 the refrains1 the catchwords by which we are helped to divide even the confused ,second ,section of the ,book of ,amos1 are not found in ,hosea4 ,only twice does the exordium of a spoken address occur3 at the beginning of the section 7chap4 iv4 #a71 and at what is now the opening of the next chapter 7v4 #a74 ,the phrase 'tis the oracle of ,jehovah1 which occurs so periodically in ,amos1 and thrice in the second chapter of ,hosea1 is found only once in chaps4 iv4-xiv4 ,again1 the obvious climaxes or perorations1 of which we found so many in ,amos1 are very few1#dce and even when they occur the next verses start impulsively from them1 without a pause4 ,in spite of these difficulties1 since the section is so long1 attempts at division have been made4 ,ewald distinguished three parts in three different tempers3 ,first1 iv4-vi4 #aa a1 ,god's ,plaint against ,his people2 ,second1 vi4 #aa b-ix4 #i1 ,their ,punishment2 ,third1 ix4 #aj-xiv4 #aj1 ,retrospect of the earlier history--warning and consolation4 ,driver also divides into three subsections1 but differently3 ,first1 iv4-viii41 in which ,israel's ,guilt predominates2 ,second1 ix4-xi4 #aa1 in which the prevailing thought is their ,punishment2 ,third1 xi4 #ab-xiv4 #aj1 in which both lines of thought are continued1 but followed by a glance at the brighter future4#dcf ,what is common to both these arrangements is the recognition of a certain progress from feelings about ,israel's guilt which prevail in the earlier chapters1 to a clear vision of the political destruction awaiting them2 and finally more hope of repentance in the people1 with a vision of the blessed future that must follow upon it4 ,it is1 however1 more accurate to say that the emphasis of ,hosea's prophesying1 instead of changing from the ,guilt to the ,punishment of ,israel1 changes about the middle of chap4 vii4 from their ,moral ,decay to their ,political ,decay1 and that the description of the latter is modified or interrupted by ,two ,visions of better things3 one of ,jehovah's early guidance of the people1 with a great outbreak of ,his ,love upon them1 in chap4 xi42 and one of their future ,return to ,jehovah and restoration in chap4 xiv4 ,it is on these features that the division of the following ,exposition is arranged4 #c4 ,it will be obvious that with a text so corrupt1 with a style so broken and incapable of logical division1 questions of ,,authenticity are raised to a pitch of the greatest difficulty4 ,allusion has been made to the number of glosses which must have been found necessary from even an early period1 and of some of which we can discern the proofs4#dcg ,we will deal with these as they occur4 ,but we may here discuss1 as a whole1 another class of suspected passages--suspected for the same reason that we saw a number in ,amos to be1 because of their reference to ,judah4 ,in the ,book of ,hosea 7chaps4 iv4-xiv47 they are twelve in number4 ,only one of them is favourable 7iv4 #ae73 ,though ,israel play the harlot1 let not ,judah sin4 ,kuenen#dch argues that this is genuine1 on the ground that the peculiar verb to sin or take guilt to oneself is used several other times in the book1#dci and that the wish expressed is in consonance with what he understands to be ,hosea's favourable feeling towards ,judah4 ,yet ,hosea nowhere else makes any distinction between ,ephraim and ,judah in the matter of sin1 but condemns both equally2 and as iv4 #ae f4 are to be suspected on other grounds as well1 ,i cannot hold this reference to ,judah to be beyond doubt4 ,nor is the reference in viii4 #ad genuine3 ,and ,israel forgat her ,maker and built temples1 and ,judah multiplied fenced cities1 but ,i will send fire on his cities and it shall devour her palaces4 ,kuenen#ddj refuses to reject the reference to ,judah1 on the ground that without it the rhythm of the verse is spoiled2 but the fact is the whole verse must go4 ,chap4 v4 #ac forms a climax1 which v4 #ad only weakens2 the style is not like ,hosea's own1 and indeed is but an echo of verses of ,amos4#dda ,nor can we be quite sure about v4 #e3 ,israel and ,ephraim shall stumble by their iniquities1 and 7,,lxx47 stumble also shall ,judah with them2 or vi4 #aj1 #aa3 ,in ,bethel ,i have seen horrors3 there playest thou the harlot1 ,ephraim2 there ,israel defiles himself2 also ,judah 444 7the rest of the text is impracticable74 ,in both these passages ,judah is the awkward third of a parallelism1 and is introduced by an also1 as if an afterthought4 ,yet the afterthought may be the prophet's own2 for in other passages1 to which no doubt attaches1 he fully includes ,judah in the sinfulness of ,israel4 ,cornill rejects x4 #aa1 ,judah must plough1 but ,i cannot see on what grounds2 as ,kuenen says1 it has no appearance of being an intrusion4#ddb ,in xii4 #c ,wellhausen reads ,israel for ,judah1 but the latter is justified if not rendered necessary by the reference to ,judah in ver4 #a1 which ,wellhausen admits4 ,against the other references--v4 #aj1 ,the princes of ,judah are as removers of boundaries2 v4 #ab1 ,i shall be as the moth to ,ephraim1 and a worm to the house of ,judah2 v4 #ac1 ,and ,ephraim saw his disease1 and ,judah his sore2 v4 #ad1 ,for ,i am as a roaring lion to ,ephraim1 and as a young lion to the house of ,judah2 vi4 #d1 ,what shall ,i do to thee1 ,ephraim8 what shall ,i do to thee1 ,judah8--there are no apparent objections2 and they are generally admitted by critics4 ,as ,kuenen says1 it would have been surprising if ,hosea had made no reference to the sister kingdom4 ,his judgment of her is amply justified by that of her own citizens1 ,isaiah and ,micah4 ,other short passages of doubtful authenticity will be treated as we come to them2 but again it may be emphasised that1 in a book of such a style as this1 certainty on the subject is impossible4 ,finally1 there may be given here the only notable addition which the ,septuagint makes to the ,book of ,hosea4 ,it occurs in xiii4 #d1 after ,i am ,jehovah thy ,god3 ,that made fast the heavens and founded the earth1 whose hands founded all the host of the heaven1 and ,i did not show them to thee that thou shouldest follow after them1 and ,i led thee up--from the land of ,egypt4 ,at first this recalls those apostrophes to ,jehovah's power which break forth in the ,book of ,amos2 and the resemblance has been taken to prove that they also are late intrusions4 ,but this both obtrudes itself as they do not1 and is manifestly of much lower poetical value4 ,see page #bjc4 99 99 99 99 99 ,we have now our material clearly before us1 and may proceed to the more welcome task of tracing our prophet's life1 and expounding his teaching4 ,,footnotes3 #cid ,see below1 pp4 #bac f4 #cie ,geschichte1 pp4 #ic ff41 #bad ff41 #dci f4 #cif ,a list of the more obvious is given by ,kuenen1 p4 #cbd4 #cig ,the first chapter in the ,hebrew closes with ver4 #i4 #cih ,cf4 this with ,amos2 above1 pp4 #aib ff4 #cii ,knig's arguments 7,einleitung1 #cji7 in favour of the possibility of the genuineness of the verse do not seem to me to be conclusive4 ,he thinks the verse admissible because ,judah had sinned less than ,israel2 the threat in vv4 #d-f is limited to ,israel2 the phrase ,jehovah their ,god is so peculiar that it is difficult to assign it to a mere expander of the text2 and if it was a later hand that put in the verse1 why did he not alter the judgments against ,juda1 which occur further on in the book8 #djj ,so ,cheyne and others1 ,kuenen adhering4 ,knig agrees that they have been removed from their proper place and the text corrupted4 #dja ,rom4 ix4 #be1 #bf1 which first give the end of ,hosea ii4 #bc 7,heb4 #be71 and then the end of i4 #aj 7,heb4 ii4 #b74 ,see below1 p4 #bdi1 n4 #b4 #djb #gba ,b4,c4 #djc ,stade1 ,gesch41 ,i4 #egg2 ,cornill1 ,einleitung1 who also would exclude no king and no prince in iii4 #d4 #djd ,this objection1 however1 does not hold against the removal of merely and ,david1 leaving their king4 #dje ii4 #g1 #aa1 #ad1 #ag 7,heb474 ,in i4 #d ,b-text reads for while ,qmq have 4 #djf ,in determining the date of the ,book of ,hosea the title in chap4 i4 is of no use to us3 ,the ,word of ,jehovah which was to ,hosea ben ,be'eri in the days of ,uzziah1 ,jotham1 ,ahaz1 ,hezekiah1 kings of ,judah1 and in the days of ,jeroboam ben ,joash1 king of ,israel4 ,this title is trebly suspicious4 ,first3 the given reigns of ,judah and ,israel do not correspond2 ,jeroboam was dead before ,uzziah4 ,second3 there is no proof either in the ,first or ,second ,section of the book that ,hosea prophesied after the reign of ,jotham4 ,third3 it is curious that in the case of a prophet of ,northern ,israel kings of ,judah should be stated first1 and four of them be given while only one king of his own country is placed beside them4 ,on these grounds critics are probably correct who take the title as it stands to be the work of some later ,judan scribe who sought to make it correspond to the titles of the ,books of ,isaiah and ,micah4 ,he may have been the same who added chap4 i4 #g4 ,the original form of the title probably was ,the ,word of ,god which was to ,hosea son of ,be'eri in the days of ,jeroboam ben ,joash1 king of ,israel1 and designed only for the ,first ,section of the book1 chaps1 i4-iii4 #djg vii4 #g4 ,there are also other passages which1 while they may be referred1 as they stand1 to the whole succession of illegitimate dynasties in ,northern ,israel from the beginning to the end of that kingdom1 more probably reflect the same ten years of special anarchy and disorder after the death of ,jeroboam ,,ii4 ,see vii4 #c ff42 viii4 #d1 where the illegitimate kingmaking is coupled with the idolatry of the ,northern ,kingdom2 xiii4 #aj1 #aa4 #djh x4 #c1 #g1 #h1 #ae4 #dji ix4 #ae4 #daj vi4 #h1 #i4 #daa vii4 #a4 #dab vii4 #aa4 #dac x4 #f4 #dad xiii4 #ab f4 #dae ,the chronology of these years is exceedingly uncertain4 ,jeroboam was dead about #gdc2 in #gch ,menahem gave tribute to ,assyria2 in #gcd ,tiglath-,pileser had conquered ,aram1 ,gilead and ,galilee in response to ,king ,ahaz1 who had a year or two before been attacked by ,rezin of ,aram and ,pekah of ,israel4 #daf #b ,kings xv4 #h-af4 ,it may be to this appearance of three kings within one month that there was originally an allusion in the now obscure verse of ,hosea1 v4 #g4 #dag #b ,kings xv4 #ag-bb4 #dah ,or prince1 3 cf4 ,hosea's denunciation of the as rebels4 #dai ,isa4 vii42 #b ,kings xv4 #cg1 #ch4 #dbj ,some have found a later allusion in chap4 x4 #ad3 like unto the destruction of 787 ,shalman 7of 87 ,beth' ,arbe'l4 ,pusey1 p4 #e b1 and others take this to allude to a destruction of the ,galilean ,arbela1 the modern ,irbid1 by ,salmanassar ,,iv41 who ascended the ,assyrian throne in #gbg and besieged ,samaria in #gbd ff4 ,but since the construction of the phrase leaves it doubtful whether the name ,shalman is that or the agent or object of the destruction1 and whether1 if the agent1 he be one of the ,assyrian ,salmanassars or a ,moabite ,king ,salman c4 #gcj ,b4,c41 it is impossible to make use of the verse in fixing the date of the ,book of ,hosea4 ,see further1 p4 #bhi4 ,wellhausen omits4 #dba v4 #a2 vi4 #h2 xii4 #ab3 cf4 ,w4 ,r4 ,smith1 ,prophets1 #aef4 #dbb ,cf4 ,w4 ,r4 ,smith1 l4c4 #dbc ,cf4 ,w4 ,r4 ,smith1 ,prophets1 #aeg3 ,hosea's language and the movement of his thoughts are far removed from the simplicity and self-control which characterise the prophecy of ,amos4 ,indignation and sorrow1 tenderness and severity1 faith in the sovereignty of ,jehovah's love1 and a despairing sense of ,israel's infidelity are woven together in a sequence which has no logical plan1 but is determined by the battle and alternate victory of contending emotions2 and the swift transitions1 the fragmentary unbalanced utterance1 the half-developed allusions1 that make his prophecy so difficult to the commentator1 express the agony of this inward conflict4 #dbd ,see above1 p4 #aad4 #dbe ,prf4 in ,duod4 ,prophetas4 #dbf ,especially in chap4 vii4 #dbg ,as in xi4 #b b4 #dbh ,this is especially the case in x4 #aa-ac2 xi4 #d2 xiv4 #e4 #dbi ,e4g4 vi4 #e b3 ,m4,t4 which is nonsense2 ,,lxx4 1 ,my judgment shall go forth like light4 xi4 #b3 ,m4,t4 2 ,,lxx4 4 #dcj iv4 #d1 for 2 #h1 for --perhaps2 #ac1 for 2 v4 #b2 vi4 #b 7possibly72 viii4 #d1 read 2 ix4 #b2 xi4 #b1 #c2 xi4 #e1 #f1 where for read 2 #aj1 read 2 xii4 #i2 xiv4 #i a1 for 4 ,on the other hand1 they are either improbable or quite wrong1 as in v4 #b b2 vi4 #b 7but the ,,lxx4 may be right here72 vii #a b2 xi4 #a1 #d2 xii4 #e2 xiii4 #ad1 #ae 7ter474 #dca v4 #e 7so as to change the tense3 and ,judah shall stumble72 xii4 #c1 etc4 #dcb vi4 #c2 viii4 #aj1 #ac2 ix4 #b2 x4 #d1 #ac b1 #ae 7probably72 xii4 #b2 xiii4 #i2 xiv4 #c4 ,wrong tense1 xii4 #aa4 ,cf4 also vi4 #c4 #dcc ,e4g4 viii4 #ac4 #dcd ,cf4 the ,hebrew and ,greek1 of e4g41 iv4 #aj1 #aa1 #ab2 vi4 #i1 #aj2 viii4 #e1 #f2 ix4 #h1 #i4 #dce viii4 #ac 7#ad must be omitted72 ix4 #ag4 #dcf ,introd4 #bhd4 #dcg ,e4g4 iv4 #ae 7872 vi4 #aa-vii4 #a 7872 vii4 #d2 viii4 #b2 xii4 #f4 #dch ,einl41 #cbc4 #dci 1 v4 #ae2 x4 #b2 xiii4 #a2 xiv4 #a4 #ddj ,p4 #cac4 #dda viii4 #ad is also rejected by ,wellhausen and ,cornill4 #ddb ,loc4 cit4 ,,chapter ,,xiii ,,the ,,problem ,,that ,,amos ,,left ,amos was a preacher of righteousness almost wholly in its judicial and punitive offices4 ,exposing the moral conditions of society in his day1 emphasising on the one hand its obduracy and on the other the intolerableness of it1 he asserted that nothing could avert the inevitable doom--neither ,israel's devotion to ,jehovah nor ,jehovah's interest in ,israel4 ,you alone have ,i known of all the families of the ground3 therefore will ,i visit upon you all your iniquities4 ,the visitation was to take place in war and in the captivity of the people4 ,this is practically the whole message of the prophet ,amos4 ,that he added to it the promise of restoration which now closes his book1 we have seen to be extremely improbable4#ddc ,yet even if that promise is his own1 ,amos does not tell us how the restoration is to be brought about4 ,with wonderful insight and patience he has traced the captivity of ,israel to moral causes4 ,but he does not show what moral change in the exiles is to justify their restoration1 or by what means such a moral change is to be effected4 ,we are left to infer the conditions and the means of redemption from the principles which ,amos enforced while there yet seemed time to pray for the doomed people3 ,seek the ,lord and ye shall live4#ddd ,according to this1 the moral renewal of ,israel must precede their restoration2 but the prophet seems to make no great effort to effect the renewal4 ,in short ,amos illustrates the easily-forgotten truth that a preacher to the conscience is not necessarily a preacher of repentance4 ,of the great antitheses between which religion moves1 ,law and ,love1 ,amos had therefore been the prophet of ,law4 ,but we must not imagine that the association of ,love with the ,deity was strange to him4 ,this could not be to any ,israelite who remembered the past of his people--the romance of their origins and early struggles for freedom4 ,israel had always felt the grace of their ,god2 and1 unless we be wrong about the date of the great poem in the end of ,deuteronomy1 they had lately celebrated that grace in lines of exquisite beauty and tenderness3-- ,he found him in a desert land1 ,in a waste and a howling wilderness4 ,he compassed him about1 cared for him1 ,kept him as the apple of ,his eye4 ,as an eagle stirreth up his nest1 ,fluttereth over his young1 ,spreadeth his wings1 taketh them1 ,beareth them up on his pinions-- ,so ,jehovah alone led him4#dde ,the patience of the ,lord with their waywardness and their stubbornness had been the ethical influence on ,israel's life at a time when they had probably neither code of law nor system of doctrine4 ,thy gentleness1 as an early ,psalmist says for his people1 ,thy gentleness hath made me great4#ddf ,amos is not unaware of this ancient grace of ,jehovah4 ,but he speaks of it in a fashion which shows that he feels it to be exhausted and without hope for his generation4 ,i brought you up out of the land of ,egypt1 and led you forty years in the wilderness1 to possess the land of the ,amorites4 ,and ,i raised up of your sons for prophets and of your young men for ,nazirites4#ddg ,but this can now only fill the cup of the nation's sin4 ,you alone have ,i known of all the families of the earth3 therefore will ,i visit upon you all your iniquities4#ddh ,jehovah's ancient ,love but strengthens now the justice and the impetus of ,his ,law4 ,we perceive1 then1 the problem which ,amos left to prophecy4 ,it was not to discover ,love in the ,deity whom he had so absolutely identified with ,law4 ,the ,love of ,god needed no discovery among a people with the ,deliverance1 the ,exodus1 the ,wilderness and the ,gift of the ,land in their memories4 ,but the problem was to prove in ,god so great and new a mercy as was capable of matching that ,law1 which the abuse of ,his millennial gentleness now only the more fully justified4 ,there was needed a prophet to arise with as keen a conscience of ,law as ,amos himself1 and yet affirm that ,love was greater still2 to admit that ,israel were doomed1 and yet promise their redemption by processes as reasonable and as ethical as those by which the doom had been rendered inevitable4 ,the prophet of ,conscience had to be followed by the prophet of ,repentance4 ,such an one was found in ,hosea1 the son of ,be'eri1 a citizen and probably a priest of ,northern ,israel1 whose very name1 ,salvation1 the synonym of ,joshua and of ,jesus1 breathed the larger hope1 which it was his glory to bear to his people4 ,before we see how for this task ,hosea was equipped with the love and sympathy which ,amos lacked1 let us do two things4 ,let us appreciate the magnitude of the task itself1 set to him first of prophets2 and let us remind ourselves that1 greatly as he achieved it1 the task was not one which could be achieved even by him once for all1 but that it presents itself to religion again and again in the course of her development4 ,for the first of these duties1 it is enough to recall how much all subsequent prophecy derives from ,hosea4 ,we shall not exaggerate if we say that there is no truth uttered by later prophets about the ,divine ,grace1 which we do not find in germ in him4 ,isaiah of ,jerusalem was a greater statesman and a more powerful writer1 but he had not ,hosea's tenderness and insight into motive and character4 ,hosea's marvellous sympathy both with the people and with ,god is sufficient to foreshadow every grief1 every hope1 every gospel1 which make the books of ,jeremiah and the great ,prophet of the ,exile exhaustless in their spiritual value for mankind4 ,those others explored the kingdom of ,god3 it was ,hosea who took it by storm4#ddi ,he is the first prophet of ,grace1 ,israel's earliest ,evangelist2 yet with as keen a sense of law1 and of the inevitableness of ethical discipline1 as ,amos himself4 ,but the task which ,hosea accomplished was not one that could be accomplished once for all4 ,the interest of his book is not merely historical4 ,for so often as a generation is shocked out of its old religious ideals1 as ,amos shocked ,israel1 by a realism and a discovery of law1 which have no respect for ideals1 however ancient and however dear to the human heart1 but work their own pitiless way to doom inevitable2 so often must the ,book of ,hosea have a practical value for living men4 ,at such a crisis we stand to-day4 ,the older ,evangelical assurance1 the older ,evangelical ideals have to some extent been rendered impossible by the realism to which the sciences1 both physical and historical1 have most healthily recalled us1 and by their wonderful revelation of ,law working through nature and society without respect to our creeds and pious hopes4 ,the question presses3 ,is it still possible to believe in repentance and conversion1 still possible to preach the power of ,god to save1 whether the individual or society1 from the forces of heredity and of habit8 ,we can at least learn how ,hosea mastered the very similar problem which ,amos left to him1 and how1 with a moral realism no less stern than his predecessor and a moral standard every whit as high1 he proclaimed ,love to be the ultimate element in religion2 not only because it moves man to a repentance and ,god to a redemption more sovereign than any law2 but because if neglected or abused1 whether as love of man or love of ,god1 it enforces a doom still more inexorable than that required by violated truth or by outraged justice4 ,love our ,saviour1 ,love our almighty and unfailing ,father1 but1 just because of this1 ,love our most awful ,judge--we turn to the life and the message in which this eternal theme was first unfolded4 ,,footnotes3 #ddc ,see above1 pp4 #aic ff4 #ddd v4 #d4 #dde ,deut4 xxxii4 #aj-ab3 a song probably earlier than the eighth century4 ,but some put it later4 #ddf ,psalm xviii4 #ddg ii4 #aj f4 #ddh iii4 #b4 #ddi ,matt4 xi4 #ab4 ,,chapter ,,xiv ,,the ,,story ,,of ,,the ,,prodigal ,,wife ,,hosea i4-iii4 ,it has often been remarked that1 unlike the first ,doomster of ,israel1 ,israel's first ,evangelist was one of themselves1 a native and citizen1 perhaps even a priest1 of the land to which he was sent4 ,this appears even in his treatment of the stage and soil of his ministry4 ,contrast him in this respect with ,amos4 ,in the ,book of ,amos we have few glimpses of the scenery of ,israel1 and these always by flashes of the lightnings of judgment3 the towns in drought or earthquake or siege2 the vineyards and orchards under locusts or mildew2 ,carmel itself desolate1 or as a hiding-place from ,god's wrath4 ,but ,hosea's love steals across his whole land like the dew1 provoking every separate scent and colour1 till all ,galilee lies before us1 lustrous and fragrant as nowhere else outside the parables of ,jesus4 ,the ,book of ,amos1 when it would praise ,god's works1 looks to the stars4 ,but the poetry of ,hosea clings about his native soil like its trailing vines4 ,if he appeals to the heavens1 it is only that they may speak to the earth1 and the earth to the corn and the wine1 and the corn and the wine to ,jezreel4#dej ,even the wild beasts--and ,hosea tells us of their cruelty almost as much as ,amos--he cannot shut out of the hope of his love3 ,i will make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field1 and with the fowls of heaven1 and with the creeping things of the ground4#dea ,god's love-gifts to ,his people are corn and wool1 flax and oil2 while spiritual blessings are figured in the joys of them who sow and reap4 ,with ,hosea we feel all the seasons of the ,syrian year3 early rain and latter rain1 the first flush of the young corn1 the scent of the vine blossom1 the first ripe fig of the fig-tree in her first season1 the bursting of the lily2 the wild vine trailing on the hedge1 the field of tares1 the beauty of the full olive in sunshine and breeze2 the mists and heavy dews of a summer morning in ,ephraim1 the night winds laden with the air of the mountains1 the scent of ,lebanon4#deb ,or it is the dearer human sights in valley and field3 the smoke from the chimney1 the chaff from the threshing-floor1 the doves startled to their towers1 the fowler and his net2 the breaking up of the fallow ground1 the harrowing of the clods1 the reapers1 the heifer that treadeth out the corn2 the team of draught oxen surmounting the steep road1 and at the top the kindly driver setting in food to their jaws4#dec ,where1 ,i say1 do we find anything like this save in the parables of ,jesus8 ,for the love of ,hosea was as the love of that greater ,galilean3 however high1 however lonely it soared1 it was yet rooted in the common life below1 and fed with the unfailing grace of a thousand homely sources4 ,but just as the ,love which first showed itself in the sunny ,parables of ,galilee passed onward to ,gethsemane and the ,cross1 so the love of ,hosea1 that had wakened with the spring lilies and dewy summer mornings of the ,north1 had also1 ere his youth was spent1 to meet its agony and shame4 ,these came upon the prophet in his home1 and in her in whom so loyal and tender a heart had hoped to find his chiefest sanctuary next to ,god4 ,there are1 it is true1 some of the ugliest facts of human life about this prophet's experience2 but the message is one very suited to our own hearts and times4 ,let us read this story of the ,prodigal ,wife as we do that other ,galilean tale of the ,prodigal ,son4 ,there as well as here are harlots2 but here as well as there is the clear mirror of the ,divine ,love4 ,for the ,bible never shuns realism when it would expose the exceeding hatefulness of sin or magnify the power of ,god's love to redeem4 ,to an age which is always treating conjugal infidelity either as a matter of comedy or as a problem of despair1 the tale of ,hosea and his wife may still become1 what it proved to his own generation1 a gospel full of love and hope4 ,the story1 and how it led ,hosea to understand ,god's relations to sinful men1 is told in the first three chapters of his book4 ,it opens with the very startling sentence3 ,the beginning of the word of ,jehovah to ,hosea3--,and ,jehovah said to ,hosea1 ,go1 take thee a wife of harlotry and children of harlotry3 for the ,land hath committed great harlotry in departing from ,jehovah4#ded ,the command was obeyed4 ,and he went and took ,gomer1 daughter of ,diblaim2#dee and she conceived1 and bare to him a son4 ,and ,jehovah said unto him1 ,call his name ,jezreel2 for yet a little and ,i shall visit the blood of ,jezreel upon the house of ,jehu1 and will bring to an end the kingdom of the house of ,israel2 and it shall be on that day that ,i shall break the bow of ,israel in the ,vale of ,jezreel--the classic battle-field of ,israel4#def ,and she conceived again1 and bare a daughter2 and ,he said to him1 ,call her name ,un-,loved1 or ,that-never-knew-a-,father's-,pity2#deg for ,i will not again have pity--such pity as a ,father hath--on the house of ,israel1 that ,i should fully forgive them4#deh ,and she weaned ,un-,pitied1 and conceived1 and bare a son4 ,and ,he said1 ,call his name ,not-,my-,people2 for ye are not ,my people1 and ,i--,i am not yours4#dei ,it is not surprising that divers interpretations have been put upon this troubled tale4 ,the words which introduce it are so startling that very many have held it to be an allegory1 or parable1 invented by the prophet to illustrate1 by familiar human figures1 what was at that period the still difficult conception of the ,love of ,god for sinful men4 ,but to this well-intended argument there are insuperable objections4 ,it implies that ,hosea had first awakened to the relations of ,jehovah and ,israel--,he faithful and full of affection1 she unfaithful and thankless--and that then1 in order to illustrate the relations1 he had invented the story4 ,to that we have an adequate reply4 ,in the first place1 though it were possible1 it is extremely improbable1 that such a man should have invented such a tale about his wife1 or1 if he was unmarried1 about himself4 ,but1 in the second place1 he says expressly that his domestic experience was the beginning of ,jehovah's word to him4 ,that is1 he passed through it first1 and only afterwards1 with the sympathy and insight thus acquired1 he came to appreciate ,jehovah's relation to ,israel4 ,finally1 the style betrays narrative rather than parable4 ,the simple facts are told2 there is an absence of elaboration2 there is no effort to make every detail symbolic2 the names ,gomer and ,diblaim are apparently those of real persons2 every attempt to attach a symbolic value to them has failed4 ,she was1 therefore1 no dream1 this woman1 but flesh and blood3 the sorrow1 the despair1 the sphinx of the prophet's life2 yet a sphinx who in the end yielded her riddle to love4 ,accordingly a large number of other interpreters have taken the story throughout as the literal account of actual facts4 ,this is the theory of many of the ,latin and ,greek ,fathers1#dfj of many of the ,puritans and of ,dr4 ,pusey--by one of those agreements into which1 from such opposite schools1 all these commentators are not infrequently drawn by their common captivity to the letter of ,scripture4#dfa ,when you ask them1 ,how then do you justify that first strange word of ,god to ,hosea1#dfb if you take it literally and believe that ,hosea was charged to marry a woman of public shame8 they answer either that such an evil may be justified by the bare word of ,god1 or that it was well worth the end1 the salvation of a lost soul4#dfc ,and indeed this tragedy would be invested with an even greater pathos if it were true that the human hero had passed through a self-sacrifice so unusual1 had incurred such a shame for such an end4 ,the interpretation1 however1 seems forbidden by the essence of the story4 ,had not ,hosea's wife been pure when he married her she could not have served as a type of the ,israel whose earliest relations to ,jehovah he describes as innocent4 ,and this is confirmed by other features of the book3 by the high ideal which ,hosea has of marriage1 and by that sense of early goodness and early beauty passing away like morning mist1 which is so often and so pathetically expressed that we cannot but catch in it the echo of his own experience4 ,as one has said to whom we owe1 more than to any other1 the exposition of the gospel in ,hosea1#dfd ,the struggle of ,hosea's shame and grief when he found his wife unfaithful is altogether inconceivable unless his first love had been pure and full of trust in the purity of its object4 ,how then are we to reconcile with this the statement of that command to take a wife of the character so frankly described8 ,in this way--and we owe the interpretation to the same lamented scholar4#dfe ,when1 some years after his marriage1 ,hosea at last began to be aware of the character of her whom he had taken to his home1 and while he still brooded upon it1 ,god revealed to him why ,he who knoweth all things from the beginning had suffered ,his servant to marry such a woman2 and ,hosea1 by a very natural anticipation1 in which he is imitated by other prophets1#dff pushed back his own knowledge of ,god's purpose to the date when that purpose began actually to be fulfilled1 the day of his betrothal4 ,this1 though he was all unconscious of its fatal future1 had been to ,hosea the beginning of the word of the ,lord4 ,on that uncertain voyage he had sailed with sealed orders4 ,now this is true to nature1 and may be matched from our own experience4 ,the beginning of ,god's word to any of us--where does it lie8 ,does it lie in the first time the meaning of our life became articulate1 and we were able to utter it to others8 ,ah no2 it always lies far behind that1 in facts and in relationships1 of the ,divine meaning of which we are at the time unconscious1 though now we know4 ,how familiar this is in respect to the sorrows and adversities of life3 dumb1 deadening things that fall on us at the time with no more voice than clods falling on coffins of dead men1 we have been able to read them afterwards as the clear call of ,god to our souls4 ,but what we thus so readily admit about the sorrows of life may be equally true of any of those relations which we enter with light and unawed hearts1 conscious only of the novelty and the joy of them4 ,it is most true of the love which meets a man as it met ,hosea in his opening manhood4 ,how long ,hosea took to discover his shame he indicates by a few hints which he suffers to break from the delicate reserve of his story4 ,he calls the first child his own2 and the boy's name1 though ominous of the nation's fate1 has no trace of shame upon it4 ,hosea's ,jezreel was as ,isaiah's ,shear-,jashub or ,maher-shalal-hash-baz4 ,but ,hosea does not claim the second child2 and in the name of this little lass1 ,lo-,ruhamah1 she-that-never-knew-a-father's-love1 orphan not by death but by her mother's sin1 we find proof of the prophet's awakening to the tragedy of his home4 ,nor does he own the third child1 named ,not-my-people1 that could also mean ,no-kin-of-mine4 ,the three births must have taken at least six years2#dfg and once at least1 but probably oftener1 ,hosea had forgiven the woman1 and till the sixth year she stayed in his house4 ,then either he put her from him1 or she went her own way4 ,she sold herself for money1 and finally drifted1 like all of her class1 into slavery4#dfh ,such were the facts of ,hosea's grief1 and we have now to attempt to understand how that grief became his gospel4 ,we may regard the stages of the process as two3 first1 when he was led to feel that his sorrow was the sorrow of the whole nation2 and1 second1 when he comprehended that it was of similar kind to the sorrow of ,god ,himself4 ,while ,hosea brooded upon his pain one of the first things he would remember would be the fact1 which he so frequently illustrates1 that the case of his home was not singular1 but common and characteristic of his day4 ,take the evidence of his book1 and there must have been in ,israel many such wives as his own4 ,he describes their sin as the besetting sin of the nation1 and the plague of ,israel's life4 ,but to lose your own sorrow in the vaster sense of national trouble--that is the first consciousness of a duty and a mission4 ,in the analogous vice of intemperance among ourselves we have seen the same experience operate again and again4 ,how many a man has joined the public warfare against that sin1 because he was aroused to its national consequences by the ruin it had brought to his own home6 ,and one remembers from recent years a more illustrious instance1 where a domestic grief--it is true of a very different kind--became not dissimilarly the opening of a great career of service to the people3-- ,i was in ,leamington1 and ,mr4 ,cobden called on me4 ,i was then in the depths of grief--,i may almost say of despair1 for the light and sunshine of my house had been extinguished4 ,all that was left on earth of my young wife1 except the memory of a sainted life and a too brief happiness1 was lying still and cold in the chamber above us4 ,mr4 ,cobden called on me as his friend1 and addressed me1 as you may suppose1 with words of condolence4 ,after a time he looked up and said3 ',there are thousands and thousands of homes in ,england at this moment where wives and mothers and children are dying of hunger4 ,now1 when the first paroxysm of your grief is passed1 ,i would advise you to come with me1 and we will never rest until the ,corn ,laws are repealed4'#dfi ,not dissimilarly was ,hosea's pain overwhelmed by the pain of his people4 ,he remembered that there were in ,israel thousands of homes like his own4 ,anguish gave way to sympathy4 ,the mystery became the stimulus to a mission4 ,but1 again1 ,hosea traces this sin of his day to the worship of strange gods4 ,he tells the fathers of ,israel1 for instance1 that they need not be surprised at the corruption of their wives and daughters when they themselves bring home from the heathen rites the infection of light views of love4#dgj ,that is to say1 the many sins against human love in ,israel1 the wrong done to his own heart in his own home1 ,hosea connects with the wrong done to the ,love of ,god1 by ,his people's desertion of ,him for foreign and impure rites4 ,hosea's own sorrow thus became a key to the sorrow of ,god4 ,had he loved this woman1 cherished and honoured her1 borne with and forgiven her1 only to find at the last his love spurned and hers turned to sinful men3 so also had the ,love of ,god been treated by ,his chosen people1 and they had fallen to the loose worship of idols4 ,hosea was the more naturally led to compare his relations to his wife with ,jehovah's to ,israel1 by certain religious beliefs current among the ,semitic peoples4 ,it was common to nearly all ,semitic religions to express the union of a god with his land or with his people by the figure of marriage4 ,the title which ,hosea so often applies to the heathen deities1 ,ba'al1 meant originally not lord of his worshippers1 but possessor and endower of his land1 its husband and fertiliser4 ,a fertile land was a land of ,ba'al1 or ,be'ulah1 that is1 possessed or blessed by a ,ba'al4#dga ,under the fertility was counted not only the increase of field and flock1 but the human increase as well2 and thus a nation could speak of themselves as the children of the ,land1 their mother1 and of her ,ba'al1 their father4#dgb ,when ,hosea1 then1 called ,jehovah the husband of ,israel1 it was not an entirely new symbol which he invented4 ,up to his time1 however1 the marriage of ,heaven and ,earth1 of a god and his people1 seems to have been conceived in a physical form which ever tended to become more gross2 and was expressed1 as ,hosea points out1 by rites of a sensual and debasing nature1 with the most disastrous effects on the domestic morals of the people4 ,by an inspiration1 whose ethical character is very conspicuous1 ,hosea breaks the physical connection altogether4 ,jehovah's ,bride is not the ,land1 but the ,people1 and ,his marriage with her is conceived wholly as a moral relation4 ,not that ,he has no connection with the physical fruits of the land3 corn1 wine1 oil1 wool and flax4 ,but these are represented only as the signs and ornaments of the marriage1 love-gifts from the husband to the wife4#dgc ,the marriage itself is purely moral3 ,i will betroth her to ,me in righteousness and justice1 in leal love and tender mercies4#dgd ,from her in return are demanded faithfulness and growing knowledge of her ,lord4 ,it is the re-creation of an ,idea4 ,slain and made carrion by the heathen religions1 the figure is restored to life by ,hosea4 ,and this is a life everlasting4 ,prophet and apostle1 the ,israel of ,jehovah1 the ,church of ,christ1 have alike found in ,hosea's figure an unfailing significance and charm4 ,here we cannot trace the history of the figure2 but at least we ought to emphasise the creative power which its recovery to life proves to have been inherent in prophecy4 ,this is one of those triumphs of which the ,god of ,israel said3 ,behold1 ,i make all things new4#dge ,having dug his figure from the mire and set it upon the rock1 ,hosea sends it on its way with all boldness4 ,if ,jehovah be thus the husband of ,israel1 her first husband1 the husband of her youth1 then all her pursuit of the ,ba'alim is unfaithfulness to her marriage vows4 ,but she is worse than an adulteress2 she is a harlot4 ,she has fallen for gifts4 ,here the historical facts wonderfully assisted the prophet's metaphor4 ,it was a fact that ,israel and ,jehovah were first wedded in the wilderness upon conditions1 which by the very circumstances of desert life could have little or no reference to the fertility of the earth1 but were purely personal and moral4 ,and it was also a fact that ,israel's declension from ,jehovah came after her settlement in ,canaan1 and was due to her discovery of other deities1 in possession of the soil1 and adored by the natives as the dispensers of its fertility4 ,israel fell under these superstitions1 and1 although she still formally acknowledged her bond to ,jehovah1 yet in order to get her fields blessed and her flocks made fertile1 her orchards protected from blight and her fleeces from scab1 she went after the local ,ba'alim4#dgf ,with bitter scorn ,hosea points out that there was no true love in this3 it was the mercenariness of a harlot1 selling herself for gifts4#dgg ,and it had the usual results4 ,the children whom ,israel bore were not her husband's4#dgh ,the new generation in ,israel grew up in ignorance of ,jehovah1 with characters and lives strange to ,his ,spirit4 ,they were ,lo-,ruhamah3 ,he could not feel towards them such pity as a father hath4#dgi ,they were ,lo-,ammi3 not at all ,his people4 ,all was in exact parallel to ,hosea's own experience with his wife2 and only the real pain of that experience could have made the man brave enough to use it as a figure of his ,god's treatment by ,israel4 ,following out the human analogy1 the next step should have been for ,jehovah to divorce ,his erring spouse4 ,but ,jehovah reveals to the prophet that this is not ,his way4 ,for ,he is ,god and not man1 the ,holy ,one in the midst of thee4 ,how shall ,i give thee up1 ,ephraim8 ,how shall ,i surrender thee1 ,o ,israel8 ,my heart is turned within ,me1 ,my compassions are kindled together6 ,jehovah will seek1 find and bring back the wanderer4 ,yet the process shall not be easy4 ,the gospel which ,hosea here preaches is matched in its great tenderness by its full recognition of the ethical requirements of the case4 ,israel may not be restored without repentance1 and cannot repent without disillusion and chastisement4 ,god will therefore show her that her lovers1 the ,ba'alim1 are unable to assure to her the gifts for which she followed them4 ,these are ,his corn1 ,his wine1 ,his wool and ,his flax1 and ,he will take them away for a time4 ,nay more1 as if mere drought and blight might still be regarded as some ,ba'al's work1 ,he who has always manifested ,himself by great historic deeds will do so again4 ,he will remove herself from the land1 and leave it a waste and a desolation4 ,the whole passage runs as follows1 introduced by the initial ,therefore of judgment3-- ,therefore1 behold1 ,i am going to hedge#dhj up her#dha way with thorns1 and build her#dhb a wall1 so that she find not her paths4 ,and she shall pursue her paramours and shall not come upon them1 seek them and shall not find them2 and she shall say1 ,let me go and return to my first husband1 for it was better for me then than now4 ,she knew not1 then1 that it was ,i who gave her the corn and the wine and the oil2 yea1 silver ,i heaped upon her and gold--they worked it up for the ,ba'al6#dhc ,israel had deserted the religion that was historical and moral for the religion that was physical4 ,but the historical religion was the physical one4 ,jehovah who had brought ,israel to the land was also the ,god of the ,land4 ,he would prove this by taking away its blessings4 ,therefore ,i will turn and take away ,my corn in its time and ,my wine in its season1 and ,i will withdraw ,my wool and ,my flax that should have covered her nakedness4 ,and now--the other initial of judgment--,i will lay bare her shame to the eyes of her lovers1 and no man shall rescue her from ,my hand4 ,and ,i will make an end of all her joyaunce1 her pilgrimages1 her ,new-,moons and her ,sabbaths1 with every festival2 and ,i will destroy her vines and her figs of which she said1 ,they are a gift1 mine own1 which my lovers gave me1 and ,i will turn them to jungle and the wild beast shall devour them4 ,so shall ,i visit upon her the days of the ,ba'alim1 when she used to offer incense to them1 and decked herself with her rings and her jewels and went after her paramours1 but ,me she forgat--'tis the oracle of ,jehovah4 ,all this implies something more than such natural disasters as those in which ,amos saw the first chastisements of the ,lord4 ,each of the verses suggests1 not only a devastation of the land by war1#dhd but the removal of the people into captivity4 ,evidently1 therefore1 ,hosea1 writing about #gde1 had in view a speedy invasion by ,assyria1 an invasion which was always followed up by the exile of the people subdued4 ,this is next described1 with all plainness1 under the figure of ,israel's early wanderings in the wilderness1 but is emphasised as happening only for the end of the people's penitence and restoration4 ,the new hope is so melodious that it carries the language into metre4 ,therefore1 lo6 ,i am to woo her1 and ,i will bring her to the wilderness1 ,and ,i will speak home to her heart4 ,and from there ,i will give to her her vineyards1 ,and the ,valley of ,achor for a doorway of hope4 ,and there she shall answer ,me as in the days of her youth1 ,and as the day when she came up from the land of ,miraim4 ,to us the terms of this passage may seem formal and theological4 ,but to every ,israelite some of these terms must have brought back the days of his own wooing4 ,i will speak home to her heart is a forcible expression1 like the ,german an das ,herz or the sweet ,scottish it cam' up roond my heart1 and was used in ,israel as from man to woman when he won her4#dhe ,but the other terms have an equal charm4 ,the prophet1 of course1 does not mean that ,israel shall be literally taken back to the desert4 ,but he describes her coming ,exile under that ancient figure1 in order to surround her penitence with the associations of her innocency and her youth4 ,by the grace of ,god1 everything shall begin again as at first4 ,the old terms wilderness1 the giving of vineyards1 ,valley of ,achor1 are1 as it were1 the wedding ring restored4 ,as a result of all this 7whether the words be by ,hosea or another71#dhf ,it shall be in that day--'tis ,jehovah's oracle--that thou shalt call ,me1 ,my husband1 ,and thou shalt not again call ,me1 ,my ,ba'al3 ,for ,i will take away the names of the ,ba'alim from her mouth1 ,and they shall no more be remembered by their names4 ,there follows a picture of the ideal future1 in which--how unlike the vision that now closes the ,book of ,amos6--moral and spiritual beauty1 the peace of the land and the redemption of the people1 are wonderfully mingled together1 in a style so characteristic of ,hosea's heart4 ,it is hard to tell where the rhythmical prose passes into actual metre4 ,and ,i will make for them a covenant in that day with the wild beasts1 and with the birds of the heavens1 and with the creeping things of the ground2 and the bow and the sword and battle will ,i break from the land1 and ,i will make you to dwell in safety4 ,and ,i will betroth thee to ,me for ever1 and ,i will betroth thee to ,me in righteousness and in justice1 in leal love and in tender mercies2 and ,i will betroth thee to ,me in faithfulness1 and thou shalt know ,jehovah4 ,and it shall be on that day ,i will speak--'tis the oracle of ,jehovah--,i will speak to the heavens1 and they shall speak to the earth2 and the earth shall speak to the corn and the wine and the oil1 and they shall speak to ,jezreel1 the scattered like seed across many lands2 but ,i will sow him#dhg for ,myself in the land3 and ,i will have a father's pity upon ,un-,pitied2 and to ,not-,my-,people ,i will say4 ,my people thou art6 and he shall say1 ,my ,god6#dhh ,the circle is thus completed on the terms from which we started4 ,the three names which ,hosea gave to the children1 evil omens of ,israel's fate1 are reversed1 and the people restored to the favour and love of their ,god4 ,we might expect this glory to form the culmination of the prophecy4 ,what fuller prospect could be imagined than that we see in the close of the second chapter8 ,with a wonderful grace1 however1 the prophecy turns back from this sure vision of the restoration of the people as a whole1 to pick up again the individual from whom it had started1 and whose unclean rag of a life had fluttered out of sight before the national fortunes sweeping in upon the scene4 ,this was needed to crown the story--this return to the individual4 ,and ,jehovah said unto me1 ,once more go1 love a wife that is loved of a paramour and is an adulteress1#dhi as ,jehovah loveth the children of ,israel1 the while they are turning to other gods1 and love raisin-cakes--probably some element in the feasts of the gods of the land1 the givers of the grape4 ,then ,i bought her to me for fifteen pieces of silver and a homer of barley and a lethech of wine4#dij ,and ,i said to her1 ,for many days shall thou abide for me alone2 thou shall not play the harlot1 thou shall not be for any husband2 and ,i for my part also shall be so towards thee4 ,for the days are many that the children of ,israel shall abide without a king and without a prince1 without sacrifice and without maebah1 and without ephod and teraphim4#dia ,afterwards the children of ,israel shall turn and seek ,jehovah their ,god and ,david their king1 and shall be in awe of ,jehovah and towards ,his goodness in the end of the days4#dib ,do not let us miss the fact that the story of the wife's restoration follows that of ,israel's1 although the story of the wife's unfaithfulness had come before that of ,israel's apostasy4 ,for this order means that1 while the prophet's private pain preceded his sympathy with ,god's pain1 it was not he who set ,god1 but ,god who set him1 the example of forgiveness4 ,the man learned the ,god's sorrow out of his own sorrow2 but conversely he was taught to forgive and redeem his wife only by seeing ,god forgive and redeem the people4 ,in other words1 the ,divine was suggested by the human pain2 yet the ,divine ,grace was not started by any previous human grace1 but1 on the contrary1 was itself the precedent and origin of the latter4 ,this is in harmony with all ,hosea's teaching4 ,god forgives because ,he is ,god and not man4#dic ,our pain with those we love helps us to understand ,god's pain2 but it is not our love that leads us to believe in ,his love4 ,on the contrary1 all human grace is but the reflex of the ,divine4 ,so ,st4 ,paul3 ,even as ,christ forgave you1 so also do ye4 ,so ,st4 ,john3 ,we love ,him1 and one another1 because ,he first loved us4 ,but this return from the nation to the individual has another interest4 ,gomer's redemption is not the mere formal completion of the parallel between her and her people4 ,it is1 as the story says1 an impulse of the ,divine ,love1 recognised even then in ,israel as seeking the individual4 ,he who followed ,hagar into the wilderness1 who met ,jacob at ,bethel and forgat not the slave ,joseph in prison1#did remembers also ,hosea's wife4 ,his love is not satisfied with ,his ,nation-,bride3 ,he remembers this single outcast4 ,it is the ,shepherd leaving the ninety-and-nine in the fold to seek the one lost sheep4 99 99 99 99 99 ,for ,hosea himself his home could never be the same as it was at the first4 ,and ,i said to her1 ,for many days shalt thou abide1 as far as ,i am concerned1 alone4 ,thou shalt not play the harlot4 ,thou shalt not be for a husband3 and ,i on my side also shall be so towards thee4 ,discipline was needed there2 and abroad the nation's troubles called the prophet to an anguish and a toil which left no room for the sweet love or hope of his youth4 ,he steps at once to his hard warfare for his people2 and through the rest of his book we never again hear him speak of home1 or of children1 or of wife4 ,so ,arthur passed from ,guinevere to his last battle for his land3-- ,lo6 ,i forgive thee1 as ,eternal ,god ,forgives3 do thou for thine own soul the rest4 ,but how to take last leave of all ,i loved8 99 99 99 99 99 ,i cannot touch thy lips1 they are not mine2444 ,i cannot take thy hand2 that too is flesh1 ,and in the flesh thou hast sinned2 and mine own flesh1 ,here looking down on thine polluted1 cries ',i loathe thee'2 yet not less1 ,o ,guinevere1 ,for ,i was ever virgin save for thee1 ,my love thro' flesh hath wrought into my life ,so far1 that my doom is1 ,i love thee still4 ,let no man dream but that ,i love thee still4 ,perchance1 and so thou purify thy soul1 ,and so thou lean on our fair father ,christ1 ,hereafter in that world where all are pure ,we two may meet before high ,god1 and thou ,wilt spring to me1 and claim me thine1 and know ,i am thine husband1 not a smaller soul4444 ,leave me that1 ,i charge thee1 my last hope4 ,now must ,i hence1 ,thro' the thick night ,i hear the trumpet blow4 ,,footnotes3 #dej ii4 #bc1 ,heb4 #dea ii4 #bj1 ,heb4 #deb vi4 #c1 #d2 vii4 #h2 ix4 #aj2 xiv4 #f1 #g1 #h4 #dec vii4 #aa1 #ab2 x4 #aa2 xi4 #d1 etc4 #ded ,pregnant construction1 hath committed great harlotry from after ,jehovah4 #dee ,these personal names do not elsewhere occur4 2 4 2 ,b2 1 ,,aq4 ,they have1 of course1 been interpreted allegorically in the interests of the theory discussed below4 has been taken to mean completion1 and interpreted as various derivatives of that root3 ,jerome1 the perfect one2 ,raschi1 that fulfilled all evil2 ,kimchi1 fulfilment of punishment2 ,calvin1 consumptio1 and so on4 has been traced to 1 ,pl4 1 cakes of pressed figs1 as if a name had been sought to connect the woman at once with the idol-worship and a rich sweetness2 or to an ,arabic root1 1 to press1 as if it referred either to the plumpness of the body 7cf4 ,ezek4 xvi4 #g2 so ,hitzig7 or to the woman's habits4 ,but all these are far-fetched and vain4 ,there is no reason to suppose that either of the two names is symbolic4 ,the alternative 7allowed by the language7 naturally suggests itself that is the name of ,gomer's birthplace4 ,but there is nothing to prove this4 ,no such place-name occurs elsewhere3 one cannot adduce the ,diblathaim in ,moab 7,num4 xxxiii4 #df ff42 ,jer4 xlviii4 #b74 #def ,hist4 ,geog41 ,chap4 ,,xviii4 #deg 1 probably #crd pers4 sing4 fem4 ,pual 7in ,pause cf4 ,prov4 xxviii4 #ac72 literally1 ,she is not loved or pitied4 ,the word means love as pity3 such pity as a father hath unto his children dear 7,psalm ciii471 or ,god to a penitent man 7,psalm xxviii4 #ac74 ,the ,greek versions alternate between love and pity4 ,,lxx4 1 for which the ,complutensian has 1 the reading followed by ,paul 7,rom4 ix1 #be3 cf4 #a ,peter ii4 #aj74 #deh ,here ver4 #g is to be omitted1 as explained above1 p4 #bac4 #dei ,do not belong to you2 but the ,i am1 1 recalls the ,i am that ,i am of ,exodus4 #dfj ,augustine1 ,ambrose1 ,theodoret1 ,cyril ,alex4 and ,theodore of ,mopsuestia4 #dfa ,it is interesting to read in parallel the interpretations of ,matthew ,henry and ,dr4 ,pusey4 ,they are very alike1 but the latter has the more delicate taste of his age4 #dfb i4 #b4 #dfc ,the former is ,matthew ,henry's2 the latter seems to be implied by ,pusey4 #dfd ,robertson ,smith1 ,prophets of ,israel4 #dfe ,apparently it was ,w4 ,r4 ,smith's interpretation which caused ,kuenen to give up the allegorical theory4 #dff ,two instances are usually quoted4 ,the one is ,isaiah vi41 where most are agreed that what ,isaiah has stated there as his inaugural vision is not only what happened in the earliest moments of his prophetic life1 but this spelt out and emphasised by his experience since4 ,see ,isaiah ,i4-,,xxxix4 7,exp4 ,bible71 pp4 #eg f4 ,the other instance is ,jeremiah xxxii4 #h1 where the prophet tells us that he became convinced that the ,lord spoke to him on a certain occasion only after a subsequent event proved this to be the case4 #dfg ,an ,eastern woman seldom weans her child before the end of its second year4 #dfh iii4 #b4 #dfi ,from a speech by ,john ,bright4 #dgj iv4 #ac1 #ad4 #dga ,cf4 the spiritual use of the term1 ,isa4 lxii4 #d4 #dgb ,for proof and exposition of all this see ,robertson ,smith1 ,religion of the ,semites1 #ib ff4 #dgc ii4 #h4 #dgd ,so best is rendered 1 esedh1 which means always not merely an affection1 lovingkindness1 as our version puts it1 but a relation loyally observed4 #dge ,an expansion of this will be found in the present writer's ,isaiah ,,xl4-,,lxvi4 7,expositor's ,bible ,series71 pp4 #cih ff4 #dgf ii4 #ac4 #dgg ii4 #e1 #ac4 #dgh ii4 #e4 #dgi ,see above1 p4 #bce4 #dhj ,the participle ,qal1 used by ,god of ,himself in ,his proclamations of grace or of punishment1 has in this passage 7cf4 ver4 #af7 and elsewhere 7especially in ,deuteronomy7 the force of an immediate future4 #dha ,so ,,lxx42 ,mass4 ,text1 thy4 #dhb ,the reading is more probable than 4 #dhc ,or they made it into a ,ba'al image4 ,so ,ew41 ,hitz41 ,nowack4 ,but ,wellhausen omits the clause4 #dhd ,wellhausen thinks that up to ver4 #ad only physical calamities are meant1 but the of ver4 #aa1 as well as others of the terms used1 imply not the blighting of crops before their season1 but the carrying of them away in their season1 when they had fully ripened1 by invaders4 ,the cessation of all worship points to the removal of the people from their land1 which is also implied1 of course1 by the promise that they shall be sown again in ver4 #bc4 #dhe ,cf4 ,isa4 xl4 #a3 which to the same exiled ,israel is the fulfilment of the promise made by ,hosea4 ,see ,isaiah ,,xl4-,,lxvi4 7,expositor's ,bible71 pp4 #ge ff4 #dhf ,wellhausen calls ver4 #ah a gloss to ver4 #ai4 #dhg ,massoretic ,text1 her4 #dhh ,it is at this point1 if at any1 that i4 #aj1 #aa1 ii4 #a 7,eng41 but ii4 #a-c ,heb47 ought to come in4 ,it will be observed1 however1 that even here they are superfluous3 ,and the number of the children of ,israel shall be as the sand of the sea1 which cannot be measured nor counted2 and it shall be in the place where it was said to them1 ,no ,people of ,mine are ye6 it shall be said to them1 ,sons of the ,living ,god6 ,and the children of ,judah and the children of ,israel shall be gathered together1 and they shall appoint themselves one head1 and shall go up from the land3 for great is the day of ,jezreel4 ,say unto your brothers1 ,my ,people1 and to your sisters 7,,lxx4 sister71 ,she-is-,pitied4 ,on the whole passage see above1 p4 #bac4 #dhi ,or that is loved of her husband though an adulteress4 #dij ,so ,,lxx4 ,the homer was eight bushels4 ,the lethech is a measure not elsewhere mentioned4 #dia ,on these see above1 ,introduction1 ,chap4 ,,iii41 p4 #ch4 #dib ,on the text see above1 p4 #bad4 #dic xi4 #i4 #did ,as the stories all written down before this had made familiar to ,israel4 ,,chapter ,,xv ,,the ,,thick ,,night ,,of ,,israel ,,hosea iv4-xiv4 ,it was indeed thick night into which this ,arthur of ,israel stepped from his shattered home4 ,the mists drive across ,hosea's long agony with his people1 and what we see1 we see blurred and broken4 ,there is stumbling and clashing2 crowds in drift2 confused rallies2 gangs of assassins breaking across the highways2 doors opening upon lurid interiors full of drunken riot4 ,voices1 which other voices mock1 cry for a dawn that never comes4 ,god ,himself is ,laughter1 ,lightning1 a ,lion1 a ,gnawing ,worm4 ,only one clear note breaks over the confusion--the trumpet summoning to war4 ,take courage1 ,o great heart6 ,not thus shall it always be6 ,there wait thee1 before the end1 of open ,visions at least two--one of ,memory and one of ,hope1 one of ,childhood and one of ,spring4 ,past this night1 past the swamp and jungle of these fetid years1 thou shalt see thy land in her beauty1 and ,god shall look on the face of ,his ,bride4 99 99 99 99 99 ,chaps1 iv4-xiv4 are almost indivisible4 ,the two ,visions just mentioned1 chaps4 xi4 and xiv4 #c-i1 may be detached by virtue of contributing the only strains of gospel which rise victorious above the ,lord's controversy with ,his people and the troubled story of their sins4 ,all the rest is the noise of a nation falling to pieces1 the crumbling of a splendid past4 ,and as decay has no climax and ruin no rhythm1 so we may understand why it is impossible to divide with any certainty ,hosea's record of ,israel's fall4 ,some arrangement we must attempt1 but it is more or less artificial1 and to be undertaken for the sake of our own minds1 that cannot grasp so great a collapse all at once4 ,chap4 iv4 has a certain unity1 and is followed by a new exordium1 but as it forms only the theme of which the subsequent chapters are variations1 we may take it with them as far as chap4 vii41 ver4 #g2 after which there is a slight transition from the moral signs of ,israel's dissolution to the political--although ,hosea still combines the religious offence of idolatry with the anarchy of the land4 ,these form the chief interest to the end of chap4 x4 ,then breaks the bright ,vision of the ,past1 chap4 xi41 the temporary victory of the ,gospel of the ,prophet over his ,curse4 ,in chaps4 xii4-xiv4 #b we are plunged into the latter once more1 and reach in xiv4 #c ff4 the second bright ,vision1 the ,vision of the ,future4 ,to each of these phases of ,israel's ,thick ,night--we can hardly call them ,sections--we may devote a chapter of simple exposition1 adding three chapters more of detailed examination of the main doctrines we shall have encountered on our way--the ,knowledge of ,god1 ,repentance1 and the ,sin against ,love4 ,,chapter ,,xvi ,a ,,people ,,in ,,decay3 #a4 ,,morally ,,hosea iv4-vii #g4 ,pursuing the plan laid down in the last chapter1 we now take the section of ,hosea's discourse which lies between chap4 iv4 #a and chap4 vii4 #g4 ,chap4 iv4 is the only really separable bit of it2 but there are also slight breaks at v4 #ae and vii4 #b4 ,so we may attempt a division into four periods3 #a4 ,chap4 iv41 which states ,god's general charge against the people2 #b4 ,chap4 v4 #a-ad1 which discusses the priests and princes2 #c4 ,chaps4 v4 #ae-vii4 #b1 which abjures the people's attempts at repentance2 and #d4 ,chap4 vii4 #c-g1 which is a lurid spectacle of the drunken and profligate court4 ,all these give symptoms of the moral decay of the people1--the family destroyed by impurity1 and society by theft and murder2 the corruption of the spiritual guides of the people2 the debauchery of the nobles2 the sympathy of the throne with evil1--with the despairing judgment that such a people are incapable even of repentance4 ,the keynotes are these3 ,no troth1 leal love1 nor knowledge of ,god in the land4 ,priest and ,prophet stumble4 ,ephraim and ,judah stumble4 ,i am as the moth to ,ephraim4 ,what can ,i make of thee1 ,ephraim8 ,when ,i would heal them1 their guilt is only the more exposed4 ,morally1 ,israel is rotten4 ,the prophet1 of course1 cannot help adding signs of their political incoherence4 ,but these he deals with more especially in the part of his discourse which follows chap4 vii4 #g4 #a4 ,,the ,,lord',s ,,quarrel ,,with ,,israel4 ,,hosea iv4 ,hear the word of ,jehovah1 sons of ,israel6#die ,jehovah hath a quarrel with the inhabitants of the land1 for there is no troth nor leal love nor knowledge of ,god in the land4 ,perjury#dif and murder and theft and adultery6#dig ,they break out1 and blood strikes upon blood4 ,that stable and well-furnished life1 across which1 while it was still noon1 ,amos hurled his alarms--how quickly it has broken up6 ,if there be still ease in ,zion1 there is no more security in ,samaria4#dih ,the great ,jeroboam is dead1 and society1 which in the ,east depends so much on the individual1 is loose and falling to pieces4 ,the sins which are exposed by ,amos were those that lurked beneath a still strong government1 but ,hosea adds outbreaks which set all order at defiance4 ,later we shall find him describing housebreaking1 highway robbery and assassination4 ,therefore doth the land wither1 and every one of her denizens languisheth1 even to the beast of the field and the fowl of the heaven2 yea1 even the fish of the sea are swept up in the universal sickness of man and nature3 for ,hosea feels1 like ,amos1 the liability of nature to the curse upon sin4 ,yet the guilt is not that of the whole people1 but of their religious guides4 ,let none find fault and none upbraid1 for ,my people are but as their priestlings4#dii ,o ,priest1 thou hast stumbled to-day3 and stumble to-night shall the prophet with thee4 ,one order of the nation's ministers goes staggering after the other6 ,and ,i will destroy thy ,mother1 presumably the ,nation herself4 ,perished are ,my people for lack of knowledge4 ,but how8 ,by the sin of their teachers4 ,because thou1 ,o ,priest1 hast rejected knowledge1 ,i reject thee from being priest to ,me2 and as thou hast forgotten the ,torah of thy ,god1 ,i forget thy children#ejj--;,i on ,my side4 ,as many as they be1 so many have sinned against ,me4 ,every jack-priest of them is culpable4 ,they have turned#eja their glory into shame4 ,they feed on the sin of ,my people1 and to the guilt of these lift up their appetite6 ,the more the people sin1 the more merrily thrive the priests by fines and sin-offerings4 ,they live upon the vice of the day1 and have a vested interest in its crimes4 ,english ,langland said the same thing of the friars of his time4 ,the contention is obvious4 ,the priests have given themselves wholly to the ritual2 they have forgotten that their office is an intellectual and moral one4 ,we shall return to this when treating of ,hosea's doctrine of knowledge and its responsibilities4 ,priesthood1 let us only remember1 priesthood is an intellectual trust4 ,thus it comes to be--like people like priest3 they also have fallen under the ritual1 doing from lust what the priests do from greed4 ,but ,i will visit upon them their ways1 and their deeds will ,i requite to them4 ,for they--those shall eat and not be satisfied1 these shall play the harlot and have no increase1 because they have left off heeding ,jehovah4 ,this absorption in ritual at the expense of the moral and intellectual elements of religion has insensibly led them over into idolatry1 with all its unchaste and drunken services4 ,harlotry1 wine and new wine take away the brains6#ejb ,the result is seen in the stupidity with which they consult their stocks for guidance4 ,my people6 of its bit of wood it asketh counsel1 and its staff telleth to it the oracle6 ,for a spirit of harlotry hath led them astray1 and they have played the harlot from their ,god4 ,upon the headlands of the hills they sacrifice1 and on the heights offer incense1 under oak or poplar or terebinth1 for the shade of them is pleasant4 ,on headlands1 not summits1 for here no trees grow2 and the altar was generally built under a tree and near water on some promontory1 from which the flight of birds or of clouds might be watched4 ,wherefore--because of this your frequenting of the heathen shrines--your daughters play the harlot and your daughters-in-law commit adultery4 ,i will not come with punishment upon your daughters because they play the harlot1 nor upon your daughters-in-law because they commit adultery4 ,why8 ,for they themselves1 the fathers of ,israel--or does he still mean the priests8--go aside with the harlots and sacrifice with the common women of the shrines6 ,it is vain for the men of a nation to practise impurity1 and fancy that nevertheless they can keep their womankind chaste4 ,so the stupid people fall to ruin6 7,though thou play the harlot1 ,israel1 let not ,judah bring guilt on herself4 ,and come not to ,gilgal1 and go not up to ,beth-,aven1 and take not your oath at the ,well-of-the-,oath1 ,beer-,sheba1#ejc ,by the life of ,jehovah6 ,this obvious parenthesis may be either by ,hosea or a later writer2 the latter is more probable4#ejd7 ,yea1 like a wild heifer ,israel has gone wild4 ,how now can ,jehovah feed them like a lamb in a broad meadow8 ,to treat this clause interrogatively is the only way to get sense out of it4#eje ,wedded to idols is ,ephraim3 leave him alone4 ,the participle means mated or leagued4 ,the corresponding noun is used of a wife as the mate of her husband#ejf and of an idolater as the mate of his idols4#ejg ,the expression is doubly appropriate here1 since ,hosea used marriage as the figure of the relation of a deity to his worshippers4 ,leave him alone--he must go from bad to worse4 ,their drunkenness over1 they take to harlotry3 her rulers have fallen in love with shame1 or they love shame more than their pride4#ejh ,but in spite of all their servile worship the ,assyrian tempest shall sweep them away in its trail4 ,a wind hath wrapt them up in her skirts2 and they shall be put to shame by their sacrifices4 ,this brings the passage to such a climax as ,amos loved to crown his periods4 ,and the opening of the next chapter offers a new exordium4 #b4 ,,priests ,,and ,,princes ,,fail4 ,,hosea v4 #a-ad4 ,the line followed in this paragraph is almost parallel to that of chap4 iv41 running out to a prospect of invasion4 ,but the charge is directed solely against the chiefs of the people1 and the strictures of chap4 vii4 #g ff4 upon the political folly of the rulers are anticipated4 ,hear this1 ,o ,priests1 and hearken1 ,house of ,israel1 and1 ,house of the ,king1 give ear4 ,for on you is the sentence6 ,you1 who have hitherto been the judges1 this time shall be judged4 ,a snare have ye become at ,mizpeh1 and a net spread out upon ,tabor1 and a pit have they made deep upon ,shittim2#eji but ,i shall be the scourge of them all4 ,i know ,ephraim1 and ,israel is not hid from ,me--for now hast thou played the harlot1 ,ephraim1 ,israel is defiled4 ,the worship on the high places1 whether nominally of ,jehovah or not1 was sheer service of ,ba'alim4 ,it was in the interest both of the priesthood and of the rulers to multiply these sanctuaries1 but they were only traps for the people4 ,their deeds will not let them return to their ,god2 for a harlot spirit is in their midst1 and ,jehovah1 for all their oaths by ,him1 they have not known4 ,but the pride of ,israel shall testify to his face2 and ,israel and ,ephraim shall stumble by their guilt--stumble also shall ,judah with them4 ,by ,israel's pride many understand ,god4 ,but the term is used too opprobriously by ,amos to allow us to agree to this4 ,the phrase must mean that ,israel's arrogance1 or her proud prosperity1 by the wounds which it feels in this time of national decay1 shall itself testify against the people--a profound ethical symptom to which we shall return when treating of ,repentance4#eaj ,yet the verse may be rendered in harmony with the context3 the pride of ,israel shall be humbled to his face4 ,with their sheep and their cattle they go about to seek ,jehovah1 and shall not find ,him2 ,he hath drawn off from them4 ,they have been unfaithful to ,jehovah1 for they have begotten strange children4 ,a generation has grown up who are not ,his4 ,now may a month devour them with their portions6 ,any month may bring the swift invader4 ,hark6 the alarum of war6 ,how it reaches to the back of the land6 ,blow the trumpet in ,gibeah1 the clarion in ,ramah2 ,raise the slogan1 ,beth-,aven3 ,after thee1 ,benjamin6#eaa ,ephraim shall become desolation in the day of rebuke6 ,among the tribes of ,israel ,i have made known what is certain6 ,at this point1 ver4 #aj1 the discourse swerves from the religious to the political leaders of ,israel2 but as the princes were included with the priests in the exordium 7ver4 #a71 we can hardly count this a new oracle4#eab ,the princes of ,judah are like landmark-removers--commonest of cheats in ,israel--upon them will ,i pour out ,my wrath like water4 ,ephraim is oppressed1 crushed is his right1 for he wilfully went after vanity4#eac ,and ,i am as the moth to ,ephraim1 and as rottenness to the house of ,judah4 ,both kingdoms have begun to fall to pieces1 for by this time ,uzziah of ,judah also is dead1 and the weak politicians are in charge whom ,isaiah satirised4 ,and ,ephraim saw his sickness1 and ,judah his sore2 and ,ephraim went to ,asshur and#ead sent to ,king ,jareb--,king ,combative1 ,king ,pick-,quarrel1#eae a nickname for the ,assyrian monarch4 ,the verse probably refers to the tribute which ,menahem sent to ,assyria in #gch4 ,if so1 then ,israel has drifted full five years into her thick night4 ,but ,he cannot heal you1 nor dry up your sore4 ,for ,i1 ,myself1 am like a lion to ,ephraim1 and like a young lion to the house of ,judah4 ,i1 ,i rend and go ,my way2 ,i carry off and there is none to deliver4 ,it is the same truth which ,isaiah expressed with even greater grimness4#eaf ,god ,himself is ,his people's sore2 and not all their statecraft nor alliances may heal what ,he inflicts4 ,priests and ,princes1 then1 have alike failed4 ,a greater failure is to follow4 #c4 ,,repentance ,,fails4 ,,hosea v4 #ae-vii4 #b4 ,seeing that their leaders are so helpless1 and feeling their wounds1 the people may themselves turn to ,god for healing1 but that will be with a repentance so shallow as also to be futile4 ,they have no conviction of sin1 nor appreciation of how deeply their evils have eaten4 ,this too facile repentance is expressed in a prayer which the ,christian ,church has paraphrased into one of its most beautiful hymns of conversion4 ,yet the introduction to this prayer1 and its own easy assurance of how soon ,god will heal the wounds ,he has made1 as well as the impatience with which ,god receives it1 oblige us to take the prayer in another sense than the hymn which has been derived from it4#eag ,it offers but one more symptom of the optimism of this light-hearted people1 whom no discipline and no judgment can impress with the reality of their incurable decay4 ,they said of themselves1 ,the bricks are fallen1 let us build with stones1#eah and now they say just as easily and airily of their ,god1 ,he hath torn only that ,he may heal3 we are fallen1 but ,he will raise us up again in a day or two4 ,at first it is still ,god who speaks4 ,i am going ,my way1 ,i am returning to ,my own place1#eai until they feel their guilt and seek ,my face4 ,when trouble comes upon them1 they will soon enough seek ,me1 saying3#ebj-- ,come and let us return to ,jehovah3 ,for ,he hath rent1 that ,he may heal us1 ,and hath wounded1#eba that ,he may bind us up4 ,he will bring us to life in a couple of days2 ,on the third day ,he will raise us up again1 ,that we may live in ,his presence4 ,let us know1 let us follow up#ebb to know1 ,jehovah2 ,as soon as we seek ,him1 we shall find ,him4#ebc ,and ,he shall come to us like the winter-rain1 ,like the spring-rain1 pouring on the land6 ,but how is this fair prayer received by ,god8 ,with incredulity1 with impatience4 ,what can ,i make of thee1 ,ephraim8 what can ,i make of thee1 ,judah8 since your love is like the morning cloud and like the dew so early gone4 ,their shallow hearts need deepening4 ,have they not been deepened enough8 ,wherefore ,i have hewn them by the prophets1 ,i have slain them by the words of ,my mouth1 and ,my judgment goeth forth like the lightning4#ebd ,for leal love have ,i desired1 and not sacrifice2 and the knowledge of ,god more than burnt-offerings4 ,that the discourse comes back to the ritual is very intelligible4 ,for what could make repentance seem so easy as the belief that forgiveness can be won by simply offering sacrifices8 ,then the prophet leaps upon what each new year of that anarchy revealed afresh--the profound sinfulness of the people4 ,but they in human fashion#ebe have transgressed the covenant6 ,there--he will now point out the very spots--have they betrayed#ebf ,me6 ,gilead is a city of evildoers3 stamped with bloody footprints2 assassins#ebg in troops2 a gang of priests murder on the way to ,shechem4 ,yea1 crime#ebh have they done4 ,in the house of ,israel ,i have seen horrors3 there ,ephraim hath played the harlot3 ,israel is defiled--,judah as well4#ebi ,truly the sinfulness of ,israel is endless4 ,every effort to redeem them only discovers more of it4 ,when ,i would turn1 when ,i would heal ,israel1 then the guilt of ,ephraim displays itself and the evils of ,samaria1 these namely3 that they work fraud1 and the thief cometh in--evidently a technical term for housebreaking#ecj--while abroad a crew of highwaymen foray4 ,and they never think in their hearts that all their evil is recorded by ,me4 ,now have their deeds encompassed them3 they are constantly before ,me4 ,evidently real repentance on the part of such a people is impossible4 ,as ,hosea said before1 ,their deeds will not let them return4#eca #d4 ,,wickedness ,,in ,,high ,,places4 ,,hosea vii4 #c-g4 ,there follows now a very difficult passage4 ,the text is corrupt1 and we have no means of determining what precise events are intended4 ,the drift of meaning1 however1 is evident4 ,the disorder and licentiousness of the people are favoured in high places2 the throne itself is guilty4 ,with their evil they make a king glad1 and princes with their falsehoods3 all of them are adulterers1 like an oven heated by the baker1444#ecb ,on the day of our king--some coronation or king's birthday--the princes were sick with fever from wine4 ,he stretched forth his hand with loose fellows1#ecc presumably made them his associates4 ,like an oven have they made#ecd their hearts with their intriguing4#ece ,all night their anger sleepeth3#ecf in the morning it blazes like a flame of fire4 ,all of them glow like an oven1 and devour their rulers3 all their kings have fallen1 without one of them calling on ,me4 ,an obscure passage upon obscure events2 yet so lurid with the passion of that fevered people in the flagrant years #gdc-gce that we can make out the kind of crimes described4 ,a king surrounded by loose and unscrupulous nobles3 adultery1 drunkenness1 conspiracies1 assassinations3 every man striking for himself2 none appealing to ,god4 ,from the court1 then1 downwards1 by princes1 priests and prophets1 to the common fathers of ,israel and their households1 immorality prevails4 ,there is no redeeming feature1 and no hope of better things4 ,for repentance itself the capacity is gone4 99 99 99 99 99 ,in making so thorough an indictment of the moral condition of ,israel1 it would have been impossible for ,hosea not to speak also of the political stupidity and restlessness which resulted from it4 ,but he has largely reserved these for that part of his discourse which now follows1 and which we will take in the next chapter4 ,,footnotes3 #die formally introduces the charge4 #dif ,lit4 swearing and falsehood4 #dig ,ninth1 sixth1 eighth and seventh of the ,decalogue4 #dih ,amos vi4 #a4 #dii iv4 #d4 ,according to the excellent emendation of ,beck 7quoted by ,wnsche1 p4 #adb71 who instead of proposes 1 for the first word of which there is support in the ,,lxx4 4 ,the second word1 1 is used for priest only in a bad sense by ,hosea himself1 x4 #e1 and in #b ,kings xxiii4 #e of the calf-worship and in ,zech4 i4 #d of the ,baal priesthood4 ,as ,wellhausen remarks1 this emendation restores sense to a passage that had none before4 ,ver4 #d cannot be directed against the people1 but must rather furnish the connection for ver4 #e1 and effect the transference from the reproof of the people 7vv4 #a-c7 to the reproof of the priests 7#e ff474 ,the letters which are left over in ver4 #d by the emendation are then justly improved by ,wellhausen 7following ,zunz7 into the vocative and taken with the following verse4 #ejj ,the application seems to swerve here4 ,thy children would seem to imply that1 for this clause at least1 the whole people1 and not the priests only1 were addressed4 ,but ,robertson ,smith takes thy mother as equivalent1 not to the nation1 but to the priesthood4 #eja ,a reading current among ,jewish writers and adopted by ,geiger1 ,urschrift1 #caf4 #ejb ,heb4 the heart1 which ancient ,israel conceived as the seat of the intellect4 #ejc ,wellhausen thinks this third place-name 7cf4 ,amos v4 #e7 has been dropped4 ,it certainly seems to be understood4 #ejd ,but see above1 p4 #bbd4 #eje ,so all critics since ,hitzig4 #ejf ,mal4 ii4 #d4 #ejg ,isa4 xliv4 #aa4 #ejh ,the verse is very uncertain4 ,,lxx4 read a different and a fuller text from ,ephraim in the previous verse to harlotry in this3 ,ephraim hath set up for himself stumbling-blocks and chosen ,canaanites4 ,in the first of alternate readings of the latter half of the verse omit as probably a repetition of the end of the preceding word2 the second alternative is adapted from ,,lxx41 which for must have read 4 #eji ,so by slightly altering the consonants4 ,but the text is uncertain4 #eaj ,note on the ,pride of ,israel4-- means grandeur1 and is 7#a7 so used of ,jehovah's majesty 7,micah v4 #c2 ,isa4 ii4 #aj1 #ai1 #ba2 xxiv4 #ad71 and 7#b7 of the greatness of human powers 7,zech4 x4 #aa2 ,ezek4 xxxii4 #ab74 ,in ,psalm xlvii4 #e it is parallel to the land of ,israel 7cf4 ,nahum ii4 #c74 7#c7 ,in a grosser sense the word is used of the rank vegetation of ,jordan 7,eng4 wrongly swelling7 7,jer4 xii4 #e2 ,zech4 xi4 #c3 cf4 ,job xxxviii4 #aa74 ,it would appear to be this grosser sense of rankness1 arrogance1 in which ,amos vi4 #h takes it as parallel to the palaces of ,israel which ,jehovah loathes and will destroy4 ,in ,amos viii4 #g the phrase may be used in scorn2 yet some take it even there of ,god ,himself 7,buhl1 last ed4 of ,gesenius' ,lexicon74 ,now in ,hosea it occurs twice in the phrase given above-- 7v4 #e1 vii4 #aj74 ,,lxx41 ,targum and some ,jewish exegetes take as a verb1 to be humbled1 and this suits both contexts4 ,but the word to his face almost compels us to take as a verb1 to witness against 7cf4 ,job xvi4 #h2 ,jer4 xiv4 #g74 ,hence ,wellhausen renders ,with his arrogance ,israel witnesseth against himself1 and confirms the plaint of ,jehovah--the arrogance being the trust in the ritual and the feeling of no need to turn from that and repent 7cf4 vii4 #aj74 ,orelli quotes ,amos vi4 #h and ,nahum ii4 #c1 and says injustice cleaves to all ,israel's splendour1 so it testifies against him4 ,but the context1 which in both cases speaks of ,israel's gradual decay1 demands rather the interpretation that ,israel's material grandeur shows unmistakable signs of breaking down4 ,for the ethical development of this interpretation1 see below1 pp4 #ccg f4 #eaa ,probably the ancient war-cry of the clan4 ,cf4 ,judg4 v4 #ad4 #eab ,yet ver4 #i goes with ver4 #h 7so ,wellhausen71 and not with ver4 #aj 7so ,ewald74 #eac ,for read 4 #ead ,wellhausen inserts ,judah1 with that desire to complete a parallel which seems to me to be overdone by so many critics4 ,if ,judah be inserted we should need to bring the date of these verses down to the reign of ,ahaz in #gcd4 #eae ,guthe3 ,king ,fighting-,cock4 #eaf ,see ,isaiah ,i4-,,xxxix4 7,expositor's ,bible71 pp4 #bdb ff4 #eag ,cheyne indeed 7,introduction to ,robertson ,smith's ,prophets of ,israel7 takes the prayer to be genuine1 but an intrusion4 ,his reasons do not persuade me4 ,but at least it is clear that there is a want of connection between the prayer and what follows it1 unless the prayer be understood in the sense explained above4 #eah ,isaiah ix4 #aj4 #eai ,cf4 ,isaiah xviii4 #d4 #ebj ,saying3 so the ,,lxx4 adds and thereby connects chap4 v4 with chap4 vi4 #eba ,read 4 #ebb ,literally hunt1 pursue4 ,it is the same word as is used of the unfaithful ,israel's pursuit of the ,ba'alim1 chap4 ii4 #i4 #ebc ,so by a rearrangement of consonants 7 7 and the help of the ,,lxx4 7 7 ,giesebrecht 7,beitrge1 p4 #bjh7 proposes to read the clause1 which in the traditional text runs1 like the morn ,his going forth shall be certain4 #ebd ,read 4 #ebe ,or like ,adam1 or 7,guthe7 like the heathen4 #ebf ,the verb means to prove false to any contract1 but especially marriage4 #ebg ,read 4 #ebh ,in several passages of the ,old ,testament the word means unchastity4 #ebi ,here the ,,lxx4 close chap4 vi41 taking #aa b along with chap4 vii4 ,some think the whole of ver4 #aa to be a ,judan gloss4 #ecj ,cf4 ,joel ii4 #i1 and the ,new ,testament phrase to come as a thief4 #eca v4 #d4 #ecb ,the text is unsound4 ,heb43 like an oven kindled by the baker1 the stirrer 7stoker or kneader87 resteth from kneading the dough until it be leavened4 ,,lxx43 --i4e4 for they read 4 ,oort emends ,heb4 to 1 which gets rid of the difficulty of a feminine participle with 4 ,wellhausen omits whole clause as a gloss on ver4 #f4 ,but if there be a gloss it properly commences with 4 #ecc ,,lxx4 88 #ecd ,,lxx4 kindled1 4 ,so ,vollers1 ,z4,a4,t4,w41 ,,iii4 #bej4 #ece ,lit4 lurking4 #ecf ,massoretic ,text with different vowels reads their baker4 ,,lxx4 6 ,,chapter ,,xvii ,a ,,people ,,in ,,decay3 ,,ii4 ,,politically ,,hosea vii4 #h-x4 ,moral decay means political decay4 ,sins like these are the gangrene of nations4 ,it is part of ,hosea's greatness to have traced this1 a proof of that versatility which distinguishes him above other prophets4 ,the most spiritual of them all1 he is at the same time the most political4 ,we owe him an analysis of repentance to which the ,new ,testament has little to add2#ecg but he has also left us a criticism of society and of politics in ,israel1 unrivalled except by ,isaiah4 ,we owe him an intellectual conception of ,god1#ech which for the first time in ,israel exploded idolatry2 yet he also is the first to define ,israel's position in the politics of ,western ,asia4 ,with the simple courage of conscience ,amos had said to the people3 ,you are bad1 therefore you must perish4 ,but ,hosea's is the insight to follow the processes by which sin brings forth death--to trace1 for instance1 the effects of impurity upon a nation's powers of reproduction1 as well as upon its intellectual vigour4 ,so intimate are these two faculties of ,hosea1 that in chapters devoted chiefly to the sins of ,israel we have already seen him expose the political disasters that follow4 ,but from the point we have now reached--chap4 vii4 #h--the proportion of his prophesying is reversed3 he gives us less of the sin and more of the social decay and political folly of his age4 ,i4 ,,the ,,confusion ,,of ,,the ,,nation4 ,,hosea vii4 #h-viii4 #c4 ,hosea begins by summing up the public aspect of ,israel in two epigrams1 short but of marvellous adequacy 7vii4 #h73-- ,ephraim--among the nations he mixeth himself3 ,ephraim has become a cake not turned4 ,it is a great crisis for any nation to pass from the seclusion of its youth and become a factor in the main history of the world4 ,but for ,israel the crisis was trebly great4 ,their difference from all other tribes about them had struck the ,canaanites on their first entry to the land3#eci their own earliest writers had emphasised their seclusion as their strength2#edj and their first prophets consistently deprecated every overture made by them either to ,egypt or to ,assyria4 ,we feel the force of the prophets' policy when we remember what happened to the ,philistines4 ,these were a people as strong and as distinctive as ,israel1 with whom at one time they disputed possession of the whole land4 ,but their position as traders in the main line of traffic between ,asia and ,africa rendered the ,philistines peculiarly open to foreign influence4 ,they were now ,egyptian vassals1 now ,assyrian victims2 and after the invasion of ,alexander the ,great their cities became centres of ,hellenism1 while the ,jews upon their secluded hills still stubbornly held unmixed their race and their religion4 ,this contrast1 so remarkably developed in later centuries1 has justified the prophets of the eighth in their anxiety that ,israel should not annul the advantages of her geographical seclusion by trade or treaties with the ,gentiles4 ,but it was easier for ,juda to take heed to the warning than for ,ephraim4 ,the latter lies as open and fertile as her sister-province is barren and aloof4 ,she has many gates into the world1 and they open upon many markets4 ,nobler opportunities there could not be for a nation in the maturity of its genius and loyal to its vocation3-- ,rejoice1 ,o ,zebulun1 in thine outgoings3 ,they shall call the nations to the mountain2 ,they shall suck of the abundance of the seas1 ,and of the treasure that is stored in the sands4#eda ,but in the time of his outgoings ,ephraim was not sure of himself nor true to his ,god1 the one secret and strength of the national distinctiveness4 ,so he met the world weak and unformed1 and1 instead of impressing it1 was by it dissipated and confused4 ,the tides of a lavish commerce scattered abroad the faculties of the people1 and swept back upon their life alien fashions and tempers1 to subdue which there was neither native strength nor definiteness of national purpose4 ,all this is what ,hosea means by the first of his epigrams3 ,ephraim--among the nations he lets himself be poured out1 or mixed up4 ,the form of the verb does not elsewhere occur2 but it is reflexive1 and the meaning of the root is certain4 ,balal is to pour out1 or mingle1 as of oil in the sacrificial flour4 ,yet it is sometimes used of a mixing which is not sacred1 but profane and hopeless4 ,it is applied to the first great confusion of mankind1 to which a popular etymology has traced the name ,babel1 as if for ,balbel4 ,derivatives of the stem bear the additional ideas of staining and impurity4 ,the alternative renderings which have been proposed1 lets himself be soaked and scatters himself abroad like wheat among tares1 are not so probable1 yet hardly change the meaning4#edb ,ephraim wastes and confuses himself among the ,gentiles4 ,the nation's character is so disguised that ,hosea afterwards nicknames him ,canaan2#edc their religion so filled with foreign influences that he calls the people the harlot of the ,ba'alim4 ,if the first of ,hosea's epigrams satirises ,israel's foreign relations1 the second1 with equal brevity and wit1 hits off the temper and constitution of society at home4 ,for the metaphor of which this epigram is composed ,hosea has gone to the baker4 ,among all classes in the ,east1 especially under conditions requiring haste1 there is in demand a round flat scone1 which is baked by being laid on hot stones or attached to the wall of a heated oven4 ,the whole art of baking consists in turning the scone over at the proper moment4 ,if this be mismanaged1 it does not need a baker to tell us that one side may be burnt to a cinder1 while the other remains raw4 ,ephraim1 says ,hosea1 is an unturned cake4 ,by this he may mean one of several things1 or all of them together1 for they are infectious of each other4 ,there was1 for instance1 the social condition of the people4 ,what can better be described as an unturned scone than a community one half of whose number are too rich1 and the other too poor8 ,or ,hosea may refer to that unequal distribution of religion through life with which in other parts of his prophecy he reproaches ,israel4 ,they keep their religion1 as ,amos more fully tells us1 for their temples1 and neglect to carry its spirit into their daily business4 ,or he may refer to ,israel's politics1 which were equally in want of thoroughness4 ,they rushed hotly at an enterprise1 but having expended so much fire in the beginning of it1 they let the end drop cold and dead4 ,or he may wish to satirise1 like ,amos1 ,israel's imperfect culture--the pretentious and overdone arts1 stuck excrescence-wise upon the unrefined bulk of the nation1 just as in many ,german principalities last century society took on a few ,french fashions in rough and exaggerated forms1 while at heart still brutal and coarse4 ,hosea may mean any one of these things1 for the figure suits all1 and all spring from the same defect4 ,want of thoroughness and equable effort was ,israel's besetting sin1 and it told on all sides of his life4 ,how better describe a half-fed people1 a half-cultured society1 a half-lived religion1 a half-hearted policy1 than by a half-baked scone8 ,we who are so proud of our political bakers1 we who scorn the rapid revolutions of our neighbours and complacently dwell upon our equable ovens1 those slow and cautious centuries of political development which lie behind us--have we anything better than our neighbours1 anything better than ,israel1 to show in our civilisation8 ,hosea's epigram fits us to the letter4 ,after all those ages of baking1 society is still with us an unturned scone3 one end of the nation with the strength burnt out of it by too much enjoyment of life1 the other with not enough of warmth to be quickened into anything like adequate vitality4 ,no man can deny that this is so2 we are able to live only by shutting our hearts to the fact4 ,or is religion equably distributed through the lives of the religious portion of our nation8 ,of late years religion has spread1 and spread wonderfully1 but of how many ,christians is it still true that they are but half-baked--living a life one side of which is reeking with the smoke of sacrifice1 while the other is never warmed by one religious thought4 ,we may have too much religion if we confine it to one day or one department of life3 our worship overdone1 with the sap and the freshness burnt out of it1 cindery1 dusty1 unattractive1 fit only for crumbling2 our conduct cold1 damp and heavy1 like dough the fire has never reached4 ,upon the theme of these two epigrams the other verses of this chapter are variations4 ,has ,ephraim mixed himself among the peoples8 ,strangers have devoured his strength1 and he knoweth it not1 senselessly congratulating himself upon the increase of his trade and wealth1 while he does not feel that these have sucked from him all his distinctive virtue4 ,yea1 grey hairs are sprinkled upon him1 and he knoweth it not4 ,he makes his energy the measure of his life1 as ,isaiah also marked1#edd but sees not that it all means waste and decay4 ,the pride of ,israel testifieth to his face1 yet--even when the pride of the nation is touched to the quick by such humiliating overtures as they make to both ,assyria and ,egypt#ede--they do not return to ,jehovah their ,god1 nor seek ,him for all this4 ,with virtue and single-hearted faith have disappeared intellect and the capacity for affairs4 ,ephraim is become like a silly dove--a dove without heart1 to the ,hebrews the organ of the wits of a man--they cry to ,egypt1 they go off to ,assyria4 ,poor pigeon of a people1 fluttering from one refuge to another6 ,but as they go ,i will throw over them ,my net1 like a bird of the air ,i will bring them down4 ,i will punish them as their congregation have heard--this text as it stands#edf can only mean in the manner ,i have publicly proclaimed in ,israel4 ,woe to them that they have strayed from ,me6 ,damnation to them that they have rebelled against ,me6 ,while ,i would have redeemed them1 they spoke lies about ,me4 ,and they have never cried unto ,me with their heart1 but they keep howling on their beds for corn and new wine4 ,no real repentance theirs1 but some fear of drought and miscarriage of the harvests1 a sensual and servile sorrow in which they wallow4 ,they seek ,god with no heart1 no true appreciation of what ,he is1 but use the senseless means by which the heathen invoke their gods3 they cut themselves1#edg and so apostatise from ,me6 ,and yet it was ,i who disciplined them1 ,i strengthened their arm1 but with regard to ,me they kept thinking only evil6 ,so fickle and sensitive to fear1 they turn indeed1 but not upwards2 no ,godward conversion theirs4 ,in their repentance they are like a bow which swerves--off upon some impulse of their ill-balanced natures4 ,their princes must fall by the sword because of the bitterness--we should have expected falseness--of their tongue3 this is their scorn in the land of ,egypt6 ,to the allusion we have no key4 ,with so false a people nothing can be done4 ,their doom is inevitable4 ,so ,cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war4 ,to thy mouth with the trumpet6 ,the ,eagle is down upon the house of ,jehovah6#edh ,where the carcase is1 there are the eagles gathered together4 ,for--to sum up the whole crisis--they have transgressed ,my covenant1 and against ,my law have they rebelled4 ,to ,me they cry1 ,my ,god1 we know ,thee1 we ,israel6 ,what does it matter8 ,israel hath spurned the good3#edi the ,foe must pursue him4 ,it is the same climax of inevitable war to which ,amos led up his periods2 and a new subject is now introduced4 #b4 ,,artificial ,,kings ,,and ,,artificial ,,gods4 ,,hosea viii4 #d-ac4 ,the curse of such a state of dissipation as that to which ,israel had fallen is that it produces no men4 ,had the people had in them the root of the matter1 had there been the stalk and the fibre of a national consciousness and purpose1 it would have blossomed to a man4 ,in the similar time of her outgoings upon the world ,prussia had her ,frederick the ,great1 and ,israel1 too1 would have produced a leader1 a heaven-sent king1 if the national spirit had not been squandered on foreign trade and fashions4 ,but after the death of ,jeroboam every man who rose to eminence in ,israel1 rose1 not on the nation1 but only on the fevered and transient impulse of some faction2 and through the broken years one party monarch was lifted after another to the brief tenancy of a blood-stained throne4 ,they were not from ,god1 these monarchs2 but man-made1 and sooner or later man-murdered4 ,with his sharp insight ,hosea likens these artificial kings to the artificial gods1 also the work of men's hands2 and till near the close of his book the idols of the sanctuary and the puppets of the throne form the twin targets of his scorn4 ,they have made kings1 but not from ,me2 they have made princes1 but ,i knew not4 ,with their silver and their gold they have manufactured themselves idols1 only that they#eej may be cut off--king after king1 idol upon idol4 ,he loathes thy ,calf1 ,o ,samaria1 the thing of wood and gold which thou callest ,jehovah4 ,and ,god confirms this4 ,kindled is ,mine anger against them6 ,how long will they be incapable of innocence8--unable to clear themselves of guilt6 ,the idol is still in his mind4 ,for from ,israel is it also--as much as the puppet-kings2 a workman made it1 and no god is it4 ,yea1 splinters shall the ,calf of ,samaria become4#eea ,splinters shall everything in ,israel become4 ,for they sow the wind1 and the whirlwind shall they reap4 ,indeed like a storm ,hosea's own language now sweeps along2 and his metaphors are torn into shreds upon it4 ,stalk it hath none3 the sprout brings forth no grain3 if it were to bring forth1 strangers would swallow it4#eeb ,nay1 ,israel hath let herself be swallowed up6 ,already are they become among the nations like a vessel there is no more use for4 ,heathen empires have sucked them dry4 ,they have gone up to ,assyria like a runaway wild-ass4 ,ephraim hath hired lovers4#eec ,it is again the note of their mad dissipation among the foreigners4 ,but if they thus give themselves away among the nations1 ,i must gather them in1 and then shall they have to cease a little from the anointing of a king and princes4#eed ,this wilful roaming of theirs among the foreigners shall be followed by compulsory exile1 and all their unholy artificial politics shall cease4 ,the discourse turns to the other target4 ,for ,ephraim hath multiplied altars--to sin2 altars are his own--to sin4 ,were ,i to write for him by myriads ,my laws1#eee as those of a stranger would they be accounted4 ,they slay burnt-offerings for ,me and eat flesh4#eef ,jehovah hath no delight in them4 ,now must ,he remember their guilt and make visitation upon their sin4 ,they--to ,egypt--shall return4444#eeg ,back to their ancient servitude must they go1 as formerly ,he said ,he would withdraw them to the wilderness4#eeh #c4 ,,the ,,effects ,,of ,,exile4 ,,hosea ix4 #a-i4 ,hosea now turns to describe the effects of exile upon the social and religious habits of the people4 ,it must break up at once the joy and the sacredness of their lives4 ,every pleasure will be removed1 every taste offended4 ,indeed1 even now1 with their conscience of having deserted ,jehovah1 they cannot pretend to enjoy the feasts of the ,ba'alim in the same hearty way as the heathen with whom they mix4 ,but1 whether or no1 the time is near when nature-feasts and all other religious ceremonies--all that makes life glad and regular and solemn--shall be impossible4 ,rejoice not1 ,o ,israel1 to the pitch of rapture like the heathen1 for thou hast played the harlot from thy ,god2 a harlot's hire hast thou loved on all threshing-floors4#eei ,threshing-floor and wine-vat shall ignore#efj them1 and the new wine shall play them false4 ,they shall not abide in the land of ,jehovah1 but ,ephraim shall return to ,egypt1 and in ,assyria they shall eat what is unclean4 ,they shall not pour libations to ,jehovah1 nor prepare#efa for ,him their sacrifices4 ,like the bread of sorrows shall their bread#efb be2 all that eat of it shall be defiled3 yea1 their bread shall be only for their appetite2 they shall not bring it#efc to the temple of ,jehovah4 ,he cannot be worshipped off ,his own land4 ,they will have to live like animals1 divorced from religion1 unable to hold communion with their ,god4 ,what shall ye do for days#efd of festival1 or for a day of pilgrimage to ,jehovah8 ,for lo1 they shall be gone forth from destruction1#efe the shock and invasion of their land1 only that ,egypt may gather them in1 ,memphis give them sepulture1 nettles inherit their jewels of silver1 thorns come up in their tents4 ,the threat of exile still wavers between ,assyria and ,egypt4 ,and in ,egypt ,memphis is chosen as the destined grave of ,israel2 for even then her ,pyramids and mausoleums were ancient and renowned1 her vaults and sepulchres were countless and spacious4 ,but what need is there to seek the future for ,israel's doom1 when already this is being fulfilled by the corruption of her spiritual leaders8 ,the days of visitation have come1 have come the days of requital4 ,israel already experiences#eff them6 ,a fool is the prophet1 raving mad the man of the spirit4 ,the old ecstasy of ,saul's day has become delirium and fanaticism4#efg ,why8 ,for the mass of thy guilt and the multiplied treachery6 ,ephraim acts the spy with my ,god4 ,there is probably a play on the name1 for with the meaning a watchman for ,god it is elsewhere used as an honourable title of the prophets4 ,the prophet is a fowler's snare upon all his ways4 ,treachery--they have made it profound in the very house of their ,god4#efh ,they have done corruptly1 as in the days of ,gibeah4 ,their iniquity is remembered2 visitation is made on their sin4 99 99 99 99 99 ,these then were the symptoms of the profound political decay which followed on ,israel's immorality4 ,the national spirit and unity of the people had disappeared4 ,society--half of it was raw1 half of it was baked to a cinder4 ,the nation1 broken into factions1 produced no man to lead1 no king with the stamp of ,god upon him4 ,anarchy prevailed2 monarchs were made and murdered4 ,there was no prestige abroad1 nothing but contempt among the ,gentiles for a people whom they had exhausted4 ,judgment was inevitable by exile--nay1 it had come already in the corruption of the spiritual leaders of the nation4 ,hosea now turns to probe a deeper corruption still4 #d4 ,,the ,,corruption ,,that ,,is ,,through ,,lust4 ,,hosea ix4 #aj-ag3 cf4 iv4 #aa-ad4 ,those who at the present time are enforcing among us the revival of a ,paganism--without the ,pagan conscience--and exalting licentiousness to the level of an art1 forget how frequently the human race has attempted their experiment1 with far more sincerity than they themselves can put into it1 and how invariably the result has been recorded by history to be weariness1 decay and death4 ,on this occasion we have the story told to us by one who to the experience of the statesman adds the vision of the poet4 ,the generation to which ,hosea belonged practised a periodical unchastity under the alleged sanctions of nature and religion4 ,and1 although their prophet told them that--like our own apostates from ,christianity--they could never do so with the abandon of the ,pagans1 for they carried within them the conscience and the memory of a higher faith1 it appears that even the fathers of ,israel resorted openly and without shame to the licentious rites of the sanctuaries4 ,in an earlier passage of his book ,hosea insists that all this must impair the people's intellect4 ,harlotry takes away the brains4#efi ,he has shown also how it confuses the family1 and has exposed the old delusion that men may be impure and keep their womankind chaste4#egj ,but now he diagnoses another of the inevitable results of this sin4 ,after tracing the sin1 and the theory of life which permitted it1 to their historical beginnings at the entry of the people into ,canaan1 he describes how the long practice of it1 no matter how pretentious its sanctions1 inevitably leads not only to exterminating strifes1 but to the decay of the vigour of the nation1 to barrenness and a diminishing population4 ,like grapes in the wilderness ,i found ,israel1 like the first fruit on a fig-tree in her first season ,i saw your fathers4 ,so had the lusty nation appeared to ,god in its youth2 in that dry wilderness all the sap and promise of spring were in its eyes1 because it was still pure4 ,but they--they came to ,ba'al-,peor--the first of the shrines of ,canaan which they touched--and dedicated themselves to the ,shame1 and became as abominable as the object of their love4 ,ephraim--the ,fruitful name is emphasised--their glory is flown away like a bird4 ,no more birth1 no more motherhood1 no more conception6#ega ,blasted is ,ephraim1 withered the root of them1 fruit they produce not3 yea1 even when they beget children ,i slay the darlings of their womb4 ,yea1 though they bring up their sons ,i bereave them1 till they are poor in men4 ,yea1 woe upon themselves also1 when ,i look away from them6 ,ephraim--again the ,fruitful name is dragged to the front--for prey1 as ,i have seen1 are his sons destined4#egb ,ephraim--he must lead his sons to the slaughter4 ,and the prophet interrupts with his chorus3 ,give them1 ,o ,,lord--what wilt ,thou give them8 ,give them a miscarrying womb and breasts that are dry6 ,all their mischief is in ,gilgal--again the ,divine voice strikes the connection between the national worship and the national sin--yea1 there do ,i hate them3 for the evil of their doings from ,my house ,i will drive them4 ,i will love them no more3 all their nobles are rebels4#egc ,and again the prophet responds3 ,my ,god will cast them away1 for they have not hearkened to ,him1 and they shall be vagabonds among the nations4 ,some of the warnings which ,hosea enforces with regard to this sin have been instinctively felt by mankind since the beginnings of civilisation1 and are found expressed among the proverbs of nearly all the languages4#egd ,but ,i am unaware of any earlier moralist in any literature who traced the effects of national licentiousness in a diminishing population1 or who exposed the persistent delusion of libertine men that they themselves may resort to vice1 yet keep their womankind chaste4 ,hosea1 so far as we know1 was the first to do this4 ,history in many periods has confirmed the justice of his observations1 and by one strong voice after another enforced his terrible warnings4 ,the experience of ancient ,persia and ,egypt2 the languor of the ,greek cities2 the deep weariness and sated lust which in ,imperial ,rome made human life a hell2 the decay which overtook ,italy after the renascence of ,paganism without the ,pagan virtues2 the strife and anarchy that have rent every court where1 as in the case of ,henri ,quatre1 the king set the example of libertinage2 the incompetence1 the poltroonery1 the treachery1 that have corrupted every camp where1 as in ,french ,metz in #ahgj1 soldiers and officers gave way so openly to vice2 the checks suffered by modern civilisation in face of barbarism because its pioneers mingled in vice with the savage races they were subduing2 the number of great statesmen falling by their passion1 and in their fall frustrating the hopes of nations2 the great families worn out by indulgence2 the homes broken up by infidelities2 the tainting of the blood of a new generation by the poisonous practices of the old1--have not all these things been in every age1 and do they not still happen near enough to ourselves to give us a great fear of the sin which causes them all8 ,alas6 how slow men are to listen and to lay to heart6 ,is it possible that we can gild by the names of frivolity and piquancy habits the wages of which are death8 ,is it possible that we can enjoy comedies which make such things their jest8 ,we have among us many who find their business in the theatre1 or in some of the periodical literature of our time1 in writing and speaking and exhibiting as closely as they dare to limits of public decency4 ,when will they learn that it is not upon the easy edge of mere conventions that they are capering1 but upon the brink of those eternal laws whose further side is death and hell--that it is not the tolerance of their fellow-men they are testing1 but the patience of ,god ,himself8 ,as for those loud few who claim licence in the name of art and literature1 let us not shrink from them as if they were strong or their high words true4 ,they are not strong1 they are only reckless2 their claims are lies4 ,all history1 the poets and the prophets1 whether ,christian or ,pagan1 are against them4 ,they are traitors alike to art1 to love1 and to every other high interest of mankind4 ,it may be said that a large part of the art of the day1 which takes great licence in dealing with these subjects1 is exercised only by the ambition to expose that ruin and decay which ,hosea himself affirms4 ,this is true4 ,some of the ablest and most popular writers of our time have pictured the facts1 which ,hosea describes1 with so vivid a realism that we cannot but judge them to be inspired to confirm his ancient warnings1 and to excite a disgust of vice in a generation which otherwise treats vice so lightly4 ,but if so1 their ministry is exceeding narrow1 and it is by their side that we best estimate the greatness of the ancient prophet4 ,their transcript of human life may be true to the facts it selects1 but we find in it no trace of facts which are greater and more essential to humanity4 ,they have nothing to tell us of forgiveness and repentance1 and yet these are as real as the things they describe4 ,their pessimism is unrelieved4 ,they see the corruption that is in the world through lust2 they forget that there is an escape from it4#ege ,it is ,hosea's greatness that1 while he felt the vices of his day with all needed thoroughness and realism1 he yet never allowed them to be inevitable or ultimate1 but preached repentance and pardon1 with the possibility of holiness even for his depraved generation4 ,it is the littleness of the ,art of our day that these great facts are forgotten by her1 though once she was their interpreter to men4 ,when she remembers them the greatness of her past will return4 #e4 ,,once ,,more3 ,,puppet-,,kings ,,and ,,puppet-,,gods4 ,,hosea x4 ,for another section1 the tenth chapter1 the prophet returns to the twin targets of his scorn3 the idols and the puppet-kings4 ,but few notes are needed4 ,observe the reiterated connection between the fertility of the land and the idolatry of the people4 ,a wanton vine is ,israel2 he lavishes his fruit3#egf the more his fruit1 the more he made his altars2 the goodlier his land1 the more goodly he made his maeboth1 or sacred pillars4 ,false is the heart of them3 now must they atone for it4 ,he shall break the neck of their altars2 ,he shall ruin their pillars4 ,for already they are saying1 ,no king have we1 for we have not feared ,jehovah1 and the king--what could he do for us8 ,speaking#egg of words1 swearing of false oaths1 making of bargains--till law#egh breaks out like weeds in the furrows of the field4 ,for the ,calf of ,beth-,aven the inhabitants#egi of ,samaria shall be anxious3 yea1 mourn for him shall his people1 and his priestlings shall writhe for him--for his glory that it is banished from him4 ,in these days of heavy tribute shall the gold of the golden calf be safe8 ,yea1 himself shall they pack#ehj to ,assyria2 he shall be offered as tribute to ,king ,pick-,quarrel4#eha ,ephraim shall take disgrace1 and ,israel be ashamed because of his counsel4#ehb ,undone ,samaria6 ,her king like a chip#ehc on the face of the waters6 ,this may refer to one of the revolutions in which the king was murdered4 ,but it seems more appropriate to the final catastrophe of #gbd-a3 the fall of the kingdom1 and the king's banishment to ,assyria4 ,if the latter1 the verse has been inserted2 but the following verse would lead us to take these disasters as still future4 ,and the high places of idolatry shall be destroyed1 the sin of ,israel2 thorn and thistle shall come up on their altars4 ,and they shall say to the mountains1 ,cover us1 and to the hills1 ,fall on us4 ,it cannot be too often repeated3 these handmade gods1 these chips of kings1 shall be swept away together4 ,once more the prophet returns to the ancient origins of ,israel's present sins1 and once more to their shirking of the discipline necessary for spiritual results1 but only that he may lead up as before to the inevitable doom4 ,from#ehd the days of ,gibeah thou hast sinned1 ,o ,israel4 ,there have they remained--never progressed beyond their position there--and this without war overtaking them in ,gibeah against the dastards4#ehe ,as soon as ,i please1 ,i can chastise them1 and peoples shall be gathered against them in chastisement for their double sin4 ,this can scarcely be1 as some suggest1 the two calves at ,bethel and ,dan4 ,more probably it is still the idols and the man-made kings4 ,now he returns to the ambition of the people for spiritual results without a spiritual discipline4 ,and ,ephraim is a broken-in heifer1 that loveth to thresh4#ehf ,but ,i have come on her fair neck4 ,i will yoke ,ephraim2 ,judah must plough2 ,jacob must harrow for himself4 ,it is all very well for the unmuzzled beast#ehg to love the threshing1 but harder and unrewarded labours of ploughing and harrowing have to come before the floor be heaped with sheaves4 ,israel must not expect religious festival without religious discipline4 ,sow for yourselves righteousness2 then shall ye reap the fruit of ,god's leal love4#ehh ,break up your fallow ground1 for it is time to seek ,jehovah1 till ,he come and shower salvation#ehi upon you4#eij ,ye have ploughed wickedness2 disaster have ye reaped3 ye have eaten the fruit of falsehood2 for thou didst trust in thy chariots1#eia in the multitude of thy warriors4 ,for the tumult of war shall arise among thy tribes1#eib and all thy fenced cities shall be ruined1 as ,salman beat to ruin ,beth-,arbel#eic in the day of war3 the mother shall be broken on the children--presumably the land shall fall with the falling of her cities4 ,thus shall ,i do to you1 ,o house of ,israel1#eid because of the evil of your evil3 soon shall the king of ,israel be undone--undone4 ,the political decay of ,israel1 then1 so deeply figured in all these chapters1 must end in utter collapse4 ,let us sum up the gradual features of this decay3 the substance of the people scattered abroad2 the national spirit dissipated2 the national prestige humbled2 the kings mere puppets2 the prophets corrupted2 the national vigour sapped by impurity2 the idolatry conscious of its impotence4 ,,footnotes3 #ecg ,see below1 ,chap4 ,,xxii4 #ech ,see ,chap4 ,,xxi4 #eci ,numb4 xxiii4 #i b2 ,josh4 ii4 #h4 #edj ,deut4 xxxiii4 #bg4 #eda ,deut4 xxxiii4 #ah1 #ai4 #edb from 4 ,in ,phn4 seems to have been used as in ,israel of the sacrificial mingling of oil and flour 7cf4 ,robertson ,smith1 ,religion of ,semites1 ,i4 #bjc72 in ,arabic ball is to weaken a strong liquid with water1 while balbal is to be confused1 disordered4 ,the ,syriac balal is to mix4 ,some have taken ,hosea's as if from 7,isa4 xxx4 #bd2 ,job vi4 #e71 usually understood as a mixed crop of wheat and inferior vegetables for fodder2 but there is reason to believe means rather fresh corn4 ,the derivation from to grow old1 does not seem probable4 #edc xii4 #h4 #edd ix4 #i f4 #ede ,see above1 p4 #bfa1 and below1 p4 #ccg4 #edf ,but the reading is very doubtful4 #edg ,for read 4 #edh ,wellhausen's objection to the first clause1 that one does not set a trumpet to one's gums1 which literally means1 is beside the mark4 is more than once used of the mouth as a whole 7,job viii4 #g2 ,prov4 v4 #c74 ,the second clause gives the reason of the trumpet1 the alarum trumpet1 in the first4 ,read 7so also ,wellhausen74 #edi ,cf4 ,amos3 ,seek ,me ,seek the good2 and ,jesus3 ,not every one that saith unto ,me1 ,lord1 ,lord2 but he that doeth the will of ,my ,father in heaven4 #eej ,so ,,lxx41 but ,hebrew it4 #eea ,davidson's ,syntax1 #acf1 ,rem4 #a1 and #ga1 ,rom4 #d4 #eeb ,so by the accents runs the verse1 but1 as ,wellhausen has pointed out1 both its sense and its assonance are better expressed by another arrangement3 ,hath it grown up8 then it hath no shoot1 nor bringeth forth fruit4 n lo emach1 b'li ya'aseh qemach4 ,yet to this there is a grammatical obstacle4 #eec ,wellhausen's reading to ,egypt with love gifts scarcely suits the verb go up4 ,notice the play upon ,p7h7ere'1 wild-ass and ,ephra'm4 #eed ,so ,,lxx4 reads4 ,heb43 they shall involve themselves with tribute to the king of princes1 presumably the ,assyrian monarch4 #eee ,so ,,lxx4 #eef ,text obscure4 #eeg ,,lxx4 addition here is plainly borrowed from ix4 #c4 ,for the reasons for omitting ver4 #ad see above1 p4 #bbc4 #eeh ii4 #af4 #eei ,on this verse see more particularly below1 pp4 #cdj ff4 #efj ,so ,,lxx4 #efa ,read 4 ,cf4 with the whole passage iii4 #d f4 #efb for 4 #efc 4 #efd ,plural3 so ,,lxx4 #efe ,others read they are gone to ,assyria4 #eff ,literally knows4 ,see below1 p4 #cba1 n4 #i4 #efg ,see above1 p4 #bh4 #efh ,so1 after the ,,lxx41 by taking with this verse1 #h1 instead of with ver4 #i4 #efi iv4 #ab4 #egj iv4 #ac1 #ad4 #ega ,here1 between vv4 #aa and #ab1 ,wellhausen with justice proposes to insert ver4 #af4 #egb ,so ,wellhausen1 after ,,lxx42 probably correct4 #egc ,so we may attempt to echo the play on the words4 #egd ,cf41 e4g41 the ,proverbs of ,ptah-,hotep the ,egyptian1 circa #bejj ,b4,c4 ,there is no prudence in taking part in it1 and thousands of men destroy themselves in order to enjoy a moment1 brief as a dream1 while they gain death so as to know it4 ,it is a villainous 444 that of a man who excites himself 7872 if he goes on to carry it out1 his mind abandons him4 ,for as for him who is without repugnance for such an act1 there is no good sense at all in him4--,from the translation in ,records of the ,past1 ,second ,series1 ,vol4 ,,iii41 p4 #bd4 #ege #b ,peter i4 #egf ,doubtful4 ,the ,heb4 text gives an inappropriate if not impossible clause1 even if be taken from a root 1 to set or produce 7,barth1 ,etym4 ,stud41 #ff74 ,,lxx43 7,a4,q4 71 her the vine's fruit flourishing4 ,some parallel is required to of the first clause2 and it is possible that it may have been from a root or 1 corresponding to ,arabic s1 to wander in the sense of scattering or being scattered4 #egg ,after ,,lxx4 #egh ,doubtful4 ,lawsuits8 #egi ,calf1 inhabitants--so ,,lxx4 #ehj ,,lxx4 supplies4 #eha ,see above1 p4 #bfc4 #ehb ,very uncertain4 ,wellhausen reads from his idol1 4 #ehc 3 compare ,arabic qf1 to break2 but there is also the assonant ,arabic qb1 reed4 ,the ,rabbis translate foam3 cf4 the other meaning of --outbreak of anger1 which suggests bubble4 #ehd ,rosenmller3 more than in4 ,these days are evidently not the beginning of the kingship under ,saul 7so ,wellhausen71 for with that ,hosea has no quarrel1 but either the idolatry of ,micah 7,judg4 xvii4 #c ff471 or more probably the crime of ,benjamin 7,judg4 xix4 #bb74 #ehe ,obscure2 text corrupt1 and in next verse uncertain4 #ehf ,for the tense of the verse both participles are surely needed4 ,wellhausen thinks two redundant4 #ehg ,deut4 xxv4 #d2 #a ,cor4 ix4 #i2 #a ,tim4 v4 #ah4 #ehh ,,lxx43 fruit of life4 #ehi surely in the sense in which we find it in ,isa4 xl4 ff4 ,,lxx43 the fruits of righteousness shall be yours4 #eij ,we shall return to this passage in dealing with ,repentance2 see p4 #cde4 #eia ,so ,,lxx4 ,wellhausen suspects authenticity of the whole clause4 #eib ,wellhausen proposes to read for 1 but there is no need4 #eic ,see above1 p4 #baf1 n4 #e4 #eid ,so ,,lxx4 ,,chapter ,,xviii ,,the ,,fatherhood ,,and ,,humanity ,,of ,,god ,,hosea xi4 ,from the thick jungle of ,hosea's travail1 the eleventh chapter breaks like a high and open mound4 ,the prophet enjoys the first of his two clear visions--that of the ,past4#eie ,judgment continues to descend4 ,israel's ,sun is near his setting1 but before he sinks-- ,a lingering light he fondly throws ,on the dear hills1 whence first he rose4 ,across these confused and vicious years1 through which he has painfully made his way1 ,hosea sees the tenderness and the romance of the early history of his people4 ,and although he must strike the old despairing note--that1 by the insincerity of the present generation1 all the ancient guidance of their ,god must end in this6--yet for some moments the blessed memory shines by itself1 and ,god's mercy appears to triumph over ,israel's ingratitude4 ,surely their sun will not set2 ,love must prevail4 ,to which assurance a later voice from the ,exile has added1 in verses #aj and #aa1 a confirmation suitable to its own circumstances4 ,when ,israel was a child1 then ,i loved him1 ,and from ,egypt ,i called him to be ,my son4 ,the early history of ,israel was a romance4 ,think of it historically4 ,before the ,most ,high there spread an array of kingdoms and peoples4 ,at their head were three strong princes--sons indeed of ,god1 if all the heritage of the past1 the power of the present and the promise of the future be tokens4 ,egypt1 wrapt in the rich and jewelled web of centuries1 basked by ,nile and ,pyramid1 all the wonder of the world's art in his dreamy eyes4 ,opposite him ,assyria1 with barer but more massive limbs1 stood erect upon his highlands1 grasping in his sword the promise of the world's power4 ,between the two1 and using both of them1 yet with his eyes westward on an empire of which neither dreamed1 the ,phnician on his sea-coast built his storehouses and sped his navies1 the promise of the world's wealth4 ,it must ever remain the supreme romance of history1 that the true son of ,god1 bearer of ,his love and righteousness to all mankind1 should be found1 not only outside this powerful trinity1 but in the puny and despised captive of one of them--in a people that was not a state1 that had not a country1 that was without a history1 and1 if appearances be true1 was as yet devoid of even the rudiments of civilisation--a child people and a slave4 ,that was the ,romance1 and ,hosea gives us the ,grace which made it4 ,when ,israel was a child1 then ,i loved him4 ,the verb is a distinct impulse3 ,i began1 ,i learned1 to love him4 ,god's eyes1 that passed unheeding the adult princes of the world1 fell upon this little slave boy1 and ,he loved him and gave him a career3 from ,egypt ,i called him to be ,my son4 ,now1 historically1 it was the persuasion of this which made ,israel4 ,all their distinctiveness and character1 their progress from a level with other nomadic tribes to the rank of the greatest religious teachers of humanity1 started from the memory of these two facts--that ,god loved them1 and that ,god called them4 ,this was an unfailing conscience--the obligation that they were not their own1 the irresistible motive to repentance even in their utmost backsliding1 the unquenchable hope of a destiny in their direst days of defeat and scattering4 ,some1 of course1 may cavil at the narrow1 national scale on which such a belief was held1 but let them remember that it was held in trust for all mankind4 ,to snarl that ,israel felt this sonship to ,god only for themselves1 is to forget that it is they who have persuaded humanity that this is the only kind of sonship worth claiming4 ,almost every other nation of antiquity imagined a filial relation to the deity1 but it was either through some fabulous physical descent1 and then often confined only to kings and heroes1 or by some mystical mingling of the ,divine with the human1 which was just as gross and sensuous4 ,israel alone defined the connection as a historical and a moral one4 ,the sons of ,god are begotten not of blood1 nor of the will of the flesh1 nor of the will of man1 but of ,god4#eif ,sonship to ,god is something not physical1 but moral and historical1 into which men are carried by a supreme awakening to the ,divine love and authority4 ,israel1 it is true1 felt this only in a general way for the nation as a whole2#eig but their conception of it embraced just those moral contents which form the glory of ,christ's doctrine of the ,divine sonship of the individual4 ,the belief that ,god is our ,father does not come to us with our carnal birth--except in possibility3 the persuasion of it is not conferred by our baptism except in so far as that is ,christ's own seal to the fact that ,god ,almighty loves us and has marked us for ,his own4 ,to us sonship is a becoming1 not a being--the awakening of our adult minds into the surprise of a ,father's undeserved mercy1 into the constraint of ,his authority and the assurance of the destiny ,he has laid up for us4 ,it is conferred by love1 and confirmed by duty4 ,neither has power brought it1 nor wisdom1 nor wealth1 but it has come solely with the wonder of the knowledge that ,god loves us1 and has always loved us1 as well as in the sense1 immediately following1 of a true vocation to serve ,him4 ,sonship which is less than this is no sonship at all4 ,but so much as this is possible to every man through ,jesus ,christ4 ,his constant message is that the ,father loves every one of us1 and that if we know#eih that love1 we are ,god's sons indeed4 ,to them who feel it1 adoption into the number and privileges of the sons of ,god comes with the amazement and the romance which glorified ,god's choice of the child-slave ,israel4 ,behold1 they cry1 what manner of love the ,father hath bestowed upon us1 that we should be called the sons of ,god4#eii ,but we cannot be loved by ,god and left where we are4 ,beyond the grace there lies the long discipline and destiny4 ,we are called from servitude to freedom1 from the world to ,god--each of us to run a course1 and do a work1 which can be done by no one else4 ,that ,israel did not perceive this was ,god's sore sorrow with them4 ,the more ,i#fjj called to them1 the farther they went from ,me4#fja ,they to the ,ba'alim kept sacrificing1 and to images offering incense4 ,but ,god persevered with grace1 and the story is at first continued in the figure of ,fatherhood with which it commenced2 then it changes to the metaphor of a humane man's goodness to his beasts4 ,yet ,i taught ,ephraim to walk1 holding them on ,mine arms1#fjb but they knew not that ,i healed them--presumably when they fell and hurt themselves4 ,with the cords of a man ,i would draw them1 with bands of love2 and ,i was to them as those who lift up the yoke on their jaws1 and gently would ,i give them to eat4#fjc ,it is the picture of a team of bullocks1 in charge of a kind driver4 ,israel are no longer the wanton young cattle of the previous chapter1 which need the yoke firmly fastened on their neck1#fjd but a team of toiling oxen mounting some steep road4 ,there is no use now for the rough ropes1 by which frisky animals are kept to their work2 but the driver1 coming to his beasts' heads1 by the gentle touch of his hand at their mouths and by words of sympathy draws them after him4 ,i drew them with cords of a man1 and with bands of love4 ,yet there is the yoke1 and it would seem that certain forms of this1 when beasts were working upwards1 as we should say against the collar1 pressed and rubbed upon them1 so that the humane driver1 when he came to their heads1 eased the yoke with his hands4 ,i was as they that take the yoke off their jaws2#fje and then1 when they got to the top of the hill1 he would rest and feed them4 ,that is the picture1 and however uncertain we may feel as to some of its details1 it is obviously a passage--,ewald says the earliest of all passages--in which human means precisely the same as love4 ,it ought to be taken along with that other passage in the great ,prophecy of the ,exile1 where ,god is described as ,he that led them through the deep1 as an horse in the wilderness1 that they should not stumble3 as a beast goeth down into the valley1 the ,spirit of the ,lord gave him rest4#fjf ,thus then the figure of the fatherliness of ,god changes into that of ,his gentleness or humanity4 ,do not let us think that there is here either any descent of the poetry or want of connection between the two figures4 ,the change is true1 not only to ,israel's1 but to our own experience4 ,men are all either the eager children of happy1 irresponsible days1 or the bounden1 plodding draught-cattle of life's serious burdens and charges4 ,hosea's double figure reflects human life in its whole range4 ,which of us has not known this fatherliness of the ,most ,high1 exercised upon us1 as upon ,israel1 throughout our years of carelessness and disregard8 ,it was ,god ,himself who taught and trained us then2-- ,when through the slippery paths of youth ,with heedless steps ,i ran1 ,thine arm unseen conveyed me safe1 ,and led me up to man4 ,those speedy recoveries from the blunders of early wilfulness1 those redemptions from the sins of youth--happy were we if we knew that it was ,he who healed us4 ,but there comes a time when men pass from leading-strings to harness--when we feel faith less and duty more--when our work touches us more closely than our ,god4 ,death must be a strange transformer of the spirit1 yet surely not more strange than life1 which out of the eager buoyant child makes in time the slow automaton of duty4 ,it is such a stage which the fourth of these verses suits1 when we look up1 not so much for the fatherliness as for the gentleness and humanity of our ,god4 ,a man has a mystic power of a very wonderful kind upon the animals over whom he is placed4 ,on any of these wintry roads of ours we may see it1 when a kind carter gets down at a hill1 and1 throwing the reins on his beast's back1 will come to its head and touch it with his bare hands1 and speak to it as if it were his fellow2 till the deep eyes fill with light1 and out of these things1 so much weaker than itself1 a touch1 a glance1 a word1 there will come to it new strength to pull the stranded waggon onward4 ,the man is as a god to the beast1 coming down to help it1 and it almost makes the beast human that he does so4 ,not otherwise does ,hosea feel the help which ,god gives ,his own on the weary hills of life4 ,we need not discipline1 for our work is discipline enough1 and the cares we carry of themselves keep us straight and steady4 ,but we need sympathy and gentleness--this very humanity which the prophet attributes to our ,god4 ,god comes and takes us by the head2 through the mystic power which is above us1 but which makes us like itself1 we are lifted to our task4 ,let no one judge this incredible4 ,the incredible would be that our ,god should prove any less to us than the merciful man is to his beast4 ,but we are saved from argument by experience4 ,when we remember how1 as life has become steep and our strength exhausted1 there has visited us a thought which has sharpened to a word1 a word which has warmed to a touch1 and we have drawn ourselves together and leapt up new men1 can we feel that ,god was any less in these things1 than in the voice of conscience or the message of forgiveness1 or the restraints of ,his discipline8 ,nay1 though the reins be no longer felt1 ,god is at our head1 that we should not stumble nor stand still4 ,upon this gracious passage there follows one of those swift revulsions of feeling1 which we have learned almost to expect in ,hosea4 ,his insight again overtakes his love4 ,the people will not respond to the goodness of their ,god2 it is impossible to work upon minds so fickle and insincere4 ,discipline is what they need4 ,he shall return to the land of ,egypt1 or ,asshur shall be his king 7it is still an alternative71 for they have refused to return to ,me4444#fjg ',tis but one more instance of the age-long apostasy of the people4 ,my people have a bias#fjh to turn from ,me2 and though they 7the prophets7 call them upwards1 none of them can lift them4#fji ,yet ,god is ,god1 and though prophecy fail ,he will attempt ,his ,love once more4 ,there follows the greatest passage in ,hosea--deepest if not highest of his book--the breaking forth of that exhaustless mercy of the ,most ,high which no sin of man can bar back nor wear out4 ,how am ,i to give thee up1 ,o ,ephraim8 ,how am ,i to let thee go1 ,o ,israel8 ,how am ,i to give thee up8 ,am ,i to make an ,admah of thee--a eboim8 ,my heart is turned upon ,me1 ,my compassions begin to boil3 ,i will not perform the fierceness of ,mine anger1 ,i will not turn to destroy ,ephraim2 ,for ,god am ,i and not man1 ,the ,holy ,one in the midst of thee1 yet ,i come not to consume6#faj ,such a love has been the secret of ,hosea's persistence through so many years with so faithless a people1 and now1 when he has failed1 it takes voice to itself and in its irresistible fulness makes this last appeal4 ,once more before the end let ,israel hear ,god in the utterness of ,his ,love6 ,the verses are a climax1 and obviously to be succeeded by a pause4 ,on the brink of his doom1 will ,israel turn to such a ,god1 at such a call8 ,the next verse1 though dependent for its promise on this same exhaustless ,love1 is from an entirely different circumstance1 and cannot have been put by ,hosea here4#faa ,,footnotes3 #eie ,see above1 p4 #bec4 #eif ,st4 ,john's ,gospel1 i4 #ab1 #ac4 #eig ,or occasionally for the king as the nation's representative4 #eih ,see below1 pp4 #cba-c4 #eii #a ,john iii4 #fjj ,so rightly the ,,lxx4 #fja ,,lxx41 rightly separating into and 1 which latter is the nominative to the next clause4 #fjb ,so again rightly the ,,lxx4 #fjc ,the reading is uncertain4 ,the of the following verse 7#f7 must be read as the ,greek reads it1 as 1 and taken with ver4 #e4 #fjd x4 #aa4 #fje ,or lifted forward from the neck to the jaws4 #fjf ,isa4 lxiii4 #ac1 #ad4 #fjg ,ver4 #f has an obviously corrupt text1 and1 weakening as it does the climax of ver4 #e1 may be an insertion4 #fjh ,are hung or swung towards turning away from ,me4 #fji ,this verse is also uncertain4 #faj ,for 1 which makes nonsense1 read 1 to consume1 or with ,wellhausen amend further 1 ,i am not willing to consume4 #faa ,they will follow ,jehovah2 like a lion ,he will roar1 and they shall hurry trembling from the west4 ,like birds shall they hurry trembling from ,egypt1 and like doves from the land of ,assyria1 and ,i will bring them to their homes--'tis the oracle of ,jehovah4 ,not only does this verse contain expressions which are unusual to ,hosea1 and a very strange metaphor1 but it is not connected either historically or logically with the previous verse4 ,the latter deals with the people before ,god has scattered them--offers them one more chance before exile comes on them4 ,but in this verse they are already scattered1 and just about to be brought back4 ,it is such a promise as both in language and metaphor was common among the prophets of the ,exile4 ,in the ,,lxx4 the verse is taken from chap4 xi4 and put with chap4 xii4 ,,chapter ,,xix ,,the ,,final ,,argument ,,hosea xii4-xiv4 #a4 ,the impassioned call with which last chapter closed was by no means an assurance of salvation3 ,how am ,i to give thee up1 ,ephraim8 how am ,i to let thee go1 ,israel8 ,on the contrary1 it was the anguish of ,love1 when it hovers over its own on the brink of the destruction to which their wilfulness has led them1 and before relinquishing them would seek1 if possible1 some last way to redeem4 ,surely that fatal morrow and the people's mad leap into it are not inevitable6 ,at least1 before they take the leap1 let the prophet go back once more upon the moral situation of to-day1 go back once more upon the past of the people1 and see if he can find anything else to explain that bias to apostasy#fab which has brought them to this fatal brink--anything else which may move them to repentance even there4 ,so in chaps4 xii4 and xiii4 ,hosea turns upon the now familiar trail of his argument1 full of the ,divine jealousy1 determined to give the people one other chance to turn2 but if they will not1 he at least will justify ,god's relinquishment of them4 ,the chapters throw even a brighter light upon the temper and habits of that generation4 ,they again explore ,israel's ancient history for causes of the present decline2 and1 in especial1 they cite the spiritual experience of the ,father of the nation1 as if to show that what of repentance was possible for him is possible for his posterity also4 ,but once more all hope is seen to be vain2 and ,hosea's last travail with his obstinate people closes in a doom even more awful than its predecessors4 ,the division into chapters is probably correct2 but while chap4 xiii4 is well-ordered and clear1 the arrangement1 and in parts the meaning1 of chap4 xii4 are very obscure4 #a4 ,,the ,,people ,,and ,,their ,,father ,,jacob4 ,,hosea xii4 ,in no part even of the difficult ,book of ,hosea does the sacred text bristle with more problems4 ,it may well be doubted whether the verses lie in their proper order1 or1 if they do1 whether we have them entire as they came from the prophet1 for the connection is not always perceptible4#fac ,we cannot believe1 however1 that the chapter is a bundle of isolated oracles1 for the analogy between ,jacob and his living posterity runs through the whole of it1#fad and the refrain that ,god must requite upon the nation their deeds is found both near the beginning and at the end of the chapter4#fae ,one is tempted to take the two fragments about the ,patriarch 7vv4 #d1 #e1 and #ac f47 by themselves1 and the more so that ver4 #h would follow so suitably on either ver4 #b or ver4 #c4 ,but this clue is not sufficient2 and till one more evident is discovered1 it is perhaps best to keep to the extant arrangement4#faf ,as before1 the argument starts from the falseness of ,israel1 which is illustrated in the faithlessness of their foreign relations4 ,ephraim hath compassed ,me with lies1 and the house of ,israel with deceit1 and ,judah 444#fag ,ephraim herds the wind#fah and hunts the sirocco4 ,all day long they heap up falsehood and fraud3#fai they strike a bargain with ,assyria1 and carry oil to ,egypt1 as ,isaiah also complained4#fbj ,jehovah hath a quarrel with ,israel#fba and is about to visit upon ,jacob his ways2 according to his deeds will ,he requite him4 ,in the womb he supplanted his brother1 and in his man's strength he wrestled with ,god4#fbb ,yea1 he wrestled with the ,angel and prevailed2 he wept and besought of ,him mercy4 ,at ,bethel he met with ,him1 and there ,he spake with him#fbc 7or with us--that is1 in the person of our father74444#fbd ,so thou by thy ,god--by ,his help1#fbe for no other way is possible except1 like thy father1 through wrestling with ,him--shouldest return3 keep leal love and justice1 and wait on thy ,god without ceasing4#fbf ,to this passage we shall return in dealing with ,hosea's doctrine of ,repentance4 ,in characteristic fashion the discourse now swerves from the ideal to the real state of the people4 ,canaan6 ,so the prophet nicknames his mercenary generation4#fbg ,with false balances in his hand1 he loves to defraud4 ,for ,ephraim said1 ,ah but ,i have grown rich1 ,i have won myself wealth4#fbh ,none of my gains can touch me with guilt which is sin4#fbi ,but ,i1 ,jehovah thy ,god from the land of ,egypt--,i could make thee dwell in tents again1 as in the days of the ,assembly in ,horeb--,i could destroy all this commercial civilisation of thine1 and reduce thee to thine ancient level of nomadic life--and ,i spake to the prophets3 it was ,i who multiplied vision1 and by the hand of the prophets gave parables4 ,if ,gilead be for idolatry1 then shall it become vanity6 ,if in ,gilgal--,stone-,circle--they sacrifice bullocks1#fcj stone-heaps shall their altars become among the furrows of the field4 ,one does not see the connection of these verses with the preceding4 ,but now the discourse oscillates once more to the national father1 and the parallel between his own and his people's experience4 ,and ,jacob fled to the land#fca of ,aram1 and ,israel served for a wife1 and for a wife he herded sheep4 ,and by a prophet ,jehovah brought ,israel up from ,egypt1 and by a prophet he was shepherded4 ,and ,ephraim hath given bitter provocation2 but his blood-guiltiness shall be upon him1 and his ,lord shall return it to him4 ,i cannot trace the argument here4 #b4 ,,the ,,last ,,judgment4 ,,hosea xiii4-xiv4 #a4 ,the crisis draws on4 ,on the one hand ,israel's sin1 accumulating1 bulks ripe for judgment4 ,on the other the times grow more fatal1 or the prophet more than ever feels them so4 ,he will gather once again the old truths on the old lines--the great past when ,jehovah was ,god alone1 the descent to the idols and the mushroom monarchs of to-day1 the people1 who once had been strong1 sapped by luxury1 forgetful1 stupid1 not to be roused4 ,the discourse has every mark of being ,hosea's latest4 ,there is clearness and definiteness beyond anything since chap4 iv4 ,there are ease and lightness of treatment1 a playful sarcasm1 as if the themes were now familiar both to the prophet and his audience4 ,but1 chiefly1 there is the passion--so suitable to last words--of how different it all might have been1 if to this crisis ,israel had come with store of strength instead of guilt4 ,how these years1 with their opening into the great history of the world1 might have meant a birth for the nation1 which instead was lying upon them like a miscarried child in the mouth of the womb6 ,it was a fatality ,god ,himself could not help in4 ,only death and hell remained4 ,let them1 then1 have their way6 ,samaria must expiate her guilt in the worst horrors of war4 ,instead of with one definite historical event1 this last effort of ,hosea opens more naturally with a summary of all ,ephraim's previous history4 ,the tribe had been the first in ,israel till they took to idols4 ,whenever ,ephraim spake there was trembling4#fcb ,prince#fcc was he in ,israel2 but he fell into guilt through the ,ba'al1 and so--died4 ,even now they continue to sin and make them a smelting of their silver1 idols after their own model1#fcd smith's work all of it4 ,to them--to such things--they speak6 ,sacrificing men kiss calves6 ,in such unreason have they sunk4 ,they cannot endure4 ,therefore shall they be like the morning cloud and like the dew that early vanisheth1 like chaff which whirleth up from the floor and like smoke from the window4 ,and ,i was thy ,god#fce from the land of ,egypt2 and god besides ,me thou knowest not1 nor saviour has there been any but ,myself4 ,i shepherded#fcf thee in the wilderness1 in the land of droughts--long before they came among the gods of fertile ,canaan4 ,but once they came hither1 the more pasture they had1 the more they ate themselves full1 and the more they ate themselves full1 the more was their heart uplifted1 so they forgat ,me4 ,so that ,i must be#fcg to them like a lion1 like a leopard on the way ,i must leap4#fch ,i will fall on them like a bear robbed of its young1 and will tear the caul of their hearts1 and will devour them like a lion--wild beasts shall rend them4#fci ,when ,he hath destroyed thee1 ,o ,israel--who then may help thee8#fdj ,where is thy king now8 that he may save thee1 or all thy princes8 that they may rule thee2#fda those of whom thou hast said1 ,give me a king and princes4 ,aye1 ,i give thee a king in ,mine anger1 and ,i take him away in ,my wrath6 ,fit summary of the short and bloody reigns of these last years4 ,gathered is ,ephraim's guilt1 stored up is his sin4 ,the nation is pregnant--but with guilt6 ,birth pangs seize him1 but--the figure changes1 with ,hosea's own swiftness1 from mother to child--he is an impracticable son2#fdb for this is no time to stand in the mouth of the womb4 ,the years that might have been the nation's birth are by their own folly to prove their death4 ,israel lies in the way of its own redemption--how truly this has been forced home upon them in one chapter after another6 ,shall ,god then step in and work a deliverance on the brink of death8 ,from the hand of ,sheol shall ,i deliver them8 from death shall ,i redeem them8 ,nay1 let death and ,sheol have their way4 ,where are thy plagues1 ,o death8 where thy destruction1 ,sheol8 ,here with them4 ,compassion is hid from ,mine eyes4 ,this great verse has been very variously rendered4 ,some have taken it as a promise3 ,i will deliver 444 ,i will redeem4444 ,so the ,septuagint translated1 and ,st4 ,paul borrowed1 not the whole ,greek verse1 but its spirit and one or two of its terms1 for his triumphant challenge to death in the power of the ,resurrection of ,christ4#fdc ,as it stands in ,hosea1 however1 the verse must be a threat4 ,the last clause unambiguously abjures mercy1 and the statement that ,his people will not be saved1 for ,god cannot save them1 is one in thorough harmony with all ,hosea's teaching4#fdd ,an appendix follows with the illustration of the exact form which doom shall take4 ,as so frequently with ,hosea1 it opens with a play upon the people's name1 which at the same time faintly echoes the opening of the chapter4 ,although he among his brethren#fde is the fruit-bearer--yaphri'1 he ,ephraim--there shall come an east wind1 a wind of ,jehovah rising from the wilderness1 so that his fountain dry up and his spring be parched4 ,he--himself1 not the ,assyrian1 but ,menahem1 who had to send gold to the ,assyrian--shall strip the treasury of all its precious jewels4 ,samaria must bear her guilt3 for she hath rebelled against her ,god4 ,to this simple issue has the impenitence of the people finally reduced the many possibilities of those momentous years2 and their last prophet leaves them looking forward to the crash which came some dozen years later in the invasion and captivity of the land4 ,they shall fall by the sword2 their infants shall be dashed in pieces1 and their women with child ripped up4 ,horrible details1 but at that period certain to follow every defeat in war4 ,,footnotes3 #fab xi4 #g4 #fac ,this is especially true of vv4 #aa and #ab4 #fad ,even in the most detachable portion1 vv4 #h-aj1 where the of ver4 #i seems to refer to the of ver4 #d4 #fae ,viz4 in vv4 #c and #ae4 #faf ,beer indeed1 at the close of a very ingenious analysis of the chapter 7,z4,a4,t4,w41 #ahic1 pp4 #bha ff471 claims to have proved that it contains eine wohlgegliederte ,rede des ,propheten 7p4 #bib74 ,but he reaches this conclusion only by several forced and precarious arguments4 ,especially unsound do his pleas appear that in #h;b is a play upon the root-meaning of 1 lowly2 that 1 in analogy to the of ver4 #d1 is the crude original1 the raw material1 of the ,ephraim of ver4 #i2 and that is the determined time of the coming judgment on ,israel4 #fag ,something is written about ,judah 7remember what was said above about ,hosea's treble parallels71 but the text is too obscure for translation4 ,the theory that it has been altered by a later ,judan writer in favour of his own people is probably correct3 the ,authorised ,version translates in favour of ,judah2 so too ,guthe in ,kautzsch's ,bibel4 ,but an adverse statement is required by the parallel clauses1 and the ,hebrew text allows this3 ,judah is still wayward with ,god1 and with the ,holy ,one who is faithful4 ,so virtually ,ewald1 ,hitzig1 ,wnsche1 ,nowack and ,cheyne4 ,but ,cornill and ,wellhausen read the second half of the clause as 1 profanes himself with ,qedeshim 7,z4,a4,t4,w41 #ahhg1 pp4 #bhf ff474 #fah ,why should not ,hosea1 the master of many forced phrases1 have also uttered this one8 ,this in answer to ,wellhausen4 #fai ,so ,,lxx41 reading for 4 #fbj ,isa4 xxx4 #f4 #fba ,heb4 ,judah1 but surely ,israel is required by the next verse1 which is a play upon the two names ,israel and ,jacob4 #fbb ,supplanted is 'aqab1 the presumable root of ,ja'aqab 7,jacob74 ,wrestled with ,god is ,sarah eth ,elohim1 the presumable origin of ,yisra'el 7,israel74 #fbc ,heb4 us1 ,,lxx4 them4 #fbd ,ver4 #f--;,and ,jehovah ,god of ,hosts1 ,jehovah is ,his memorial1 i4e4 name--is probably an insertion for the reasons mentioned above1 pp4 #bjd f4 #fbe ,this1 the most natural rendering of the ,hebrew phrase1 has been curiously omitted by ,beer1 who says that can only mean to thy ,god4 ,hitzig3 durch deinen ,gott4 #fbf ,some take these words as addressed by ,jehovah at ,bethel to the ,patriarch4 #fbg ,so nearly all interpreters4 ,hitzig aptly quotes ,polybius1 ,de ,virtute1 ,l4 ix43 1 4444 ,one might also refer to the ,romans' idea of the ,punica fides4 #fbh ,or1 full man's strength3 ct4 ver4 #d4 #fbi ,but the ,,lxx4 reads3 ,all his gains shalt not be found of him because of the iniquity which he has sinned2 and ,wellhausen emends this to3 ,all his gain sufficeth not for the guilt which it has incurred4 #fcj ,others to demons4 #fca ,field1 but here in sense of territory4 ,see ,hist4 ,geog41 pp4 #gi f4 #fcb ,uncertain4 #fcc for 4 #fcd ,read with ,ewald 4 ,,lxx4 read 4 #fce ,here the ,,lxx4 makes the insertion noted on pp4 #bjc1 #bbf4 #fcf ,so ,,lxx41 4 #fcg ,read 4 #fch 1 usually taken as first fut4 of 1 to lurk4 ,but there is a root of common use in ,arabic1 sar1 to spring up suddenly1 of wine into the head or of a lion on its prey2 sawr1 the springer1 is one of the ,arabic names for lion4 #fci ,we shall treat this passage later in connection with ,hosea's doctrine of the knowledge of ,god3 see pp4 #ccj f4 #fdj ,after the ,,lxx4 #fda ,read with ,houtsma 4 #fdb ,literally a son not wise1 perhaps a name given to children whose birth was difficult4 #fdc ,the ,,lxx4 reads3 1 1 2 ,but ,paul says3 1 1 1 1 2 ,i ,cor4 xv4 #ee 7,westcott and ,hort's ,ed474 #fdd ,the following is a list of the interpretations of verse #ad4 ,a4 ,taken as a threat #a4 ,it is ,i who redeemed you from the grip of the grave1 and who delivered you from death--but now ,i will call up the words 7sic7 of death against you2 for repentance is hid from ,my eyes4 ,so ,raschi4 #b4 ,i would have redeemed them from the grip of ,sheol1 etc41 if they had been wise1 but being foolish ,i will bring on them the plagues of death4 ,so ,kimchi1 ,eichhorn1 ,simson1 etc4 #c ,should ,i or shall ,i deliver them from the hand of ,sheol1 redeem them from death8 etc41 as in the text above4 ,so ,wnsche1 ,wellhausen1 ,guthe in ,kautzsch's ,bibel4 etc4 ,b4 ,taken as a promise4 ,from the hand of ,sheol ,i will deliver them1 from death redeem them1 etc4 ,so ,umbreit1 ,ewald1 ,hitzig and ,authorised and ,revised ,english ,versions4 ,in this case repentance in the last clause must be taken as resentment 7,ewald74 ,but1 as ,ewald sees1 the whole verse must then be put in a parenthesis1 as an ejaculation of promise in the midst of a context that only threatens4 ,some without change of word render3 ,i will be thy plagues1 ,o death8 ,i will be thy sting1 ,o hell4 ,so the ,authorised ,english ,version4 #fde ,text doubtful4 ,,chapter ,,xx ,i ,,will ,,be ,,as ,,the ,,dew ,,hosea xiv4 #b-aj4 ,like the ,book of ,amos1 the ,book of ,hosea1 after proclaiming the people's inevitable doom1 turns to a blessed prospect of their restoration to favour with ,god4 ,it will be remembered that we decided against the authenticity of such an epilogue in the ,book of ,amos2 and it may now be asked1 how can we come to any other conclusion with regard to the similar peroration in the ,book of ,hosea8 ,for the following reasons4 ,we decided against the genuineness of the closing verses of ,amos1 because their sanguine temper is opposed to the temper of the whole of the rest of the book1 and because they neither propose any ethical conditions for the attainment of the blessed future1 nor in their picture of the latter do they emphasise one single trace of the justice1 or the purity1 or the social kindliness1 on which ,amos has so exclusively insisted as the ideal relations of ,israel to ,jehovah4 ,it seemed impossible to us that ,amos could imagine the perfect restoration of his people in the terms only of requickened nature1 and say nothing about righteousness1 truth and mercy towards the poor4 ,the prospect which now closes his book is psychologically alien to him1 and1 being painted in the terms of later prophecy1 may be judged to have been added by some prophet of the ,exile1 speaking from the standpoint1 and with the legitimate desires1 of his own day4 ,but the case is very different for this epilogue in ,hosea4 ,in the first place1 ,hosea has not only continually preached repentance1 and been1 from his whole affectionate temper of mind1 unable to believe repentance impossible2 but he has actually predicted the restoration of his people upon certain well-defined and ethical conditions4 ,in chap4 ii4 he has drawn for us in detail the whole prospect of ,god's successful treatment of his erring spouse4 ,israel should be weaned from their sensuousness and its accompanying trust in idols by a severe discipline1 which the prophet describes in terms of their ancient wanderings in the wilderness4 ,they should be reduced1 as at the beginning of their history1 to moral converse with their ,god2 and abjuring the ,ba'alim 7later chapters imply also their foreign allies and foolish kings and princes7 should return to ,jehovah1 when ,he1 having proved that these could not give them the fruits of the land they sought after1 should ,himself quicken the whole course of nature to bless them with the fertility of the soil and the friendliness even of the wild beasts4 ,now in the epilogue and its prospect of ,israel's repentance we find no feature1 physical or moral1 which has not already been furnished by these previous promises of the book4 ,all their ethical conditions are provided2 nothing but what they have conceived of blessing is again conceived4 ,israel is to abjure senseless sacrifice and come to ,jehovah with rational and contrite confession4#fdf ,she is to abjure her foreign alliances4#fdg ,she is to trust in the fatherly love of her ,god4#fdh ,he is to heal her1#fdi and ,his anger is to turn away4#fej ,he is to restore nature1 just as described in chap4 ii41 and the scenery of the restoration is borrowed from ,hosea's own ,galilee4 ,there is1 in short1 no phrase or allusion of which we can say that it is alien to the prophet's style or environment1 while the very keynotes of his book--return1 backsliding1 idols the work of our hands1 such pity as a father hath1 and perhaps even the answer or converse of verse #i--;are all struck once more4 ,the epilogue then is absolutely different from the epilogue to the ,book of ,amos1 nor can the present expositor conceive of the possibility of a stronger case for the genuineness of any passage of ,scripture4 ,the sole difficulty seems to be the place in which we find it--a place where its contradiction to the immediately preceding sentence of doom is brought out into relief4 ,we need not suppose1 however1 that it was uttered by ,hosea in immediate proximity to the latter1 nor even that it formed his last word to ,israel4 ,but granting only 7as the above evidence obliges us to do7 that it is the prophet's own1 this fourteenth chapter may have been a discourse addressed by him at one of those many points when1 as we know1 he had some hope of the people's return4 ,personally1 ,i should think it extremely likely that ,hosea's ministry closed with that final1 hopeless proclamation in chap4 xiii43 no other conclusion was possible so near the fall of ,samaria1 and the absolute destruction of the ,northern ,kingdom4 ,but ,hosea had already in chap4 ii4 painted the very opposite issue as a possible ideal for his people2 and during some break in those years when their insincerity was less obtrusive1 and the final doom still uncertain1 the prophet's heart swung to its natural pole in the exhaustless and steadfast love of ,god1 and he uttered his unmingled gospel4 ,that either himself or the unknown editor of his prophecies should have placed it at the very end of his book is not less than what we might have expected4 ,for if the book were to have validity beyond the circumstances of its origin1 beyond the judgment which was so near and so inevitable1 was it not right to let something else than the proclamation of this latter be its last word to men8 was it not right to put as the conclusion of the whole matter the ideal eternally valid for ,israel--the gospel which is ever ,god's last word to ,his people8#fea ,at some point or other1 then1 in the course of his ministry1 there was granted to ,hosea an open vision like to the vision which he has recounted in the second chapter4 ,he called on the people to repent4 ,for once1 and in the power of that ,love to which he had already said all things are possible1 it seemed to him as if repentance came4 ,the tangle and intrigue of his generation fell away2 fell away the reeking sacrifices and the vain show of worship4 ,the people turned from their idols and puppet-kings1 from ,assyria and from ,egypt1 and with contrite hearts came to ,god ,himself1 who1 healing and loving1 opened to them wide the gates of the future4 ,it is not strange that down this spiritual vista the prophet should see the same scenery as daily filled his bodily vision4 ,throughout ,galilee ,lebanon#feb dominates the landscape4 ,you cannot lift your eyes from any spot of ,northern ,israel without resting them upon the vast mountain4 ,from the unhealthy jungles of the ,upper ,jordan1 the pilgrim lifts his heart to the cool hill air above1 to the ever-green cedars and firs1 to the streams and waterfalls that drop like silver chains off the great breastplate of snow4 ,from ,esdraelon and every plain the peasants look to ,lebanon to store the clouds and scatter the rain2 it is not from heaven but from ,hermon that they expect the dew1 their only hope in the long drought of summer4 ,across ,galilee and in ,northern ,ephraim1 across ,bashan and in ,northern ,gilead1 across ,hauran and on the borders of the desert1 the mountain casts its spell of power1 its lavish promise of life4#fec ,lebanon is everywhere the summit of the land1 and there are points from which it is as dominant as heaven4 ,no wonder then that our northern prophet painted the blessed future in the poetry of the ,mountain--its air1 its dew and its trees4 ,other seers were to behold1 in the same latter days1 the mountain of the ,lord above the tops of the mountains2 the ordered city1 her steadfast walls salvation1 and her open gates praise2 the wealth of the ,gentiles flowing into her1 profusion of flocks for sacrifice1 profusion of pilgrims2 the great ,temple and its solemn services2 and the glory of ,lebanon shall come unto thee1 fir-tree and pine and box-tree together1 to beautify the place of ,my ,sanctuary4#fed ,but1 with his home in the north1 and weary of sacrifice and ritual1 weary of everything artificial whether it were idols or puppet-kings1 ,hosea turns to the glory of ,lebanon as it lies1 untouched by human tool or art1 fresh and full of peace from ,god's own hand4 ,like that other seer of ,galilee1 ,hosea in his vision of the future saw no temple therein4#fee ,his sacraments are the open air1 the mountain breeze1 the dew1 the vine1 the lilies1 the pines2 and what ,god asks of men are not rites nor sacrifices1 but life and health1 fragrance and fruitfulness1 beneath the shadow and the ,dew of ,his ,presence4 ,return1 ,o ,israel1 to ,jehovah thy ,god1 for thou hast stumbled by thine iniquity4 ,take with you words#fef and return unto ,jehovah4 ,say unto ,him1 ,remove iniquity altogether1 and take good1 so will we render the calves#feg of our lips2 confessions1 vows1 these are the sacrificial offerings ,god delights in4 ,which vows are now registered3-- ,asshur shall not save us2 ,we will not ride upon horses 7from ,egypt72 ,and we will say no more1 ,o our ,god1 to the work of our hands3 ,for in ,thee the fatherless findeth a father's pity4 ,alien help1 whether in the protection of ,assyria or the cavalry which ,pharaoh sends in return for ,israel's homage2 alien gods1 whose idols we have ourselves made1--we abjure them all1 for we remember how ,thou didst promise to show a father's love to the people whom ,thou didst name1 for their mother's sins1 ,lo-,ruhamah1 the ,unfathered4 ,then ,god replies3-- ,i will heal their backsliding1 ,i will love them freely3 ,for ,mine anger is turned away from them4 ,i will be as the dew unto ,israel3 ,he shall blossom as the lily1 ,and strike his roots deep as ,lebanon2 ,his branches shall spread1 ,and his beauty shall be as the olive-tree1 ,and his smell as ,lebanon-- smell of clear mountain air with the scent of the pines upon it4 ,the figure in the end of ver4 #f seems forced to some critics1 who have proposed various emendations1 such as like the fast-rooted trees of ,lebanon1#feh but any one who has seen how the mountain himself rises from great roots1 cast out across the land like those of some giant oak1 will not feel it necessary to mitigate the metaphor4 ,the prophet now speaks3-- ,they shall return and dwell in ,his shadow4 ,they shall live well-watered as a garden1 ,till they flourish like the vine1 ,and be fragrant like the wine of ,lebanon4#fei ,god speaks3-- ,ephraim1 what has he#ffj to do any more with idols6 ,i have spoken for him1 and ,i will look after him4 ,i am like an ever-green fir2 ,from ,me is thy fruit found4 ,this version is not without its difficulties2 but the alternative that ,god is addressed and ,ephraim is the speaker--,ephraim says1 ,what have ,i to do any more with idols8 ,i answer and look to ,him3 ,i am like a green fir-tree2 from me is ,thy fruit found--has even greater difficulties1#ffa although it avoids the unusual comparison of the ,deity with a tree4 ,the difficulties of both interpretations may be overcome by dividing the verse between ,god and the people3-- ,ephraim6 what has he to do any more with idols3 ,i have spoken for him1 and will look after him4 ,in this case the speaking would be intended in the same sense as the speaking in chap4 ii4 to the heavens and earth1 that they might speak to the corn and wine4#ffb ,then ,ephraim replies3-- ,i am like an ever-green fir-tree2 ,from me is ,thy fruit found4 ,but the division appears artificial1 and the text does not suggest that the two ,i's belong to different speakers4 ,the first version therefore is the preferable4 99 99 99 99 99 ,some one has added a summons to later generations to lay this book to heart in face of their own problems and sins4 ,may we do so for ourselves6 ,who is wise1 that he understands these things8 ,intelligent1 that he knows them8 ,yea1 straight are the ways of ,jehovah1 ,and the righteous shall walk therein1 but sinners shall stumble upon them4 ,,footnotes3 #fdf ,cf4 vi4 #f1 etc4 #fdg ,cf4 xii4 #b1 etc4 #fdh ,cf4 i4 #g2 ii4 #bb1 #be4 #fdi ,cf4 xi4 #d4 #fej ,cf4 xi4 #h1 #i4 #fea ,since preparing the above for the press there has come into my hands ,professor ,cheyne's ,introduction to the new edition of ,robertson ,smith's ,the ,prophets of ,israel1 in which 7p4 xix47 he reaches with regard to ,hosea xiv4 #b-aj conclusions entirely opposite to those reached above4 ,professor ,cheyne denies the passage to ,hosea on the grounds that it is akin in language and imagery and ideas to writings of the age which begins with ,jeremiah1 and which among other works includes the ,song of ,songs4 ,but1 as has been shown above1 the language1 imagery and ideas are all akin to what ,professor ,cheyne admits to be genuine prophecies of ,hosea2 and the likeness to them of1 e4g41 ,jer4 xxxi4 #aj-bj may be explained on the same ground as so much else in ,jeremiah1 by the influence of ,hosea4 ,the allusion in ver4 #c suits ,hosea's own day more than ,jeremiah's4 ,nor can ,i understand what ,professor ,cheyne means by this3 ,the spirituality of the tone of vers4 #a-c is indeed surprising 7contrast the picture in ,hos4 v4 #f74 ,spirituality surprising in the book that contains ,i will have love and not sacrifice1 and the knowledge of ,god rather than burnt-offerings6 ,the verse1 v4 #f1 he would contrast with xiv4 #a-c is actually one in which ,hosea says that when they go with flocks and herds ,israel shall not find ,god6 ,he says that to understand ,hosea aright we must omit it 7i4e4 the whole epilogue74 ,but after the argument ,i have given above it will be plain that if we understand ,hosea aright we have every reason not to omit it4 ,his last contention1 that to have added anything to the stern warning in xiii4 #af would have robbed it of half its force1 is fully met by the considerations stated above on p4 #caj4 #feb ,by ,lebanon in the fourteenth chapter and almost always in the ,old ,testament we must understand not the western range now called ,lebanon1 for that makes no impression on the ,holy ,land1 its bulk lying too far to the north1 but ,hermon1 the southmost and highest summits of ,anti-,lebanon4 ,see ,hist4 ,geog41 pp4 #dag f4 #fec ,full sixty miles off1 in the ,jebel ,druze1 the ancient ,greek amphitheatres were so arranged that ,hermon might fill the horizon of the spectators4 #fed ,isa4 lx4 #ac4 #fee ,revelation of ,st4 ,john xxi4 #bb4 #fef ,on all this exhortation see below1 p4 #cdc4 #feg ,,lxx4 fruit1 for 2 the whole verse is obscure4 #feh ,so ,guthe2 some other plant ,wellhausen1 who for reads 4 #fei ,ver4 #h obviously needs emendation4 ,the ,hebrew text contains at least one questionable construction1 and gives no sense3 ,they that dwell in his shadow shall turn1 and revive corn and flourish like the vine1 and his fame1 etc4 ,to cultivate corn and be themselves like a vine is somewhat mixed4 ,the ,,lxx4 reads3 1 4 ,it removes the grammatical difficulty from clause #a1 which then reads 2 the supplied vau may easily have dropped after the final vau of the previous word4 ,in the #bnd clause the ,,lxx4 takes as an intransitive1 which is better suited to the other verbs1 and adds 1 7a form that may have easily slipped from the ,hebrew text1 through its likeness to the preceding 74 ,and they shall be well-watered4 ,after this it is probable that should read 4 ,in the #crd clause the ,hebrew text may stand4 ,in the #dth may not1 as many propose1 be taken for and translated their perfume2 but the parallelism makes it now probable that we have a verb here2 and if in the ,hiph4 has the sense to make a perfume 7cf4 ,isa4 lxvi4 #c71 there is no reason against the ,kal being used in the intransitive sense here4 ,in the ,,lxx4 for ,qa reads 4 #ffj ,,lxx4 #ffa ,this alternative1 which ,robertson ,smith adopted1 though not without some hesitation 7,prophets1 #dac7 is that which follows the ,hebrew text1 reading in the first clause 1 and not1 like ,,lxx41 1 and avoids the unusual figure of comparing ,jehovah to a tree4 ,but it does not account for the singular emphasis laid in the second clause on the first personal pronoun1 and implies that ,god1 whose name has not for several verses been mentioned1 is meant by the mere personal suffix1 ,i will look to ,him4 ,wellhausen suggests changing the second clause to ,i am his ,anat and his ,aschera4 #ffb 1 ii4 #bc4 ,,chapter ,,xxi ,,the ,,knowledge ,,of ,,god ,,hosea passim4 ,we have now finished the translation and detailed exposition of ,hosea's prophecies4 ,we have followed his minute examination of his people's character2 his criticism of his fickle generation's attempts to repent2 and his presentation of true religion in contrast to their shallow optimism and sensual superstitions4 ,we have seen an inwardness and spirituality of the highest kind--a love not only warm and mobile1 but nobly jealous1 and in its jealousy assisted by an extraordinary insight and expertness in character4 ,why ,hosea should be distinguished above all prophets for inwardness and spirituality must by this time be obvious to us4 ,from his remote watchfulness1 ,amos had seen the nations move across the world as the stars across heaven2 had seen1 within ,israel1 class distinct from class1 and given types of all3 rich and poor2 priest1 merchant and judge2 the panic-stricken1 the bully2 the fraudulent and the unclean4 ,the observatory of ,amos was the world1 and the nation4 ,but ,hosea's was the home2 and there he had watched a human soul decay through every stage from innocence to corruption4 ,it was a husband's study of a wife which made ,hosea the most inward of all the prophets4 ,this was the beginning of ,god's word by him4#ffc ,among the subjects in the subtle treatment of which ,hosea's service to religion is most original and conspicuous1 there are especially three that deserve a more detailed treatment than we have been able to give them4 ,these are the ,knowledge of ,god1 ,repentance and the ,sin against ,love4 ,we may devote a chapter to each of them1 beginning in this with the most characteristic and fundamental truth ,hosea gave to religion--the ,knowledge of ,god4 99 99 99 99 99 ,if to the heart there be one pain more fatal than another1 it is the pain of not being understood4 ,that prevents argument3 how can you reason with one who will not come to quarters with your real self8 ,it paralyses influence3 how can you do your best with one who is blind to your best8 ,it stifles ,love2 for how dare she continue to speak when she is mistaken for something else8 ,here as elsewhere against stupidity the gods themselves fight in vain4 ,this anguish ,hosea had suffered4 ,as closely as two souls may live on earth1 he had lived with ,gomer4 ,yet she had never wakened to his worth4 ,she must have been a woman with a power of love1 or such a heart had hardly wooed her4 ,he was a man of deep tenderness and exquisite powers of expression4 ,his tact1 his delicacy1 his enthusiasm are sensible in every chapter of his book4 ,gomer must have tasted them all before ,israel did4 ,yet she never knew him4 ,it was her curse that1 being married1 she was not awake to the meaning of marriage1 and1 being married to ,hosea1 she never appreciated the holy tenderness and heroic patience which were deemed by ,god not unworthy of becoming a parable of ,his own4 ,now ,i think we do not go far wrong if we conclude that it was partly this long experience of a soul that loved1 but had neither conscience nor ideal in her love1 which made ,hosea lay such frequent and pathetic emphasis upon ,israel's ignorance of ,jehovah4 ,to have his character ignored1 his purposes baffled1 his gifts unappreciated1 his patience mistaken--this was what drew ,hosea into that wonderful sympathy with the heart of ,god towards ,israel which comes out in such passionate words as these3 ,my people perish for lack of knowledge4#ffd ,there is no troth1 nor leal love1 nor knowledge of ,god in the land4#ffe ,they have not known the ,lord4#fff ,she did not know that ,i gave her corn and wine4#ffg ,they knew not that ,i healed them4#ffh ,for now1 because thou hast rejected knowledge1 ,i will reject thee4#ffi ,i will have leal love and not sacrifice1 and the knowledge of ,god rather than burnt-offerings4#fgj ,repentance consists in change of knowledge4 ,and the climax of the new life which follows is again knowledge3 ,i will betroth thee to ,me1 and thou shall know the ,lord4#fga ,israel shall cry1 ,my ,god1 we know ,thee4#fgb ,to understand what ,hosea meant by knowledge we must examine the singularly supple word which his language lent him to express it4 ,the ,hebrew root ,yadh'a1#fgc almost exclusively rendered in the ,old ,testament by the ,english verb to know1 is employed of the many processes of knowledge1 for which richer languages have separate terms4 ,it is by turns to perceive1 be aware of1 recognise1 understand or conceive1 experience and be expert in4#fgd ,but there is besides nearly always a practical effectiveness1 and in connection with religious objects a moral consciousness4 ,the barest meaning is to be aware that something is present or has happened1 and perhaps the root meant simply to see4#fge ,but it was the frequent duty of the prophets to mark the difference between perceiving a thing and laying it to heart4 ,isaiah speaks of the people seeing1 but not so as to know2#fgf and ,deuteronomy renders the latter sense by adding with the heart1 which to the ,hebrews was the seat1 not of the feeling1 but of the practical intellect3#fgg ,and thou knowest with thy heart that as a man chastiseth his son1 so the ,lord your ,god chastiseth you4#fgh ,usually1 however1 the word know suffices by itself4 ,this practical vigour naturally developed in such directions as intimacy1 conviction1 experience and wisdom4 ,job calls his familiars my knowers2#fgi of a strong conviction he says1 ,i know that my ,redeemer liveth1#fhj and referring to wisdom1 ,we are of yesterday and know not2#fha while ,ecclesiastes says1 ,whoso keepeth the commandment shall know--that is1 experience1 or suffer--no evil4#fhb ,but the verb rises into a practical sense--to the knowledge that leads a man to regard or care for its object4 ,job uses the verb know when he would say1 ,i do not care for my life2#fhc and in the description of the sons of ,eli1 that they were sons of ,belial1 and did not know ,god1 it means that they did not have any regard for ,him4#fhd ,finally1 there is a moral use of the word in which it approaches the meaning of conscience3 ,their eyes were opened1 and they knew that they were naked4#fhe ,they were aware of this before1 but they felt it now with a new sense4 ,also it is the mark of the awakened and the fullgrown to know1 or to feel1 the difference between good and evil4#fhf ,here1 then1 we have a word for knowing1 the utterance of which almost invariably starts a moral echo1 whose very sound1 as it were1 is haunted by sympathy and by duty4 ,it is knowledge1 not as an effort of1 so much as an effect upon1 the mind4 ,it is not to know so as to see the fact of1 but to know so as to feel the force of2 knowledge1 not as acquisition and mastery1 but as impression1 passion4 ,to quote ,paul's distinction1 it is not so much the apprehending as the being apprehended4 ,it leads to a vivid result--either warm appreciation or change of mind or practical effort4 ,it is sometimes the talent conceived as the trust1 sometimes the enlistment of all the affections4 ,it is knowledge that is followed by shame1 or by love1 or by reverence1 or by the sense of a duty4 ,one sees that it closely approaches the meaning of our conscience1 and understands how easily there was developed from it the evangelical name for repentance1 ,metanoia--that is1 change of mind under a new impression of facts4 ,there are three writers who thus use knowledge as the key to the ,divine life--in the ,old ,testament ,hosea and the author of ,deuteronomy1 in the ,new ,testament ,st4 ,john4 ,we likened ,amos to ,st4 ,john the ,baptist3 it is not only upon his similar temperament1 but far more upon his use of the word knowledge for spiritual purposes1 that we may compare ,hosea to ,st4 ,john the ,evangelist4 ,hosea's chief charge against the people is one of stupidity4 ,high and low they are a people without intelligence4#fhg ,once he defines this as want of political wisdom3 ,ephraim is a silly dove without heart1 or1 as we should say1 without brains2#fhh and again1 as insensibility to every ominous fact3 ,strangers have devoured his strength1 and he knoweth it not2 yea1 grey hairs are scattered upon him1 and he knoweth it not1#fhi or1 as we should say1 lays it not to heart4 ,but ,israel's most fatal ignorance is of ,god ,himself4 ,this is the sign and the cause of every one of their defects4 ,there is no troth1 nor leal love1 nor knowledge of ,god in the land4#fij ,they have not known the ,,lord4#fia ,they have not known ,me4 ,with the causes of this ignorance the prophet has dealt most explicitly in the fourth chapter4#fib ,they are two3 the people's own vice and the negligence of their priests4 ,habitual vice destroys a people's brains4 ,harlotry1 wine and new wine take away the heart of ,my people4#fic ,lust1 for instance1 blinds them to the domestic consequences of their indulgence in the heathen worship1 and so the stupid people come to their end4#fid ,again1 their want of political wisdom is due to their impurity1 drunkenness and greed to be rich4#fie ,let those take heed who among ourselves insist that art is independent of moral conditions--that wit and fancy reach their best and bravest when breaking from any law of decency4 ,they lie3 such licence corrupts the natural intelligence of a people1 and robs them of insight and imagination4 ,yet ,hosea sees that all the fault does not lie with the common people4 ,their teachers are to blame1 priest and prophet alike1 for both stumble1 and it is true that a people shall be like its priests4#fif ,the priests have rejected knowledge and forgotten the ,torah of their ,god2 they think only of the ritual of sacrifice and the fines by which they fill their mouths4 ,it was1 as we have seen1 the sin of ,israel's religion in the eighth century4 ,to the priests religion was a mass of ceremonies which satisfied the people's superstitions and kept themselves in bread4 ,to the prophets it was an equally sensuous1 an equally mercenary ecstasy4 ,but to ,hosea religion is above all a thing of the intellect and conscience3 it is that knowing which is at once common-sense1 plain morality and the recognition by a pure heart of what ,god has done and is doing in history4 ,of such a knowledge the priests and prophets are the stewards1 and it is because they have ignored their trust that the people have been provided with no antidote to the vices that corrupt their natural intelligence and make them incapable of seeing ,god4 ,in contrast to such ignorance ,hosea describes the essential temper and contents of a true understanding of ,god4 ,using the word knowledge1 in the passive sense characteristic of his language1 not so much the acquisition as the impression of facts1 an impression which masters not only a man's thoughts but his heart and will1 ,hosea describes the knowledge of ,god as feeling1 character and conscience4 ,again and again he makes it parallel to loyalty1 repentance1 love and service4 ,again and again he emphasises that it comes from ,god ,himself4 ,it is not something which men can reach by their own endeavours1 or by the mere easy turning of their fickle hearts4 ,for it requires ,god ,himself to speak1 and discipline to chasten4 ,the only passage in which the knowledge of ,god is described as the immediate prize of man's own pursuit is that prayer of the people on whose facile religiousness ,hosea pours his scorn4#fig ,let us know1 let us follow on to know the ,lord1 he heard them say1 and promise themselves1 ,as soon as we seek ,him we shall find ,him4 ,but ,god replies that ,he can make nothing of such ambitions2 they will pass away like the morning cloud and the early dew4#fih ,this discarded prayer1 then1 is the only passage in the book in which the knowledge of ,god is described as man's acquisition4 ,elsewhere1 in strict conformity to the temper of the ,hebrew word to know1 ,hosea presents the knowledge of the ,most ,high1 not as something man finds out for himself1 but something which comes down on him from above4 ,the means which ,god took to impress ,himself upon the heart of ,his people were1 according to ,hosea1 the events of their history4 ,hosea1 indeed1 also points to another means4 ,the ,torah of thy ,god1 which in one passage#fii he makes parallel to knowledge1 is evidently the body of instruction1 judicial1 ceremonial and social1 which has come down by the tradition of the priests4 ,this was not all oral2 part of it at least was already codified in the form we now know as the ,book of the ,covenant4#gjj ,but ,hosea treats of the ,torah only in connection with the priests4 ,and the far more frequent and direct means by which ,god has sought to reveal ,himself to the people are the great events of their past4 ,these ,hosea never tires of recalling4 ,more than any other prophet1 he recites the deeds done by ,god in the origins and making of ,israel4 ,so numerous are his references that from them alone we could almost rebuild the early history4 ,let us gather them together4 ,the nation's father ,jacob in the womb overreached his brother1 and in his manhood strove with ,god2 yea1 he strove with the ,angel and he overcame1#gja he wept and supplicated ,him2 at ,bethel he found ,him1 and there ,he spake with us--,jehovah ,god of ,hosts1 ,jehovah is ,his name4#gjb 444 ,and ,jacob fled to the territory#gjc of ,aram1 and he served for a wife1 and for a wife he tended sheep4 ,and by a prophet ,jehovah brought ,israel up out of ,egypt1 and by a prophet he was tended4#gjd ,when ,israel was young1#gje then ,i came to love him1 and out of ,egypt ,i called ,my son4#gjf ,as often as ,i called to them1 so often did they go from ,me3#gjg they to the ,ba'alim kept sacrificing1 and to images offering incense4 ,but ,i taught ,ephraim to walk1 taking him upon ,mine#gjh arms1 and they did not know that ,i nursed them4#gji 444 ,like grapes in the wilderness ,i found ,israel1 like the firstfruits on an early fig-tree ,i saw your fathers2 but they went to ,ba'al-,peor1 and consecrated themselves to the ,shame4#gaj 444 ,but ,i am ,jehovah thy ,god from the land of ,egypt1 and gods besides ,me thou knowest not1 and ,saviour there is none but ,me4 ,i knew thee in the wilderness1 in the land of burning heats4 ,but the more pasture they had1 the more they fed themselves full2 as they fed themselves full their heart was lifted up3 therefore they forgat ,me4#gaa 444 ,i ,jehovah thy ,god from the land of ,egypt4#gab ,and all this revelation of ,god was not only in that marvellous history1 but in the yearly gifts of nature and even in the success of the people's commerce3 ,she knew not that it was ,i who have given her the corn and the wine and the oil1 and silver have ,i multiplied to her4#gac ,this1 then1 is how ,god gave ,israel knowledge of ,himself4 ,first it broke upon the ,individual1 the ,nation's ,father4 ,and to him it had not come by miracle1 but just in the same fashion as it has broken upon men from then until now4 ,he woke to find ,god no tradition1 but an experience4 ,amid the strife with others of which life for all so largely consists1 ,jacob became aware that ,god also has to be reckoned with1 and that1 hard as is the struggle for bread and love and justice with one's brethren and fellow-men1 with the ,esaus and with the ,labans1 a more inevitable wrestle awaits the soul when it is left alone in the darkness with the ,unseen4 ,oh1 this is our sympathy with those early patriarchs1 not that they saw the sea dry up before them or the bush ablaze with ,god1 but that upon some lonely battle-field of the heart they also endured those moments of agony1 which imply a more real ,foe than we ever met in flesh and blood1 and which leave upon us marks deeper than the waste of toil or the rivalry of the world can inflict4 ,so the ,father of the ,nation came to find ,god at ,bethel1 and there1 adds ,hosea1 where the ,nation still worship1 ,god spake with us#gad in the person of our ,father4 ,the second stage of the knowledge of ,god was when the ,nation awoke to ,his leading1 and through a prophet1 ,moses1 were brought up out of ,egypt4 ,here again no miracle is adduced by ,hosea1 but with full heart he appeals to the grace and the tenderness of the whole story4 ,to him it is a wonderful romance4 ,passing by all the empires of earth1 the ,almighty chose for ,himself this people that was no people1 this tribe that were the slaves of ,egypt4 ,and the choice was of love only3 ,when ,israel was young ,i came to love him1 and out of ,egypt ,i called ,my son4 ,it was the adoption of a little slave-boy1 adoption by the heart2 and the fatherly figure continues1 ,i taught ,ephraim to walk1 taking him upon ,mine arms4 ,it is just the same charm1 seen from another point of view1 when ,hosea hears ,god say that ,he had found ,israel like grapes in the wilderness1 like the firstfruits on an early fig-tree ,i saw your fathers4 ,now these may seem very imperfect figures of the relation of ,god to this one people1 and the ideas they present may be felt to start more difficulties than ever their poetry could soothe to rest3 as1 for instance1 why ,israel alone was chosen--why this of all tribes was given such an opportunity to know the ,most ,high4 ,with these questions prophecy does not deal1 and for ,israel's sake had no need to deal4 ,what alone ,hosea is concerned with is the ,character discernible in the origin and the liberation of his people4 ,he hears that ,character speak for itself2 and it speaks of a love and of a joy1 to find figures for which it goes to childhood and to spring--to the love a man feels for a child1 to the joy a man feels at the sight of the firstfruits of the year4 ,as the human heart feels in those two great dawns1 when nothing is yet impossible1 but all is full of hope and promise1 so humanly1 so tenderly1 so joyfully had ,god felt towards ,his people4 ,never again say that the gods of ,greece were painted more living or more fair6 ,the ,god of ,israel is ,love and ,springtime to ,his people4 ,grace1 patience1 pure joy of hope and possibility--these are the ,divine elements which this spiritual man1 ,hosea1 sees in the early history of his people1 and not the miraculous1 about which1 from end to end of his book1 he is utterly silent4 ,it is ignorance1 then1 of such a ,character1 so evident in these facts of their history1 with which ,hosea charges his people--not ignorance of the facts themselves1 not want of devotion to their memory1 for they are a people who crowd the sacred scenes of the past1 at ,bethel1 at ,gilgal1 at ,beersheba1 but ignorance of the ,character which shines through the facts4 ,hosea also calls it forgetfulness1 for the people once had knowledge4#gae ,the cause of their losing it has been their prosperity in ,canaan3 ,as their pastures were increased they grew satisfied2 as they grew satisfied their heart was lifted up1 and therefore they forgat ,me4#gaf ,equally instructive is the method by which ,hosea seeks to move ,israel from this oblivion and bring them to a true knowledge of ,god4 ,he insists that their recovery can only be the work of ,god ,himself--the living ,god working in their lives to-day as ,he did in the past of the nation4 ,to those past deeds it is useless for this generation to go back1 and seek again the memory of which they have disinherited themselves4 ,let them rather realise that the same ,god still lives4 ,the knowledge of ,him may be recovered by appreciating ,his deeds in the life of to-day4 ,and these deeds must first of all be violence and terror1 if only to rouse them from their sensuous sloth4 ,the last verse we have quoted1 about ,israel's complacency and pride1 is followed by this terrible one3 ,i shall be#gag to them like a lion1 like a leopard ,i shall leap#gah upon the way4 ,i will meet them as a bear bereft of her cubs1 that ,i may tear the caul of their heart1 that ,i may devour them there like a lion3 the wild beast shall rend them4#gai ,this means that into ,israel's insensibility to ,himself ,god must break with facts1 with wounds1 with horrors they cannot evade4 ,till ,he so acts1 their own efforts1 then shall we know if we hunt up to know1#gbj and their assurance1 ,my ,god1 we do know ,thee1#gba are very vain4 ,hosea did not speak for nothing4 ,events were about to happen more momentous than even the ,exodus and the ,conquest of the ,land4 ,by #gcd the ,assyrians had depopulated ,gilead and ,galilee2 in #gbe the capital itself was invested1 and by #gba the whole nation carried into captivity4 ,god had made ,himself known4 ,we are already aware1 however1 that ,hosea did not count this as ,god's final revelation to ,his people4 ,doom is not doom to him1 as it was to ,amos1 but discipline2 and ,god withdraws ,his people from their fascinating land only that ,he may have them more closely to ,himself4 ,he will bring ,his ,bride into the wilderness again1 the wilderness where they first met1 and there1 when her soul is tender and her stupid heart broken1 ,he will plant in her again the seeds of ,his knowledge and ,his love4 ,the passages which describe this are among the most beautiful of the book4 ,they tell us of no arbitrary conquest of ,israel by ,jehovah1 of no magic and sudden transformation4 ,they describe a process as natural and gentle as a human wooing2 they use1 as we have seen1 the very terms of this3 ,i will woo her1 bring her into the wilderness1 and speak home to her heart4444 ,and it shall be in that day that thou shalt call ,me1 ,my husband1 444 and ,i will betroth thee to ,me for ever in righteousness and in justice1 and in leal love and in mercies and in faithfulness2 and thou shalt know ,jehovah4#gbb ,,footnotes3 #ffc i4 #b4 #ffd iv4 #f4 #ffe iv4 #a4 #fff v4 #d4 #ffg ii4 #aj4 #ffh xi4 #c4 #ffi iv4 #f4 #fgj vi4 #f4 #fga ii4 #bb4 #fgb viii4 #b4 #fgc 4 #fgd ,the ,latin videre1 scire1 noscere1 cognoscere1 intelligere1 sapere and peritus esse4 #fge ,cf4 the ,greek from 4 #fgf vi4 #i4 #fgg ,see above1 pp4 #beh1 #bge2 and below1 p4 #cbc4 #fgh viii4 #e3 cf4 xxix4 #c 7,eng4 #d71 ,jehovah did not give you a heart to know4 #fgi ,job xix4 #ac3 still more close1 of course1 the intimacy between the sexes for which the verb is so often used in the ,old ,testament4 #fhj xix4 #be3 cf4 ,gen4 xx4 #f4 #fha viii4 #i4 #fhb viii4 #e3 cf4 ,hosea ix4 #g4 #fhc ix4 #ba4 #fhd #a ,sam4 ii4 #ab4 ,a similar meaning is probably to be attached to the word in ,gen4 xxxix4 #f3 ,potiphar had no thought or care for anything that was in ,joseph's hand4 ,cf4 ,prov4 ix4 #ac2 xxvii4 #bc2 ,job xxxv4 #ae4 #fhe ,gen4 iii4 #g4 #fhf ,gen4 iii4 #e2 ,isa4 vii4 #ae1 etc4 #fhg iv4 #ad1 3 if the original meaning of be to get between1 see through or into1 so discriminate1 understand1 then intelligence is its etymological equivalent4 #fhh vii4 #aa4 ,see above1 p4 #cba1 n4 #d4 #fhi vii4 #i4 #fij iv4 #a4 #fia v4 #d4 #fib ,for exposition of this chapter see above1 pp4 #bef ff4 #fic iv4 #aa1 #ab1 ,,lxx4 #fid iv4 #ad f4 ,see above1 pp4 #beh f4 #fie vii4 passim4 #fif iv4 #d-i4 ,above1 pp4 #beg f4 #fig vi4 #a ff4 ,see above1 pp4 #bfc ff4 #fih vi4 #d4 #fii iv4 #f4 ,see above1 p4 #beg4 #gjj ,see above1 pp4 #ig f4 ,on the other doubtful phrase1 viii4 #ab--literally ,i write multitudes of ,my ,torah1 as a stranger they have reckoned it--no argument can be built2 for even if we take the first clause as conditional and render1 ,though ,i wrote multitudes of ,my ,torth1 yet as those of a stranger they would regard them1 that would not necessarily mean that no ,torth of ,jehovah were yet written1 but1 on the contrary1 might equally well imply that some at least had been written4 #gja ,or was overcome4 #gjb xii4 #d-f4 ,see above1 p4 #cjb4 ,,lxx4 reads they supplicated ,me 444 they found ,me 444 ,he spoke with them4 ,many propose to read the last clause with him4 ,the passage is obscure4 ,note the order of the events--the wrestling at ,peniel1 the revelation at ,bethel1 then in the subsequent passage the flight to ,aram4 ,this however does not prove that in ,hosea's information the last happened after the two first4 #gjc 1 field1 here used in its political sense3 cf4 ,hist4 ,geog41 p4 #gi4 ,our word country1 now meaning territory and now the rural as opposed to the urban districts1 is strictly analogous to the ,hebrew field4 #gjd xii4 #ac1 #ad4 #gje ,a youth4 #gjf ,,lxx41 followed by many critics1 his sons4 ,but ,my son is a better parallel to young in the preceding clause4 ,or trans43 to be ,my son4 #gjg ,so ,,lxx4 ,see p4 #bic4 #gjh ,so rightly ,,lxx4 #gji xi4 #a-c4 #gaj ix4 #aj4 #gaa xiii4 #d-f4 #gab xii4 #aj4 ,other references to the ancient history are the story of ,gibeah and the ,valley of ,achor4 #gac ii4 #aj4 #gad ,see above1 p4 #cjb4 #gae iv4 #f4 #gaf xiii4 #e4 #gag ,with ,wellhausen read for 4 #gah ,see above1 p4 #cje1 n4 #d4 #gai xiii4 #g ff4 #gbj vi4 #c4 #gba viii4 #b4 #gbb i4 #af1 #ah1 #ba1 #bb4 ,,chapter ,,xxii ,,repentance ,,hosea passim4 ,if we keep in mind what ,hosea meant by knowledge--a new impression of facts implying a change both of temper and of conduct--we shall feel how natural it is to pass at once from his doctrine of knowledge to his doctrine of repentance4 ,hosea may be accurately styled the first preacher of repentance yet so thoroughly did he deal with this subject of eternal interest to the human heart1 that between him and ourselves almost no teacher has increased the insight with which it has been examined1 or the passion with which it ought to be enforced4 ,one thing we must hold clear from the outset4 ,to us repentance is intelligible only in the individual4 ,there is no motion of the heart which more clearly derives its validity from its personal character4 ,repentance is the conscience1 the feeling1 the resolution of a man by himself and for himself--,i will arise and go to my ,father4 ,yet it is not to the individual that ,hosea directs his passionate appeals4 ,for him and his age the religious unit was not the ,israelite but ,israel4 ,god had called and covenanted with the nation as a whole2 ,he had revealed ,himself through their historical fortunes and institutions4 ,his grace was shown in their succour and guidance as a people2 ,his last judgment was threatened in their destruction as a state4 ,so similarly1 when by ,hosea ,god calls to repentance1 it is the whole nation whom ,he addresses4 ,at the same time we must remember those qualifications which we adduced with regard to ,hosea's doctrine of the nation's knowledge of ,god4#gbc ,they affect also his doctrine of the national repentance4 ,hosea's experience of ,israel had been preceded by his experience of an ,israelite4 ,for years the prophet had carried on his anxious heart a single human character--lived with her1 travailed for her1 pardoned and redeemed her4 ,as we felt that this long cure of a soul must have helped ,hosea to his very spiritual sense of the knowledge of ,god1 so now we may justly assume that the same cannot have been without effect upon his very personal teaching about repentance4 ,but with his experience of ,gomer1 there conspired also his intense love for ,israel4 ,a warm patriotism necessarily personifies its object4 ,to the passionate lover of his people1 their figure rises up one and individual--his mother1 his lover1 his wife4 ,now no man ever loved his people more intimately or more tenderly than ,hosea loved ,israel4 ,the people were not only dear to him1 because he was their son1 but dear and vivid also for their loneliness and their distinction among the peoples of the earth1 and for their long experience as the intimate of the ,god of grace and lovingkindness4 ,god had chosen this ,israel as ,his ,bride2 and the remembrance of the unique endowment and lonely destiny stimulated ,hosea's imagination in the work of personifying and individualising his people4 ,he treats ,israel with the tenderness and particularity with which the ,shepherd1 leaving the ninety and nine in the wilderness1 seeks till ,he find it the one lost lamb4 ,his analysis of his fickle generation's efforts to repent1 of their motives in turning to ,god1 and of their failures1 is as inward and definite as if it were a single heart he were dissecting4 ,centuries have passed2 the individual has displaced the nation2 the experience of the human heart has been infinitely increased1 and prophecy and all preaching has grown more and more personal4 ,yet it has scarcely ever been found either necessary to add to the terms which ,hosea used for repentance1 or possible to go deeper in analysing the processes which these denote4 99 99 99 99 99 ,hosea's most simple definition of repentance is that of returning unto ,god4 ,for turning and re-turning the ,hebrew language has only one verb--shbh4 ,in the ,book of ,hosea there are instances in which it is employed in the former sense2#gbd but1 even apart from its use for repentance1 the verb usually means to return4 ,thus the wandering wife in the second chapter says1 ,i will return to my former husband2#gbe and in the threat of judgment it is said1 ,ephraim will return to ,egypt4#gbf ,similar is the sense in the phrases ,his deeds will ,i turn back upon him#gbg and ,i will not turn back to destroy ,ephraim4#gbh ,the usual meaning of the verb is therefore1 not merely to turn or change1 but to turn right round1 to turn back and home4#gbi ,this is obviously the force of its employment to express repentance4 ,for this purpose ,hosea very seldom uses it alone4#gcj ,he generally adds either the name by which ,god had always been known1 ,jehovah1#gca or the designation of ,him1 as their own ,god4#gcb ,we must emphasise this point if we would appreciate the thoroughness of our prophet's doctrine1 and its harmony with the preaching of the ,new ,testament4 ,to ,hosea repentance is no mere change in the direction of one's life4 ,it is a turning back upon one's self1 a retracing of one's footsteps1 a confession and acknowledgment of what one has abandoned4 ,it is a coming back and a coming home to ,god1 exactly as ,jesus ,himself has described in the ,parable of the ,prodigal4 ,as ,hosea again and again affirms1 the ,return to ,god1 like the ,new ,testament ,metanoia1 is the effect of new knowledge2 but the new knowledge is not of new facts--it is of facts which have been present for a long time and which ought to have been appreciated before4 ,of these facts ,hosea describes three kinds3 the nation's misery1 the unspeakable grace of their ,god1 and their great guilt in turning from ,him4 ,again it is as in the case of the prodigal3 his hunger1 his father1 and his cry1 ,i have sinned against heaven and in thy sight4 ,we have already felt the pathos of those passages in which ,hosea describes the misery and the decay of ,israel1 the unprofitableness and shame of all their restless traffic with other gods and alien empires4 ,the state is rotten2#gcc anarchy prevails4#gcd ,the national vitality is lessened3 ,ephraim hath grey hairs4#gce ,power of birth and begetting have gone2 the universal unchastity causes the population to diminish3 their glory flieth away like a bird4#gcf ,the presents to ,egypt1#gcg the tribute to ,assyria1 drain the wealth of the people3 strangers devour his strength4#gch ,the prodigal ,israel has his far-off country where he spends his substance among strangers4 ,it is in this connection that we must take the repeated verse3 the pride of ,israel testifieth to his face4#gci ,we have seen#gdj the impossibility of the usual exegesis of these words1 that by the ,pride of ,israel ,hosea means ,jehovah2 the word pride is probably to be taken in the sense in which ,amos employs it of the exuberance and arrogance of ,israel's civilisation4 ,if we are right1 then ,hosea describes a very subtle symptom of the moral awakening whether of the individual or of a community4 ,the conscience of many a man1 of many a kingdom1 has been reached only through their pride4 ,pride is the last nerve which comfort and habit leave quick2 and when summons to a man's better nature fail1 it is still possible in most cases to touch his pride with the presentation of the facts of his decadence4 ,this is probably what ,hosea means4 ,israel's prestige suffers4 ,the civilisation of which they are proud has its open wounds4 ,their politicians are the sport of ,egypt2#gda their wealth1 the very gold of their ,temple1 is lifted by ,assyria4#gdb ,the nerve of pride was also touched in the prodigal3 ,how many hired servants of my father have enough and to spare1 while ,i perish with hunger4 ,yet1 unlike him1 this prodigal son of ,god will not therefore return4#gdc ,though there are grey hairs upon him1 though strangers devour his strength1 he knoweth it not2 of him it cannot be said that he has come to himself4 ,and that is why the prophet threatens the further discipline of actual exile from the land and its fruits1#gdd of bitter bread#gde and poverty#gdf on an unclean soil4 ,israel must also eat husks and feed with swine before he arises and returns to his ,god4 ,but misery alone never led either man or nation to repentance3 the sorrow of this world worketh only death4 ,repentance is the return to ,god2 and it is the awakening to the truth about ,god1 to the facts of ,his nature and ,his grace1 which alone makes repentance possible4 ,no man's doctrine of repentance is intelligible without his doctrine of ,god2 and it is because ,hosea's doctrine of ,god is so rich1 so fair and so tender1 that his doctrine of repentance is so full and gracious4 ,here we see the difference between him and ,amos4 ,amos had also used the phrase with frequency2 again and again he had appealed to the people to seek ,god and to return to ,god4#gdg ,but from ,amos it went forth only as a pursuing voice1 a voice crying in the wilderness4 ,hosea lets loose behind it a heart1 plies the people with gracious thoughts of ,god1 and brings about them1 not the voices only1 but the atmosphere1 of love4 ,i will be as the dew unto ,israel1 promises the ,most ,high2 but ,he is before ,his promise4 ,the chapters of ,hosea are drenched with the dew of ,god's mercy1 of which no drop falls on those of ,amos1 but there ,god is rather the roar as of a lion1 the flash as of lightning4 ,both prophets bid ,israel turn to ,god2 but ,amos means by that1 to justice1 truth and purity1 while ,hosea describes a husband1 a father1 long-suffering and full of mercy4 ,i bid you come back1 cries ,amos4 ,but ,hosea pleads1 ,if only you were aware of what ,god is1 you would come back4 ,come back to ,god and live1 cries ,amos2 but ,hosea1 ,come back to ,god1 for ,he is ,love4 ,amos calls1 ,come back at once1 for there is but little time left till ,god must visit you in judgment2 but ,hosea1 ,come back at once1 for ,god has loved you so long and so kindly4 ,amos cries1 ,turn1 for in front of you is destruction2 but ,hosea1 ,turn1 for behind you is ,god4 ,and that is why all ,hosea's preaching of repentance is so evangelical4 ,i will arise and go to my ,father4 ,but the third element of the new knowledge which means repentance is the conscience of guilt4 ,my ,father1 ,i have sinned4 ,on this point it might be averred that the teaching of ,hosea is less spiritual than that of later prophets in ,israel1 and that here at last he comes short of the evangelical inwardness of the ,new ,testament4 ,there is truth in the charge2 and here perhaps we feel most the defects of his standpoint1 as one who appeals1 not to the individual1 but to the nation as a whole4 ,hosea's treatment of the sense of guilt cannot be so spiritual as that1 say1 of the fifty-first ,psalm4 ,but1 at least1 he is not satisfied to exhaust it by the very thorough exposure which he gives us of the social sins of his day1 and of their terrible results4 ,he1 too1 understands what is meant by a conscience of sin4 ,he has called ,israel's iniquity harlotry1 unfaithfulness to ,god2 and in a passage of equal insight and beauty of expression he points out that in the service of the ,ba'alim ,jehovah's people can never feel anything but a harlot's shame and bitter memories of the better past4 ,rejoice not1 ,o ,israel1 to the pitch of rapture like the heathen3 for thou hast played the harlot from thine own ,god2 'tis hire thou hast loved on all threshing-floors4 ,floor and vat shall not acknowledge them2 the new wine shall play them false4#gdh ,mere children of nature may abandon themselves to the riotous joy of harvest and vintage festivals1 for they have never known other gods than are suitably worshipped by these orgies4 ,but ,israel has a past--the memory of a holier ,god1 the conscience of having deserted ,him for material gifts4 ,with such a conscience she can never enjoy the latter2 as ,hosea puts it1 they will not acknowledge or take to#gdi her4 ,here there is an instinct of the profound truth1 that even in the fulness of life conscience is punishment2 by itself the sense of guilt is judgment4 ,but ,hosea does not attack the service of strange gods only because it is unfaithfulness to ,jehovah1 but also because1 as the worship of images1 it is a senseless stupidity utterly inconsistent with that spiritual discernment of which repentance so largely consists4 ,and with the worship of heathen idols ,hosea equally condemns the worship of ,jehovah under the form of images4 ,hosea was the first in ,israel to lead the attack upon the idols4 ,elijah had assaulted the worship of a foreign god1 but neither he nor ,elisha nor ,amos condemned the worship of ,israel's own ,god under the form of a calf4 ,indeed ,amos1 except in one doubtful passage1#gej never at all attacks idols or false gods4 ,the reason is very obvious4 ,amos and ,elijah were concerned only with the proclamation of ,god as justice and purity3 and to the moral aspects of religion the question of idolatry is not relevant2 the two things do not come directly into collision4 ,but ,hosea had deeper and more wide views of ,god1 with which idolatry came into conflict at a hundred points4 ,we know what ,hosea's knowledge of ,god was--how spiritual1 how extensive--and we can appreciate how incongruous idolatry must have appeared against it4 ,we are prepared to find him treating the images1 whether of the ,ba'alim or of ,jehovah1 with that fine scorn which a passionate monotheism1 justly conscious of its intellectual superiority1 has ever passed upon the idolatry even of civilisations in other respects higher than its own4 ,to ,hosea the idol is an 'eseb1 a made thing4#gea ,it is made of the very silver and gold with which ,jehovah ,himself had endowed the people4#geb ,it is made only to be cut off#gec by the first invader6 ,chiefly1 however1 does ,hosea's scorn fall upon the image under which ,jehovah ,himself was worshipped4 ,thy ,calf1 ,o ,samaria6#ged he contemptuously calls it4 ,from ,israel is it also1 as much as the ,ba'alim4 ,a workman made it1 and no god is it3 chips shall the ,calf of ,samaria become6 ,in another place he mimics the anxiety of ,samaria for their ,calf2 his people mourn for him1 and his priestlings writhe for his glory1 why8--because it is going into exile3#gee the gold that covers him shall be stripped for the tribute to ,assyria4 ,and once more3 ,they continue to sin2 they make them a smelting of their silver1 idols after their own modelling1 smith's work all of it4 ,to these things they speak6 ,sacrificing men actually kiss calves6#gef ,all this is in the same vein of satire which we find grown to such brilliance in the great ,prophet of the ,exile4#geg ,hosea was the first in whom it sparkled2 and it was due to his conception of the knowledge of ,god4 ,its relevancy to his doctrine of repentance is this1 that so spiritual an apprehension of ,god as repentance implies1 so complete a metanoia or change of mind1 is intellectually incompatible with idolatry4 ,you cannot speak of repentance to men who kiss calves and worship blocks of wood4 ,hence he says3 ,ephraim is wedded to idols3 leave him alone4#geh ,there was more than idolatry1 however1 in the way of ,israel's repentance4 ,the whole of the national worship was an obstacle4 ,its formalism and its easy and mechanical methods of turning to ,god disguised the need of that moral discipline and change of heart1 without which no repentance can be genuine4 ,amos had contrasted the ritualism of the time with the duty of civic justice and the service of the poor3#gei ,hosea opposes to it leal love and the knowledge of ,god4 ,i will have leal love and not sacrifice1 and the knowledge of ,god rather than burnt-offerings4#gfj ,it is characteristic of ,hosea to class sacrifices with idols4 ,both are senseless and inarticulate1 incapable of expressing or of answering the deep feelings of the heart4 ,true repentance1 on the contrary1 is rational1 articulate1 definite4 ,take with you words1 says ,hosea1 and so return to ,jehovah4#gfa ,to us who1 after twenty-five more centuries of talk1 know painfully how words may be abused1 it is strange to find them enforced as the tokens of sincerity4 ,but let us consider against what the prophet enforces them4 ,against the kissing of calves and such mummery--worship of images that neither hear nor speak4 ,let us remember the inarticulateness of ritualism1 how it stifles rather than utters the feelings of the heart4 ,let us imagine the dead routine of the legal sacrifices1 their original symbolism worn bare1 bringing forward to the young hearts of new generations no interpretation of their ancient and distorted details1 reducing those who perform them to irrational machines like themselves4 ,then let us remember how our own ,reformers had to grapple with the same hard mechanism in the worship of their time1 and how they bade the heart of every worshipper speak--speak for itself to ,god with rational and sincere words4 ,so in place of the frozen ritualism of the ,church there broke forth from all lands of the ,reformation1 as though it were birds in springtime1 a great burst of hymns and prayers1 with the clear notes of the ,gospel in the common tongue4 ,so intolerable was the memory of what had been1 that it was even enacted that henceforth no sacrament should be dispensed but the ,word should be given to the people along with it4 ,if we keep all these things in mind1 we shall know what ,hosea means when he says to ,israel in their penitence1 ,take with you words4 ,no one1 however1 was more conscious of the danger of words4 ,upon the lips of the people ,hosea has placed a confession of repentance1 which1 so far as the words go1 could not be more musical or pathetic4#gfb ,in every ,christian language it has been paraphrased to an exquisite confessional hymn4 ,but ,hosea describes it as rejected4 ,its words are too easy2 its thoughts of ,god and of ,his power to save are too facile4 ,repentance1 it is true1 starts from faith in the mercy of ,god1 for without this there were only despair4 ,nevertheless in all true penitence there is despair4 ,genuine sorrow for sin includes a feeling of the irreparableness of the past1 and the true penitent as he casts himself upon ,god does not dare to feel that he ever can be the same again4 ,i am no more worthy to be called ,thy son3 make me as one of ,thy hired servants4 ,such necessary thoughts as these ,israel does not mingle with her prayer4 ,come and let us return to ,jehovah1 for ,he hath torn only that ,he may heal1 and smitten only that ,he may bind up4 ,he will revive us again in a couple of days1 on the third day raise us up1 that we may live before ,him4 ,then shall we know if we hunt up to know the ,lord4 ,as soon as we seek ,him we shall find ,him3 and ,he shall come upon us like winter-rain1 and like the spring-rain pouring on the land4 ,this is too facile1 too shallow4 ,no wonder that ,god despairs of such a people4 ,what am ,i to make of thee1 ,ephraim8#gfc ,another familiar passage1 the ,parable of the ,heifer1 describes the same ambition to reach spiritual results without spiritual processes4 ,ephraim is a broken-in heifer--one that loveth to tread out the corn4 ,but ,i will pass upon her goodly neck4 ,i will give ,ephraim a yoke1 ,judah must plough4 ,jacob must harrow for himself4#gfd ,cattle1 being unmuzzled by law#gfe at threshing time1 loved this best of all their year's work4 ,yet to reach it they must first go through the harder and unrewarded trials of ploughing and harrowing4 ,like a heifer1 then1 which loved harvest only1 ,israel would spring at the rewards of penitence1 the peaceable fruits of righteousness1 without going through the discipline and chastisement which alone yield them4 ,repentance is no mere turning or even re-turning4 ,it is a deep and an ethical process--the breaking up of fallow ground1 the labour and long expectation of the sower1 the seeking and waiting for ,jehovah till ,himself send the rain4 ,sow to yourselves in righteousness2 reap in proportion to love 7the love you have sown71 break up your fallow ground3 for it is time to seek ,jehovah1 until ,he come and rain righteousness upon us4#gff ,a repentance so thorough as this cannot but result in the most clear and steadfast manner of life4 ,truly it is a returning not by oneself1 but a returning by ,god1 and it leads to the keeping of leal love and justice1 and waiting upon ,god continually4#gfg ,,footnotes3 #gbc ,see above1 p4 #cbj4 #gbd vii4 #af1 ,they turn1 but not upwards2 xiv4 #e1 ,mine anger is turned away4 #gbe ii4 #i4 #gbf viii4 #ac2 ix4 #c2 xi4 #e4 #gbg iv4 #i3 cf4 xii4 #c1 #ae4 #gbh xi4 #i3 cf4 ii4 #aa4 #gbi ,this may be further seen in the very common phrase 1 to turn again the captivity of ,my people 7see ,hosea vi4 #aa72 or in the use of in xiv4 #h1 where it has the force1 auxiliary to the other verb in the clause1 of repeating or coming back to do a thing4 ,but the text here needs emendation3 cf4 above1 p4 #cae4 ,cf4 ,amos' use of the ,hiphil form to draw back1 withdraw1 i4 #c1 #f1 #i1 #aa1 #ac2 ii4 #a1 #d1 #f4 #gcj ,cf4 xi4 #e1 they refused to return4 #gca vi4 #a1 ,come and let us return to ,jehovah2 vii4 #aj1 ,they did not return to ,jehovah2 xiv4 #b1 #c1 ,return1 ,o ,israel1 to ,jehovah4 #gcb iii4 #e1 ,they shall return and seek ,jehovah their ,god2 v4 #d1 ,their deeds do not allow them to return to their ,god4 #gcc v4 #ab1 etc4 #gcd iv4 #b ff42 vi4 #g ff41 etc4 #gce vii4 #g4 #gcf ix4 #aa ff4 #gcg xii4 #b4 #gch vii4 #g4 #gci v4 #e2 vii4 #aj4 #gdj ,see above1 p4 #bfa4 #gda vii4 #af4 #gdb x4 #e4 #gdc vii4 #aj4 #gdd ii4 #af1 etc42 ix4 #b ff41 etc4 #gde ix4 #d4 #gdf xii4 #aj4 #gdg iv4 #f1 #h1 #i1 #aj1 #aa4 #gdh ix4 #a4 ,see above1 p4 #bgi4 #gdi ,see above1 p4 #bgi1 n4 #d4 #gej v4 #bf4 #gea from 1 which in ,job x4 #h is parallel to 4 #geb ii4 #h4 #gec viii4 #d4 #ged viii4 #e4 #gee x4 #e4 #gef xiii4 #b4 #geg ,isa4 xli4 ff4 #geh iv4 #ag4 #gei ,amos v4 #gfj vi4 #f4 #gfa xiv4 #b4 ,perhaps the curious expression at the close of the verse1 so will we render the calves of our lips1 or 7as a variant reading gives7 fruit of our lips1 has the same intention4 ,articulate confession 7or vows71 these are the sacrifices1 the calves1 which are acceptable to ,god4 #gfb vi4 #a-d4 #gfc ,for the reasons for this interpretation see above1 pp4 #bfc ff4 #gfd x4 #aa4 #gfe ,see above1 p4 #bhh4 #gff x4 #ab4 #gfg xii4 #g4 ,,chapter ,,xxiii ,,the ,,sin ,,against ,,love ,,hosea i4-iii42 iv4 #aa ff42 ix4 #aj ff42 xi4 #h f4 ,the ,love of ,god is a terrible thing--that is the last lesson of the ,book of ,hosea4 ,my ,god will cast them away4#gfh ,my ,god--let us remember the right which ,hosea had to use these words4 ,of all prophets he was the first to break into the full aspect of the ,divine ,mercy--to learn and to proclaim that ,god is ,love4 ,but he was worthy to do so1 by the patient love of his own heart towards another who for years had outraged all his trust and tenderness4 ,he had loved1 believed and been betrayed2 pardoned and waited and yearned1 and sorrowed and pardoned again4 ,it is in this long-suffering that his breast beats upon the breast of ,god with the cry ,my ,god4 ,as he had loved ,gomer1 so had ,god loved ,israel1 past hope1 against hate1 through ages of ingratitude and apostasy4 ,quivering with his own pain1 ,hosea has exhausted all human care and affection for figures to express the ,divine tenderness1 and he declares ,god's love to be deeper than all the passion of men1 and broader than all their patience3 ,how can ,i give thee up1 ,ephraim8 ,how can ,i let thee go1 ,israel8 ,i will not execute the fierceness of ,mine anger4 ,for ,i am ,god1 and not man4 ,and yet1 like poor human affection1 this ,love of ,god1 too1 confesses its failure--,my ,god shall cast them away4 ,it is ,god's sentence of relinquishment upon those who sin against ,his ,love1 but the poor human lips which deliver it quiver with an agony of their own1 and here1 as more explicitly in twenty other passages of the book1 declare it to be equally the doom of those who outrage the love of their fellow men and women4 ,we have heard it said3 ,the lives of men are never the same after they have loved2 if they are not better they must be worse4 ,be afraid of the love that loves you3 it is either your heaven or your hell4 ,all the discipline of men springs from their love--if they take it not so1 then all their sorrow must spring from the same source4 ,there is a depth of sorrow1 which can only be known to a soul that has loved the most perfect thing and beholds itself fallen4 ,these things are true of the ,love1 both of our brother and of our ,god4 ,and the eternal interest of the life of ,hosea is that he learned how1 for strength and weakness1 for better for worse1 our human and our ,divine loves are inseparably joined4 ,i4 ,most men learn that love is inseparable from pain where ,hosea learned it--at home4 ,there it is that we are all reminded that when love is strongest she feels her weakness most4 ,for the anguish which love must bear1 as it were from the foundation of the world1 is the contradiction at her heart between the largeness of her wishes and the littleness of her power to realise them4 ,a mother feels it1 bending over the bed of her child1 when its body is racked with pain or its breath spent with coughing4 ,so great is the feeling of her love that it ought to do something1 that she will actually feel herself cruel because nothing can be done4 ,let the sick-bed become the beach of death1 and she must feel the helplessness and the anguish still more as the dear life is now plucked from her and now tossed back by the mocking waves1 and then drawn slowly out to sea upon the ebb from which there is no returning4 ,but the pain which disease and death thus cause to love is nothing to the agony that ,sin inflicts when he takes the game into his unclean hands4 ,we know what pain love brings1 if our love be a fair face and fresh body in which ,death brands his sores while we stand by1 as if with arms bound4 ,but what if our love be a childlike heart1 and a frank expression and honest eyes1 and a clean and clever mind4 ,our powerlessness is just as great and infinitely more tormented when ,sin comes by and casts his shadow over these4 ,ah1 that is ,love's greatest torment when her children1 who have run from her to the bosom of sin1 look back and their eyes are changed6 ,that is the greatest torment of ,love--to pour herself without avail into one of those careless natures which seem capacious and receptive1 yet never fill with love1 for there is a crack and a leak at the bottom of them4 ,the fields where ,love suffers her sorest defeats are not the sick-bed and not death's margin1 not the cold lips and sealed eyes kissed without response2 but the changed eyes of children1 and the breaking of the full-orbed face1 and the darkening look of growing sons and daughters1 and the home the first time the unclean laugh breaks across it4 ,to watch1 though unable to soothe1 a dear body racked with pain1 is peace beside the awful vigil of watching a soul shrink and blacken with vice1 and your love unable to redeem it4 ,such a clinical study ,hosea endured for years4 ,the prophet of ,god1 we are told1 brought a dead child to life by taking him in his arms and kissing him4 ,but ,hosea with all his love could not make ,gomer a true whole wife again4 ,love had no power on this woman--no power even at the merciful call to make all things new4 ,hosea1 who had once placed all hope in tenderness1 had to admit that ,love's moral power is not absolute4 ,love may retire defeated from the highest issues of life4 ,sin may conquer ,love4 ,yet it is in this his triumph that ,sin must feel the ultimate revenge4 ,when a man has conquered this weak thing and beaten her down beneath his feet1 ,god speaks the sentence of abandonment4 ,there is enough of the whipped dog in all of us to make us dread penalty when we come into conflict with the strong things of life4 ,but it takes us all our days to learn that there is far more condemnation to them who offend the weak things of life1 and particularly the weakest of all1 its love4 ,it was on sins against the weak that ,christ passed ,his sternest judgments3 ,woe unto him that offends one of these little ones2 it were better for him that he had never been born4 ,god's little ones are not only little children1 but all things which1 like little children1 have only love for their strength4 ,they are pure and loving men and women--men with no weapon but their love1 women with no shield but their trust4 ,they are the innocent affections of our own hearts--the memories of our childhood1 the ideals of our youth1 the prayers of our parents1 the faith in us of our friends4 ,these are the little ones of whom ,christ spake1 that he who sins against them had better never have been born4 ,often may the dear solicitudes of home1 a father's counsels1 a mother's prayers1 seem foolish things against the challenges of a world1 calling us to play the man and do as it does2 often may the vows and enthusiasms of boyhood seem impertinent against the temptations which are so necessary to manhood3 yet let us be true to the weak1 for if we betray them1 we betray our own souls4 ,we may sin against law and maim or mutilate ourselves1 but to sin against love is to be cast out of life altogether4 ,he who violates the purity of the love with which ,god has filled his heart1 he who abuses the love ,god has sent to meet him in his opening manhood1 he who slights any of the affections1 whether they be of man or woman1 of young or of old1 which ,god lays upon us as the most powerful redemptive forces of our life1 next to that of ,his dear ,son--he sinneth against his own soul1 and it is of such that ,hosea spake3 ,my ,god will cast them away4 ,we talk of breaking law3 we can only break ourselves against it4 ,but if we sin against ,love1 we do destroy her2 we take from her the power to redeem and sanctify us4 ,though in their youth men think ,love a quick and careless thing--a servant always at their side1 a winged messenger easy of despatch--let them know that every time they send her on an evil errand she returns with heavier feet and broken wings4 ,when they make her a pander they kill her outright4 ,when she is no more they waken to that which ,gomer came to know1 that love abused is love lost1 and love lost means ,hell4 ,,ii4 ,this1 however1 is only the margin from which ,hosea beholds an abandonment still deeper4 ,all that has been said of human love and the penalty of outraging it is equally true of the ,divine love and the sin against that4 ,the love of ,god has the same weakness which we have seen in the love of man4 ,it1 too1 may fail to redeem2 it1 too1 has stood defeated on some of the highest moral battle-fields of life4 ,god ,himself has suffered anguish and rejection from sinful men4 ,herein1 says a theologian1 is the mystery of this love1 444 that ,god can never by ,his ,almighty ,power compel that which is the very highest gift in the life of ,his creatures--love to ,himself1 but that ,he receives it as the free gift of ,his creatures1 and that ,he is only able to allow men to give it to ,him in a free act of their own will4 ,so ,hosea also has told us how ,god does not compel1 but allure or woo1 the sinful back to ,himself4 ,and it is the deepest anguish of the prophet's heart1 that this free grace of ,god may fail through man's apathy or insincerity4 ,the anguish appears in those frequent antitheses in which his torn heart reflects herself in the style of his discourse4 ,i have redeemed them--yet have they spoken lies against ,me4#gfi ,i found ,israel like grapes in the wilderness--they went to ,ba'al-,peor4#ggj ,when ,israel was a child1 then ,i loved him 444 but they sacrificed to ,ba'alim4#gga ,i taught ,ephraim to walk1 but they knew not that ,i healed them4#ggb ,how can ,i give thee up1 ,ephraim8 how can ,i let thee go1 ,o ,israel8444 ,ephraim compasseth ,me with lies1 and the house of ,israel with deceit6#ggc ,we fear to apply all that we know of the weakness of human love to the love of ,god4 ,yet though ,he be ,god and not man1 it was as man ,he commended ,his love to us4 ,he came nearest us1 not in the thunders of ,sinai1 but in ,him ,who presented ,himself to the world with the caresses of a little child2 ,who met men with no angelic majesty or heavenly aureole1 but whom when we saw we found nothing that we should desire ,him1 ,his visage was so marred more than any man1 and ,his form than the sons of men2 ,who came to ,his own and ,his own received ,him not2 ,who1 having loved ,his own that were in the world1 loved them up to the end1 and yet at the end was by them deserted and betrayed1--it is of ,him that ,hosea prophetically says3 ,i drew them with cords of a man and with bands of love4 ,we are not bound to ,god by any unbreakable chain4 ,the strands which draw us upwards to ,god1 to holiness and everlasting life1 have the weakness of those which bind us to the earthly souls we love4 ,it is possible for us to break them4 ,we love ,christ1 not because ,he has compelled us by any magic1 irresistible influence to do so2 but1 as ,john in his great simplicity says1 ,we love ,him because ,he first loved us4 ,now this is surely the terror of ,god's love--that it can be resisted2 that even as it is manifest in ,jesus ,christ we men have the power1 not only to remain1 as so many do1 outside its scope1 feeling it to be far-off and vague1 but having tasted it to fall away from it1 having realised it to refuse it1 having allowed it to begin its moral purposes in our lives to baffle and nullify these2 to make the glory of ,heaven absolutely ineffectual in our own characters2 and to give our ,saviour the anguish of rejection4 ,give ,him the anguish1 yet pass upon ourselves the doom6 ,for1 as ,i read the ,new ,testament1 the one unpardonable sin is the sin against our ,blessed ,redeemer's ,love as it is brought home to the heart by the power of the ,holy ,spirit4 ,every other sin is forgiven to men but to crucify afresh ,him who loved us and gave ,himself for us4 ,the most terrible of ,his judgments is the wail of a heart wounded because its love has been despised3 ,jerusalem1 ,jerusalem6 how often would ,i have gathered thy children as a hen gathereth her chickens1 and ye would not4 ,behold1 your house is left unto you desolate6 ,men say they cannot believe in hell1 because they cannot conceive how ,god may sentence men to misery for the breaking of laws they were born without power to keep4 ,and one would agree with the inference1 if ,god had done any such thing4 ,but for them which are under the law and the sentence of death1 ,christ died once for all1 that ,he might redeem them4 ,yet this does not make a hell less believable4 ,when we see how ,almighty was that ,love of ,god in ,christ ,jesus1 lifting our whole race and sending them forward with a freedom and a power of growth nothing else in history has won for them2 when we prove again how weak it is1 so that it is possible for millions of characters that have felt it to refuse its eternal influence for the sake of some base and transient passion2 nay1 when ,i myself know this power and this weakness of ,christ's love1 so that one day being loyal ,i am raised beyond the reach of fear and of doubt1 beyond the desire of sin and the habit of evil1 and the next day finds me capable of putting it aside in preference for some slight enjoyment or ambition--then ,i know the peril and the terror of this love1 that it may be to a man either ,heaven or ,hell4 ,believe then in hell1 because you believe in the ,love of ,god--not in a hell to which ,god condemns men of ,his will and pleasure1 but a hell into which men cast themselves from the very face of ,his love in ,jesus ,christ4 ,the place has been painted as a place of fires4 ,but when we contemplate that men come to it with the holiest flames in their nature quenched1 we shall justly feel that it is rather a dreary waste of ash and cinder1 strewn with snow--some ribbed and frosted ,arctic zone1 silent in death1 for there is no life there1 and there is no life there because there is no ,love1 and no ,love because men in rejecting or abusing her have slain their own power ever again to feel her presence4 ,,footnotes3 #gfh x4 #ag4 #gfi vii4 #ac4 #ggj ix4 #aj4 #gga xi4 #a1 #b4 #ggb xi4 #d4 #ggc xi4 #h2 xii4 #a4 ,,micah ,but ,i am full of power by the ,spirit of ,jehovah ,to declare to ,jacob his transgressions1 and to ,israel his sin4 ,,chapter ,,xxiv ,,the ,,book ,,of ,,micah ,the ,book of ,micah lies sixth of the ,twelve ,prophets in the ,hebrew ,canon1 but in the order of the ,septuagint third1 following ,amos and ,hosea4 ,the latter arrangement was doubtless directed by the size of the respective books2#ggd in the case of ,micah it has coincided with the prophet's proper chronological position4 ,though his exact date be not certain1 he appears to have been a younger contemporary of ,hosea1 as ,hosea was of ,amos4 ,the book is not two-thirds the size of that of ,amos1 and about half that of ,hosea4 ,it has been arranged in seven chapters1 which follow1 more or less1 a natural method of division4#gge ,they are usually grouped in three sections1 distinguishable from each other by their subject-matter1 by their temper and standpoint1 and to a less degree by their literary form4 ,they are ,a4 ,chaps4 i4-iii42 ,b4 ,chaps4 iv41 v42 ,c4 ,chaps1 vi41 vii4 ,there is no book of the ,bible1 as to the date of whose different parts there has been more discussion1 especially within recent years4 ,the history of this is shortly as follows3-- ,tradition and the criticism of the early years of this century accepted the statement of the title1 that the book was composed in the reigns of ,jotham1 ,ahaz and ,hezekiah--that is1 between #gdj and #gjj ,b4,c4 ,it was generally agreed that there were in it only traces of the first two reigns1 but that the whole was put together before the fall of ,samaria in #gba4ggf ,then ,hitzig and ,steiner dated chaps1 iii4-vi4 after #gba2 and ,ewald denied that ,micah could have given us chaps1 vi41 vii41 and placed them under ,king ,manasseh1 circa #fij-fdj4 ,next ,wellhausen#ggg sought to prove that vii4 #g-bj must be post-exilic4 ,stade#ggh took a further step1 and1 on the ground that ,micah himself could not have blunted or annulled his sharp pronouncements of doom1 by the promises which chaps1 iv4 and v4 contain1 he withdrew these from the prophet and assigned them to the time of the ,exile4#ggi ,but the sufficiency of this argument was denied by ,vatke4#ghj ,also in opposition to ,stade1 ,kuenen#gha refused to believe that ,micah could have been content with the announcement of the fall of ,jerusalem as his last word1 that therefore much of chaps1 iv4 and v4 is probably from himself1 but since their argument is obviously broken and confused1 we must look in them for interpolations1 and he decides that such are iv4 #f-h1 #aa-ac1 and the working up of v4 #i-ad4 ,the famous passage in iv4 #a-d may have been ,micah's1 but was probably added by another4 ,chaps1 vi4 and vii4 were written under ,manasseh by some of the persecuted adherents of ,jehovah4 ,we may next notice two critics who adopt an extremely conservative position4 ,von ,ryssel1#ghb as the result of a very thorough examination1 declared that all the chapters were ,micah's1 even the much doubted ii4 #ab1 #ac1 which have been placed by an editor of the book in the wrong position1 and chap4 vii4 #g-bj1 which he agrees with ,ewald can only date from the reign of ,manasseh1 ,micah himself having lived long enough into that reign to write them himself4 ,another careful analysis by ,elhorst#ghc also reached the conclusion that the bulk of the book was authentic1 but for his proof of this ,elhorst requires a radical rearrangement of the verses1 and that on grounds which do not always commend themselves4 ,he holds chap4 iv4 #i-ad and v4 #h for post-exilic insertions4 ,driver#ghd contributes a thorough examination of the book1 and reaches the conclusions that ii4 #ab1 #ac1 though obviously in their wrong place1 need not be denied to ,micah2 that the difficulties of ascribing chaps1 iv41 v41 to the prophet are not insuperable1 nor is it even necessary to suppose in them interpolations4 ,he agrees with ,ewald as to the date of vi4-vii4 #f1 and1 while holding that it is quite possible for ,micah to have written them1 thinks they are more probably due to another1 though a confident conclusion is not to be achieved4 ,as to vii4 #g-bj1 he judges ,wellhausen's inferences to be unnecessary4 ,a prophet in ,micah's or ,manasseh's time may have thought destruction nearer than it actually proved to be1 and1 imagining it as already arrived1 have put into the mouth of the people a confession suited to its circumstance4 ,wildeboer#ghe goes further than ,driver4 ,he replies in detail to the arguments of ,stade and ,cornill1 denies that the reasons for withdrawing so much from ,micah are conclusive1 and assigns to the prophet the whole book1 with the exception of several interpolations4 ,we see1 then1 that all critics are practically agreed as to the presence of interpolations in the text1 as well as to the occurrence of certain verses of the prophet out of their proper order4 ,this indeed must be obvious to every careful reader as he notes the somewhat frequent break in the logical sequence1 especially of chaps1 iv4 and v4 ,all critics1 too1 admit the authenticity of chaps1 i4-iii41 with the possible exception of ii4 #ab1 #ac2 while a majority hold that chaps1 vi4 and vii41 whether by ,micah or not1 must be assigned to the reign of ,manasseh4 ,on the authenticity of chaps1 iv4 and v4--minus interpolations--and of chaps1 vi4 and vii41 opinion is divided2 but we ought not to overlook the remarkable fact that those who have recently written the fullest monographs on ,micah#ghf incline to believe in the genuineness of the book as a whole4#ghg ,we may now enter for ourselves upon the discussion of the various sections1 but before we do so let us note how much of the controversy turns upon the general question1 whether after decisively predicting the overthrow of ,jerusalem it was possible for ,micah to add prophecies of her restoration4 ,it will be remembered that we have had to discuss this same point with regard both to ,amos and ,hosea4 ,in the case of the former we decided against the authenticity of visions of a blessed future which now close his book2 in the case of the latter we decided for the authenticity4 ,what were our reasons for this difference8 ,they were1 that the closing vision of the ,book of ,amos is not at all in harmony with the exclusively ethical spirit of the authentic prophecies2 while the closing vision of the ,book of ,hosea is not only in language and in ethical temper thoroughly in harmony with the chapters which precede it1 but in certain details has been actually anticipated by these4 ,hosea1 therefore1 furnishes us with the case of a prophet who1 though he predicted the ruin of his impenitent people 7and that ruin was verified by events71 also spoke of the possibility of their restoration upon conditions in harmony with his reasons for the inevitableness of their fall4 ,and we saw1 too1 that the hopeful visions of the future1 though placed last in the collection of his prophecies1 need not necessarily have been spoken last by the prophet1 but stand where they do because they have an eternal spiritual validity for the remnant of ,israel4#ghh ,what was possible for ,hosea is surely possible for ,micah4 ,that promises come in his book1 and closely after the conclusive threats which he gave of the fall of ,jerusalem1 does not imply that originally he uttered them all in such close proximity4 ,that indeed would have been impossible4 ,but considering how often the political prospect in ,israel changed during ,micah's time1 and how far the city was in his day from her actual destruction--more than a century distant--it seems to be improbable that he should not 7in whatever order7 have uttered both threat and promise4 ,and naturally1 when his prophecies were arranged in permanent order1 the promises would be placed after the threats4#ghi ,,first ,,section3 ,,chaps4 ,i4-,,iii4 ,no critic doubts the authenticity of the bulk of these chapters4 ,the sole question at issue is the date or 7possibly7 the dates of them4 ,only chap4 ii4 #ab1 #ac1 are generally regarded as out of place1 where they now stand4 ,chap4 i4 trembles with the destruction of both ,northern ,israel and ,judah--a destruction either very imminent or actually in the process of happening4 ,the verses which deal with ,samaria1 #f ff41 do not simply announce her inevitable ruin4 ,they throb with the sense either that this is immediate1 or that it is going on1 or that it has just been accomplished4 ,the verbs suit each of these alternatives3 ,and ,i shall set1 or am selling1 or have set1 ,samaria for a ruin of the field1 and so on4 ,we may assign them to any time between #gbe ,b4,c41 the beginning of the siege of ,samaria by ,shalmaneser1 and a year or two after its destruction by ,sargon in #gba4 ,their intense feeling seems to preclude the possibility of their having been written in the years to which some assign them1 #gje-gjj1 or twenty years after ,samaria was actually overthrown4 ,in the next verses the prophet goes on to mourn the fact that the affliction of ,samaria reaches even to the gate of ,jerusalem1 and he especially singles out as partakers in the danger of ,jerusalem a number of towns1 most of which 7so far as we can discern7 lie not between ,jerusalem and ,samaria1 but at the other corner of ,judah1 in the ,shephelah or out upon the ,philistine plain4#gij ,this was the region which ,sennacherib invaded in #gja1 simultaneously with his detachment of a corps to attack the capital2 and accordingly we might be shut up to affirm that this end of chap4 i4 dates from that invasion1 if no other explanation of the place-names were possible4 ,but another is possible4 ,micah himself belonged to one of these ,shephelah towns1 ,moresheth-,gath1 and it is natural that1 anticipating the invasion of all ,judah1 after the fall of ,samaria 7as ,isaiah#gia also did71 he should single out for mourning his own district of the country4 ,this appears to be the most probable solution of a very doubtful problem1 and accordingly we may date the whole of chap4 i4 somewhere between #gbe and #gbj or #gah4 ,let us remember that in #gai ,sargon marched past this very district of the ,shephelah in his campaign against ,egypt1 whom he defeated at ,raphia4#gib ,our conclusion is supported by chap4 ii4 ,judah1 though ,jehovah be planning evil against her1 is in the full course of her ordinary social activities4 ,the rich are absorbing the lands of the poor 7vv4 i4 ff473 note the phrase upon their beds2 it alone signifies a time of security4 ,the enemies of ,israel are internal 7#h74 ,the public peace is broken by the lords of the land and men and women1 disposed to live quietly1 are robbed 7#h ff474 ,the false prophets have sufficient signs of the times in their favour to regard ,micah's threats of destruction as calumnies 7#f74 ,and although he regards destruction as inevitable1 it is not to be to-day2 but in that day 7#d71 viz4 some still indefinite date in the future1 the blow will fall and the nation's elegy be sung4 ,on this chapter1 then1 there is no shadow of a foreign invader4 ,we might assign it to the years of ,jotham and ,ahaz 7under whose reigns the title of the book places part of the prophesying of ,micah71 but since there is no sense of a double kingdom1 no distinction between ,judah and ,israel1 it belongs more probably to the years when all immediate danger from ,assyria had passed away1 between ,sargon's withdrawal from ,raphia in #gai and his invasion of ,ashdod in #gaj1 or between the latter date and ,sennacherib's accession in #gje4 ,chap4 iii4 contains three separate oracles1 which exhibit a similar state of affairs3 the abuse of the common people by their chiefs and rulers1 who are implied to be in full sense of power and security4 ,they have time to aggravate their doings 7#d72 their doom is still future--then at that time 7ib474 ,the bulk of the prophets determine their oracles by the amount men give them 7#e71 another sign of security4 ,their doom is also future 7#f f474 ,in the third of the oracles the authorities of the land are in the undisturbed exercise of their judicial offices 7#i f471 and the priests and prophets of their oracles 7#aj71 though all these professions practise only for bribe and reward4 ,jerusalem is still being built and embellished 7#aj74 ,but the prophet1 not because there are political omens pointing to this1 but simply in the force of his indignation at the sins of the upper classes1 prophesies the destruction of the capital 7#ab74 ,it is possible that these oracles of chap4 iii4 may be later than those of the previous chapters4#gic ,,second ,,section3 ,,chaps4 ,,iv41 ,v4 ,this section of the book opens with two passages1 verses #a-e and verses #f1 #g1 which there are serious objections against assigning to ,micah4 #a4 ,the first of these1 #a-e1 is the famous prophecy of the ,mountain of the ,lord's ,house1 which is repeated in ,isaiah ii4 #b-e4 ,probably the ,book of ,micah presents this to us in the more original form4#gid ,the alternatives therefore are four3 ,micah was the author1 and ,isaiah borrowed from him2 or both borrowed from an earlier source2#gie or the oracle is authentic in ,micah1 and has been inserted by a later editor in ,isaiah2 or it has been inserted by later editors in both ,micah and ,isaiah4 ,the last of these conclusions is required by the arguments first stated by ,stade and ,hackmann1 and then elaborated1 in a very strong piece of reasoning1 by ,cheyne4 ,hackmann1 after marking the want of connection with the previous chapter1 alleges the keynotes of the passage to be three3 that it is not the arbitration of ,jehovah1#gif but ,his sovereignty over foreign nations1 and their adoption of ,his law1 which the passage predicts2 that it is the ,temple at ,jerusalem whose future supremacy is affirmed2 and that there is a strong feeling against war4 ,these1 ,cheyne contends1 are the doctrines of a much later age than that of ,micah2 he holds the passage to be the work of a post-exilic imitator of the prophets1 which was first intruded into the ,book of ,micah and afterwards borrowed from this by an editor of ,isaiah's prophecies4 ,it is just here1 however1 that the theory of these critics loses its strength4 ,agreeing heartily as ,i do with recent critics that the genuine writings of the early prophets have received some1 and perhaps considerable1 additions from the ,exile and later periods1 it seems to me extremely improbable that the same post-exilic insertion should find its way into two separate books4 ,and ,i think that the undoubted bias towards the post-exilic period of all ,canon ,cheyne's recent criticism1 has in this case hurried him past due consideration of the possibility of a pre-exilic date4 ,in fact the gentle temper shown by the passage towards foreign nations1 the absence of hatred or of any ambition to subject the ,gentiles to servitude to ,israel1 contrasts strongly with the temper of many exilic and post-exilic prophecies2#gig while the position which it demands for ,jehovah and ,his religion is quite consistent with the fundamental principles of earlier prophecy4 ,the passage really claims no more than a suzerainty of ,jehovah over the heathen tribes1 with the result only that their war with ,israel and with one another shall cease1 not that they shall become1 as the great prophecy of the ,exile demands1 tributaries and servitors4 ,such a claim was no more than the natural deduction from the early prophets' belief of ,jehovah's supremacy in righteousness4 ,and although ,amos had not driven the principle so far as to promise the absolute cessation of war1 he also had recognised in the most unmistakable fashion the responsibility of the ,gentiles to ,jehovah1 and ,his supreme arbitrament upon them4#gih ,and ,isaiah himself1 in his prophecy on ,tyre1 promised a still more complete subjection of the life of the heathen to the service of ,jehovah4#gii ,moreover the fifth verse of the passage in ,micah 7though it is true its connection with the previous four is not apparent7 is much more in harmony with pre-exilic than with post-exilic prophecy3 ,all the nations shall walk each in the name of his god1 and we shall walk in the name of ,jehovah our ,god for ever and aye4 ,this is consistent with more than one prophetic utterance before the ,exile1#hjj but it is not consistent with the beliefs of ,judaism after the ,exile4 ,finally1 the great triumph achieved for ,jerusalem in #gja is quite sufficient to have prompted the feelings expressed by this passage for the mountain of the house of the ,lord2 though if we are to bring it down to a date subsequent to #gja1 we must rearrange our views with regard to the date and meaning of the second chapter of ,isaiah4 ,in ,micah the passage is obviously devoid of all connection1 not only with the previous chapter1 but with the subsequent verses of chap4 iv4 ,the possibility of a date in the eighth or beginning of the seventh century is all that we can determine with regard to it2 the other questions must remain in obscurity4 #b4 ,verses #f1 #g1 may refer to the ,captivity of ,northern ,israel1 the prophet adding that when it shall be restored the united kingdom shall be governed from ,mount ,zion2 but a date during the ,exile is1 of course1 equally probable4 #c4 ,verses #h-ac contain a series of small pictures of ,jerusalem in siege1 from which1 however1 she issues triumphant4#hja ,it is impossible to say whether such a siege is actually in course while the prophet writes1 or is pictured by him as inevitable in the near future4 ,the words thou shalt go to ,babylon may be1 but are not necessarily1 a gloss4 #d4 ,chap4 iv4 #ad-v4 #h again pictures such a siege of ,jerusalem1 but promises a ,deliverer out of ,bethlehem1 the city of ,david4#hjb ,sufficient heroes will be raised up along with him to drive the ,assyrians from the land1 and what is left of ,israel after all these disasters shall prove a powerful and sovereign influence upon the peoples4 ,these verses were probably not all uttered at the same time4 #e4 ,verses #i-ad4--;,in prospect of such a deliverance the prophet returns to what chap4 i4 has already described and ,isaiah frequently emphasises as the sin of ,judah--her armaments and fortresses1 her magic and idolatries1 the things she trusted in instead of ,jehovah4 ,they will no more be necessary1 and will disappear4 ,the nations that serve not ,jehovah will feel ,his wrath4 ,in all these oracles there is nothing inconsistent with authorship in the eighth century3 there is much that witnesses to this date4 ,everything that they threaten or promise is threatened or promised by ,hosea and by ,isaiah1 with the exception of the destruction 7in ver4 #ab7 of the ,maeboth1 or sacred pillars1 against which we find no sentence going forth from ,jehovah before the ,book of ,deuteronomy1 while ,isaiah distinctly promises the erection of a ,maebah to ,jehovah in the land of ,egypt4#hjc ,but waiving for the present the possibility of a date for ,deuteronomy1 or for part of it1 in the reign of ,hezekiah1 we must remember the destruction1 which took place under this king1 of idolatrous sanctuaries in ,judah1 and feel also that1 in spite of such a reform1 it was quite possible for ,isaiah to introduce a ,maebah into his poetic vision of the worship of ,jehovah in ,egypt4 ,for has he not also dared to say that the harlot's hire of the ,phnician commerce shall one day be consecrated to ,jehovah8 ,,third ,,section3 ,,chaps4 ,,vi41 ,,vii4 ,the style now changes4 ,we have had hitherto a series of short oracles1 as if delivered orally4 ,these are succeeded by a series of conferences or arguments1 by several speakers4 ,ewald accounts for the change by supposing that the latter date from a time of persecution1 when the prophet1 unable to speak in public1 uttered himself in literature4 ,but chap4 i4 is also dramatic4 #a4 ,chap4 vi4 #a-h4--;,an argument in which the prophet as herald calls on the hills to listen to ,jehovah's case against the people 7#a1 #b74 ,jehovah ,himself appeals to the latter1 and in a style similar to ,hosea's cites ,his deeds in their history1 as evidence of what ,he seeks from them 7#c-e74 ,the people1 presumably penitent1 ask how they shall come before ,jehovah 7#f1 #g74 ,and the prophet tells them what ,jehovah has declared in the matter 7#h74 ,opening very much like ,micah's first oracle 7chap4 i4 #a71 this argument contains nothing strange either to ,micah or the eighth century4 ,exception has been taken to the reference in ver4 #g to the sacrifice of the first-born1 which appears to have become more common from the gloomy age of ,manasseh onwards1 and which1 therefore1 led ,ewald to date all chaps4 vi4 and vii4 from that king's reign4 ,but child-sacrifice is stated simply as a possibility1 and--occurring as it does at the climax of the sentence--as an extreme possibility4#hjd ,i see no necessity1 therefore1 to deny the piece to ,micah or the reign of ,hezekiah4 ,of those who place it under ,manasseh1 some1 like ,driver1 still reserve it to ,micah himself1 whom they suppose to have survived ,hezekiah and seen the evil days which followed4 #b4 ,verses #i-af4--,most expositors#hje take these verses along with the previous eight1 as well as with the six which follow in chap4 vii4 ,but there is no connection between verses #h and #i2 and #i-af are better taken by themselves4 ,the prophet heralds1 as before1 the speech of ,jehovah to tribe and city7#i74 ,addressing ,jerusalem1 ,jehovah asks how ,he can forgive such fraud and violence as those by which her wealth has been gathered 7#aj-ab74 ,then addressing the people 7note the change from feminine to masculine in the second personal pronouns7 ,he tells them ,he must smite2 they shall not enjoy the fruit of their labours7#ad1 #ae74 ,they have sinned the sins of ,omri and the house of ,ahab 7query--should it not be of ,ahab and the house of ,omri871 so that they must be put to shame before the ,gentiles#hjf7af74 ,in this section three or four words have been marked as of late ,hebrew4#hjg ,but this is uncertain1 and the inference made from it precarious4 ,the deeds of ,omri and ,ahab's house have been understood as the persecution of the adherents of ,jehovah1 and the passage has1 therefore1 been assigned by ,ewald and others to the reign of the tyrant ,manasseh4 ,but such habits of persecution could hardly be imputed to the ,city or ,people as a whole2 and we may conclude that the passage means some other of that notorious dynasty's sins4 ,among these1 as is well known1 it is possible to make a large selection--the favouring of idolatry1 or the tyrannous absorption by the rich of the land of the poor 7as in ,naboth's case71 a sin which ,micah has already marked as that of his age4 ,the whole treatment of the subject1 too1 whether under the head of the sin or its punishment1 strongly resembles the style and temper of ,amos4 ,it is1 therefore1 by no means impossible for this passage also to have been ,micah's1 and we must accordingly leave the question of its date undecided4 ,certainly we are not shut up1 as the majority of modern critics suppose1 to a date under ,manasseh or ,amon4 #c4 ,chap4 vii4 #a-f4--,these verses are spoken by the prophet in his own name or that of the people's4 ,the land is devastated2 the righteous have disappeared2 everybody is in ambush to commit deeds of violence and take his neighbour unawares4 ,there is no justice3 the great ones of the land are free to do what they like2 they have intrigued with and bribed the authorities4 ,informers have crept in everywhere4 ,men must be silent1 for the members of their own families are their foes4 ,some of these sins have already been marked by ,micah as those of his age 7chap4 ii471 but the others point rather to a time of persecution such as that under ,manasseh4 ,wellhausen remarks the similarity to the state of affairs described in ,mal4 iii4 #bd and in some ,psalms4 ,we cannot fix the date4 #d4 ,verses #g-bj4--,this passage starts from a totally different temper of prophecy1 and presumably1 therefore1 from very different circumstances4 ,israel1 as a whole1 speaks in penitence4 ,she has sinned1 and bows herself to the consequences1 but in hope4 ,a day shall come when her exiles shall return and the heathen acknowledge her ,god4 ,the passage1 and with it the ,book of ,micah1 concludes by apostrophising ,jehovah as the ,god of forgiveness and grace to ,his people4 ,ewald1 and following him ,driver1 assign the passage1 with those which precede it1 to the times of ,manasseh1 in which of course it is possible that ,micah was still active1 though ,ewald supposes a younger and anonymous prophet as the author4 ,wellhausen#hjh goes further1 and1 while recognising that the situation and temper of the passage resemble those of ,isaiah xl4 ff41 is inclined to bring it even further down to post-exilic times1 because of the universal character of the ,diaspora4 ,driver objects to these inferences1 and maintains that a prophet in the time of ,manasseh1 thinking the destruction of ,jerusalem to be nearer than it actually was1 may easily have pictured it as having taken place1 and put an ideal confession in the mouth of the people4 ,it seems to me that all these critics have failed to appreciate a piece of evidence even more remarkable than any they have insisted on in their argument for a late date4 ,this is1 that the passage speaks of a restoration of the people only to ,bashan and ,gilead1 the provinces overrun by ,tiglath-,pileser ,,iii4 in #gcd4 ,it is not possible to explain such a limitation either by the circumstances of ,manasseh's time or by those of the ,exile4 ,in the former surely ,samaria would have been included2 in the latter ,zion and ,judah would have been emphasised before any other region4 ,it would be easy for the defenders of a post-exilic date1 and especially of a date much subsequent to the ,exile1 to account for a longing after ,bashan and ,gilead1 though they also would have to meet the objection that ,samaria or ,ephraim is not mentioned4 ,but how natural it would be for a prophet writing soon after the captivity of ,tiglath-,pileser ,,iii4 to make this precise selection6 ,and although there remain difficulties 7arising from the temper and language of the passage7 in the way of assigning all of it to ,micah or his contemporaries1 ,i feel that on the geographical allusions much can be said for the origin of this part of the passage in their age1 or even in an age still earlier3 that of the ,syrian wars in the end of the ninth century1 with which there is nothing inconsistent either in the spirit or the language of vv4 #ad-ag4 ,and ,i am sure that if the defenders of a late date had found a selection of districts as suitable to the post-exilic circumstances of ,israel as the selection of ,bashan and ,gilead is to the circumstances of the eighth century1 they would1 instead of ignoring it1 have emphasised it as a conclusive confirmation of their theory4 ,on the other hand1 ver4 #aa can date only from the ,exile1 or the following years1 before ,jerusalem was rebuilt4 ,again1 vv4 #ah-bj appear to stand by themselves4 ,it seems likely1 therefore1 that chap4 vii4 #g-bj is a ,psalm composed of little pieces from various dates1 which1 combined1 give us a picture of the secular sorrows of ,israel1 and of the conscience she ultimately felt in them1 and conclude by a doxology to the everlasting mercies of her ,god4 ,,footnotes3 #ggd ,see above1 pp4 #f f4 #gge ,note that the ,hebrew and ,english divisions do not coincide between chaps4 iv4 and v4 ,in the ,hebrew chap4 iv4 includes a fourteenth verse1 which in the ,english stands as the first verse of chap4 v4 ,in this the ,english agrees with the ,septuagint4 #ggf ,caspari4 #ggg ,in the fourth edition of ,bleek's ,introduction4 #ggh ,z4,a4,t4,w41 ,vols4 ,i41 ,,iii41 ,,iv4 #ggi ,see also ,cornill1 ,einleitung1 #ahc f4 ,stade takes iv4 #a-d1 iv4 #aa-v4 #c1 v4 #f-ad1 as originally one prophecy 7distinguished by certain catchwords and an outlook similar to that of ,ezekiel and the great ,prophet of the ,exile71 in which the two pieces iv4 #e-aj and v4 #d1 #e1 were afterwards inserted by the author of ii4 #ab1 #ac4 #ghj ,einleitung in das ,a4,t41 pp4 #fij ff4 #gha ,einleitung4 #ghb ,untersuchungen ber dis ,textgestalt u4 die ,echtheit des ,buches ,micha1 #ahhg4 #ghc ,de ,profetie van ,micha1 #ahia1 which ,i have not seen4 ,it is summarised in ,wildeboer's ,litteratur des ,a4,t41 #ahie4 #ghd ,introduction1 #ahib4 #ghe ,litteratur des ,a4,t41 pp4 #adh ff4 #ghf ,wildeboer 7,de ,profet ,micha71 ,von ,ryssel and ,elhorst4 #ghg ,cheyne1 therefore1 is not correct when he says 7,introduction to second edition of ,robertson ,smith's ,prophets1 p4 xxiii47 that it is becoming more and more doubtful whether more than two or three fragments of the heterogeneous collection of fragments in chaps4 iv4-vii4 can have come from that prophet4 #ghh ,see above1 p4 #caa4 #ghi ,wildeboer seems to me to have good grounds for his reply to ,stade's assertion that the occurrence of promises after the threats only blunts and nullifies the latter4 ,these objections1 says ,wildeboer1 raise themselves only against the spoken1 but not against the written word4 ,see1 too1 the admirable remarks he quotes from ,de ,goeje4 #gij ,see below1 pp4 #chc ff4 #gia x4 #ah4 #gib ,smend assigns the prophecy of the destruction of ,jerusalem in iii4 #ad1 along with ,isaiah xxviii4-xxxii41 to #gjd-gja1 and suggests that the end of chap4 i4 refers to ,sennacherib's campaign in ,philistia in #gja 7,a4 ,t4 ,religionsgeschichte1 p4 #bbe1 n474 ,the former is possible1 but the latter passage1 following so closely on i4 #f1 which implies the fall of ,samaria to be still recent1 if not in actual course1 is more suitably placed in the time of the campaign of ,sargon over pretty much the same ground4 #gic ,see above1 p4 #cfc1 n4 #b4 #gid ,so ,hitzig 7ohne ,zweifel71 and ,cheyne1 ,introduction to the ,book of ,isaiah2 ,ryssel1 op4 cit41 pp4 #bah f4 ,hackmann 7,die ,zukunftserwartung des ,jesaia1 #abg-h1 n47 prefers the ,greek of ,micah4 ,ewald is doubtful4 ,duhm1 however1 inclines to authorship by ,isaiah1 and would assign the composition to ,isaiah's old age4 #gie ,hitzig2 ,ewald4 #gif ,as against ,duhm4 #gig ,so rightly ,duhm on ,isa4 ii4 #b-d4 #gih ,amos i4 and ii4 ,see above1 pp4 #abd1 #acc4 #gii ,isa4 xxiii4 #ag f4 #hjj ,jer4 xvii4 #hja ,wellhausen indeed thinks that ver4 #h presupposes that ,jerusalem is already devastated1 reduced to the state of a shepherd's tower in the wilderness4 ,this1 however1 is incorrect4 ,the verse implies only that the whole country is overrun by the foe1 ,jerusalem alone standing1 with the flock of ,god in it1 like a fortified fold 7cf4 ,isaiah i474 #hjb ,roorda1 reasoning from the ,greek text1 takes ,house of ,ephratha as the original reading1 with ,bethlehem added later2 and ,hitzig properly reads ,ephrath1 giving its final letter to the next word which improves the grammar1 thus3 #hjc ,isa4 xix4 #ai4 #hjd ,so also ,wellhausen4 #hje ,e4g4 ,ewald and ,driver4 #hjf ,for read with the ,,lxx4 #hjg ,wellhausen states four4 ,but of ver4 #i is an uncertain reading4 is found in ,hosea vii4 #af1 though the text of this1 it is true1 is corrupt4 in another verbal form is found in ,isa4 i4 #af4 ,there only remains 1 but again it is uncertain whether we should take this in its late sense of tribe4 #hjh ,and also ,giesebrecht1 ,beitrge1 p4 #bag4 ,,chapter ,,xxv ,,micah ,,the ,,morasthite ,,micah i4 ,some time in the reign of ,hezekiah1 when the kingdom of ,judah was still inviolate1 but shivering to the shock of the fall of ,samaria1 and probably while ,sargon the destroyer was pushing his way past ,judah to meet ,egypt at ,raphia1 a ,judan prophet of the name of ,micah1 standing in sight of the ,assyrian march1 attacked the sins of his people and prophesied their speedy overthrow beneath the same flood of war4 ,if we be correct in our surmise1 the exact year was #gbj-gai ,b4,c4 ,amos had been silent thirty years1 ,hosea hardly fifteen2 ,isaiah was in the midway of his career4 ,the title of ,micah's book asserts that he had previously prophesied under ,jotham and ,ahaz1 and though we have seen it to be possible1 it is by no means proved1 that certain passages of the book date from these reigns4 ,micah is called the ,morasthite4#hji ,for this designation there appears to be no other meaning than that of a native of ,moresheth-,gath1 a village mentioned by himself4#haj ,it signifies ,property or ,territory of ,gath1 and after the fall of the latter1 which from this time no more appears in history1 ,moresheth may have been used alone4 ,compare the analogous cases of ,helkath 7portion of--7 ,galilee1 ,ataroth1 ,chesulloth and ,iim4#haa ,in our ignorance of ,gath's position1 we should be equally at fault about ,moresheth1 for the name has vanished1 were it not for one or two plausible pieces of evidence4 ,belonging to ,gath1 ,moresheth must have lain near the ,philistine border3 the towns among which ,micah includes it are situate in that region2 and ,jerome declares that the name--though the form1 ,morasthi1 in which he cites it is suspicious--was in his time still extant in a small village to the east of ,eleutheropolis or ,beit-,jibrin4 ,jerome cites ,morasthi as distinct from the neighbouring ,mareshah1 which is also quoted by ,micah beside ,moresheth-,gath4#hab ,moresheth was1 therefore1 a place in the ,shephelah1 or range of low hills which lie between the hill-country of ,judah and the ,philistine plain4 ,it is the opposite exposure from the wilderness of ,tekoa1#hac some seventeen miles away across the watershed4 ,as the home of ,amos is bare and desert1 so the home of ,micah is fair and fertile4 ,the irregular chalk hills are separated by broad glens1 in which the soil is alluvial and red1 with room for cornfields on either side of the perennial or almost perennial streams4 ,the olive groves on the braes are finer than either those of the plain below or of the ,judan tableland above4 ,there is herbage for cattle4 ,bees murmur everywhere1 larks are singing1 and although to-day you may wander in the maze of hills for hours without meeting a man or seeing a house1 you are never out of sight of the traces of ancient habitation1 and seldom beyond sound of the human voice--shepherds and ploughmen calling to their flocks and to each other across the glens4 ,there are none of the conditions or of the occasions of a large town4 ,but1 like the south of ,england1 the country is one of villages and homesteads1 breeding good yeomen--men satisfied and in love with their soil1 yet borderers with a far outlook and a keen vigilance and sensibility4 ,the ,shephelah is sufficiently detached from the capital and body of the land to beget in her sons an independence of mind and feeling1 but so much upon the edge of the open world as to endue them at the same time with that sense of the responsibilities of warfare1 which the national statesmen1 aloof and at ease in ,zion1 could not possibly have shared4 ,upon one of the westmost terraces of this ,shephelah1 nearly a thousand feet above the sea1 lay ,moresheth itself4 ,there is a great view across the undulating plain with its towns and fortresses1 ,lachish1 ,eglon1 ,shaphir and others1 beyond which runs the coast road1 the famous war-path between ,asia and ,africa4 ,ashdod and ,gaza are hardly discernible against the glitter of the sea1 twenty-two miles away4 ,behind roll the round bush-covered hills of the ,shephelah1 with ,david's hold at ,adullam1#had the field where he fought ,goliath1 and many another scene of border warfare2 while over them rises the high wall of the ,judan plateau1 with the defiles breaking through it to ,hebron and ,bethlehem4 ,the valley-mouth near which ,moresheth stands has always formed the south-western gateway of ,juda1 the ,philistine or ,egyptian gate1 as it might be called1 with its outpost at ,lachish1 twelve miles across the plain4 ,roads converge upon this valley-mouth from all points of the compass4 ,beit-,jibrin1 which lies in it1 is midway between ,jerusalem and ,gaza1 about twenty-five miles from either1 nineteen miles from ,bethlehem and thirteen from ,hebron4 ,visit the place at any point of the long history of ,palestine1 and you find it either full of passengers or a centre of campaign4 ,asa defeated the ,ethiopians here4 ,the ,maccabees and ,john ,hyrcanus contested ,mareshah1 two miles off1 with the ,idumeans4 ,gabinius fortified ,mareshah4 ,vespasian and ,saladin both deemed the occupation of the valley necessary before they marched upon ,jerusalem4 ,septimius ,severus made ,beit-,jibrin the capital of the ,shephelah1 and laid out military roads1 whose pavements still radiate from it in all directions4 ,the ,onomasticon measures distances in the ,shephelah from ,beit-,jibrin4 ,most of the early pilgrims from ,jerusalem by ,gaza to ,sinai or ,egypt passed through it1 and it was a centre of ,crusading operations whether against ,egypt during the ,latin kingdom or against ,jerusalem during the ,third ,crusade4 ,not different was the place in the time of ,micah4 ,micah must have seen pass by his door the frequent embassies which ,isaiah tells us went down to ,egypt from ,hezekiah's court1 and seen return those ,egyptian subsidies in which a foolish people put their trust instead of in their ,god4 ,in touch1 then1 with the capital1 feeling every throb of its folly and its panic1 but standing on that border which must1 as he believed1 bear the brunt of the invasion that its crimes were attracting1 ,micah lifted up his voice4 ,they were days of great excitement4 ,the words of ,amos and ,hosea had been fulfilled upon ,northern ,israel4 ,should ,judah escape1 whose injustice and impurity were as flagrant as her sister's8 ,it were vain to think so4 ,the ,assyrians had come up to her northern border4 ,isaiah was expecting their assault upon ,mount ,zion4#hae ,the ,lord's ,controversy was not closed4 ,micah will summon the whole earth to hear the old indictment and the still unexhausted sentence4 ,the prophet speaks3-- ,hear ye1 peoples#haf all2 ,hearken1 ,o ,earth1 and her fulness6 ,that ,jehovah may be among you to testify1 ,the ,lord from ,his holy temple6 ,for1 lo6 ,jehovah goeth forth from ,his place2 ,he descendeth and marcheth on the heights of the earth4#hag ,molten are the mountains beneath ,him1 ,and the valleys gape open1 ,like wax in face of the fire1 ,like water poured over a fall4 ,god speaks3-- ,for the transgression of ,jacob is all this1 ,and for the sins of the house of ,israel4 ,what is the transgression of ,jacob8 is it not ,samaria8 ,and what is the sin of the house#hah of ,judah8 is it not ,jerusalem8 ,therefore do ,i turn ,samaria into a ruin of the field1#hai ,and into vineyard terraces2 ,and ,i pour down her stones to the glen1 ,and lay bare her foundations4#hbj ,all her images are shattered1 ,and all her hires are being burned in the fire2 ,and all her idols ,i lay desolate1 ,for from the hire of a harlot they were gathered1#hba ,and to a harlot's hire they return4#hbb ,the prophet speaks3-- ,for this let me mourn1 let me wail1 ,let me go barefoot and stripped 7of my robe71 ,let me make lamentation like the jackals1 ,and mourning like the daughters of the desert4#hbc ,for her stroke#hbd is desperate2 ,yea1 it hath come unto ,judah6 ,it hath smitten right up to the gate of my people1 ,up to ,jerusalem4 ,within the capital itself ,isaiah was also recording the extension of the ,assyrian invasion to its walls1 but in a different temper4#hbe ,he was full of the exulting assurance that1 although at the very gate1 the ,assyrian could not harm the city of ,jehovah1 but must fall when he lifted his impious hand against it4 ,micah has no such hope3 he is overwhelmed with the thought of ,jerusalem's danger4 ,provincial though he be1 and full of wrath at the danger into which the politicians of ,jerusalem had dragged the whole country1 he profoundly mourns the peril of the capital1 the gate of my people1 as he fondly calls her4 ,therefore we must not exaggerate the frequently drawn contrast between ,isaiah and himself4#hbf ,to ,micah also ,jerusalem was dear1 and his subsequent prediction of her overthrow#hbg ought to be read with the accent of this previous mourning for her peril4 ,nevertheless his heart clings most to his own home1 and while ,isaiah pictures the ,assyrian entering ,judah from the north by ,migron1 ,michmash and ,nob1 ,micah anticipates invasion by the opposite gateway of the land1 at the door of his own village4 ,his elegy sweeps across the landscape so dear to him4 ,this obscure province was even more than ,jerusalem his world1 the world of his heart4 ,it gives us a living interest in the man that the fate of these small villages1 many of them vanished1 should excite in him more passion than the fortunes of ,zion herself4 ,in such a passion we can incarnate his spirit4 ,micah is no longer a book1 or an oration1 but flesh and blood upon a home and a countryside of his own4 ,we see him on his housetop pouring forth his words before the hills and the far-stretching heathen land4 ,in the name of every village within sight he reads a symbol of the curse that is coming upon his country1 and of the sins that have earned the curse4 ,so some of the greatest poets have caught their music from the nameless brooklets of their boyhood's fields2 and many a prophet has learned to read the tragedy of man and ,god's verdict upon sin in his experience of village life4 ,but there was more than feeling in ,micah's choice of his own country as the scene of the ,assyrian invasion4 ,he had better reasons for his fears than ,isaiah1 who imagined the approach of the ,assyrian from the north4 ,for it is remarkable how invaders of ,juda1 from ,sennacherib to ,vespasian and from ,vespasian to ,saladin and ,richard1 have shunned the northern access to ,jerusalem and endeavoured to reach her by the very gateway at which ,micah stood mourning4 ,he had1 too1 this greater motive for his fear1 that ,sargon1 as we have seen1 was actually in the neighbourhood1 marching to the defeat of ,judah's chosen patron1 ,egypt4 ,was it not probable that1 when the latter was overthrown1 ,sargon would turn back upon ,judah by ,lachish and ,mareshah8 ,if we keep this in mind we shall appreciate1 not only the fond anxiety1 but the political foresight that inspires the following passage1 which is to our ,western taste so strangely cast in a series of plays upon place-names4 ,the disappearance of many of these names1 and our ignorance of the transactions to which the verses allude1 often render both the text and the meaning very uncertain4 ,micah begins with the well-known play upon the name of ,gath2 the ,acco which he couples with it is either the ,phnician port to the north of ,carmel1 the modern ,acre1 or some ,philistine town1 unknown to us1 but in any case the line forms with the previous one an intelligible couplet3 ,tell it not in ,tell-town2 ,weep not in ,weep-town4 ,the following ,beth-le-',aphrah1 ,house of ,dust1 must be taken with them1 for in the phrase roll thyself there is a play upon the name ,philistine4 ,so1 too1 ,shaphir1 or ,beauty1 the modern ,suafr1 lay in the ,philistine region4 ,sa'anan and ,beth-esel and ,maroth are unknown2 but if ,micah1 as is probable1 begins his list far away on the western horizon and comes gradually inland1 they also are to be sought for on the maritime plain4 ,then he draws nearer by ,lachish1 on the first hills1 and in the leading pass towards ,judah1 to ,moresheth-,gath1 ,achzib1 ,mareshah and ,adullam1 which all lie within ,israel's territory and about the prophet's own home4 ,we understand the allusion1 at least1 to ,lachish in ver4 #ac4 ,as the last ,judan outpost towards ,egypt1 and on a main road thither1 ,lachish would receive the ,egyptian subsidies of horses and chariots1 in which the politicians put their trust instead of in ,jehovah4 ,therefore she was the beginning of sin to the daughter of ,zion4 ,and if we can trust the text of ver4 #ad1 ,lachish would pass on the ,egyptian ambassadors to ,moresheth-,gath1 the next stage of their approach to ,jerusalem4 ,but this is uncertain4 ,with ,moresheth-,gath is coupled ,achzib1 a town at some distance from ,jerome's site for the former1 to the neighbourhood of which1 ,mareshah1 we are brought back again in ver4 #ae4 ,adullam1 with which the list closes1 lies some eight or ten miles to the north-east of ,mareshah4 ,the prophet speaks3-- ,tell it not in ,gath1 ,weep not in ,acco1#hbh ,in ,beth-le-',aphrah#hbi roll thyself in dust4 ,pass over1 inhabitress of ,shaphir1#hcj thy shame uncovered6 ,the inhabitress of ,sa'anan#hca shall not march forth2 ,the lamentation of ,beth-esel#hcb taketh from you its standing4 ,the inhabitress of ,maroth#hcc trembleth for good1 ,for evil hath come down from ,jehovah to the gate of ,jerusalem4 ,harness the horse to the chariot1 inhabitress of ,lachish1#hcd ,that hast been the beginning of sin to the daughter of ,zion2 ,yea1 in thee are found the transgressions of ,israel4 ,therefore thou givest 444#hce to ,moresheth-,gath3#hcf ,the houses of ,achzib#hcg shall deceive the kings of ,israel4 ,again shall ,i bring the ,possessor conqueror to thee1 inhabitress of ,mareshah2#hch ,to ,adullam#hci shall come the glory of ,israel4 ,make thee bald1 and shave thee for thy darlings2 ,make broad thy baldness like the vulture1 ,for they go into banishment from thee4 ,this was the terrible fate which the ,assyrian kept before the peoples with whom he was at war4 ,other foes raided1 burned and slew3 he carried off whole populations into exile4 ,having thus pictured the doom which threatened his people1 ,micah turns to declare the sins for which it has been sent upon them4 ,,footnotes3 #hji ,micah i42 ,jer4 xxvi4 #ah4 #haj i4 #ad4 #haa ,ataroth 7,numb4 xxxii4 #c7 is ,atroth-,shophan 7ib4 #ce72 ,chesulloth 7,josh4 xix4 #ah7 is ,chisloth-,tabor 7ib4 #ab72 ,iim 7,numb4 xxxiii4 #de7 is ,iye-,abarim 7ib4 #dd74 #hab ,micham de ,morasthi qui usque hodie juxta ,eleutheropolim1 haud grandis est viculus4--,jerome1 ,preface to ,micha4 ,morasthi1 unde fuit ,micheas propheta1 est autem vicus contra orientem ,eleutheropoleos4--,onomasticon1 which also gives ,maresa1 in tribu ,juda3 cuius nunc tantummodo sunt ruin in secundo lapide ,eleutheropoleos4 ,see1 too1 the ,epitaphium ,s4 ,paul3 ,videam ,morasthim sepulchrum quondam ,mich1 nunc ecclesiam1 et ex latere derelinquam ,choros1 et ,gitthos et ,maresam4 ,the occurrence of a place bearing the name ,property-of-,gath so close to ,beit-,jibrin certainly strengthens the claims of the latter to be ,gath4 ,see ,hist4 ,geog41 p4 #aif4 #hac ,see above1 pp4 #gd ff4 #had ,for the situation of ,adullam in the ,shephelah see ,hist4 ,geog41 p4 #bbi4 #hae ,isa4 x4 #bh ff4 ,this makes it quite conceivable that ,micah i4 #i1 it hath struck right up to the gate of ,jerusalem1 was composed immediately after the fall of ,samaria1 and not1 as ,sinend imagines1 during the campaign of ,sennacherib4 ,against the latter date there is the objection that by then the fall of ,samaria1 which ,micah i4 #f describes as present1 was already nearly twenty years past4 #haf ,the address is either to the tribes1 in which case we must substitute land for earth in the next line2 or much more probably it is to the ,gentile nations1 but in this case we cannot translate 7as all do7 in the third line that the ,lord will be a witness against them1 for the charge is only against ,israel4 ,they are summoned in the same sense as ,amos summons a few of the nations in chap4 iii4 #i ff4--,the opening words of ,micah are original to this passage1 and interpolated in the exordium of the other ,micah1 #a ,kings xxii4 #bh4 #hag ,jehovah's ,temple or ,place is not1 as in earlier poems1 ,sinai or ,seir 7cf4 ,deborah's song and ,deut4 xxxiii471 but ,heaven 7cf4 ,isaiah xix4 or ,psalm xxix474 #hah ,so ,,lxx4 and other versions4 #hai ,wellhausen's objections to this phrase are arbitrary and incorrect4 ,a ruin in the midst of soil gone out of cultivation1 where before there had been a city among vineyards1 is a striking figure of desolation4 #hbj ,which is precisely how ,herod's ,samaria lies at the present day4 #hba ,so ,ewald4 #hbb ,it must be kept in mind that all the verbs in the above passage may as correctly be given in the future tense2 in that case the passage will be dated just before the fall of ,samaria1 in #gbb-a1 instead of just after4 #hbc 1 that is1 the ostriches3 cf4 ,arab1 wa'ana1 white1 barren ground4 ,the ,arabs call the ostrich father of the desert3 abu sahr4 #hbd ,,lxx4 #hbe ,isa4 x4 #bh ff4 #hbf ,it is well put by ,robertson ,smith's ,prophets#b1 pp4 #bhi ff4 #hbg iii4 #ab4 #hbh ,,lxx4 2 ,heb4 weep not at all4 #hbi cannot be the ,ophrah1 1 of ,benjamin4 ,it may be connected with 1 a gazelle2 and it is to be noted that ,s4 of ,beit-,jibrin there is a wady now called ,el-,ghufr1 the corresponding ,arabic word4 ,but1 as stated in the text above1 the name ought to be one of a ,philistine town4 #hcj ,beauty town4 ,this is usually taken to be the modern ,suafr on the ,philistine plain1 #d-a_/b miles ,s4,e4 of ,ashdod1 a site not unsuitable for identification with the of the ,onom41 between ,eleutheropolis and ,ascalon1 except that is also described as in the hill country4 ,gurin found the name ,safar a very little ,n4 of ,beit-,jbrin 7,jude1 ,,ii4 #cag74 #hca ,march-town3 perhaps the same as enan 77 of ,josh4 xv4 #cg2 given along with ,migdal-,gad and ,hadashah2 not identified4 #hcb ,unknown4 #hcc ,bitternesses3 unknown4 #hcd ,tell-el-,hesy4 #hce ,ambassadors or letters of dismissal4 #hcf ,see above1 p4 #cgf4 #hcg ,josh4 xv4 #dd2 mentioned with ,keilah and ,mareshah2 perhaps the present ,ain ,kezbeh1 #h miles ,n4,n4,e4 of ,beit-,jibrin4 #hch 1 but in ,josh4 xv4 #dd 1 which is identical with spelling of the present name of a ruin #a mile ,s4 of ,beit-,jibrin4 is placed by ,eusebius 7,onom47 #b ,roman miles ,s4 of ,eleutheropolis 7 ,beit-,jibrin74 #hci #f miles ,n4,e4 of ,beit-,jibrin4 ,,chapter ,,xxvi ,,the ,,prophet ,,of ,,the ,,poor ,,micah ii41 iii4 ,we have proved ,micah's love for his countryside in the effusion of his heart upon her villages with a grief for their danger greater than his grief for ,jerusalem4 ,now in his treatment of the sins which give that danger its fatal significance1 he is inspired by the same partiality for the fields and the folk about him4 ,while ,isaiah chiefly satirises the fashions of the town and the intrigues of the court1 ,micah scourges the avarice of the landowner and the injustice which oppresses the peasant4 ,he could not1 of course1 help sharing ,isaiah's indignation for the fatal politics of the capital1 any more than ,isaiah could help sharing his sense of the economic dangers of the provinces2#hdj but it is the latter with which ,micah is most familiar and on which he spends his wrath4 ,these so engross him1 indeed1 that he says almost nothing about the idolatry1 or the luxury1 or the hideous vice1 which1 according to ,amos and ,hosea1 were now corrupting the nation4 ,social wrongs are always felt most acutely1 not in the town1 but in the country4 ,it was so in the days of ,rome1 whose earliest social revolts were agrarian4#hda ,it was so in the ,middle ,ages3 the fourteenth century saw both the ,jacquerie in ,france and the ,peasants' ,rising in ,england2 ,langland1 who was equally familiar with town and country1 expends nearly all his sympathy upon the poverty of the latter1 the poure folk in cotes4 ,it was so after the ,reformation1 under the new spirit of which the first social revolt was the ,peasants' ,war in ,germany4 ,it was so at the ,french ,revolution1 which began with the march of the starving peasants into ,paris4 ,and it is so still1 for our new era of social legislation has been forced open1 not by the poor of ,london and the large cities1 but by the peasantry of ,ireland and the crofters of the ,scottish ,highlands4 ,political discontent and religious heresy take their start among industrial and manufacturing centres1 but the first springs of the social revolt are nearly always found among rural populations4 ,why the country should begin to feel the acuteness of social wrong before the town is sufficiently obvious4 ,in the town there are mitigations1 and there are escapes4 ,if the conditions of one trade become oppressive1 it is easier to pass to another4 ,the workers are better educated and better organised2 there is a middle class1 and the tyrant dare not bring matters to so high a crisis4 ,the might of the wealthy1 too1 is divided2 the poor man's employer is seldom at the same time his landlord4 ,but in the country power easily gathers into the hands of the few4 ,the labourer's opportunities and means of work1 his home1 his very standing-ground1 are often all of them the property of one man4 ,in the country the rich have a real power of life and death1 and are less hampered by competition with each other and by the force of public opinion4 ,one man cannot hold a city in fee1 but one man can affect for evil or for good almost as large a population as a city's1 when it is scattered across a countryside4 ,this is precisely the state of wrong which ,micah attacks4 ,the social changes of the eighth century in ,israel were peculiarly favourable to its growth4#hdb ,the enormous increase of money which had been produced by the trade of ,uzziah's reign threatened to overwhelm the simple economy under which every family had its croft4 ,as in many another land and period1 the social problem was the descent of wealthy men1 land-hungry1 upon the rural districts4 ,they made the poor their debtors1 and bought out the peasant proprietors4 ,they absorbed into their power numbers of homes1 and had at their individual disposal the lives and the happiness of thousands of their fellow-countrymen4 ,isaiah had cried1 ,woe upon them that join house to house1 that lay field to field1 till there be no room for the common people1 and the inhabitants of the rural districts grow fewer and fewer4#hdc ,micah pictures the recklessness of those plutocrats--the fatal ease with which their wealth enabled them to dispossess the yeomen of ,judah4 ,the prophet speaks3-- ,woe to them that plan mischief1 ,and on their beds work out evil6 ,as soon as morning breaks they put it into execution1 ,for--it lies to the power of their hands6 ,they covet fields and--seize them1 ,houses and--lift them up4 ,so they crush a good man and his home1 ,a man and his heritage4 ,this is the evil--the ease with which wrong is done in the country6 ,it lies to the power of their hands3 they covet and seize4 ,and what is it that they get so easily--not merely field and house1 so much land and stone and lime3 it is human life1 with all that makes up personal independence1 and the security of home and of the family4 ,that these should be at the mercy of the passion or the caprice of one man--this is what stirs the prophet's indignation4 ,we shall presently see how the tyranny of wealth was aided by the bribed and unjust judges of the country2 and how1 growing reckless1 the rich betook themselves1 as the lords of the feudal system in ,europe continually did1 to the basest of assaults upon the persons of peaceful men and women4 ,but meantime ,micah feels that by themselves the economic wrongs explain and justify the doom impending on the nation4 ,when this doom falls1 by the ,divine irony of ,god it shall take the form of a conquest of the land by the heathen1 and the disposal of these great estates to the foreigner4 ,the prophet speaks3-- ,therefore thus saith ,jehovah3 ,behold1 ,i am planning evil against this race1 ,from which ye shall not withdraw your necks1 ,nor walk upright2 ,for an evil time it is6#hdd ,in that day shall they raise a taunt-song against you1 ,and wail out the wailing 7,it is done72#hde and say1 ,we be utterly undone3 ,my people's estate is measured off6#hdf ,how they take it away from me6#hdg ,to the rebel our fields are allotted4 ,so thou shalt have none to cast the line by lot ,in the congregation of ,jehovah4 ,no restoration at time of ,jubilee for lands taken away in this fashion6 ,there will be no congregation of ,jehovah left6 ,at this point the prophet's pessimist discourse1 that must have galled the rich1 is interrupted by their clamour to him to stop4 ,the rich speak3-- ,prate not1 they prate1 let none prate of such things6 ,revilings will never cease6 ,o thou that speakest thus to the house of ,jacob1#hdh ,is the spirit of ,jehovah cut short8 ,or are such ,his doings8 ,shall not ,his words mean well with him that walketh uprightly8 ,so the rich1 in their immoral confidence that ,jehovah was neither weakened nor could permit such a disaster to fall on ,his own people1 tell the prophet that his sentence of doom on the nation1 and especially on themselves1 is absurd1 impossible4 ,they cry the eternal cry of ,respectability3 ,god can mean no harm to the like of us6 ,his words are good to them that walk uprightly--and we are conscious of being such4 ,what you1 prophet1 have charged us with are nothing but natural transactions4 ,the ,lord ,himself has ,his answer ready4 ,upright indeed6 ,they have been unprovoked plunderers6 ,god speaks3-- ,but ye are the foes of ,my people1 ,rising against those that are peaceful2 ,the mantle ye strip from them that walk quietly by1 ,averse to war6#hdi ,women of ,my people ye tear from their happy homes1#hej ,from their children ye take ,my glory for ever4 ,rise and begone--for this is no resting-place6 ,because of the uncleanness that bringeth destruction1 ,destruction incurable4 ,of the outrages on the goods of honest men1 and the persons of women and children1 which are possible in a time of peace1 when the rich are tyrannous and abetted by mercenary judges and prophets1 we have an illustration analogous to ,micah's in the complaint of ,peace in ,langland's vision of ,english society in the fourteenth century4 ,the parallel to our prophet's words is very striking3-- ,and thanne come ,pees into parlement and put forth a bille1 ,how ,wronge ageines his wille had his wyf taken4 ',both my gees and my grys#hea his gadelynges#heb feccheth2 ,i dar noughte for fere of hym fyghte ne chyde4 ,he borwed of me bayard#hec he broughte hym home nevre1 ,ne no ferthynge ther-fore for naughte ,i couthe plede4 ,he meynteneth his men to marther myne hewen1#hed ,forstalleth my feyres#hee and fighteth in my chepynge1 ,and breketh up my bernes dore and bereth aweye my whete1 ,and taketh me but a taile#hef for ten quarters of otes1 ,and yet he bet me ther-to and lyth bi my mayde1 ,i nam#heg noughte hardy for hym uneth#heh to loke4' ,they pride themselves that all is stable and ,god is with them4 ,how can such a state of affairs be stable6 ,they feel at ease1 yet injustice can never mean rest4 ,god has spoken the final sentence1 but with a rare sarcasm the prophet adds his comment on the scene4 ,these rich men had been flattered into their religious security by hireling prophets1 who had opposed himself4 ,as they leave the presence of ,god1 having heard their sentence1 ,micah looks after them and muses in quiet prose4 ,the prophet speaks3-- ,yea1 if one whose walk is wind and falsehood were to try to cozen thee1 saying1 ,i will babble to thee of wine and strong drink1 then he might be the prophet of such a people4 ,at this point in chap4 ii4 there have somehow slipped into the text two verses 7#ab1 #ac71 which all are agreed do not belong to it1 and for which we must find another place4#hei ,they speak of a return from the ,exile1 and interrupt the connection between ver4 #aa and the first verse of chap4 iii4 ,with the latter ,micah begins a series of three oracles1 which give the substance of his own prophesying in contrast to that of the false prophets whom he has just been satirising4 ,he has told us what they say1 and he now begins the first of his own oracles with the words1 ,but ,i said4 ,it is an attack upon the authorities of the nation1 whom the false prophets flatter4 ,micah speaks very plainly to them4 ,their business is to know justice1 and yet they love wrong4 ,they flay the people with their exactions2 they cut up the people like meat4 ,the prophet speaks3--,but ,i said1 ,hear now1 ,o chiefs ,of ,jacob1 ,and rulers of the house of ,israel3 ,is it not yours to know justice8-- ,haters of good and lovers of evil1 ,tearing their hide from upon them 7he points to the people71 ,and their flesh from the bones of them2 ,and who devour the flesh of my people1 ,and their hide they have stripped from them ,and their bones have they cleft1 ,and served it up as if from a pot1 ,like meat from the thick of the caldron6 ,at that time shall they cry to ,jehovah1 ,and ,he will not answer them2 ,but hide ,his face from them at that time1 ,because they have aggravated their deeds4 ,these words of ,micah are terribly strong1 but there have been many other ages and civilisations than his own of which they have been no more than true4 ,they crop us1 said a ,french peasant of the lords of the great ,louis' time1 as the sheep crops grass4 ,they treat us like their food1 said another on the eve of the ,revolution4 ,is there nothing of the same with ourselves8 ,while ,micah spoke he had wasted lives and bent backs before him4 ,his speech is elliptic till you see his finger pointing at them4 ,pinched peasant-faces peer between all his words and fill the ellipses4 ,and among the living poor to-day are there not starved and bitten faces--bodies with the blood sucked from them1 with the ,divine image crushed out of them8 ,brothers1 we cannot explain all of these by vice4 ,drunkenness and unthrift do account for much2 but how much more is explicable only by the following facts6 ,many men among us are able to live in fashionable streets and keep their families comfortable only by paying their employs a wage upon which it is impossible for men to be strong or women to be virtuous4 ,are those not using these as their food8 ,they tell us that if they are to give higher wages they must close their business1 and cease paying wages at all2 and they are right if they themselves continue to live on the scale they do4 ,as long as many families are maintained in comfort by the profits of businesses in which some or all of the employs work for less than they can nourish and repair their bodies upon1 the simple fact is that the one set are feeding upon the other set4 ,it may be inevitable1 it may be the fault of the system and not of the individual1 it may be that to break up the system would mean to make things worse than ever--but all the same the truth is clear that many families of the middle class1 and some of the very wealthiest of the land1 are nourished by the waste of the lives of the poor4 ,now and again the fact is acknowledged with as much shamelessness as was shown by any tyrant in the days of ,micah4 ,to a large employer of labour1 who was complaining that his employs1 by refusing to live at the low scale of ,belgian workmen1 were driving trade from this country1 the present writer once said3 ,would it not meet your wishes if1 instead of your workmen being levelled down1 the ,belgians were levelled up8 ,this would make the competition fair between you and the employers in ,belgium4 ,his answer was1 ,i care not so long as ,i get my profits4 ,he was a religious man1 a liberal giver to his ,church1 and he died leaving more than one hundred thousand pounds4 ,micah's tyrants1 too1 had religion to support them4 ,a number of the hireling prophets1 whom we have seen both ,amos and ,hosea attack1 gave their blessing to this social system1 which crushed the poor1 for they shared its profits4 ,they lived upon the alms of the rich1 and flattered according as they were fed4 ,to them ,micah devotes the second oracle of chap4 iii41 and we find confirmed by his words the principle we laid down before1 that in that age the one great difference between the false and the true prophet was what it has been in every age since then till now--an ethical difference2 and not a difference of dogma1 or tradition1 or ecclesiastical note4 ,the false prophet spoke1 consciously or unconsciously1 for himself and his living4 ,he sided with the rich2 he shut his eyes to the social condition of the people2 he did not attack the sins of the day4 ,this made him false--robbed him of insight and the power of prediction4 ,but the true prophet exposed the sins of his people4 ,ethical insight and courage1 burning indignation of wrong1 clear vision of the facts of the day--this was what ,jehovah's spirit put into him1 this was what ,micah felt to be inspiration4 ,the prophet speaks3-- ,thus saith ,jehovah against the prophets who lead my people astray1 ,who while they have ought between their teeth proclaim peace4 ,but against him who will not lay to their mouths they sanctify war6 ,wherefore night shall be yours without vision1 ,and yours shall be darkness without divination2 ,and the sun shall go down on the prophets1 ,and the day shall darken about them2 ,and the seers shall be put to the blush1 ,and the diviners be ashamed3 ,all of them shall cover the beard1 ,for there shall be no answer from ,god4 ,but ,i--,i am full of power by the spirit of ,jehovah1 and justice and might1 ,to declare to ,jacob his transgressions and to ,israel his sin4 ,in the third oracle of this chapter rulers and prophets are combined--how close the conspiracy between them6 ,it is remarkable that1 in harmony with ,isaiah1 ,micah speaks no word against the king4 ,but evidently ,hezekiah had not power to restrain the nobles and the rich4 ,when this oracle was uttered it was a time of peace1 and the lavish building1 which we have seen to be so marked a characteristic of ,israel in the eighth century1#hfj was in process4 ,jerusalem was larger and finer than ever4 ,ah1 it was a building of ,god's own city in blood6 ,judges1 priests and prophets were all alike mercenary1 and the poor were oppressed for a reward4 ,no walls1 however sacred1 could stand on such foundations4 ,did they say that they built her so grandly1 for ,jehovah's sake8 ,did they believe her to be inviolate because ,he was in her8 ,they should see4 ,zion--yes1 ,zion--should be ploughed like a field1 and the ,mountain of the ,lord's ,temple become desolate4 ,the prophet speaks3-- ,hear now this1 ,o chiefs of the house of ,jacob1 ,and rulers of the house of ,israel1 ,who spurn justice and twist all that is straight1 ,building ,zion in blood1 and ,jerusalem with crime6 ,her chiefs give judgment for a bribe1 ,and her priests oracles for a reward1 ,and her prophets divine for silver2 ,and on ,jehovah they lean1 saying3 ,is not ,jehovah in the midst of us8 ,evil cannot come at us4 ,therefore for your sakes shall ,zion be ploughed like a field1 ,and ,jerusalem become heaps1 ,and the ,mount of the ,house mounds in a jungle4 ,it is extremely difficult for us to place ourselves in a state of society in which bribery is prevalent1 and the fingers both of justice and of religion are gilded by their suitors4 ,but this corruption has always been common in the ,east4 ,an ,oriental state can never altogether prevent the abuse by which officials1 small and great1 enrich themselves in illicit ways4#hfa ,the strongest government takes the bribery for granted1 and periodically prunes the rank fortunes of its great officials4 ,a weak government lets them alone4 ,but in either case the poor suffer from unjust taxation and from laggard or perverted justice4 ,bribery has always been found1 even in the more primitive and puritan forms of ,semitic life4 ,mr4 ,doughty has borne testimony with regard to this among the austere ,wahabees of ,central ,arabia4 ,when ,i asked if there were no handling of bribes at ,hyil by those who are nigh the prince's ear1 it was answered1 ',nay4' ,the ,byzantine corruption cannot enter into the eternal and noble simplicity of this people's 7airy7 life1 in the poor nomad country2 but 7we have seen7 the art is not unknown to the subtle-headed ,shammar princes1 who thereby help themselves with the neighbour ,turkish governments4#hfb ,the bribes of the ruler of ,hyil are1 according to the shifting weather of the world1 to great ,ottoman government men2 and now on account of ,kheybar1 he was gilding some of their crooked fingers in ,medina4#hfc ,nothing marks the difference of ,western government more than the absence of all this1 especially from our courts of justice4 ,yet the improvement has only come about within comparatively recent centuries4 ,what a large space1 for instance1 does ,langland give to the arraigning of ,mede1 the corrupter of all authorities and influences in the society of his day6 ,let us quote his words1 for again they provide a most exact parallel to ,micah's1 and may enable us to realise a state of life so contrary to our own4 ,it is ,conscience who arraigns ,mede before the ,king3-- ,by ihesus with here jeweles youre justices she shendeth1#hfd ,and lith#hfe agein the lawe and letteth hym the gate1 ,that feith may noughte have his forth#hff here floreines go so thikke1 ,she ledeth the lawe as hire list and lovedays maketh ,and doth men lese thorw hire love that law myghte wynne1 ,the mase#hfg for a mene man though he mote#hfh hir eure4 ,law is so lordeliche and loth to make ende1 ,without presentz or pens#hfi she pleseth wel fewe4 99 99 99 99 99 ,for pore men mowe#hgj have no powere to pleyne#hga hem though thei smerte2 ,suche a maistre is ,mede amonge men of gode4#hgb ,,footnotes3 #hdj ,isa4 v4 #h4 #hda ,mr4 ,congreve1 in his ,essay on ,slavery appended to his edition of ,aristotle's ,politics1 p4 #dif1 points out that all the servile wars from which ,rome suffered arose1 not in the capital1 but in the provinces1 notably in ,sicily4 #hdb ,see above1 pp4 #cb ff4 #hdc ,isa4 v4 #h4 #hdd ,cf4 ,amos v4 #ac4 #hde ,fuit4 ,but whether this is a gloss1 as of the name of the dirge or of the tune1 or a part of the text1 is uncertain4 ,query3 4 #hdf ,so ,,lxx41 and adds3 with the measuring rope4 #hdg ,or 7after the ,,lxx47 there is none to give it back to me4 #hdh ,uncertain4 ,is the house of ,jacob4448 7,wellhausen74 ,what a saying1 ,o house of ,jacob8 7,ewald and ,guthe74 ,in the latter case the interruption of the rich ceases with the previous line1 and this one is the beginning of the prophet's answer to them4 #hdi ,so we may conjecture the very obscure details of a verse whose general meaning1 however1 is evident4 ,for read 4 ,the ,,lxx4 takes as peace and not as cloak1 for which there seems to be no place beside 7or 74 ,wellhausen with further alterations renders3 ,but ye come forward as enemies against ,my people2 from good friends ye rob their 4441 from peaceful wanderers war-booty4 #hej ,wellhausen reads for 1 tenderly bred children1 another of the many emendations which he proposes in the interests of complete parallelism4 ,see the ,preface to this volume4 #hea ,little pigs4 #heb ,fellows4 #hec ,a horse4 #hed ,servants4 #hee ,fairs1 markets4 #hef ,a tally4 #heg ,am not4 #heh ,scarcely4 #hei ,i will gather1 gather thee1 ,o ,jacob1 in mass1 ,i will bring1 bring together the ,remnant of ,israel6 ,i will set them like sheep in a fold1 ,like a flock in the midst of the pasture4 ,they shall hum with men6 ,the breach-breaker hath gone up before them3 ,they have broken the breach1 have carried the gate1 and are gone out by it2 ,and their king hath passed on before them1 and ,jehovah at their head4 #hfj ,see above1 p4 #cc4 #hfa ,nldeke1 ,sketches from ,eastern ,history1 translated by ,black1 pp4 #acd f4 #hfb ,arabia ,deserta1 ,i4 #fjg4 #hfc ,id41 ,,ii4 #bj4 #hfd ,ruins4 #hfe ,lieth4 #hff ,course4 #hfg ,confusion4 #hfh ,summon4 #hfi ,pence4 #hgj ,may4 #hga ,complain4 #hgb ,substance or property4 ,,chapter ,,xxvii ,,on ,,time',s ,,horizon ,,micah iv4 #a-g4 ,the immediate prospect of ,zion's desolation which closes chap4 iii4 is followed in the opening of chap4 iv4 by an ideal picture of her exaltation and supremacy in the issue of the days4 ,we can hardly doubt that this arrangement has been made of purpose1 nor can we deny that it is natural and artistic4 ,whether it be due to ,micah himself1 or whether he wrote the second passage1 are questions we have already discussed4#hgc ,like so many others of their kind1 they cannot be answered with certainty1 far less with dogmatism4 ,but ,i repeat1 ,i see no conclusive reason for denying either to the circumstances of ,micah's times or to the principles of their prophecy the possibility of such a hope as inspires chap4 iv4 #a-d4 ,remember how the prophets of the eighth century identified ,jehovah with supreme and universal righteousness2 remember how ,amos explicitly condemned the aggravations of war and slavery among the heathen as sins against ,him1 and how ,isaiah claimed the future gains of ,tyrian commerce as gifts for ,his sanctuary2 remember how ,amos heard ,his voice come forth from ,jerusalem1 and ,isaiah counted upon the eternal inviolateness of ,his shrine and city1--and you will not think it impossible for a third ,judan prophet of that age1 whether he was ,micah or another1 to have drawn the prospect of ,jerusalem which now opens before us4 ,it is the far-off horizon of time1 which1 like the spatial horizon1 always seems a fixed and eternal line1 but as constantly shifts with the shifting of our standpoint or elevation4 ,every prophet has his own vision of the latter days2 seldom is that prospect the same4 ,determined by the circumstances of the seer1 by the desires these prompt or only partially fulfil1 it changes from age to age4 ,the ideal is always shaped by the real1 and in this vision of the eighth century there is no exception4 ,this is not any of the ideals of later ages1 when the evil was the oppression of the ,lord's people by foreign armies or their scattering in exile2 it is not1 in contrast to these1 the spectacle of the armies of the ,lord of ,hosts imbrued in the blood of the heathen1 or of the columns of returning captives filling all the narrow roads to ,jerusalem1 like streams in the south2 nor1 again1 is it a nation of priests gathering about a rebuilt temple and a restored ritual4 ,but because the pain of the greatest minds of the eighth century was the contradiction between faith in the ,god of ,zion as ,universal ,righteousness and the experience that1 nevertheless1 ,zion had absolutely no influence upon surrounding nations1 this vision shows a day when ,zion's influence will be as great as her right1 and from far and wide the nations whom ,amos has condemned for their transgressions against ,jehovah will acknowledge ,his law1 and be drawn to ,jerusalem to learn of ,him4 ,observe that nothing is said of ,israel going forth to teach the nations the law of the ,lord4 ,that is the ideal of a later age1 when ,jews were scattered across the world4 ,here1 in conformity with the experience of a still untravelled people1 we see the ,gentiles drawing in upon the ,mountain of the ,house of the ,lord4 ,with the same lofty impartiality which distinguishes the oracles of ,amos on the heathen1 the prophet takes no account of their enmity to ,israel2 nor is there any talk--such as later generations were almost forced by the hostility of neighbouring tribes to indulge in--of politically subduing them to the king in ,zion4 ,jehovah will arbitrate between them1 and the result shall be the institution of a great peace1 with no special political privilege to ,israel1 unless this be understood in ver4 #e1 which speaks of such security to life as was impossible1 at that time at least1 in all borderlands of ,israel4 ,but among the heathen themselves there will be a resting from war3 the factions and ferocities of that wild ,semitic world1 which ,amos so vividly characterised1#hgd shall cease4 ,in all this there is nothing beyond the possibility of suggestion by the circumstances of the eighth century or by the spirit of its prophecy4 ,a prophet speaks3-- ,and it shall come to pass in the issue of the days1#hge ,that the ,mount of the ,house of ,jehovah shall be established on the tops#hgf of the mountains1 ,and lifted shall it be above the hills1 ,and peoples shall flow to it1 ,and many nations shall go and say3 ,come1 and let us up to the ,mount of ,jehovah1 ,and to the ,house of the ,god of ,jacob1 ,that ,he may teach us of ,his ways1 ,and we will walk in ,his paths4 ,for from ,zion goeth forth the law1 ,and the word of ,jehovah from out of ,jerusalem6 ,and ,he shall judge between many peoples1 ,and decide#hgg for strong nations far and wide2#hgh ,and they shall hammer their swords into ploughshares1 ,and their spears into pruning-hooks3 ,they shall not lift up1 nation against nation1 a sword1 ,and they shall not any more learn war4 ,every man shall dwell under his vine ,and under his fig-tree1 ,and none shall make afraid2 ,for the mouth of ,jehovah of ,hosts has spoken4 ,what connection this last verse is intended to have with the preceding is not quite obvious4 ,it may mean that every family among the ,gentiles shall dwell in peace2 or1 as suggested above1 that with the voluntary disarming of the surrounding heathendom1 ,israel herself shall dwell secure1 in no fear of border raids and slave-hunting expeditions1 with which especially ,micah's ,shephelah and other borderlands were familiar4 ,the verse does not occur in ,isaiah's quotation of the three which precede it4 ,we can scarcely suppose1 fain though we may be to do so1 that ,micah added the verse in order to exhibit the future correction of the evils he has been deploring in chap4 iii43 the insecurity of the householder in ,israel before the unscrupulous land-grabbing of the wealthy4 ,such are not the evils from which this passage prophesies redemption4 ,it deals only1 like the first oracles of ,amos1 with the relentlessness and ferocity of the heathen3 under ,jehovah's arbitrament these shall be at peace1 and whether among themselves or in ,israel1 hitherto so exposed to their raids1 men shall dwell in unalarmed possession of their houses and fields4 ,security from war1 not from social tyranny1 is what is promised4 ,the following verse 7#e7 gives in a curious way the contrast of the present to that future in which all men will own the sway of one ,god4 ,for at the present time all the nations are walking each in the name of his ,god1 but we go in the name of ,jehovah for ever and aye4 ,to which vision1 complete in itself1 there has been added by another hand1 of what date we cannot tell1 a further effect of ,god's blessed influence4 ,to peace among men shall be added healing and redemption1 the ingathering of the outcast and the care of the crippled4 ,in that day--'tis the oracle of ,jehovah--,i will gather the halt1 ,and the cast-off ,i will bring in1 and all that ,i have afflicted2 ,and ,i will make the halt for a ,remnant1#hgi ,and her that was weakened#hhj into a strong people1 ,and ,jehovah shall reign over them ,in the ,mount of ,zion from now and for ever4 ,whatever be the origin of the separate oracles which compose this passage 7iv4 #a-g71 they form as they now stand a beautiful whole1 rising from ,peace through ,freedom to ,love4 ,they begin with obedience to ,god and they culminate in the most glorious service which ,god or man may undertake1 the service of saving the lost4 ,see how the ,divine spiral ascends4 ,we have1 first1 ,religion the centre and origin of all1 compelling the attention of men by its historical evidence of justice and righteousness4 ,we have the world's willingness to learn of it4 ,we have the results in the widening brotherhood of nations1 in universal ,peace1 in ,labour freed from ,war1 and with none of her resources absorbed by the conscriptions and armaments which in our times are deemed necessary for enforcing peace4 ,we have the universal diffusion and security of ,property1 the prosperity and safety of the humblest home4 ,and1 finally1 we have this free strength and wealth inspired by the example of ,god ,himself to nourish the broken and to gather in the forwandered4 ,such is the ideal world1 seen and promised two thousand five hundred years ago1 out of as real an experience of human sin and failure as ever mankind awoke to4 ,are we nearer the ,vision to-day1 or does it still hang upon time's horizon1 that line which seems so stable from every seer's point of view1 but which moves from the generations as fast as they travel to it8 ,so far from this being so1 there is much in the ,vision that is not only nearer us than it was to the ,hebrew prophets1 and not only abreast of us1 but actually achieved and behind us1 as we live and strive still onward4 ,yes1 brothers1 actually behind us6 ,history has in part fulfilled the promised influence of religion upon the nations4 ,the ,unity of ,god has been owned1 and the civilised peoples bow to the standards of justice and of mercy first revealed from ,mount ,zion4 ,many nations and powerful nations acknowledge the arbitrament of the ,god of the ,bible4 ,we have had revealed that ,high ,fatherhood of which every family in heaven and earth is named2 and wherever that is believed the brotherhood of men is confessed4 ,we have seen ,sin1 that profound discord in man and estrangement from ,god1 of which all human hatreds and malices are the fruit1 atoned for and reconciled by a ,sacrifice in face of which human pride and passion stand abashed4 ,the first part of the ,vision is fulfilled4 ,the nations stream to the ,god of ,jerusalem and ,his ,christ4 ,and though to-day our ,peace be but a paradox1 and the ,christian nations stand still from war not in love1 but in fear of one another1 there are in every nation an increasing number of men and women1 with growing influence1 who1 without being fanatics for peace1 or blind to the fact that war may be a people's duty in fulfilment of its own destiny or in relief of the enslaved1 do yet keep themselves from foolish forms of patriotism1 and by their recognition of each other across all national differences make sudden and unconsidered war more and more of an impossibility4 ,i write this in the sound of that call to stand upon arms which broke like thunder upon our ,christmas peace2 but1 amid all the ignoble jealousies and hot rashness which prevail1 how the air1 burned clean by that first electric discharge1 has filled with the determination that war shall not happen in the interests of mere wealth or at the caprice of a tyrant6 ,god help us to use this peace for the last ideals of ,his prophet6 ,may we see1 not that of which our modern peace has been far too full1 mere freedom for the wealth of the few to increase at the expense of the mass of mankind4 ,may our ,peace mean the gradual disarmament of the nations1 the increase of labour1 the diffusion of property1 and1 above all1 the redemption of the waste of the people and the recovery of our outcasts4 ,without this1 peace is no peace2 and better were war to burn out by its fierce fires those evil humours of our secure comfort1 which render us insensible to the needy and the fallen at our side4 ,without the redemptive forces at work which ,christ brought to earth1 peace is no peace2 and the cruelties of war1 that slay and mutilate so many1 are as nothing to the cruelties of a peace which leaves us insensible to the outcasts and the perishing1 of whom there are so many even in our civilisation4 ,one application of the prophecy may be made at this moment4 ,we are told by those who know best and have most responsibility in the matter that an ancient ,church and people of ,christ are being left a prey to the wrath of an infidel tyrant1 not because ,christendom is without strength to compel him to deliver1 but because to use the strength1 would be to imperil the peace1 of ,christendom4 ,it is an ignoble peace which cannot use the forces of redemption1 and with the cry of ,armenia in our ears the ,unity of ,europe is but a mockery4 ,,footnotes3 #hgc ,see above1 pp4 #cfe ff4 #hgd ,see above1 ,chap4 ,,vii4 #hge is the hindmost1 furthest1 ultimate1 whether of space 7,psalm cxxxix4 #i3 the uttermost part of the sea71 or of time 7,deut4 xi4 #ab3 the end of the year74 ,it is the end as compared with the beginning1 the sequel with the start1 the future with the present 7,job xlii4 #ab74 ,in ,proverbs it is chiefly used in the moral sense of issue or result4 ,but it chiefly occurs in the phrase used here1 1 not the latter days1 as ,a4,v41 nor ultimate days1 for in these phrases lurks the idea of time having an end1 but the after-days 7,cheyne71 or1 better still1 the issue of the days4 #hgf ,,lxx4 #hgg ,or arbitrate4 #hgh ,literally3 up to far away4 #hgi ,that which shall abide and be the stock of the future4 #hhj ,,lxx4 cast off4 ,,chapter ,,xxviii ,,the ,,king ,,to ,,come ,,micah iv4 #h-v ,when a people has to be purged of long injustice1 when some high aim of liberty or of order has to be won1 it is remarkable how often the drama of revolution passes through three acts4 ,there is first the period of criticism and of vision1 in which men feel discontent1 dream of new things1 and put their hopes into systems3 it seems then as if the future were to come of itself4 ,but often a catastrophe1 relevant or irrelevant1 ensues3 the visions pale before a vast conflagration1 and poet1 philosopher and prophet disappear under the feet of a mad mob of wreckers4 ,yet this is often the greatest period of all1 for somewhere in the midst of it a strong character is forming1 and men1 by the very anarchy1 are being taught1 in preparation for him1 the indispensableness of obedience and loyalty4 ,with their chastened minds he achieves the third act1 and fulfils all of the early vision that ,god's ordeal by fire has proved worthy to survive4 ,thus history1 when distraught1 rallies again upon the ,man4 ,to this law the prophets of ,israel only gradually gave expression4 ,we find no trace of it among the earliest of them2 and in the essential faith of all there was much which predisposed them against the conviction of its necessity4 ,for1 on the one hand1 the seers were so filled with the inherent truth and inevitableness of their visions1 that they described these as if already realised2 there was no room for a great figure to rise before the future1 for with a rush the future was upon them4 ,on the other hand1 it was ever a principle of prophecy that ,god is able to dispense with human aid4 ,in presence of the ,divine omnipotence all secondary causes1 all interposition on the part of the creature1 fall away4#hha ,the more striking is it that before long the prophets should have begun1 not only to look for a ,man1 but to paint him as the central figure of their hopes4 ,in ,hosea1 who has no such promise1 we already see the instinct at work4 ,the age of revolution which he describes is cursed by its want of men3 there is no great leader of the people sent from ,god2 those who come to the front are the creatures of faction and party2 there is no king from ,god4#hhb ,how different it had been in the great days of old1 when ,god had ever worked for ,israel through some man--a ,moses1 a ,gideon1 a ,samuel1 but especially a ,david4 ,thus memory equally with the present dearth of personalities prompted to a great desire1 and with passion ,israel waited for a ,man4 ,the hope of the mother for her firstborn1 the pride of the father in his son1 the eagerness of the woman for her lover1 the devotion of the slave to his liberator1 the enthusiasm of soldiers for their captain--unite these noblest affections of the human heart and you shall yet fail to reach the passion and the glory with which prophecy looked for the ,king to ,come4 ,each age1 of course1 expected him in the qualities of power and character needed for its own troubles1 and the ideal changed from glory unto glory4 ,from valour and victory in war1 it became peace and good government1 care for the poor and the oppressed1 sympathy with the sufferings of the whole people1 but especially of the righteous among them1 with fidelity to the truth delivered unto the fathers1 and1 finally1 a conscience for the people's sin1 a bearing of their punishment and a travail for their spiritual redemption4 ,but all these qualities and functions were gathered upon an individual--a ,victor1 a ,king1 a ,prophet1 a ,martyr1 a ,servant of the ,lord4 ,micah stands among the first1 if he is not the very first1 who thus focussed the hopes of ,israel upon a great ,redeemer2 and his promise of ,him shares all the characteristics just described4 ,in his book it lies next a number of brief oracles with which we are unable to trace its immediate connection4 ,they differ from it in style and rhythm3 they are in verse1 while it seems to be in prose4 ,they do not appear to have been uttered along with it4 ,but they reflect the troubles out of which the ,hero is expected to emerge1 and the deliverance which ,he shall accomplish1 though at first they picture the latter without any hint of ,himself4 ,they apparently describe an invasion which is actually in course1 rather than one which is near and inevitable2 and if so they can only date from ,sennacherib's campaign against ,judah in #gja ,b4,c4 ,jerusalem is in siege1 standing alone in the land1#hhc like one of those solitary towers with folds round them which were built here and there upon the border pastures of ,israel for defence of the flock against the raiders of the desert4#hhd ,the prophet sees the possibility of ,zion's capitulation1 but the people shall leave her only for their deliverance elsewhere4 ,many are gathered against her1 but he sees them as sheaves upon the floor for ,zion to thresh4 ,this oracle 7vv4 #aa-ac7 cannot1 of course1 have been uttered at the same time as the previous one1 but there is no reason why the same prophet should not have uttered both at different periods4 ,isaiah had prospects of the fate of ,jerusalem which differ quite as much4#hhe ,once more 7ver4 #ad7 the blockade is established4 ,israel's ruler is helpless1 smitten on the cheek by the foe4#hhf ,it is to this last picture that the promise of the ,deliverer is attached4 ,the prophet speaks3-- ,but thou1 ,o ,tower of the ,flock1 ,hill of the daughter of ,zion1 ,to thee shall arrive the former rule1 ,and the kingdom shall come to the daughter of ,zion4 ,now wherefore criest thou so loud8 ,is there no king in thee1#hhg or is thy counsellor perished1 ,that throes have seized thee like a woman in childbirth8 ,quiver and writhe1 daughter of ,zion1 like one in childbirth3 ,for now must thou forth from the city1 ,and encamp on the field 7and come unto ,babel72#hhh ,there shalt thou be rescued1 ,there shall ,jehovah redeem thee from the hand of thy foes6 ,and now gather against thee many nations1 that say1 ,let her be violate1 that our eyes may fasten on ,zion6 ,but they know not the plans of ,jehovah1 ,nor understand they ,his counsel1 ,for ,he hath gathered them in like sheaves to the floor4 ,up and thresh1 ,o daughter of ,zion6 ,for thy horns will ,i turn into iron1 ,and thy hoofs will ,i turn into brass2 ,and thou wilt beat down many nations1 ,and devote to ,jehovah their spoil1 ,and their wealth to the ,lord of all earth4 ,now press thyself together1 thou daughter of pressure3#hhi ,the foe hath set a wall around us1 ,with a rod they smite on the cheek ,israel's regent6 ,but thou1 ,beth-,ephrath1#hij smallest among the thousands#hia of ,judah1 ,from thee unto ,me shall come forth the ,ruler to be in ,israel6 ,yea1 of old are ,his goings forth1 from the days of long ago6 ,therefore shall ,he suffer them till the time that one bearing shall have born4#hib 7,then the rest of ,his brethren shall return with the children of ,israel47#hic ,and ,he shall stand and shepherd ,his flock#hid in the strength of ,jehovah1 ,in the pride of the name of ,his ,god4 ,and they shall abide6 ,for now is ,he great to the ends of the earth4 ,and ,such an ,one shall be our ,peace4#hie ,bethlehem was the birthplace of ,david1 but when ,micah says that the ,deliverer shall emerge from her he does not only mean what ,isaiah affirms by his promise of a rod from the stock of ,jesse1 that the ,king to ,come shall spring from the one great dynasty in ,judah4 ,micah means rather to emphasise the rustic and popular origin of the ,messiah1 too small to be among the thousands of ,judah4 ,david1 the son of ,jesse the ,bethlehemite1 was a dearer figure than ,solomon son of ,david the ,king4 ,he impressed the people's imagination1 because he had sprung from themselves1 and in his lifetime had been the popular rival of an unlovable despot4 ,micah himself was the prophet of the country as distinct from the capital1 of the peasants as against the rich who oppressed them4 ,when1 therefore1 he fixed upon ,bethlehem as the ,messiah's birthplace1 he doubtless desired1 without departing from the orthodox hope in the ,davidic dynasty1 to throw round its new representative those associations which had so endeared to the people their father-monarch4 ,the shepherds of ,judah1 that strong source of undefiled life from which the fortunes of the state and prophecy itself had ever been recuperated1 should again send forth salvation4 ,had not ,micah already declared that1 after the overthrow of the capital and the rulers1 the glory of ,israel should come to ,adullam1 where of old ,david had gathered its soiled and scattered fragments8 ,we may conceive how such a promise would affect the crushed peasants for whom ,micah wrote4 ,a ,saviour1 who was one of themselves1 not born up there in the capital1 foster-brother of the very nobles who oppressed them1 but born among the people1 sharer of their toils and of their wrongs6--it would bring hope to every broken heart among the disinherited poor of ,israel4 ,yet meantime1 be it observed1 this was a promise1 not for the peasants only1 but for the whole people4 ,in the present danger of the nation the class disputes are forgotten1 and the hopes of ,israel gather upon their ,hero for a common deliverance from the foreign foe4 ,such an ,one shall be our peace4 ,but in the peace ,he is to stand and shepherd ,his flock1 conspicuous and watchful4 ,the country-folk knew what such a figure meant to themselves for security and weal on the land of their fathers4 ,heretofore their rulers had not been shepherds1 but thieves and robbers4 ,we can imagine the contrast which such a vision must have offered to the fancies of the false prophets4 ,what were they beside this8 ,deity descending in fire and thunder1 with all the other features of the ancient ,theophanies that had now become so much cant in the mouths of mercenary traditionalists4 ,besides those1 how sane was this1 how footed upon the earth1 how practical1 how popular in the best sense6 ,we see1 then1 the value of ,micah's prophecy for his own day4 ,has it also any value for ours--especially in that aspect of it which must have appealed to the hearts of those for whom chiefly ,micah arose8 ,is it wise to paint the ,messiah1 to paint ,christ1 so much as a working-man8 ,is it not much more to our purpose to remember the general fact of ,his humanity1 by which ,he is able to be ,priest and ,brother to all classes1 high and low1 rich and poor1 the noble and the peasant alike8 ,is not the ,man of ,sorrows a much wider name than the ,man of ,labour8 ,let us answer these questions4 ,the value of such a prophecy of ,christ lies in the correctives which it supplies to the ,christian apocalypse and theology4 ,both of these have raised ,christ to a throne too far above the actual circumstance of ,his earthly ministry and the theatre of ,his eternal sympathies4 ,whether enthroned in the praises of heaven1 or by scholasticism relegated to an ideal and abstract humanity1 ,christ is lifted away from touch with the common people4 ,but ,his lowly origin was a fact4 ,he sprang from the most democratic of peoples4 ,his ancestor was a shepherd1 and ,his mother a peasant girl4 ,he ,himself was a carpenter3 at home1 as ,his parables show1 in the fields and the folds and the barns of ,his country2 with the servants of the great houses1 with the unemployed in the market2 with the woman in the hovel seeking one piece of silver1 with the shepherd on the moors seeking the lost sheep4 ,the poor had the gospel preached to them2 and the common people heard ,him gladly4 ,as the peasants of ,juda must have listened to ,micah's promise of ,his origin among themselves with new hope and patience1 so in the ,roman empire the religion of ,jesus ,christ was welcomed chiefly1 as the ,apostles and the ,fathers bear witness1 by the lowly and the labouring of every nation4 ,in the great persecution which bears his name1 the ,emperor ,domitian heard that there were two relatives alive of this ,jesus whom so many acknowledged as their ,king1 and he sent for them that he might put them to death4 ,but when they came1 he asked them to hold up their hands1 and seeing these brown and chapped with toil1 he dismissed the men1 saying1 ,from such slaves we have nothing to fear4 ,ah but1 ,emperor6 it is just the horny hands of this religion that thou and thy gods have to fear6 ,any cynic or satirist of thy literature from ,celsus onwards could have told thee that it was by men who worked with their hands for their daily bread1 by domestics1 artisans and all manner of slaves1 that the power of this ,king should spread1 which meant destruction to thee and thine empire6 ,from little ,bethlehem came forth the ,ruler1 and now ,he is great to the ends of the earth4 ,there follows upon this prophecy of the ,shepherd a curious fragment which divides ,his office among a number of ,his order1 though the grammar returns towards the end to ,one4 ,the mention of ,assyria stamps this oracle also as of the eighth century4 ,mark the refrain which opens and closes it4#hif ,when ,asshr cometh into our land1 ,and when he marcheth on our borders1#hig ,then shall we raise against him seven shepherds ,and eight princes of men4 ,and they shall shepherd ,asshr with a sword1 ,and ,nimrod's land with her own bare blades ,and ,he shall deliver from ,asshr1 ,when he cometh into our land4 ,and marcheth upon our borders4 ,there follows an oracle in which there is no evidence of ,micah's hand or of his times2 but if it carries any proof of a date1 it seems a late one4 ,and the remnant of ,jacob shall be among many peoples ,like the dew from ,jehovah1 ,like showers upon grass1 ,which wait not for a man1 ,nor tarry for the children of men4 ,and the remnant of ,jacob 7among nations17 among many peoples1 ,shall be like the lion among the beasts of the jungle1 ,like a young lion among the sheepfolds1 ,who1 when he cometh by1 treadeth and teareth1 ,and none may deliver4 ,let thine hand be high on thine adversaries1 ,and all thine enemies be cut off6 ,finally in this section we have an oracle full of the notes we had from ,micah in the first two chapters4 ,it explains itself4 ,compare ,micah ii4 and ,isaiah ii4 ,and it shall be in that day--'tis the oracle of ,jehovah-- ,that ,i will cut off thy horses from the midst of thee1 ,and ,i will destroy thy chariots2 ,that ,i will cut off the cities of thy land1 ,and tear down all thy fortresses1 ,and ,i will cut off thine enchantments from thy hand1 ,and thou shall have no more soothsayers2 ,and ,i will cut off thine images and thy pillars from the midst of thee1 ,and thou shall not bow down any more to the work of thy hands2 ,and ,i will uproot thine ,asheras from the midst of thee1 ,and will destroy thine idols4 ,so shall ,i do1 in ,my wrath and ,mine anger1 ,vengeance to the nations1 who have not known ,me4 ,,footnotes3 #hha ,schultz1 ,a4 ,t4 ,theol41 p4 #gbb4 #hhb ,see above1 pp4 #bgf ff4 #hhc ,wellhausen declares that this is unsuitable to the position of ,jerusalem in the eighth century1 and virtually implies her ruin and desolation4 ,but1 on the contrary1 it is not so3 ,jerusalem is still standing1 though alone 7cf4 the similar figure in ,isa4 i474 ,consequently the contradiction which ,wellhausen sees between this eighth verse and vv4 #i1 #aj1 does not exist4 ,he grants that the latter may belong to the time of ,sennacherib's invasion--unless it be a vaticinium post eventum6 #hhd ,see above1 p4 #cb4 #hhe ,this in answer to ,wellhausen1 who thinks the two oracles incompatible1 and that the second one is similar to the eschatological prediction common from ,ezekiel onwards4 ,jerusalem1 however1 is surely still standing4 #hhf ,even ,wellhausen agrees that this verse is most suitably dated from the time of ,micah4 #hhg ,those who maintain the exilic date understand by this ,jehovah ,himself4 ,in any case it may be ,he who is meant4 #hhh ,the words in parenthesis are perhaps a gloss4 #hhi ,uncertain4 #hij ,the name ,bethlehem is probably a later insertion4 ,i read with ,hitzig and others 1 and omit 4 #hia ,smallest form of district3 cf4 ,english hundreds4 #hib ,cf4 the prophecy of ,immanuel1 ,isa4 vii4 #hic ,this seems like a later insertion3 it disturbs both sense and rhythm4 #hid ,so ,,lxx4 #hie ,take this clause from ver4 #d and the following oracle and put it with ver4 #c4 #hif ,wellhausen alleges in the numbers another trace of the late ,apocalyptic writings--but this is not conclusive4 #hig ,so ,,lxx4 ,cf4 the refrain at the close4 ,,chapter ,,xxix ,,the ,,reasonableness ,,of ,,true ,,religion ,,micah vi4 #a-h4 ,we have now reached a passage from which all obscurities of date and authorship#hih disappear before the transparence and splendour of its contents4 ,these few verses1 says a great critic1 in which ,micah sets forth the true essence of religion1 may raise a well-founded title to be counted as the most important in the prophetic literature4 ,like almost no others1 they afford us an insight into the innermost nature of the religion of ,israel1 as delivered by the prophets4 ,usually it is only the last of the verses upon which the admiration of the reader is bestowed3 ,what doth the ,lord require of thee1 ,o man1 but to do justice and love mercy and walk humbly with thy ,god8 ,but in truth the rest of the passage differeth not in glory2 the wonder of it lies no more in its peroration than in its argument as a whole4 ,the passage is cast in the same form as the opening chapter of the book--that of an ,argument or ,debate between the ,god of ,israel and ,his people1 upon the great theatre of ,nature4 ,the heart must be dull that does not leap to the ,presences before which the trial is enacted4 ,the prophet speaks3-- ,hear ye now that which ,jehovah is saying2 ,arise1 contend before the mountains1 ,and let the hills hear thy voice6 ,hear1 ,o mountains1 the ,lord's ,argument1 ,and ye1 the everlasting6 foundations of earth6 ,this is not mere scenery4 ,in all the moral questions between ,god and man1 the prophets feel that ,nature is involved4 ,either she is called as a witness to the long history of their relations to each other1 or as sharing ,god's feeling of the intolerableness of the evil which men have heaped upon her1 or by her droughts and floods and earthquakes as the executioner of their doom4 ,it is in the first of these capacities that the prophet in this passage appeals to the mountains and eternal foundations of earth4 ,they are called1 not because they are the biggest of existences1 but because they are the most full of memories and associations with both parties to the ,trial4 ,the main idea of the passage1 however1 is the ,trial itself4 ,we have seen more than once that the forms of religion which the prophets had to combat were those which expressed it mechanically in the form of ritual and sacrifice1 and those which expressed it in mere enthusiasm and ecstasy4 ,between such extremes the prophets insisted that religion was knowledge and that it was conduct--rational intercourse and loving duty between ,god and man4 ,this is what they figure in their favourite scene of a ,debate which is now before us4 ,jehovah hath a ,quarrel with ,his ,people1 ,and with ,israel ,he cometh to argue4 ,to us1 accustomed to communion with the ,godhead1 as with a ,father1 this may seem formal and legal4 ,but if we so regard it we do it an injustice4 ,the form sprang by revolt against mechanical and sensational ideas of religion4 ,it emphasised religion as rational and moral1 and at once preserved the reasonableness of ,god and the freedom of man4 ,god spoke with the people whom ,he had educated3 ,he pled with them1 listened to their statements and questions1 and produced ,his own evidences and reasons4 ,religion1 such a passage as this asserts--religion is not a thing of authority nor of ceremonial nor of mere feeling1 but of argument1 reasonable presentation and debate4 ,reason is not put out of court3 man's freedom is respected2 and he is not taken by surprise through his fears or his feelings4 ,this sublime and generous conception of religion1 which we owe first of all to the prophets in their contest with superstitious and slothful theories of religion that unhappily survive among us1 was carried to its climax in the ,old ,testament by another class of writers4 ,we find it elaborated with great power and beauty in the ,books of ,wisdom4 ,in these the ,divine ,reason has emerged from the legal forms now before us1 and has become the ,associate and ,friend of ,man4 ,the ,prologue to the ,book of ,proverbs tells how ,wisdom1 fellow of ,god from the foundation of the world1 descends to dwell among men4 ,she comes forth into their streets and markets1 she argues and pleads there with an urgency which is equal to the urgency of temptation itself4 ,but it is not till the earthly ministry of the ,son of ,god1 ,his arguments with the doctors1 ,his parables to the common people1 ,his gentle and prolonged education of ,his disciples1 that we see the reasonableness of religion in all its strength and beauty4 ,in that free court of reason in which the prophets saw ,god and man plead together1 the subjects were such as became them both4 ,for ,god unfolds no mysteries1 and pleads no power1 but the debate proceeds upon the facts and evidences of life3 the appearance of ,character in history2 whether the past be not full of the efforts of ,love2 whether ,god had not1 as human wilfulness permitted ,him1 achieved the liberation and progress of ,his people4 ,god speaks3-- ,my people1 what have ,i done unto thee8 ,and how have ,i wearied thee--answer ,me8 ,for ,i brought thee up from the land of ,miraim1 ,and from the house of slavery ,i redeemed thee4 ,i sent before thee ,moses1 ,aharon and ,miriam4 ,my people1 remember now what ,balak king of ,moab counselled1 ,and how he was answered by ,bala'am1 ,be'or's son-- ,so that thou mayest know the righteous deeds of ,jehovah4#hii ,always do the prophets go back to ,egypt or the wilderness4 ,there ,god made the people1 there ,he redeemed them4 ,in lawbook as in prophecy1 it is the fact of redemption which forms the main ground of ,his appeal4 ,redeemed by ,him1 the people are not their own1 but ,his4 ,treated with that wonderful love and patience1 like patience and love they are called to bestow upon the weak and miserable beneath them4#ijj ,one of the greatest interpreters of the prophets to our own age1 ,frederick ,denison ,maurice1 has said upon this passage3 ,we do not know ,god till we recognise him as a ,deliverer2 we do not understand our own work in the world till we believe we are sent into it to carry out ,his designs for the deliverance of ourselves and the race4 ,the bondage ,i groan under is a bondage of the will4 ,god is emphatically the ,redeemer of the will4 ,it is in that character ,he reveals ,himself to us4 ,we could not think of ,god at all as the ,god1 the living ,god1 if we did not regard ,him as such a ,redeemer4 ,but if of my will1 then of all wills3 sooner or later ,i am convinced ,he will be manifested as the ,restorer1 ,regenerator--not of something else1 but of this--of the fallen spirit that is within us4 ,in most of the controversies which the prophets open between ,god and man1 the subject on the side of the latter is his sin4 ,but that is not so here4 ,in the controversy which opens the ,book of ,micah the argument falls upon the transgressions of the people1 but here upon their sincere though mistaken methods of approaching ,god4 ,there ,god deals with dull consciences1 but here with darkened and imploring hearts4 ,in that case we had rebels forsaking the true ,god for idols1 but here are earnest seekers after ,god1 who have lost their way and are weary4 ,accordingly1 as indignation prevailed there1 here prevails pity2 and though formally this be a controversy under the same legal form as before1 the passage breathes tenderness and gentleness from first to last4 ,by this as well as by the recollections of the ancient history of ,israel we are reminded of the style of ,hosea4 ,but there is no expostulation1 as in his book1 with the people's continued devotion to ritual4 ,all that is past1 and a new temper prevails4 ,israel have at last come to feel the vanity of the exaggerated zeal with which ,amos pictures them exceeding the legal requirements of sacrifice2#ija and with a despair1 sufficiently evident in the superlatives which they use1 they confess the futility and weariness of the whole system1 even in the most lavish and impossible forms of sacrifice4 ,what then remains for them to do8 ,the prophet answers with the beautiful words1 that express an ideal of religion to which no subsequent century has ever been able to add either grandeur or tenderness4 ,the people speak3-- ,wherewithal shall ,i come before ,jehovah1 ,shall ,i bow myself to ,god the ,most ,high8 ,shall ,i come before ,him with burnt-offerings1 ,with calves of one year8 ,will ,jehovah be pleased with thousands of rams1 ,with myriads of rivers of oil8 ,shall ,i give my firstborn for a guilt-offering1#ijb ,the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul8 ,the prophet answers3-- ,he hath shown thee1 ,o man1 what is good2 ,and what is the ,,lord seeking from thee1 ,but to do justice and love mercy1 ,and humbly#ijc to walk with thy ,god8 ,this is the greatest saying of the ,old ,testament2 and there is only one other in the ,new which excels it3-- ,come unto ,me1 all ye that labour and are heavy laden1 and ,i will give you rest4 ,take ,my yoke upon you1 and learn of ,me2 for ,i am meek and lowly in heart3 and ye shall find rest unto your souls4 ,for ,my yoke is easy1 and ,my burden is light4 ,,footnotes3 #hih ,see above1 pp4 #cfi ff4 #hii ,omitted from the above is the strange clause from ,shittim to ,gilgal1 which appears to be a gloss4 #ijj ,see the passages on the subject in ,professor ,harper's work on ,deuteronomy in this series4 #ija ,see above1 p4 #afa4 #ijb ,see above1 p4 #cgj1 on the futility of the argument which because of this line would put the whole passage in ,manasseh's reign4 #ijc ,this word is only once used again1 in ,prov4 xi4 #b1 in another grammatical form1 where also it might mean humbly4 ,but the root-meaning is evidently in secret1 or secretly 7cf4 the ,aram4 1 to be hidden2 1 one who lives noiselessly1 humble1 pious2 in the feminine of a bride who is modest72 and it is uncertain whether we should not take that sense here4 ,,chapter ,,xxx ,,the ,,sin ,,of ,,the ,,scant ,,measure ,,micah vi4 #i-vii4 #f4 ,the state of the text of ,micah vi4 #i-vii4 #f is as confused as the condition of society which it describes3 it is difficult to get reason1 and impossible to get rhyme1 out of the separate clauses4 ,we had best give it as it stands1 and afterwards state the substance of its doctrine1 which1 in spite of the obscurity of details1 is1 as so often happens in similar cases1 perfectly clear and forcible4 ,the passage consists of two portions1 which may not originally have belonged to each other1 but which seem to reflect the same disorder of civic life1 with the judgment that impends upon it4#ijd ,in the first of them1 vi4 #i-af1 the prophet calls for attention to the voice of ,god1 which describes the fraudulent life of ,jerusalem1 and the evils ,he is bringing on her4 ,in the second1 vii4 #a-f1 ,jerusalem bemoans her corrupt society2 but perhaps we hear her voice only in ver4 #a1 and thereafter the prophet's4 ,the prophet speaks3-- ,hark6 ,jehovah crieth to the city6 7',tis salvation to fear ,thy ,name67#ije ,hear ye1 ,o tribe and council of the city6 787#ijf ,god speaks3-- 444 in the house of the wicked treasures of wickedness1 ,and the scant measure accursed6 ,can she be pure with the evil balances1 ,and with the bag of false weights1 ,whose rich men are full of violence1#ijg ,and her citizens speak falsehood1 ,and their tongue is deceit in their mouth8 ,but ,i on ,my part have begun to plague thee1 ,to lay thee in ruin because of thy sins4 ,thou eatest and art not filled1 ,but thy famine#ijh is in the very midst of thee6 ,and but try to remove1#iji thou canst not bring off2 ,and what thou bringest off1 ,i give to the sword4 ,thou sowest1 but never reapest2 ,treadest olives1 but never anointest with oil1 ,and must1 but not to drink wine6 ,so thou keepest the statutes of ,omri1#iaj ,and the habits of the house of ,ahab1 ,and walkest in their principles1 ,only that ,i may give thee to ruin1 ,and her inhabitants for sport-- ,yea1 the reproach of the ,gentiles#iaa shall ye bear6 ,jerusalem speaks3-- ,woe1 woe is me1 for ,i am become like sweepings of harvest1 ,like gleanings of the vintage-- ,not a cluster to eat1 not a fig that my soul lusteth after4 ,perished are the leal from the land1 ,of the upright among men there is none3 ,all of them are lurking for blood2 ,every man takes his brother in a net4 ,their hands are on evil to do it thoroughly4#iab ,the prince makes requisition1 ,the judge judgeth for payment1 ,and the great man he speaketh his lust2 ,so together they weave it out4 ,the best of them is but a thorn thicket1#iac ,the most upright worse than a prickly hedge4#iad ,the day that thy sentinels saw1 thy visitation1 draweth on2 ,now is their havoc#iae come6 ,trust not any friend6 ,rely on no confidant6 ,from her that lies in thy bosom guard the gates of thy mouth4 ,for son insulteth father1 daughter is risen against her mother1 daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law2 ,and the enemies of a man are the men of his house4 ,micah1 though the prophet of the country and stern critic of its life1 characterised ,jerusalem herself as the centre of the nation's sins4 ,he did not refer to idolatry alone1 but also to the irreligion of the politicians1 and the cruel injustice of the rich in the capital4 ,the poison which weakened the nation's blood had found its entrance to their veins at the very heart4 ,there had the evil gathered which was shaking the state to a rapid dissolution4 ,this section of the ,book of ,micah1 whether it be by that prophet or not1 describes no features of ,jerusalem's life which were not present in the eighth century2 and it may be considered as the more detailed picture of the evils he summarily denounced4 ,it is one of the most poignant criticisms of a commercial community which have ever appeared in literature4 ,in equal relief we see the meanest instruments and the most prominent agents of covetousness and cruelty--the scant measure1 the false weights1 the unscrupulous prince and the venal judge4 ,and although there are some sins denounced which are impossible in our civilisation1 yet falsehood1 squalid fraud1 pitilessness of the everlasting struggle for life are exposed exactly as we see them about us to-day4 ,through the prophet's ancient and often obscure eloquence we feel just those shocks and sharp edges which still break everywhere through our ,christian civilisation4 ,let us remember1 too1 that the community addressed by the prophet was1 like our own1 professedly religious4 ,the most widespread sin with which the prophet charges ,jerusalem in these days of her commercial activity is falsehood3 ,her inhabitants speak lies1 and their tongue is deceit in their mouth4 ,in ,mr4 ,lecky's ,history of ,european ,morals we find the opinion that the one respect in which the growth of industrial life has exercised a favourable influence on morals has been in the promotion of truth4 ,the tribute is just1 but there is another side to it4 ,the exigencies of commerce and industry are fatal to most of the conventional pretences1 insincerities and flatteries1 which tend to grow up in all kinds of society4 ,in commercial life1 more perhaps than in any other1 a man is taken1 and has to be taken1 in his inherent worth4 ,business1 the life which is called par excellence ,busy-ness1 wears off every mask1 all false veneer and unction1 and leaves no time for the cant and parade which are so prone to increase in all other professions4 ,moreover the soul of commerce is credit4 ,men have to show that they can be trusted before other men will traffic with them1 at least upon that large and lavish scale on which alone the great undertakings of commerce can be conducted4 ,when we look back upon the history of trade and industry1 and see how they have created an atmosphere in which men must ultimately seem what they really are2 how they have of their needs replaced the jealousies1 subterfuges1 intrigues1 which were once deemed indispensable to the relations of men of different peoples1 by large international credit and trust2 how they break through the false conventions that divide class from class1 we must do homage to them1 as among the greatest instruments of the truth which maketh free4 ,but to all this there is another side4 ,if commerce has exploded so much conventional insincerity1 it has developed a species of the genus which is quite its own4 ,in our days nothing can lie like an advertisement4 ,the saying the tricks of the trade has become proverbial4 ,every one knows that the awful strain and harassing of commercial life is largely due to the very amount of falseness that exists4 ,the haste to be rich1 the pitiless rivalry and competition1 have developed a carelessness of the rights of others to the truth from ourselves1 with a capacity for subterfuge and intrigue1 which reminds one of nothing so much as that state of barbarian war out of which it was the ancient glory of commerce to have assisted mankind to rise4 ,are the prophet's words about ,jerusalem too strong for large portions of our own commercial communities8 ,men who know these best will not say that they are4 ,but let us cherish rather the powers of commerce which make for truth4 ,let us tell men who engage in trade that there are none for whom it is more easy to be clean and straight2 that lies1 whether of action or of speech1 only increase the mental expense and the moral strain of life2 and that the health1 the capacity1 the foresight1 the opportunities of a great merchant depend ultimately on his resolve to be true and on the courage with which he sticks to the truth4 ,one habit of falseness on which the prophet dwells is the use of unjust scales and short measures4 ,the stores or fortunes of his day are stores of wickedness1 because they have been accumulated by the use of the lean ephah1 the balances of wrong and the bag of false weights4 ,these are evils more common in the ,east than with us3 modern government makes them almost impossible4 ,but1 all the same1 ours is the sin of the scant measure1 and the more so in proportion to the greater speed and rivalry of our commercial life4 ,the prophet's name for it1 measure of leanness1 of consumption or shrinkage1 is a proper symbol of all those duties and offices of man to man1 the full and generous discharge of which is diminished by the haste and the grudge of a prevalent selfishness4 ,the speed of modern life tends to shorten the time expended on every piece of work1 and to turn it out untempered and incomplete4 ,the struggle for life in commerce1 the organised rivalry between labour and capital1 not only puts every man on his guard against giving any other more than his due1 but tempts him to use every opportunity to scamp and curtail his own service and output4 ,you will hear men defend this parsimony as if it were a law4 ,they say that business is impossible without the temper which they call sharpness or the habit which they call cutting it fine4 ,but such character and conduct are the very decay of society4 ,the shrinkage of the units must always and everywhere mean the disintegration of the mass4 ,a society whose members strive to keep within their duties is a society which cannot continue to cohere4 ,selfishness may be firmness1 but it is the firmness of frost1 the rigour of death4 ,only the unselfish excess of duty1 only the generous loyalty to others1 give to society the compactness and indissolubleness of life4 ,who is responsible for the enmity of classes1 and the distrust which exists between capital and labour8 ,it is the workman whose one aim is to secure the largest amount of wages for the smallest amount of work1 and who will1 in his blind pursuit of that1 wreck the whole trade of a town or a district2 it is the employer who believes he has no duties to his men beyond paying them for their work the least that he can induce them to take2 it is the customer who only and ever looks to the cheapness of an article--procurer in that prostitution of talent to the work of scamping which is fast killing art1 and joy and all pity for the bodies and souls of our brothers4 ,these are the true anarchists and breakers-up of society4 ,on their methods social coherence and harmony are impossible4 ,life itself is impossible4 ,no organism can thrive whose various limbs are ever shrinking in upon themselves4 ,there is no life except by living to others4 ,but the prophet covers the whole evil when he says that the pious are perished out of the land4 ,pious is a translation of despair4 ,the original means the man distinguished by esedh1 that word which we have on several occasions translated leal love1 because it implies not only an affection but loyalty to a relation4 ,and1 as the use of the word frequently reminds us1 esedh is love and loyalty both to ,god and to our fellow-men4 ,we need not dissociate these3 they are one4 ,but here it is the human direction in which the word looks4 ,it means a character which fulfils all the relations of society with the fidelity1 generosity and grace1 which are the proper affections of man to man4 ,such a character1 says the prophet1 is perished from the land4 ,every man now lives for himself1 and as a consequence preys upon his brother4 ,they all lie in wait for blood2 they hunt every man his brother with a net4 ,this is not murder which the prophet describes3 it is the reckless1 pitiless competition of the new conditions of life developed in ,judah by the long peace and commerce of the eighth century4 ,and he carries this selfishness into a very striking figure in ver4 #d3 ,the best of them is as a thorn thicket1 the most upright worse than a prickly hedge4 ,he realises exactly what we mean by sharpness and sharp-dealing3 bristling self-interest1 all points2 splendid in its own defence1 but barren of fruit1 and without nest or covert for any life4 ,,footnotes3 #ijd ,see above1 pp4 #cgj ff4 #ije ,probably a later parenthesis4 ,the word is one which1 unusual in the prophets1 the ,wisdom literature has made its own ,prov4 ii4 #g1 xviii4 #a2 ,job v4 #ab1 etc4 ,for ,thy ,,lxx4 read ,his4 #ijf ,translation of ,,lxx4 emended by ,wellhausen so as to read 1 the being obtained by taking and transferring the of the next verse1 and relieving that verse of an unusual formation1 viz4 before the interrogative 4 ,but for an instance of preceding an interrogative see ,gen4 xix4 #ab4 #ijg ,the text of the two preceding verses1 which is acknowledged to be corrupt1 must be corrected by the undoubted #crd feminine suffix in this one--her rich men4 ,throughout the reference must be to the city4 ,we ought therefore to change of ver4 #aa into 1 which agrees with the ,,lxx4 4 ,ver4 #aj is more uncertain1 but for the same reason that the city is referred to throughout vv4 #i-ab1 it is possible that it is the nominative to 2 translate cursed with the short measure4 ,again for ,,lxx4 read 1 to which also the city would be nominative4 ,and this suggests the query whether in the letters 1 that make little sense as they stand in the ,massoretic ,text1 there was not originally another feminine participle4 ,the recommendation of a transformation of this kind is that it removes the abruptness of the appearance of the #crd feminine suffix in ver4 #ab4 #ijh ,the word is found only here4 ,the stem is no doubt the same as the ,arabic verb waash1 which in ,form ,v4 means ,inami ventre fuit pr fame2 vacuum reliquit stomachum 7,freytag74 ,in modern colloquial ,arabic washa means a longing for an absent friend4 #iji ,jussive4 ,the objects removed can hardly be goods1 as ,hitzig and others infer2 for it is to the sword they afterwards fall4 ,they must be persons4 #iaj ,,lxx4 ,zimri4 #iaa ,so ,,lxx42 but ,heb4 ,my people4 #iab ,uncertain4 #iac ,cf4 ,prov4 xv4 #ai4 #iad ,roorda1 by rearranging letters and clauses 7some of them after ,,lxx471 and by changing points1 gets a reading which may be rendered3 ,for evil are their hands6 ,to do good the prince demandeth a bribe1 and the judge1 for the reward of the great1 speaketh what he desireth4 ,and they entangle the good more than thorns1 and the righteous more than a thorn hedge4 #iae ,cf4 ,isa4 xxii4 #e4 ,,chapter ,,xxxi ,,our ,,mother ,,of ,,sorrows ,,micah vii4 #g-bj4 ,after so stern a charge1 so condign a sentence1 confession is natural1 and1 with prayer for forgiveness and praise to the mercy of ,god1 it fitly closes the whole book4 ,as we have seen1#iaf the passage is a cento of several fragments1 from periods far apart in the history of ,israel4 ,one historical allusion suits best the age of the ,syrian wars2 another can only refer to the day of ,jerusalem's ruin4 ,in spirit and language the ,confessions resemble the prayers of the ,exile4 ,the ,doxology has echoes of several ,scriptures4#iag ,but from these fragments1 it may be of many centuries1 there rises clear the ,one ,essential ,figure3 ,israel1 all her secular woes upon her2 our ,mother of ,sorrows1 at whose knees we learned our first prayers of confession and penitence4 ,other nations have been our teachers in art and wisdom and government4 ,but she is our mistress in pain and in patience1 teaching men with what conscience they should bear the chastening of the ,almighty1 with what hope and humility they should wait for their ,god4 ,surely not less lovable1 but only more human1 that her pale cheeks flush for a moment with the hate of the enemy and the assurance of revenge4 ,her passion is soon gone1 for she feels her guilt to be greater2 and1 seeking forgiveness1 her last word is what man's must ever be1 praise to the grace and mercy of ,god4 ,israel speaks3-- ,but ,i will look for the ,,lord1 ,i will wait for the ,god of my salvation3 ,my ,god will hear me6 ,rejoice not1 ,o mine enemy1 at me3 ,if ,i be fallen1 ,i rise2 ,if ,i sit in the darkness1 the ,,lord is a light to me4 ,the anger of the ,,lord will ,i bear-- ,for ,i have sinned against ,him-- ,until that ,he take up my quarrel1 ,and execute my right4 ,he will carry me forth to the light2 ,i will look on ,his righteousness3 ,so shall mine enemy see1 and shame cover her1 ,she that saith unto me1 ,where is ,jehovah thy ,god8-- ,mine eyes shall see her1 ,now is she for trampling1 like mire in the streets6 ,the prophet#iah responds3-- ,a day for the building of thy walls shall that day be6 ,broad shall thy border be#iai on that day6 444#ibj;and shall come to thee ,from ,assyria unto ,egypt1 and from ,egypt to the ,river1 ,and to ,sea from ,sea1 and ,mountain from ,mountain2#iba ,though#ibb the land be waste on account of her inhabitants1 ,because of the fruit of their doings4 ,an ,ancient ,prayer3-- ,shepherd ,thy people with ,thy staff1 ,the sheep of ,thy heritage dwelling solitarily4444#ibc ,may they pasture in ,bashan and ,gilead as in days of old6 ,as in the days when ,thou wentest forth from the land of ,miraim1 give us wonders to see6 ,nations shall see and despair of all their might2 ,their hands to their mouths shall they put1 ,their ears shall be deafened4 ,they shall lick the dust like serpents2 ,like worms of the ground from their fastnesses1 ,to ,jehovah our ,god they shall come trembling1 ,and in fear before ,thee6 ,a ,doxology3-- ,who is a ,god like to ,thee8 ,forgiving iniquity1 ,and passing by transgression1 to the remnant of ,his heritage2 ,he keepeth not hold of ,his anger for ever1 ,but ,one who delighteth in mercy is ,he2 ,he will come back1 ,he will pity us1 ,he will tread underfoot our iniquities-- ,yea1 ,thou wilt cast to the depths of the sea every one of our sins4 ,thou wilt show faithfulness to ,jacob1 leal love to ,abraham1 ,as ,thou hast sworn to our fathers from the days of yore4 ,,footnotes3 #iaf ,above1 pp4 #cgb ff4 #iag ,cf4 with it ,exod4 xxxiv4 #f1 #g 7,j72 ,jer4 iii4 #e1 l4 #bj2 ,isa4 lvii4 #af2 ,psalms ciii4 #i1 cv4 #i1 #aj4 #iah ,it was a woman who spoke before1 the ,people or the ,city4 ,but the second personal pronouns to which this reply of the prophet is addressed are all masculine4 ,notice the same change in vi4 #i-af 7above p4 #dbg74 #iai 1 ,ewald3 distant the date4 ,notice the assonance4 ,it explains the use of the unusual word for border4 ,,lxx4 thy border4 ,the ,,lxx4 also takes into ver4 #aa 7as above7 the of ver4 #ab4 #ibj ,something has probably been lost here4 #iba ,for read 4 #ibb ,it is difficult to get sense when translating the conjunction in any other way4 ,but these two lines may belong to the following4 #ibc ,the words omitted above are literally jungle in the midst of gardenland or ,carmel4 ,plausible as it would be to take the proper name ,carmel here along with ,bashan and ,gilead 7see ,hist4 ,geog41 #cch71 the connection prefers the common noun garden or gardenland3 translate dwelling alone like a bit of jungle in the midst of cultivated land4 ,perhaps the clause needs rearrangement3 1 with a verb to introduce it4 ,yet compare 1 #b ,kings xix4 #bc2 ,isa4 xxxvii4 #bd4 ,,index ,,of ,,passages ,,and ,,texts ,a single text will always be found treated in the exposition of the passage to which it belongs4 ,only the other important references to it are given in this index4 ,in the second of the columns ,roman numerals indicate the chapters1 ,arabic numerals the pages4 ,,amos i41 ii4 #fb i4 #a #fa1 #fg f41 #fi n4 i4 #b #ha1 #ic1 #ih i4 #c-;ii4 ,,vii4 ii4 #ac #gb iii4-vi4 #fb ff4 iii4-iv4 #c #fb1 #fc1 ,,viii4 iii4 #c-h #ha ff41 #hi ff41 #aif iii4 #g #aih iv4 #d-ac ,,ix41 ,sec4 #a2 #aii f4 iv4 #aa #fh iv4 #ab #aig iv4 #ac #afd1 #bja ff4 v4 #fc2 ,,ix41 ,sec4 #b v4 #h1 #i #aff1 #bja ff4 v4 #bf1 #bg #ajh1 #agj ff41 #bjd vi4 #fc2 ,,ix41 ,sec4 #c vi4 #i1 #aj ,,ix41 ,sec4 #d vi4 #ab #aih vii4-ix4 #fc f4 vii4-viii4 #d #gj2 ,v41 ,sec4 #c vii4 #bah vii4 #ab #bh f4 vii4 #ad1 #ae #bg1 #gd1 #gf ff4 viii4 #d-;ix4 #fd2 ,x4 viii4 #d-ad ,x41 ,sec4 #a viii4 #h #fh1 #ie1 #aih viii4 #i #ff1 #ie ix4 #a-f #fd2 ,x41 ,sec4 #b ix4 #a #aaa1 #aea ix4 #e1 #f #bja ff4 ix4 #g-ae #fd2 ,x41 ,sec4 #c ,,hosea i4 #a1 ,title #bae n4 #a i4-iii4 #baa1 #bab ff42 ,,xiv42 ,,xxiii4 i4 #g #bac n4 #a ii4 #a-c #bac1 #bdi n4 #b ii4 #h #cda ii4 #i #cce ii4 #aj #cbh iii4 #a #bad iii4 #e #bad iv4-xiv4 #bae ff42 ,,xv4 iv4-vii4 #g #bbc2 ,,xvi4 iv4 ,,xvi41 ,sec4 #a iv4 #a #cbc iv4 #b #cbj iv4 #d #bba n4 #d iv4 #d-i #cbd iv4 #f #cbj1 #cbf1 #ccj iv4 #i #cce iv4 #ab-ad #bda1 #bhb1 #cbc2 ,,xxiii4 iv4 #ae #bbd iv4 #ag #cdb v4 #a-ad ,,xvi41 ,sec4 #b v4 #e #bbe1 #ccg f4 v4 #aj1 #ab-ad #bbe v4 #ae-vii4 #b ,,xvi41 ,sec4 #c v4 #ad-vi4 #a #bbb vi4 #a-d #cdd vi4 #e #bba n4 #c vi4 #h1 #i #baf vi4 #aa-vii4 #a #bbb vii4 #c-g ,,xvi41 ,sec4 #d vii4 #h-x4 ,,xvii4 vii4 #h-viii4 #c ,,xvii41 ,sec4 #a vii4 #i-aa #cbc1 #ccg vii4 #af #cce n4 #a viii4 #d-ac ,,xvii41 ,sec4 #b viii4 #d #bba n4 #d viii4 #e #cda viii4 #aj #bba n4 #f viii4 #ac #bba n4 #g viii4 #ad #bbd ix4 #a-i ,,xvii41 ,sec4 #c ix4 #a #cdj ix4 #b #bba n4 #f ix4 #g #bh1 #bbb n4 #a ix4 #h1 #i #bbb n4 #a ix4 #aj-ag ,,xvii41 ,sec4 #d2 ,,xxiii4 ix4 #ag #bbb n4 #b x4 ,,xvii41 ,sec4 #e x4 #a1 #b #ch n4 #d x4 #e #bba n4 #f 7read x4 #e72 #cda1 #cdb x4 #i #cbg n4 #aj x4 #aa1 #ab #bbe1 #cdd f4 x4 #ac #bba n4 #f x4 #ad #bag n4 #e x4 #ae #bba n4 #f xi4 ,,xviii4 xi4 #a #cbg xi4 #b-d #bba nn4 #a-d xi4 #e #bba n4 #d1 #ccf n4 #b xi4 #h ,,xxiii42 #cea xii4-xiv4 #a ,,xix4 xii4 ,,xix41 ,sec4 #a xii4 #a #bbe xii4 #b #bba n4 #f xii4 #c #bbe xii4 #d1 #e #cbf xii4 #g #cde xii4 #h #cc xii4 #ac1 #ad #cbg xiii4-xiv4 #a ,,xix41 ,sec4 #b xiii4 #b #cdb xiii4 #d #bjc1 #bbf xiii4 #f #cbg1 #ccj xiii4 #g #ccj f4 xiv4 #b-aj ,,xx4 xiv4 #c #cdc xiv4 #e #cce n4 #a xiv4 #f-i #bcc ,,micah i4 #a1 ,title #ceh i4-iii4 #ceh1 #cfj1 #cfb ff4 i4 #cfb f42 ,,xxv4 ii41 iii4 #cfc1 #cfd2 ,,xxvi4 ii4 #ab1 #ac #cei1 #cfj1 #cfb1 #cic n4 #a iii4 #ad #cfc n4 #b iv41 v4 #ceg1 #ceh1 #cfj1 #cfe ff4 iv4 #a-g ,,xxvii4 iv4 #a-e #ceh1 #cfe iv4 #e #cfg iv4 #f-h #ceh1 #cfg iv4 #h-ac #cfg iv4 #h-v4 ,,xxviii4 iv4 #i-ad #ceh1 #cei iv4 #aa-ac #ceh iv4 #ad-v4 #h #cfh v4 #h #cei v4 #i-ad #cfh vi41 vii4 #ceg1 #ceh1 #cei1 #cfj1 #cfi vi4 #a-h #cfi2 ,,xxix4 vi4 #i-vii4 #f ,,xxx4 vi4 #i-af #cgj vii4 #a-f #cei1 #cga vii4 #g-bj #cei1 #cgb ff42 ,,xxxi4 vii4 #aa #cgc vii4 #ad-ag #cgc vii4 #ah-bj #cgc ,transcriber's ,notes3 ,obvious punctuation and spelling errors have been fixed throughout4 ,inconsistent hyphenation is as in the original4 ,page #cfd3 ,verse references have been updated to reflect their actual references4